OcUK Dadsnet thread

[tom_e]

I feel for you guys going through that! We were quite ruthless and had our daughter sleeping in her own room from about 3 months on. She's now 19 months and will come into our bed as long as it's after 6am but otherwise we're quite strict in the sense that our bed is ours and her bed is hers.

Though I think we've got super lucky. She was sleeping pretty much through the night bar one feeding since about 10 months. She's a really good sleeper unless she is ill. Last night was 7pm-6am with maybe one stir around 11pm.

Ours is 8 months and is very quickly outgrowing the little bedside travel cot, she's got her own room with own full size cot but my wife keeps saying we need to get a bigger travel cot for our room. No amount of "well maybe that's just a good time to move her into her own room" seems to be getting through

 

[fez]

Quick question for you guys as its good to get an outside opinion. We've just been on holiday for a week in Tenerife with the boys and generally they slept much better out there. Before we went out there they had been a bit ill for about 3 weeks so we kind of put their bad overnight sleep down to that (theres always some excuse right?).

They were getting up perhaps 2 times in the night on holiday, sometimes only once and I could get up and soothe them most of the time. Since we have been back they are straight back into waking 3-4 times a night each, usually at different times. They have managed to completely kill all the rest that my partner got last week within a few days of coming home.

They do quite a lot at home activity wise, my partner plays with them a lot and they get out of the house plenty so I don't think its lack of tiredness. We did have 9 of us on holiday so they were constantly played with so perhaps that did help.

We used the same formula for temperature in the room on holiday as we do at home with regards to clothes and sleep sacks.

The main think I can think of is that the room on holiday was much larger so perhaps our little bedroom at home gets a bit stuffy overnight with the door mostly closed.

Its very frustrating because its killing my partner. Shes up every 1.5-2 hours overnight and then looking after 2 rascals all day. I know that some part of the issue is that on holiday I got up often to soothe them and I don't smell of milk whereas when she goes in they think "go on then, I could have a snack" and then whinge until they are fed.

Any ideas? Anyone else had this?

 

[Junglist]

Ours is 8 months and is very quickly outgrowing the little bedside travel cot, she's got her own room with own full size cot but my wife keeps saying we need to get a bigger travel cot for our room. No amount of "well maybe that's just a good time to move her into her own room" seems to be getting through

I don't think there is a right or wrong solution to it really and I guess it comes down to what works for you, your partner and your daughter. Our rationale for putting her into her own room at 3 months was fairly simple. She made a lot of noise during the night. Just general night time baby noises and they were keeping us up. If we can't get a decent night of sleep how are we supposed to raise her correctly running on half a tank?

It was quite hard for the first week but we stuck it out and now she loves her own room and bed.

The most important thing about parenting which I think gets lost in all the noise is that whatever you do has to work for you and your family. If you look online it says children shouldn't be in their own room until 6 months... There was absolutely no way we were having her in our room until 6 months but that's because it didn't work for us and funnily enough most of my friends also did the 'move out' around 3 months of age and all of our kids found it easy.

For us we were also conscious of how others have done things and we didn't want to do it the same. My partners brother and sister-in-law have a 7 and 4 year old. The parents haven't slept together since the birth of the 7 year old as they never got them used to sleeping on their own so the mother sleeps with the 4 year old son and the father with the 7 year old daughter. We can't judge but it's absolutely bonkers they'd put up with that.

Any ideas? Anyone else had this?

It's a fools game trying to work this out right? The only thing kids are consistent at is being consistently inconsistent.

We went to centre parcs when she was 11 months. She was smashing out the sleeping at the point and we were super smug "oh night times are so easy". At CP she was waking up ever 90 minutes every single night. Then once back home she was back to sleeping normally.

Probably just their different surroundings and all the stimulus throughout the day?

