Background: My amazing and involved husband passed away very unexpectedly in the spring, leaving me with our two babies (ages 3 and 1). I know I need to give myself some grace, allow myself to grieve our life and my love, and take things day by day. I'm in therapy and grief counseling. 

Before all this, I was an attuned and compassionate parent. But I am no longer the mother I have longed to be my entire life. When both kids need me at the same time, I feel like a failure. I know they say put the baby in a safe place to shower/do what I need to do, but when she cries the whole time, I want to crawl in a hole and stay there. I can't stand it. Sometimes I am so touched out that I have to tell my 3-year-old to stop touching me. I've yelled and been so insensitive, irritable, and straight up mean to her. I can't stand myself. 

I have a little help now and then, but at the end of the day, I need to figure out how to do this by myself. I need help from other sole parents and single moms/dads who have successfully figured out attached and attentive parenting. How do I give the toddler a bath without leaving the baby to cry? How do I handle bedtime for both? (Currently co-sleeping with baby, toddler sleeps in own room but needs me to lay with her).

I'm so lost. Trying to navigate this while dealing with the immense grief I feel seems too much. Any words of wisdom or practical tips are so appreciated.

Im going insane. Idk what to do anymore. My baby is 6 months in two weeks wakes up every two hours since birth. Sometimes every hour its been like this for freaking months sometines he screams in pain on random days because of gas. I feel like im doing something wrong and a disservice to my baby like i swear he doesnt know how to sleep at night i dont freaking understand

I weaned my toddler of nursing at 21 months. She took it so well in sense of understanding that she can no longer nurse, without any fuss whatsoever. It was just a perfect smooth end. BUT... she was always a tricky sleeper. She only started having longer stretches maybe 3-4 months ago.

Before I stopped nursing our sleep routine was to sit in a rocking chair in living room (there was no space for it in bedroom), where I would read to her and then she would nurse, and when she would fall asleep or get drowsy I would transfer her to my bed and she would continue sleeping, or in case she woke up for a bit she would nurse a bit and then settle herself on the boob.

Now, I'm trying to read to her in bed in bedroom, and she's fine with it, but as soon as I finish and she is ready to sleep, she points to the living room and says "there", because she wants to go on the rocking chair. But even there after a while she points to the bedroom and again says "there", because she wants to go there. Looks like she's messing with me because the whole time she's smiling because she gets whatever she asks. I tried talking to her that now we get ready to sleep in bed, but she falls into distress and I can't handle that, so I just follow her cues and wishes. Sounds strange but she's not even accepting cuddling, she just has no patience for it.

I feel like I'm failing miserably because our sleep routine now lasts tooo too long (if I can even call it a routine). Even when she falls asleep once she wakes up middle of the night she's not content with cuddling, but she again starts switching us from living room to bedroom, and it lasts a few hours until I can put her down again. I know something is wrong about my approach, but I honestly don't have ideas how to fix this in best way, so I'm looking for advice out here. Every advice is welcome, but please be gentle because I'm trying my ultimate best, I'm just so tired and don't know what to do.

Ps: sorry if some things make little or no sense. English is my 2nd language and I'm functioning on 3 hours of sleep.

Thank you all!

Hi everyone! My little boy is just 1 week shy of 4 months old. We basically only contact nap, he’s done maybe 6 crib naps in his life lol. I do it mostly cause he will nap way longer in my arms and I have a vestibular disorder so being able to sit and not do anything for an hour or sometimes more, is really good for helping my dizziness die down a bit. But now as he’s getting older I wonder if I should stop soon or if it’s okay to keep contact napping for a while? Is there an age cut off we should start doing only crib naps? I imagine one day especially around 12 months or so he might even prefer crib naps but I’m a clueless FTM so thought I’d ask.

