What should I do if my baby doesn\’t sleep at night? Just yelling is useless…

Last weekend, my cousin who lives in the country came to the city with her five-year-old son Xiaoyu. I stayed with them at home for a day out of courtesy. Xiaoyu is one year older than my son Doudou. I originally thought that Xiaoyu could play with Doudou as a companion. Unexpectedly, Xiaoyu started watching cartoons after dinner. Doudou also sat on the sofa and watched. My cousin and I sat aside and chatted about home affairs. It was almost nine o\’clock, but my cousin still looked unfinished and had no intention of reminding the child that it was time to wash up and get ready for bed. After a while, I couldn\’t help but said to the two children: \”After watching this episode, can you just turn off the TV and go to bed?\” My son Doudou replied obediently: \”Okay, Mom!\” But Xiaoyu didn\’t. Lao Gao looked very unhappy and pouted: \”No, I want to watch another episode!\” Seeing that his son was very willful, his cousin yelled: \”What are you watching? What time is it? You I\’ve been watching it for more than an hour. Go to bed after watching this episode!\” When the subtitles of \”Bear Bears\” appeared, my son rushed to the TV and turned off the TV. Xiaoyu slapped the sofa with both hands angrily, yelling that he wanted to watch more. I could only coax him: \”Xiaoyu, it\’s already nine o\’clock, we should take a shower and go to bed. Let\’s continue watching tomorrow, okay?\” Xiaoyu looked at me with dissatisfied eyes, and I could see that he was full of grievances. But I\’m sorry to get angry at me. The cousin came forward and pulled him up from the sofa, and said angrily: \”I know I watch TV every day. It\’s time to go to bed, otherwise I won\’t be able to get up tomorrow!\” Xiaoyu cried loudly and pulled back from his cousin\’s hand, mouthing. I cried: \”I don\’t want to sleep, I want to watch TV!\” I didn\’t want my son Doudou to be affected by Xiaoyu\’s emotions, so I took him to take a bath first. When Doudou came out of the shower, Xiaoyu was playing with a toy dinosaur. I asked my cousin to take Xiaoyu to take a bath. Xiaoyu struggled again, and finally his cousin could only force him into the bathroom. At half past nine, I had turned off the big lights in the bedroom and only turned on a night light. Doudou was already lying on the bed ready to sleep. The lights in the guest room were still on, and Xiaoyu was still playing a fighting game on the bed. He was shouting \”hehehaha\” and smashing the bed and the wall with the wooden sword in his hand. From time to time there was a thumping sound. Doudou opened his eyes wide and listened to the sound of Xiaoyu fighting in the guest room. From time to time, my cousin yelled: \”Stop playing, go to bed!\” Xiaoyu ignored his cousin\’s yelling and jumped up on the bed with all his strength. As the bed made a squeaking sound, Xiaoyu became even more excited. When I got excited, I said deliberately: \”I won\’t sleep, I won\’t sleep!\” while jumping more energetically. Then I heard a few \”papapapa\” sounds, followed by Xiaoyu\’s cry. I know that my cousin must have used force. The crying gradually disappeared after a while, and the whole room finally became quiet. Doudou was already asleep on the bed. I looked at my watch and it was almost eleven o\’clock. I couldn\’t help but let out a long sigh. When I was chatting with my colleagues at work on Monday, I somehow ended up talking about the issue of my children not getting up in the morning and not sleeping at night. I couldn\’t help but complain about Xiaoyu\’s fuss that night. Colleagues all said that Xiaoyu was doing well. Their child went to bed at ten o\’clock and returned to bed at eleven o\’clock.I couldn\’t sleep, so I was lying on the bed, either muttering to myself or flipping over and over making pancakes. It’s really adults who are suffering too. Sister Zhang couldn\’t help but say to me: \”How lucky you are. You have such a sensible child like Tan Zhang Doudou, so you don\’t have to worry about sleeping at night!\” I smiled proudly after hearing this. But I thought to myself: Which mother has not experienced the breakdown of putting her children to bed at night and the madness of waking them up in the morning. In fact, many children are night owls, but their sleeping habits need to be cultivated and guided by their parents. In order to prevent myself from breaking down and going crazy, and to help Doudou develop good sleeping habits, I have tried my best and experienced many extremely difficult nights. Medical scientists have found that growth hormone, which is necessary for children\’s physical growth, can only be secreted at high levels during sleep. High-quality sleep can not only promote the physical growth of children, but also contribute to intellectual development. Good deep sleep is also beneficial to improving the body’s immunity. On the contrary, if a child does not get enough sleep or has poor sleep quality, he or she will suffer from lack of energy, inability to concentrate, reduced body immunity and a tendency to get sick, and may even affect physical and intellectual development. It can be seen that sleep is as important as eating to the healthy growth of children. Therefore, parents should devote more time and patience to paying attention to their children\’s sleep, improve their children\’s sleep quality, develop good sleep habits, and make their children feel that sleeping is also a happy thing. Rather than being yelled at by parents every day, children go to sleep crying or feeling grievances. In fact, if the child doesn\’t sleep, it\’s useless to yell at him. Most children have difficulty putting them to sleep because of the influence of the surrounding environment or the parents\’ methods. As long as we have a correct method, patient guidance and persistence, night owls will also become obedient rabbits. The following three points are the methods that I have successfully tested on Doudou. Now I share them with you. I hope they will be of some help to all mothers and fathers. 1. Establish a work and rest schedule with your children. Children have a strict work and rest schedule in kindergarten. Under the supervision of teachers, most babies do well. But why do you become lazy, procrastinate, and misbehave as soon as you get home? It\’s because there are no institutional constraints at home. When Doudou was three years old, he started to be playful. He would always procrastinate before going to bed and would not go to bed. When he finally went to bed, he either had to pee or drink water, or he was hungry and went out to eat. Usually: I am so sleepy that I can\’t open my eyes, and he is still lying on the bed talking to himself. One day, I took out a piece of paper and said to him in front of his small table: \”Doudou, let\’s make a work and rest schedule together, so that you will know when to do things in the future.