 

[fez]

I don't think there is a right or wrong solution to it really and I guess it comes down to what works for you, your partner and your daughter. Our rationale for putting her into her own room at 3 months was fairly simple. She made a lot of noise during the night. Just general night time baby noises and they were keeping us up. If we can't get a decent night of sleep how are we supposed to raise her correctly running on half a tank?

They are little gruffalos at night aren't they. Grunting, groaning, making cute noises. Menaces!

It's a fools game trying to work this out right? The only thing kids are consistent at is being consistently inconsistent.

We went to centre parcs when she was 11 months. She was smashing out the sleeping at the point and we were super smug "oh night times are so easy". At CP she was waking up ever 90 minutes every single night. Then once back home she was back to sleeping normally.

Probably just their different surroundings and all the stimulus throughout the day?

I would take it that way around. I could understand if they slept poorly away from home but doing it the other way around just seem malicious

 

[Junglist]

malicious

Cause they bloody are malicious. I've never felt less respected than I have now lol.
Talking about malicious. Mine is now fully in the 'lets turn the house into Tate modern' phase.

This was a few weeks ago. Pretty much every wall is covered in something now but we wont bother painting until she is fully out of it. just have to accept that our house looks like **** for a few more months

This was her weekend work... I can't even get too mad as I was supposed to be watching her but I was hanging the washing up and she was being quiet. She enjoys looking out the window so I figured she was just doing that... then I heard a highly suspicious noise and her work was revealed.

 

[t2na]

This was a few weeks ago. Pretty much every wall is covered in something now but we wont bother painting until she is fully out of it. just have to accept that our house looks like **** for a few more months

This was her weekend work... I can't even get too mad as I was supposed to be watching her but I was hanging the washing up and she was being quiet. She enjoys looking out the window so I figured she was just doing that... then I heard a highly suspicious noise and her work was revealed.

Our daughter is 15 months - so not quite as old as yours - but she absolutely loves drawing on anything. I've been pretty unwell for a few days (Quinsy = horrible) so was just crashed on the floor in the lounge with her whilst my wife was upstairs sorting a few things out and could just hear/feel something wasn't quite right. Suddenly realise she's been drawing on my jumper and is actually very very happy with herself with a wry little smile. Hard to get annoyed at her as it was entirely my fault for not really paying much attention (I blame the antibiotics...)

In terms of what everyone has said about sleep, 100% it is worth investing in a sleep coach / sleep teaching if you're at that desperation point. Good sleep is so important to your health.

Our daughter started off as a pretty good sleeper (ignoring the first 5/6 weeks of her life) and she was pretty confidently waking up for a bottle/nappy at night and then would settle quite easily. At 4 months it all went completely out the window, we had about 6 weeks/2 months of nightmare sleep where she wouldn't settle again in the night and it was really rough. We quite like doing everything as a couple so it made work for me really difficult, essentially going to work after being awake since 3am and struggling.

At 6 months we paid for some sleep teaching, within 3 days she was sleeping through the night (no bottles or anything) and it made a huge improvement to her naps. Ever since then she's been a fairly brilliant sleeper. There are of course nights that she isn't good and she wakes up and we have to go in - but for around 85% of the nights since she's been 6 months we put her down between 6.45/-7.15pm and she'll sleep until 6-7am.

She's in a tricky phase at the moment as she's moved to 1 nap - she wakes up at 6.30am but can only just about get to 12pm for her nap - then naps until 1.30/2 - and bed at 7pm is semi viable. We know her cues a lot better now so we accelerate bed time if needed. Last night in the car on the way home from nursery it was pretty clear she was shattered so we just put her down for bed at 6.15, she was asleep by 6.30 and outside of a few coughs/little cries in the night she snoozed all the way through till 6.15 this morning.

I cannot imagine doing it differently now. We both work pretty intense jobs that are mentally exhausting at times, if we weren't able to confidentally put our daughter to sleep and then get some sleep ourselves I do genuinely think either one of us would have had a breakdown by now.