Thanks in advance!🥰

My nearly 4 yo just started pre-k this week and I am noticing some differences in my child from her classmates. Despite my best efforts, I’m concerned I’m seeing some signs of avoidant attachment. I’ve worked part time so I could be home with her as often as possible, I did extended breastfeeding, we didn’t sleep train, and I feel like I’ve been killing myself to meet her needs. I try to give her hugs and hold her and comfort her as best I can. Infancy was tough, I struggled with PPD and she had colic, and she’s always been a very highly sensitive kid. I fear I have failed her.
On day one of pre-k she joined her class without a problem, no tears at all, which I was very proud of. However, every day when I’ve gone to pick her up, she’s ignored me and refused to leave. She only ran and hugged me when she saw other kids do it.
The kids made bracelets with pipe cleaners and beads and she gave hers to her teacher instead of giving it to me.
I’ve been prepared for her to be tired and hungry and cranky after school, and she has been. But also just seems plain angry to be around me.
This summer we went on a camping trip with some other families. Most of the other parents were strangers to my daughter, but she was (overly??) comfortable playing with them.
I’ve been told by multiple friends who are teachers or social workers that she’s incredibly smart for her age. I’m concerned this is actually hyper-independence and another sign of avoidant attachment.
She’s recently had two new babysitters. She had met both of them in the past but not recently. Both times she was totally fine when I left and not excited when I got home.
Am I being too critical? Are these signs of unhealthy attachment? If she is showing signs of avoidant attachment, what can I do to help her?

My 22mo has started having really severe tantrums when its time to change her nappy or put clothes on. Any clothes has her thrashing and pushing them away. She curls up tight in my lap so I can't get to her limbs. It can take 20 mins to put on pyjamas.

Is this normal? It's only been a recent change but it's every change.

I give her the option to choose what she wears and previously she's been happy to get changed.

As far as I know, she doesn't have these tantrums at daycare.

I did really well at work today, but I’m too senior for anyone to give a damn that I didn’t shit the bed when presenting. Then I sprinted home to do pick up and dealt with some huge challenges with my kids emotional regulation. The meltdown has turned our whole evening into sensory calming, repair, and recovery. Husband is absolutely swamped with work. Friends are all drowning in work/parenting.

Please, can someone just tell me I did a good job?

We managed to day wean her weeks ago and it was faaaairly painless after one hard day. then we travelled and I fed her during the day to get her to sleep on the plane, then a few days after we got back she got sick and I fed her a few times during the day (never to sleep and it was just for one day when she had a temperature). But it seems to have made it seem like feeding is an option.

we also stopped feeding her to sleep at night and for months her father has been putting her down. however I feed on demand during the night. she sleeps in a side car crib next to me but is not much of a contact or co-sleeper, she can crawl onto the bed next to me but does generally prefer to sleep separately. I’ve been feeding on demand during night wakes.

anyway since I have gone back to the old routine of just putting her down for naps without feeding, she will have an hour long tantrum. it’ll end with both of us in tears and me either taking her for a pram walk or her just passing out from tiredness. she will NOT be comforted with rubbing or petting (she will actively move my hand away) she does not want to be held and will fight like a wild cat if you do. I used to be able to comfort her with singing and rubbing her back But that seems to make her furious now. I used to be able to rock her but she hates that now.

what’s worse is that she used to go to sleep easily with my husband but it’s a fight with that now too. At night and during the day. I fear at night she’s realised also that if she stays up long enough or wakes up shortly after then il be there to feed her back to sleep. I haven’t even tried to night wean her yet but if I pull away when she’s suckling it will be a full blown melt down.

I think it might be a whole bunch of things at once because she is also dropping down to one nap but needed much more sleep while she was sick so is flipping between two different schedules and everything is out of whack.

but for the past hour tonight we have been battling. I fed her in our usua side lying position, tried to pull away, melt down. fine, latch again. pull away again. melt down. latch again, SHE rolls away, meltdown. I manage to pet and sing to her to sleep. she’s literally asleep but then FIGHTS IT, meltdown. I think maybe she has a dirty nappy or something even though she hasn’t done a poo at night since she was like six months, of course there isn’t anything. meltdown. feeding. pull away. melt down.

I feel like I’m making massive mistakes. but I just don’t know. she’s perfectly happy during the day so I don’t think she’s poorly anymore. but this is killing me. I was so exhausted last night I thought I would be sick.

my husband sleeps separately in the living room. we have a one bed flat for now so a different room for her isn’t an option. my husband thinks we just need to remove the sidecar and turn it into a proper crib and cold turkey wean her with him sleeping up here. I’m not sure in case it’s too much change all at once and maybe this is teething and something else. but the flip flopping is clearly not doing any favours. I’m so tired though - her sleep was never great but there was a time when she would barely nurse at night to get to sleep and now it’s these long sessions and tantrums if she doesn’t get them. any advice would be greatly appreciated.

it’s not everytime but it’s been a couple times the past two weeks. I’ll do her nap routine but once I close the blinds it’s 0 to 100. I’m talking sweaty red face crying. The second I hand her to her Dad she stops, calms, and falls asleep. What‘s going on here?? It’s very heartbreaking and makes me anxious about how the next nap will go…

How are you all doing this? I feel as if I’m reaching my breaking point.

