Are sleepovers at Grandparents normal for children 1 - 2 years old

@courtneyatzn Nightly. My older son would come in every night sometime between 2 and 5am. My youngest now who is just turned 3 comes in between 12 and 2am every night. Also add in night training so that makes it trickier to just pass them over for a night at that stage. But yeah night waking is normal. It’s if it’s constant throughout the night or taking a long time to settle again that isn’t. My daughter the eldest since 1 has slept through solid but was a terror for poor sleep when she was a baby.
 
@followthestar Here, grand parents are cosleeping with kids. 5 and 2. And none of the kids sleep through the night on a regular basis. But, it's happening more and more with the Big one :)
 
@joskenya I’m fine with them co sleeping. I’m just not sure how fine they are with it. Also night training. I feel like we just got the kids at each age ready for sleepovers and then it’s time for night toilet training.
 
@followthestar Sometimes from my french view, all the training thing american's child are surrounded seems sooooo overhelming.
Do you really train your kids to night toilet? We just keep them in diaper until their diapers stays consistantly dry overnight. Eventually, every kids without disability will become continent (not sure if the word) night and days bbefore 6yo for night and around 2/3yo for days.

If grand parents are into sleep training, I won't be confortable to let m'y child with them. Since we don't sleep train.
 
@jackstack
  1. It takes a village. Blah blah you know this.
  2. It's GREAT to get your kids to sleep in weird places. Crib, portable crib, guest room, whatever. It means that they won't struggle as much with sleep, and starting early is best!
  3. Trust your gut obviously if something isn't right don't do it. If your parents aren't into it, if your wife has an ewe moment, I would really listen to it, as I would want her to listen to mine. But if it's just she feels it's not normal, that's a bit different.
 
@jackstack we dont have this option as my parents are 4 hours away and generally will give thevkids back when nappies need changing. but otherwise love having the kids. assuming they were closer and willing to do nappies and get woken up all night long..... Hell yeah they could have sleep overs at Nana and Gramps.
 
@piggybank That's how you get revenge against the kids for not letting you sleep in.

"Oh, what's that? You're gonna wake up at 5am ready to play? Bad news. Papaw's been up and caffeinated since 3:30 and he's ready to get his Lego on, so you better wake up!"
 
@jackstack Since our daughter's first birthday, she has been staying at my parents overnight once a week. I drop her off in the morning and pick her up again the following evening. It saves us 2 days of childcare costs and gives us a valuable night off, every week. My parents are in their early 60s and are more than capable, and I'm really grateful for how involved they are in my daughter's life.

In my opinion, the main factor in making a decision like this is simply the relationship and trust that you have with your parents. If it feels wrong/risky to you, maybe its not worth it or maybe you should tentatively try it out as a one-off to test the waters.
 
@jackstack 2-3 times a month is abnormal - it’s 10% of your nighttimes with your son. And breakfasts the next day are realistically not going to be with you. That’s a lot, especially if you don’t eat with the kids during the week anyway. I wouldn’t give up so much time with my kids.

And it’s a lot to expect your wife to accept out of the blue. Once a month is probably acceptable, twice is good in practice, and three, work up to it and see if you really like it as well. Maybe your parents could babysit to start with, so kids get used to it, but still see you the next morning at least.

It wouldn’t work for me, but if it helps you stay sane in the crazy world of parenting, then more power to you.
 
@jaharris I wouldn't say abnormal, but it's definitely not for us. In OP's case, the grandparents are already spending 4 days babysitting, sleeping over 2-3 times a month seems excessive. At least to me.
 
@jackstack There's nothing unusual about that at all, provided the child is comfortable there and the house and sleeping arrangement is safe (there is a bed or crib available for the child that is not a fall risk or harm risk etc)
 
@jackstack Man, ours has been sleeping over 2 nights a week for the past year. From about when my wife went back to work.

She was 1 yr old and it's been bloody fantastic. Do what works for you, and fuck anyone else who says it's weird. Parenting is damn hard and you need all the help you can get. If they're willing to help, and you're happy that they're capable, then bloody go for it.
 
@jackstack I have my PTSD to blame for this, but our grandparents lived like a 2 min walk away from us and would often babysit us while our parents would be out on social stuff or just be away working etc.

They'd always babysit us in our house though so we basically never went over to their place. Anyhow, my grandfather raped my sister from the age of 4 until she was 16 and finally went to the police. I KNOW this isn't a normal situation and I know that it would most likely not happen to my kid should he sleep at his grandparents but I could never help but have that nagging thought in the back of my head, even though I know it's irrational. As I said though I'm well aware of where my hesitation would come from and I'm well aware that I can't let my bad experiences cloud the life my kids will have, so I'd let them go to a sleepover at their grandparents.

So yeah, even with my PTSD and all of that I'd let my kids sleep at their grandparents, but I would most likely be on top of if anything felt wrong or if my kid told me something that would be worrying. Also, I'm much better now but when my kid was first born he broke me, I thought I had dealt with it all but I wasn't ready for the insane feelings of wanting to protect him from everything I had to go through.
 
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