 

[Hodders]

Cause they bloody are malicious. I've never felt less respected than I have now lol.
Talking about malicious. Mine is now fully in the 'lets turn the house into Tate modern' phase.

Looks like she's done the same thing to her cell. Still I'm sure she'll be out on probation before long.

My daughter did the same thing when she was 2 and her little brother was 3 months old. I caught her with pen in hand and asked here what she had done. She blamed it on her brother - literally caught red handed.

 

[dr_volki]

Not as much a 'Dad' question but more a question I feel more comfortable with anonymity talking about with you guys.

My partner and I are hitting the 7 year mark next year. My best friend got engaged today and I'm beyond made up for her but now realise it leaves me and my partner as the only ones not engaged/married and it'll only be so long until it's my turn.

I can't imagine life with anyone else but her and I love the life we've built together yada yada yada but for some reason I am petrified of asking 'the question'. Not through fear of her saying no, not through fear of commitment but for something super trivial and stupid. I am scared of a day where all the focus is on us and I have to do a big speech. It's not in my make up. I know a wedding can be as big or as small as you wish but we both have fairly big families and a massive group of friends.

How did you find your big days and how did you go about asking? I already have thought about the asking part but I need to get the cajones. Though I think realistically I have another year. Maybe

I made the mrs pop the question on the 29th of Feb, as she kind of knew I was never going to ask. (so next year is her chance wink wink)
There were no speeches at our wedding, but then ours wasn't the bog standard kind of wedding anyways.

 

[ChrisD.]

Are there any toddler cups/bottles that do not leak? Everyone we've tried ends up leaking!

 

[Diagro]

Our 18m old was crap sleeper.
Just been diagnosed with Rionitis*

Since we started his anti hist medicine, he's been sleeping through.

Omg. Last week has been heaven. Then I got covid and have been in bed for two days.

 

[Matt-Page]

Looking to get my 2x daughter's a tablet for Christmas. The older one who's 7 is ready for one to use for homework and play maths (and other) games on. The younger one who's 4 likes to play CBeebies games and if I don't get one for her as well, we all know how they argue...

Any dad's out there bought tablets recently? Considering the latest Amazon ones, but at £200 it seems expensive. Are they really worth the premium over other cheaper ones? Anyone got any recent experience with them or recommendations?

 

[Devrij]

Looking to get my 2x daughter's a tablet for Christmas. The older one who's 7 is ready for one to use for homework and play maths (and other) games on. The younger one who's 4 likes to play CBeebies games and if I don't get one for her as well, we all know how they argue...

Any dad's out there bought tablets recently? Considering the latest Amazon ones, but at £200 it seems expensive. Are they really worth the premium over other cheaper ones? Anyone got any recent experience with them or recommendations?

Honestly, the Amazon tablets are pretty good. The parental controls are very decent. Particularly useful is the ability to "pause" a device. No arguments about time to turn it off because mine learned the hard way that she can run away with it, but that doesn't stop me turning it into a brick remotely. Also, very robust cases are a bonus for when the former event makes her mad enough to chuck it.

You can install apps and make them available on the kiddies account, or give them free reign with the amazon approved kids apps.

Mostly ours uses it to do her schools timetables rockstars app and for playing roblox at weekends or whatever other trash games are on there.

 

[tom_nieto]

Are there any toddler cups/bottles that do not leak? Everyone we've tried ends up leaking!

I don’t think we’ve found a solution to this. The munchkin 360 cups are decent, but will spill if hurled on the floor. The flip / straw ones are terrible for leaks I’ve found, especially after they’ve been smashed a few times. Also tough to keep clean.

 

[theone8181]

Looking to get my 2x daughter's a tablet for Christmas. The older one who's 7 is ready for one to use for homework and play maths (and other) games on. The younger one who's 4 likes to play CBeebies games and if I don't get one for her as well, we all know how they argue...