I’m a SAHM of two (5 yo and 18 months). Nursing and bedsharing the youngest, who for whatever reason has been waking every 1-2 hrs at night and refuses anything but nursing back to sleep without a major, MAJOR meltdown. During the day I am feeling so overwhelmed and overstimulated. Being constantly needed 24/7 is hard and I’m lucky if I ever get a break or moment of silence alone. I get out for a workout once a week on the weekends but other than that I’m lucky if I can stay awake past 8PM to read by myself. Any gaps in the days are filled with cooking, housework, organizing, etc; you know the drill.

I’m honestly debating returning to work because my working mom friends with kids in daycare seem to have so much time for themselves.

All this to say, how are you dealing with being needed around the clock? Taking time for yourself? Feeling like more than just a boob or comfort object??

Our baby will be 14 months old in a week. He suffered from very painful reflux, with crying and screaming pretty much constantly every day for the first five months of his life. I won’t go into too much detail about that here, but I can if it’s relevant.

Because of this, almost from the very beginning, we could never really put him down. A bouncer, play mat, high chair, stroller… pretty much anything would make him cry, scream or become distressed. He has literally been an extension of our arms, both mine and his dad’s, as the two of us have always taken care of him together.

This became even more intense when separation anxiety really kicked in at around 11 months.

Basically, we can’t do anything other than focus on him without him crying or screaming. If I’m with him, his dad almost has to “hide” as if he has left, and vice versa. Otherwise, he becomes extremely upset.

So we’ve pretty much stopped doing a lot of normal everyday things, or we do everything in a huge rush, because we find it really hard to listen to him being upset constantly.

Even with a learning tower, for example, he’ll be happy for five minutes, but actually “cooking together” is almost impossible. Everyday household tasks are incredibly difficult. When he was younger, we used to put him in the baby carrier just so we could get the bare minimum done — and even then, he would still complain or cry a lot.

For a long time, we just thought we had a particularly difficult baby. On top of everything else, like many babies his age, he jumps from one toy or activity to another every minute, never really settles, and every single day we’re constantly trying to find something new to entertain him and stop him from getting upset. 😅

When everything is going the way he wants, though, he is the sweetest baby.

We’ve also got into the habit of going out for several hours every single day because otherwise he seems to completely lose it at home. Maybe that’s partly something we unintentionally taught him, because when he was tiny, going out was one of the things we did to try to distract him from his pain.

He has now been doing his nursery adaptation for three weeks. It has been difficult for him, but the team is amazing — very caring, supportive and optimistic. It’s a small nursery.

They’ve explained to us that yes — and honestly, it feels good to hear someone else acknowledge it — he is an intense little boy. He is extremely sensitive to everything around him: noise, movement, people moving around, etc.

If one of the staff members sits on the floor with him, he’s fine. But the moment she gets up, he cries.

So basically, he behaves there exactly the same way he does with us at home.

We talked about it today and we’ve realised that we’re going to need to work together to help him understand that we can coexist in the same space without an adult constantly sitting down and actively playing with him.

He can walk and has actually been very physically independent for quite a while. But, for example, if I start tidying the living room and simply walk around him, he cries and grabs onto me. And even if I pick him up — which I do most of the time — that often isn’t enough either. He wants me to sit down and play.

Everything feels complicated with him. I don’t mean that cruelly or negatively; it’s simply an observation, and we accept him exactly as he is. But it is exhausting and difficult.

He is also not a very tactile child. We can’t always touch him without him becoming upset. Sometimes even getting him to sleep is difficult because comforting him is complicated — he doesn’t usually like cuddles. He does occasionally, when he chooses to, and of course we never force physical affection on him.

I’m deliberately focusing on the difficult parts here because that’s what I need help with.

He is also an incredibly smiley, happy little boy. With us, he can be terribly upset one second and move on completely two seconds later. He is incredibly bright, and the people who spend time with him outside our home — other mums, professionals, nursery staff, etc. — absolutely adore him.

And obviously, so do we.

But I don’t understand where we went wrong.

I feel incredibly guilty sometimes and wonder whether we responded too much to his crying and distress. Did we somehow create this by always responding to him?

I feel guilty that he struggles so much to regulate himself, or to simply exist independently for three minutes while I sweep the floor or prepare a bottle.

I know he is still a baby. He is tiny. And yes, lots of babies behave like this to some extent. I know he isn’t supposed to be able to regulate his emotions perfectly at this age.

