This week on the podcast, we have our 1st sleep segment with sleep consultant, Cory Greenberg. Cory will be on the podcast periodically answering listener questions about all things sleep-related. If you’d like to submit a question to be addressed in a future sleep segment, join our Mastermind Parenting free FB group and post your question there. Make sure to tag Randi Dunn Rubenstein when you do. Enjoy!
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Randi Rubenstein helps parents with a strong-willed kiddo become a happier family and enjoy the simple things again like bike rides and beach vacays.
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Transcription
0 (0s):
You’re listening to the Mastermind Parenting Podcast with Randi Rubenstein episode one Oh one.
1 (5s):
Hi, my name’s Randi Rubenstein and welcome to the Mastermind Parenting Podcast where we believe when your thoughts grow the conversations in your home flow
0 (21s):
On today’s episode, I am featuring Sleep Consultant Cory Greenberg and a new sleep segment. I’ll be doing every so often. And Cory answers a listener’s question that somebody posted to me. And I think you’ll find what she has to say. Really interesting. So Enjoy,
2 (45s):
Here’s the question about Sleep that I am going to turn over to Cory Greenberg Sleep Consultant she says, hi, thanks for doing this. I live in Houston. I have a two year-old and a 300 and a half year old boy. I have a two year-old girl and a three and a half year old boy. I love seeing the world through the eyes of my children, and I would love to learn how to better connect with and be accepting to my children. And in particular, I need to learn how to get my children to do things that I need them to do when I want to like getting dressed quickly in the morning so I can get to work on time. I also would love to wean my children of sleeping with me without resorting to cry it out.
2 (1m 31s):
Thanks so Cory, I wanted to read to you the whole, the whole situation, because I think it all blends together as both you and I know that the Sleep situation when you’re having sleep problems, doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Usually we can see all kinds of other things that are happening during the waking hours, that effect how the family is sleeping. And so I wanted you to hear her entire question and speak to it and let us know your thoughts. And I think everybody will be really excited to hear what you have to say about this.
2 (2m 13s):
And because I know you so well, I’m sure that there will be not to put the pressure on, but I’m sure that with your background and all of it, you know, as a person who is a trained therapist, I think you will find you’ll probably have a lot to enlighten us on that. Maybe we didn’t think about it so that we didn’t think about it before. So thanks for weighing in. Appreciate it. Hey, Randi this is Cory. I would love to respond to your listeners scenario about her two year old and three and a half year old. Mmm. This is actually my favorite age of kids and families to work with because I usually start with a family when they’re absolutely desperate.
2 (2m 59s):
And in that accident, accidental bed sharing is a very, very common issue that happens, and it can happen for so many reasons. It happens with good sleepers who all of a sudden go through something and they seem to need mom and dad more at night. And that might be, have been for a short time. And then it was just kind of a habit that started, and then it becomes really difficult to break, or it could be a kid that has just always struggled with sleep. And, you know, that’s just in the family’s survival mode and, and they’re just ready to have their own bed back. So I, like I said, I love working with this age and this particular issue. And when I do work with families on this, it’s, you know, we spend the first, probably hour of our time together, not even really talking about sleep.
2 (3m 45s):
And I think that’s kind of surprising to some people ’cause when they call me its for a sleep problem. However, especially when you’re dealing with toddlers, it’s a lot of other issues that are contributing or its coming out as a sleep problem. So I’m a typically when I see, you know, there’s a co-sleeping situation, it’s a kid who either has some anxiety about any number of things or it’s just a need for connection and closeness that they’re, that they’re needing. And a lot of times I have, you know, working parents who don’t get home till five, six at night and then it’s like this evening rush to get everything done. And unfortunately some sense that leaves little time for that deep sort of one-on-one connection that kids are really wanting and needing.
2 (4m 32s):
And then, you know, what just happens as they wake up a little bit at night and they just want that cuddle time or that closeness time, or, you know, even if they don’t go to bed on their own or if they do go to bed on their own, they need that in the middle of the night or it’s that it’s Get starts getting dragged out at bed time and they come up with a million excuses for why, you know, you can’t leave the room. And as a parent, I think we just feel a little bit guilty because we see through it, we know that there are just wanting us not to go and it really pulls on our heart strings and make us to get into this pattern of not being able to kind of set a boundary or put our foot down around Sleep. So like I said, the first thing I kind of want to look at is what is at the root of why those kids are wanting to be, you know, in this mom’s bed every night.
2 (5m 22s):
And like I said, connection is a big thing. And the other thing that I touched on is anxiety. And so that it could also be that it’s not necessarily like anxiety that, you know, your child needs play therapy for. It could be, but it could just be that they’re not feeling very self confident. And so one of the ways that I work on sort of building self-confidence with kids is to, you know, give them lots of little jobs to do around the house that they can feel like they’re helpful and that there are sort of contributing to the functioning as a family. And when I was mentioning connection, one way that you can sort of hit those two birds with one stone is if your getting home at five, six o’clock.
2 (6m 3s):
And the first thing you got to do is put dinner on the table, try to incorporate your toddler into, you know, that whole process. So whether it’s, you know, asking them to bring the forks to the table or help you stir a sauce or something, and then acknowledging how helpful they have been and what role they have played in helping you as a family that serves the purpose of connecting with them, because you’re really engaged. And it’s also moving things along and getting things done and sort of helping them with that self-confidence because in order for them to go to sleep all night by themselves, they need to feel like they can do that. Right. And so it’s important to kind of allow them those opportunities to do things, you know, on their own.
