My habit had been to lay down with my five-year-old daughter at bedtime until she was asleep, which often took half an hour or more. She would fall asleep fairly easily when others put her to bed, reading books with the light on until she fell asleep. I was ready to make a shift in
I have thought a lot about what words I say to my two children when they are pushing boundaries and I need to set a limit. I have found the phrase, “I can’t let you do that” to be so helpful. Of course, physically stepping in to be close, and my body language, is just
Even when we bring our best selves, by not shouting, bribing or threatening children when we try and tell them no, setting limits, and having them listened to, still often feels like an uphill struggle. But there’s a simple way to reach children who are acting off-track. Use touch over words. When children are acting irrationally,
Consistency is not vital Can you believe this? This nugget of wisdom is perhaps the most important thing that I learned when I first came across Hand in Hand. So much of the advice about how to handle a range of parenting challenges, and about limit setting in general, suggests that it’s super important to
It seems like my son has been advocating for himself since the minute he was born. If he wanted to feed, he wanted to feed now! As a toddler, if he wanted my attention he’d climb up on my lap and turn my face away from whoever I was talking to. If he did not
How Is A Tantrum A Bid For Connection? The man at my parenting talk is exasperated by his two-year-old son’s behavior. “First, he wants a glass of milk,” he tells me. “I pour the glass and hand it to him, and he gets upset and says he doesn’t want it. So I say, ‘Okay, then,
In this series we’ve been exploring how to set holidays up for the fun and relaxation time you all deserve. In Part 1, we saw how kids can go from playing nicely one minute, to a sudden switch into fighting and tears. We covered how this happens when a child loses their sense of connection
Une réponse de Patty Wipfler, traduite de l’anglais par Soizic Le Gouais et Chloé Saint Guilhem, formatrice certifiée Hand in Hand “Mes enfants me rendent folle quand ils utilisent le mot “S…” et quand ils traitent leurs parents et frères et sœurs de “stupides” lorsqu’ils sont en colère. Il me disent, “Tu es stupide” ou
Naming emotions doesn’t make them disappear. Instead, welcome emotions without naming them – at least while your child is upset.
What motivates your child to stick with a task and master new skills, even when it feels hard? These science-backed strategies help you to support your child through tough moments.
Many children fear getting vaccines, blood tests and other minor procedures. Use these ideas help them offload the fear and find confidence.
“People always say ‘choose your battles in parenting’. Let’s choose peace instead. After all, children are not our enemies, and childhood should not be a battleground.’ This wise thinking from L.R. Knost is a wonderful aim—and something that most parents strive for. None of us begin parenting hoping to spend hours locked in battle. But
Feel like you are parenting on auto-respond? Here’s how I make to shift to responsive parenting. Upstairs the kids were thumping around and shouting at each other. I paused from chopping mushrooms, hoping they’d stop, but instead heard a scream. Racing up to see what happened, I found my oldest sitting on top of my
My mum tells this story about how, when I was 18 months old, I climbed to the top of a very tall slide, cunningly waited for her to get to the top of the ladder behind me, shot down the slide, jumped up and sprinted away, cackling and shrieking with laughter at her calls for
It took months to organise, but today you escaped for lunch with two old friends and left your kids with your partner. Secretly, you couldn’t be happier. Your youngest is going through a phase that is really demanding. He says “no,” whenever you ask him to do something, he is constantly asking for things he
You wake up to a bright and shining sun, nothing but blue skies and birds singing. Your child calls out to you. You go into their room, look into their beautiful eyes feeling the joy of a new day and they complain. Loudly. “I don’t want to go to camp!!!” Your child pulls the covers
Oh, oh, oh those parenting doubts. Did you ever guess there would be so many? Some days can feel like a revolving series of second-guessing, ‘comparisonitis’, changing tack, and rewriting the rulebook. Are you too soft? Too harsh? Too permissive? Too authoritarian? Do you flip back and forth between them? At Hand in Hand, we
Your toddler may stand defiantly at the sink and refuse to brush their teeth. They may run from the table when you serve ANY food that isn’t starchy and white. They may prefer to tip up an entire box of bricks when you ask them to tidy up instead of cleaning the 10 they had
A few year’s back when my daughter was about four years old, a new family moved into our neighbourhood and their two children started to play in our back garden. One child was the same age as my daughter and her big brother was about four years older. The trampoline in our garden was a
As parents, we want nothing more than to help our kids feel loved and nurtured. When they are upset, every cell in our bodies leans towards making them feel better. We ache to have the upset stop and to do this, we use a calm voice, a warm hug. Yet often, in the throws of
My first year of motherhood felt a bit like trying to stay in control of a runaway train. Breastfeeding did not come easily to me and so I was delighted to reach the milestone of feeding my daughter for a full year. But I had grown to hate breastfeeding. My daughter was feeding throughout the