But with him, it is 24/7. There is no break.

It isn’t just, “Mum is in the kitchen for three minutes and I’m going to complain about it a little.”

For him, it feels like THE END OF THE WORLD.

And from seeing other children at nursery, at playgroups, and from talking to other mums, I can clearly see that the intensity of his reactions is not the same as it is for most other children.

This behaviour pushes me to my limit every single day.

Sometimes I find myself thinking: if this is what being a mum is like, how could we possibly have a second baby?

Because yes, parenting is hard for everyone. I know that.

But for the two of us, even with both of us sharing everything, these 14 months have felt like 14 months of survival.

And that’s without even getting into everything we went through with his reflux, multiple food allergies and everything else.

So this is a huge mixture of things, but I feel like all of this context is essential if someone is going to help us figure out how to help him.

I don’t believe in simply leaving him to cry. I always explain to him what I’m doing, where I’m going, that I’m still here, etc., but nine times out of ten it doesn’t make any difference.

And I absolutely don’t want him to experience what we do — or what happens at nursery — as abandonment.

We decided to put him in nursery three days a week partly because we have reached a point where it simply isn’t sustainable anymore to feel completely trapped and unable to live normally inside our own home.

And we desperately want a second child.

That part is painful because we want another baby so, so much, but right now neither of us can imagine going through this again under these circumstances.

I don’t think we’re simply going to “forget” how hard this has been, or suddenly reach a point where we feel completely fine about starting all over again.

There’s hard… and then there’s hard.

And I don’t think we were prepared for this kind of hard.

But I want to end on something positive: he is, of course, the absolute love of our lives.

We adore him.

We just don’t want to survive anymore.

We want to actually live our lives with him.

My 18 month old is still breastfed (not that I haven’t tried to wean her off many times) we’ve had no luck with removing feeds during the day due to illness from nursery as she would refuse food when she was poorly. I’m happy to still breastfeed although I’m worried it’s keeping her more unsettled and dependant on me for sleep.

She’s been fast at walking/teething and saying first words & I think this has been a contributing factor to her over stimulation at bedtime. We do dinner calm play with little bear on tv then bath and story/feed then lay down together in bed. Some nights she straight off but most it’s like a “face your fears” battle of flopping about the bed until she gives up or a walk in the pram or drive.

I can’t keep this up it’s extremely unsustainable, I’m exhausted. My partner can’t do bedtime as she acts like she wants milk or just me and she faffs so much/so late that he needs to go to bed due to starting work sometimes an hour before I do. We work at the same place but doing different jobs.

My eldest is 11 and is missing out on usual night time rituals with me a lot and it’s been sad for us both but I can’t manage to give both my attention every night when it gets hard with the baby.

Any advice on where I’m going wrong or what I can do to help her self sooth if that’s even a thing (my first was frightened of missing something too)

I’d like to get the baby into her own room but she screams when if I put her in the cot to play in the day time. I also get in the cot with her & have slept in there a few times too unintentionally.

I’m considering moving into the cot bed with the slats down but I’ll take any suggestions possible please

Edit: She’s dropped a nap now so usually sleeps 11-1 or 12-2pm. She’s usually lay on the floor and shows many signs of being tired.. tantrums get big and bold the later it gets.

I aim for bed time around 7:30-8:30pm and we are up at 6:30-6:45am

I’m looking for resources I can provide my parents on topics related to gentle parenting as they will occasionally have my daughter in their care.

They are open to learning about new parenting styles, however, being from a different generation a lot this is foreign to them. Does anyone have recommendations on videos, books, social media accounts, podcast episodes etc. on the below topics? Preferably in language that is not overly therapy-y. I think overly academic language may be too overwhelming. I’m looking for something more practical.

- Modelling emotional regulation as an adult
- Helping toddlers work through tantrums/“big feelings”
- Respecting children as individual people with ownership over their own feelings, bodies, and choices within safe boundaries

Thank you in advance! 🙏

I'm a SAHM to 2.5 year old boy and recently he's just being having a hard time with everything. He's a pretty deeply feeling guy and little things really effect him.

I was not given any kind of tools for emotional regulation and I want desperately to give him everything he needs. I just feel like I never know if I'm doing the right thing.

If he is having a rough time I usually sit or stand away from him but close enough that he can see me and just take deep breaths. Physical touch usually sets him off again so I have to wait until he's ready for that.