2 (6m 48s):
The other thing that I know Randi talks about a lot and I really try to focus on with toddlers to meet that connection needs is the one on one time. So I like to call it on your Randi calls at pet time, I call it like mommy and insert kids time. So mommy and Jack time or daddy and Jack time. And I really only ask that it’s like 10 or 15 minutes and I like it to be sort of before the start of the bedtime routine so that, you know, before you start that, where you’re marching towards bed and the kid knows like, okay, you know, my time with mommy or daddy is about to come to an end for the day. I like to give that hit of that really connected one-on-one time and labeling it that way.
2 (7m 29s):
It helps you sort of get credit in the kid’s mind. So it’s time for mommy and Jack time, like, what do you want to do today? And then you sort of do that, whatever the kid wants to do and you put your phone away, you’re like very engaged on what they’re doing. And then at the end of it, and you say, I have so much fun during mommy and Jack time. I can’t wait to do it again tomorrow. So those two things just off the top of my head really helps sort of build that connection and that self confidence that really effects your child’s ability to go to sleep on their own. And I know the, the caller mentioned, you know, not wanting to do cry it out and I will say a, cry it out. It’s a very loaded term. And it has like a very, you know, it, I think it just invokes this feeling of guilt like that.
2 (8m 12s):
You’re just gonna leave your child, abandoned them. And it it’s a very cold sounding. Umm, and I think there’s a big difference between the idea of that, which I think moms are like, there’s no way I could ever do that. I’m gonna, you know, emotionally scar my child and setting some boundaries around the rules that you feel are important for your family. And you know, Sleep is at the very top of the priority list. It has to be for everyone, for you as a mom and also for the kids. And so it is totally okay to set a boundary around what time its, you know, your child needs to go to sleep and how they go to sleep. So there’s a lot of different ways to get your child to a place to change or disrupt that pattern.
2 (8m 55s):
Umm, and not have it be cried out. So for example, one of the methods that I like to use is, especially for kids, who’ve kind of pop up and do that Jack in the box thing is you Leave and check on them. So, so kind of like if you’ve heard the Ferber method when there were a baby, but it’s a little bit different when they’re older. So you’re going to know when you put them to bed at night, you let them know that you are going to come and check on them every five minutes until they go to sleep, no matter what. So that’s a, it’s a little different. So I’m a forever thing where your waiting for them to cry and then you go back and check if they’re crying and then you gradually sort of increase the time here out of the room. The way I like to do it is to you, no matter what its, you tell them that it’s your job to check on them and it’s their job to wait for you to check.
2 (9m 43s):
So you kind of give them a job and you let them know you have a job to, as the mom or the dad. So I’m, you can even set a timer for an older child who, you know, loves the idea of timers to the timers are really helpful for a lot of reasons. One of them is setting boundaries. So you, you let them know that every five minutes you’re going to come check and you really hold to that. So every five minutes you just kinda go to the door and you say, I’m checking on you. I love you. And that’s it, that’s it. There’s nothing more that you’re doing. You’re not really engaging them any further, but you’re just reminding them and letting them know that you love them. You care about them. And that it’s also setting the message. It is time to go to sleep. There is absolutely nothing else happening at this moment.
2 (10m 26s):
So your child might cry and they might get upset. But this technique really generally does help a lot because it, and it sort of gives the child something else to think about, like my mommy’s coming back, I’m waiting. I’m just waiting for my mommy to come back. And the fact that you do come back builds trust, and it also builds self confidence because there in there by themselves waiting for you to come and you just basically agree that you’re going to do that until they fall asleep. And like I said, I have found this to be a very useful tool or technique. So I hope that gives you a couple of tips to use, but it is, you know, kind of a drawn-out process. There’s a lot that goes into figuring out, you know, what we need to do to help each child, you know, go to sleep on their own without leaving them alone, to scream and cry.
2 (11m 16s):
But the bottom line is, you know, setting boundaries around sleep is super important and it doesn’t make you a bad parent to want to do that. It doesn’t break the connection with them. In fact, it just helps build their own self-confidence, which is exactly what you want and our independence.
0 (11m 33s):
I hope you enjoyed today’s episode with Cory Greenberg if you would like to hear more from Cory she’s going to be doing a workshop with me at Evelyn’s park. If you’re listening to this and real time, March 4th, 2020, if you live in Houston, we will be at Evelyn’s in Bel air at 9:30 AM, March 4th. So Mark your calendar.
1 (12m 2s):
Are you ready to start having PRODUCTIVE conversations? Have you been listening to the podcast for a while and you hear me go through my three step PRODUCTIVE conversation process to solve any problem and you’re thinking, how did she do that? Guess what? I made a really cool resource for you guys. I call it the problem solving one sheet. Okay. It’s one sheet front and back. So, you know, take a with a grain of salt, but it will walk you through how to have productive conversations and you’ll practice. And before you know, it you’ll be having productive conversations all day every day. It really is the solution to solve any problems. So you can download it at Mastermind Parenting dot com forward slash problem solving all one word that’s Mastermind Parenting dot com forward slash problem solving all one word.
