Parenting Contents Archive

Schools across the country say they’re seeing an uptick in disruptive behaviors. Some are obvious and visible, but others are quieter calls for help, like students putting their head down and refusing to talk. @kalynbelsha @Chalkbeat https://t.co/uOGgBcyg7a

My kids broke into someone else's apartment

My son (6) and my daughter (8) went to go see if their friend could play. They knocked and didn't get an answer. For some reason, they tried opening the door and it was unlocked. They said they went in and yelled for the friend, nobody answered so they left. We had a long talk about all the ways that it was wrong to do that. I don't know what to do. I always try to find consequences that make since to what was done wrong. I'm stumped on this one.

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PSA: don't feed your baby dragon fruit

Unless you're ready to be scrubbing little black seeds off your baby's bum for several days with every poopy diaper. Last night he even gassed and one single seed came out. What other food-effects should I prepare myself for?

Am I being too paranoid?

My husbands side of family just got over a covid outbreak between all of them. The last person (his mother) was testing positive a little less than a week ago. Now since everyone is “better”, they wanted to have a get together today and wanted me to bring my 6 month old. I am not too worried about the people who had it 2 + weeks ago, but to me, 1 week is cutting it too close.. so I said no and explained why. I am just not willing to risk my sons health like that. Now everyone is mad at me because they “miss him” and they feel I’m being too “paranoid”. Even my mom is saying I’m being dramatic. Am I? I don’t think I am. My tik tok algorithm is always showing me babies in the hospital with covid and my anxiety just can’t handle it. I’d never forgive myself or them if he got it.

How many calm requests without listening before losing your shit and raising your voice?

I understand the answer is never, but sometimes it’s hard. My 5 year old puts up a fight whenever we ask her to do something. She “talks back” constantly. We want to nurture her strong personality, but it also makes it difficult when it comes to discipline. I don’t want to constantly be punishing her. Today she was playing with the dog who is pretty tolerant of her and a sweetheart. He has never bit anyone, but he’s also a dog and unpredictable. She was in his face saying “Coochie Coo” or something to that effect and the dog obviously didn’t like it. Her face was right up to his and I’m watching her do this asking her to stop as he was growling at her. We’ve explained to her that a growl is a dog’s warning so when she hears this to stop doing whatever she’s doing to him. So I asked her to stop 5 times before raising my voice to get her attention. Just venting here. Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

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How do you help a teen hide money from their custodial parent?

Y’all just found out one of my sisters has been taking my neice’s money and gambling it away. I’ll save THAT story for a story rant. I’m here to ask how to help her hide her money without letting her mom find out. Here is the gist -my neice is almost 18 in a few months -my neice credit is sh*r because my other sister and I found out from the bank the activity is super sketchy so we can’t open her another bank account. Plus we aren’t her legal parent anyways -my neice probably doesn’t want to file charges against my sister/her mother when she finally moves out. Is there a way we can ask a bank to open her an account? She makes good money as a hostess for her age. Right now she is squirreling her money away she gets from tips. We are trying to find a way for her to deposit the money she gets instead of keeping physical money.

In a scenario where no kids will be able to come to my 4 year old daughters party

I'm planning a party for my 4 year old daughter. I want to give her everything she wants, but given the life situation we are currently in (moving, recent divorce) as well as social issues surrounding corona I won't be able to have children at this party for her. Am I poor father? I love my girl more than anything and don't know how to feel about this. I have gifts obviously, and themed decorations like she wanted but for some reason I can't get over the fact no children will be there to celebrate with her.

FTM cannot sleep because worried about something catastrophic happening to newborn during sleep. Solutions?

My wife and I are first time parents. We just brought our baby boy home, born 1/12/22. We knew sleep deprivation and interruption for us was going to be a thing, with 2-3 hour wake ups to feed and also whenever baby cries. But an unexpected issue (for me at least) is that, even if baby is sleeping and doesn't have an immediate need, mentally my wife can't unwind because she's worried that something catrastrophic (e.g. SIDS) will happen to our boy. So basically, she can't let herself sleep, even if given the rare opportunity. I've heard this is common. Right now, the only solution is for one of us to always be up to observe baby. I'm day shift, she's night shift. I suppose that could work, but I'd love to get us to the point where she can feel confident that the baby is safe in his crib and that we've minimized as much as humanly possible any horrible thing. What can we do?

My 9yr old refuses to read books- only graphic novels. Will they be okay?

Like a lot of kids, she’s very tech-savvy. She loves Minecraft, drawing, making little animations in Scratch, that’s her creative world. But I’m finding it’s impossible to get her to sit down and actually read a book. I know she uses the Epic app on her school tablet. But she only picks graphic novels, and often uses the “read to me” function. It seems like a full page of words is just too slow and boring. She prefers the pictures and quickly getting through a story. I have books all over the house- I got her the entire Harry Potter series. She can’t get passed the first few pages. She’s just too impatient. Part of my is happy she likes graphic novels- hey at least she’s reading! But I worry she’ll never graduate from graphic novels and really limit herself. There are so many amazing books out there… Is anyone else experiencing this or experienced this? Do they grow out of it?

Baby book recommendations

I want to hear what your favorite book to read to you baby is and why. My son is almost 4 months and I haven’t really been reading to him and I want to do that because I’m not a hugely avid reader. I want to start our own little library where he can come to me and pick books for me to read to him. Right now any books with bright colorful artwork are obviously a win since he is reacting to image flash cards.

Does or has anyone else thought they could hear their child when they're asleep or silent?

First time parent and Dad. My son is 4 months old, so right now he's having a tough time sleeping, going through a regression. We knew it was going to happen and it's tough of course. However... Does anyone else mistakenly hear their child crying or screaming? For my wife and I, we might think it's him when it's actually the kettle, the tumble dryer, a noise outside OR just in our own heads, especially when trying to sleep. Then, when you check or really listen hard, it's not them at all, they're either quiet or asleep. It sucks in a way cause it often happens when trying to sleep, what little opportunity for sleep we do actually have. Even though it has its downsides, I can only imagine it's a positive and good thing to experience in the grand scheme of things.

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Am I the only one?

Who get really annoyed at the term “follow your instinct?” Never mind the fact that it presumes that all women wants to have children (I do, but I have very supportive friends who are child free and I 100% support their decision) which I find to be patriarchal BS. But also it adds extra burden on first time parents. I didn’t grow up with babies. I never babysat. Prior to giving birth, I have never changed a diaper, nor bottle fed a baby, nor held a newborn. I knew shit about soothing a baby other than maybe that’s what you buy a rocking chair for. I am now pretty okay at doing these things, but that’s because I’ve been doing them now for 9 weeks. I know my child because I spend all day with him for weeks. But I felt terrible the first weeks after my kiddo got discharged from the NICU that I just didn’t know things. I get that these phrases are often said to be supportive, but I want to normalize that parenthood is a learned skill.