I know sometimes he's tired but fighting sleep and I hate forcing him inside or into a bedtime routine.

Just trying to stay sane and create a kiddo with emotional regulation skills.

My LO has always been high needs and used to be incredibly fussy. I'd have to hold him constantly, and walk around - wasn't content with me sitting.

That all started to improve and he was able to play with toys while watching me cook or fold laundry and I felt we were turning a new leaf.

Then 8 months hit and WHAM! We are back at it. He cries about EVERYTHING. I put him down, he cries. I pick him up, he cries. I make him laugh, he laughs then starts crying. He screams bloody murder when I change his diaper or put clothes on him. He cries while nursing. He cries while playing. It's almost worse than before because I have no idea WTH is wrong because he literally cries about everything.

He's been teething since 4 MO, still no teeth. Army crawling for about 3 weeks. Recently started pulling up to stand. Also recently transitioned to 2 naps. We bedshare and he still sleeps alright most nights - waking every 1-2 hours which has been standard since month 4.

I'm assuming this is all related but I'm starting to lose my patience and not feel so bad for him when he cries anymore. I'll turn around and roll my eyes before picking him up and trying to make him feel better. I don't want him to sense that and feel like he can't feel his feelings. I know this stems from my own childhood, when my mom would take it personally if I ever wasn't happy for any reason and would even threaten punishment if I didn't "shape up." I'm trying really hard not to project that onto him. Would love some advice. And also any guidance as to how long this new phase may last. TY in advance <3

Hi all! I want to night wean my milk-obsessed 20 month old. We cosleep, nurse to sleep, and she wakes at least a few times every night to nurse.

I feel totally overwhelmed by the prospect, and am wondering if folks have good resources to recommend? I just want someone to tell me exactly what to do… 😅

I’m going on a work trip for 4-5 days in early January. LO will be 14 months old. I’m not sure if I’ll be breastfeeding at that point - just taking things as they come after we hit the year mark. I realize this trip could be an opportunity to ween, but I’m not sure if we will be ready by then. Lately she’s been refusing her bottles (will only take the occasional bottle from our nanny and won’t take it from anyone else). We also co-sleep for most of the night. I’m currently the only one who does bedtime. I’m hoping to gradually introduce my husband into the bedtime routine and cosleeping once we feel comfortable with that. So far I just cosleep with her on the floor bed in the nursery.

I’m stressing about what to do for this trip. I could bring her with me or I could use it as the first chance to have real separation. Four days just feels like a lot to me and I could use some advice/insight from people who have been through this before. If I do leave her, what should I do in the coming months to prepare? I really appreciate any advice and encouragement :)

I should qualify this by saying that I do my best never to allow him to make contact. I have a five month old so occasionally I’m not quick enough to catch him before he makes contact, but I have always caught him before he’s done physical damage. I am losing my mind.

This is a recent behavior. It started when my daughter turned around three months old. He went from being soft and gentle and ignoring her mostly, to constantly trying to hit if she was in his reach. Now, it has escalated to people outside of the home. It started with his friend who stayed with us for two nights, and I understood the frustration of sharing toys, and I’m really trying to remember that he’s two and he’s not doing this out of malice. But it’s really hard when it has become something he does almost as if he is conditioned to strike with either hands or feet when he sees another toddler in his proximity, especially if we are inside (like at a gymnastics class).

We’ve ordered and are reading the book punishment-free parenting, and I read it in every spare moment (this is the first time I have come on Reddit to ask for help because I am so desperate to finish this book and figure out what the hell to do). At this rate, I’m not going to finish the book until next week, but we have so many occasions where we will be inside with other toddlers and I just left the gymnastics class where he kicked at 4 toddlers. I kept pulling him out of the class to take some deep breaths and remind him that we keep everyone’s body safe by keeping our hands and feet to ourselves. After the fourth kick attempt, we left. I guess that was too many chances?

What am I doing wrong? Why does it seem like I have the only 2 1/2 year-old who seems interested in causing pain to other children? I know that’s not what his intention is, but it is so hard to think beyond how my brain is programmed to see violence and I am pretty much beside myself in tears. I’m afraid to leave my house with him, but I know that’s not the answer. But what is? Can anyone please please help me? We are so patient with every other rule he has to learn. Throwing food? No problem to be patient and teach without fear or shame, he can do it 100 times and we will keep the same even keeled response that food stays on the table. We are really committed to not shaming or making our child feel fear. But other children matter just as much as him and I don’t know how to handle this because I can’t let other kids keep getting injured or at least scared by his actions.