Any dad's out there bought tablets recently? Considering the latest Amazon ones, but at £200 it seems expensive. Are they really worth the premium over other cheaper ones? Anyone got any recent experience with them or recommendations?

We got samsung A7s for ours a couple of years ago. I didn't go for the fire ones as they weren't as well rated. I've not bother with parental controls so can't comment on that. What I can say is that the screen cracks if the case isn't very substantial when it gets dropped on tiles . I'd go for decent storage though as games can't be installed on external storage so my son has delete stuff and it's a pain.

 

[t2na]

I don’t think we’ve found a solution to this. The munchkin 360 cups are decent, but will spill if hurled on the floor. The flip / straw ones are terrible for leaks I’ve found, especially after they’ve been smashed a few times. Also tough to keep clean.

Yeah, these are the ones we use. They work well most of the time, although our daughter has figured out she can turn them upside down and bang them like a drum and water will spill out that way too.

90% of the time they're great and better than anything else we've tried.

 

[Hedge]

The whole drawing on walls thing I see here would make me lose my mind. Thank god our daughter wouldn't dream of doing that. She has a little blackboard, countless colouring books and craft sets to play with.

You lot seem to be way more tolerant than I would be lol.

 

[Hedge]

My 2yo has been waking up in the night and going mad will only settle when in bed with us, and same won't go to sleep if in the bed with us at bed time.

So we've started trying to get him going to sleep in his own bed.

It's really stressful, feel so neglectful, he's screaming and screaming, then kind of stops and is twiddling his hair then does it again followed by a swift hard headbutt on the bed rail and then repeats it all.

He's shreaking now and like so stressed he like of gargles he's trying so hard. Don't even know what we should do

Took us less than a week of crying it out.

All you do is let them cry for 2 mins.. Walk in. Put them down. Don't say a word..

Cry for 3 mins.. Repeat.

4 mins.. Repeat.

5 mins repeat..

We never got past 7 minutes. By that time she was asleep.

Sucks hearing them wailing a bit but once it's done you end up with a child who sticks to the routine and makes bedtimes simple. Ours turned 5 and she's never once wanted to sleep in our bed. Routine is key to everything.

I'd have no doubt been a bit crap at routine cos I have a laid back nature but my missus is so good at the parenting stuff that we made an angel. Touch wood lol.

 

[fez]

I'd have no doubt been a bit crap at routine cos I have a laid back nature but my missus is so good at the parenting stuff that we made an angel. Touch wood lol.

Famous last words my friend!

Over Christmas when I am off work we are going to sort out the spare bedroom so we can split the twins up and sleep train them. One is generally good but the other is a bit of a terror at times. Hard to sleep train one when the other is in the room though. The good one sleeps through most of the screaming but sometimes doesn't and either realises he would like a whinge or that he just wants to watch the show or perhaps have a chat with his parents.

Honestly, sleep has to be the biggest determiner of how manageable babies/children are. When they are sleeping well your life is 10x easier because you are well rested as well.

Our two have had hand, foot and mouth for the past week and my partner caught it too. I probably have it but with no outward signs other than being a bit fatigued. The problem is, there is always an excuse for babies not sleeping well. I have persuaded my partner to start sleep training. At 8 months they are certainly old enough for it.

 

[t2na]

I have persuaded my partner to start sleep training. At 8 months they are certainly old enough for it.

We did it at 6 months and never looked back, life got significantly better once everyone was sleeping again.

 

[Hedge]

We did it at 6 months and never looked back, life got significantly better once everyone was sleeping again.

Yeah id say it's absolutely essential if anyone wants a nice balanced and calm household. People just need to realise there is no neglect involved. A warm house with caring parents certainly isn't neglectful. No one is being mean by establishing a routine.

Get past the first few nights and you never look back.

Ours has slept 10-12hrs a night, every night since she was 6m old. It allows adults to have the evening to decompress and it gives the child the best opportunity to recharge and develop.