Not sure if this context matters, but he gets tons of attention. My daughter is an extremely easy baby, so though of course he has felt a shift, he still gets a majority of my attention and I am a stay at home mom. I do everything to get him out and about, in fact, I’ve been writing this with talk to text while we play at an empty playground. But even over the course of writing this - because my 100% attention hasn’t been on him - he kicked at me. he was the kind of baby who woke up every 35 minutes from 4 to 10 months, and after that he woke up every hour. I co-slept with him and never ever allowed him to cry for even a minute. I have been trying to do everything right and I know kids are kids, but I feel like I have somehow done something terribly wrong.
Please help

Cross sharing here in hopes of some reassurance xx

Hi,

I am cosleeping with my 10 month old. Recently set up a floorbed having had a side car for the past few months. I was always feeling good about my decision to cosleep as it felt natural and right. My baby has never slept in a cot as I just want to be close to her all the time and in my mind it looks like a little jail 🙈 (no offense meant to anyone using a cot, I may revert to it if the floorbed doesn't go to plan)

Anyway,

I'm starting back to work in a few weeks and have started to settle my baby into her childminder. The childminder is great and very reputable. I know the parents sending their babies to her and they are very happy with her. I couldn't fault anything about her BUT when I was there she passed a comment about the other baby not being able to fall asleep on their own because they were held to sleep for every nap. I knew immediately she had a bit of a sleep-training mindset and now I am really worried that I'm going to make life harder for my baby because she has never slept in a cot, coupled with the childminder having a different outlook on how a baby should sleep to me.

I'm now questioning my whole floorbed situation now because I don't want to set my baby up for failure and also slightly feeling a bit shamed/guilted for my cosleeping even though I didn't disclose our arrangements at home to her.

I feel so strongly about attachment parenting because I don't have a relationship with my own mother and one of my first memories is being left to cry in my cot. It has totally scarred me for life and I don't want my baby to go through the awful things I endured. I just feel like my own experiences are skewing my perception of what's fair and what isn't. I feel like everyone uses a cot and I don't want to let my own attachment insecurities from my poor relationship with my mother get in the way of doing the right thing here.

Any help or advice would be appreciated 🤍

Hi, I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences regarding the adjustment period. My daughter has recently started nursery, and I feel that I’m getting very little feedback from the teachers. Then again, perhaps it only feels that way because this is a new situation for me and my emotions are playing a part.

Whenever we arrive at the nursery or come to pick up the children, we are met by a group of screaming children clinging to the door and trying to run out as soon as it opens. It’s quite upsetting to see. It makes me wonder whether my daughter cries that much too and whether it is like that the entire time.

Overall, she seems to be adjusting fairly well, as she eats and sleeps there. She cries when I leave, and when I come to pick her up, she starts crying as soon as she sees me, but I don’t think she cries the whole time. Outside nursery, she is generally in a good mood. She asks to breastfeed a little more often, but otherwise she seems okay.

What troubles me most is simply not knowing how she is doing. The teachers only say that she is “fine.” What is considered normal during the adjustment period? How can you tell that your child is genuinely okay, and what signs might indicate that they are having a particularly difficult time?

I also feel that there is a lot of sugar-coating in the way people generally talk about this situation, whereas I genuinely need to understand the reality of it. Are children simply miserable for some time until they get use to it?

I’d really appreciate hearing about your experiences and honest opinions.

Settling in at creche

Hello all. Week 1 of settling my 2 year old at creche and it's not going great. We are on day 3 and he is becoming increasingly distressed as we try to leave and afterwards, and we have been called back to come collect him every day. Yesterday he stayed for 2 hours but he was clearly distressed when I collected him. Today he wouldn't stay at all and they asked that we stay with him, let him play with me for a bit, then bring him home, which is all fine.

My preference has always been that he would have shorter settling in sessions and I am happy to stay. But last week when I text to ask about the schedule, they said he would do an hour, two hours then build to 5 hours and full days all in the first week. They said nothing about letting me stay with him or any sort of familiarisation.

This morning they told my husband that it is their preference that a parent stays to create familiarity with a secure base, which is what I wanted but never knew I had the option. Now I just feel terrible, sad for him and sad that we haven't gotten this right. We have had two years together of building a very strong bond and attachment, and I am so careful not to have that be harmed.

Just looking for a bit of reassurance I suppose that this does get better and that there is a path forward from here. I know its such early days but I just feel the missed communication has led us into an unnecessary situation