\” In fact, every day Children are excited when you ask them to do something new. After listening to what I said, Doudou asked me curiously what a timetable was. I explained to him seriously: Just write down what you should do at what time, and just follow this schedule every day in the future. You don\’t have to think about what you should do now every time. Doudou was very happy to hear this, and then worked with me to make a simple work and rest schedule. Finally, Doudou also needs to decorate the timetable, usingHe uses colorful pens to draw patterns he likes. Doudou looked at the timetable and said it was really beautiful, and then asked Doudou to choose a place to post it so that he could see it every day. Doudou was so excited that he took scissors and tape and posted the timetable on the wall with his father. In fact, if you set a good bedtime and let the children participate in the formulation process, the children will feel that this matter is very important and sacred. With this sense of ritual, children will follow and implement it very seriously. 2. Pay attention to parent-child activities before bedtime. European researchers recently discovered that children are naturally energetic and their fatigue resistance is comparable to that of triathletes. What is even more \”frightening\” is that they recover their physical strength faster than professional athletes. So the scene that makes all mothers collapse is often: after playing for a day, the adults are exhausted and paralyzed, but the children are still jumping around as if they had been given blood. When Doudou was three and a half years old, he suddenly became obsessed with dinosaurs. Therefore, everything in life must be related to dinosaurs. When watching cartoons, you need to see dinosaurs, and your clothes and shoes should have dinosaur patterns. Every night before going to bed, I play games with my dad, and we also play games about dinosaurs. Let dad play the role of Tyrannosaurus rex, and I play the role of the Indominus rex. The two dinosaurs fight and compete for territory. He is always very involved, raising his hands and roaring like a dinosaur. I play until almost ten o\’clock every time, and I\’m still not finished. In the end, I could only force myself to be pushed down on the bed before I would lie down. Whenever he slept until midnight, he would suddenly get up in his dream and make a roar like a dinosaur, which would scare Dad and I into cold sweats. Or he would wake up crying in fear. The quality of sleep was not good at all. If you don\’t sleep well at night, you won\’t be able to get up on time smoothly in the morning. It takes a lot of effort to wake up every morning. I complained about Dou\’s dad because he was too excited to play dinosaur games with me before going to bed, so I had nightmares at night. Later, I stipulated that one hour before going to bed, I was not allowed to play crazy games or watch scary cartoons. Instead, it was changed to a milder parent-child activity. I applied for a picture book loan card for Doudou in kindergarten. In this way, Doudou can choose a few picture books he likes from the kindergarten and take them home every day. After washing, I sat on the bed and read picture books with him. Because he likes it, he listens to it very carefully every night. After listening to it, he has to read it again. Many times, after reading picture books, Doudou still can\’t fall asleep. I usually turn off the headlights and only turn on the bedside night light. Then start sharing the shared moments with your baby. I will guide Doudou to share this day\’s life in kindergarten. For example, what meals did you eat, what games did you play, and what was the happiest thing that happened that day? If you have any questions that you don’t know what to do, you can ask your mother, etc. This sharing moment has been one of Doudou\’s favorite parent-child activities from the beginning until now. He sometimes takes the initiative to share the day\’s events or mood with me. Through this sharing, you can not only understand the child\’s life and psychological activities, but also exercise the child\’s thinking and language logical expression ability. Sometimes, when Doudou asks his questions, IAfter patiently explaining it to him, he would fall asleep contentedly. In psychology, there is a psychological effect called the Hawthorne effect. That is to say, parents must take time to have a heart-to-heart talk with their children. During the discussion, they must patiently guide their children to express their confusion and dissatisfaction, and allow them to vent through talking. After speaking, they will I feel comfortable and relaxed. After falling asleep easily, the baby will generally have a good sleep quality that night. You will wake up on time the next day and feel less angry when you wake up. Without the fuss of having children wake up in the morning, as a parent, you will feel much better on this day. 3. Paying attention to fairness and not making exceptions is also the most important point in my opinion. Now that rules have been set, the whole family must abide by them. We cannot only ask the children but not the adults. It is stipulated that everyone should go to bed at 9:30, and all the people in the room should go out at 9:30. Create an atmosphere where your baby has to sleep. Even if there is something you have to do, it is best to wait until the child is asleep before getting up to do it. My best friend, Erin, is always nagging me. She said that her daughter would lie down at nine o\’clock every night and still couldn\’t fall asleep at eleven o\’clock. She would either call her mother or keep tossing and turning. When I asked her, what did you do when your daughter was sleeping? Eileen said innocently: \”She was sleeping, and I wasn\’t sleepy, so of course I lay next to her and took the opportunity to look at my phone and check Moments and so on.\” In fact, it is now common practice for every adult to play with their phone before going to bed. of incurable disease. Everyone is like a man possessed. They cannot fall asleep without checking their mobile phones and scrolling through Moments before going to bed. But many parents feel that it is natural for adults to watch their mobile phones while their children sleep next to them. In fact, children are also human beings, and they also have a desire to compare. He also wants to play with his mobile phone, and he is also curious about what his parents are staring at the screen when they are not sleeping. Full of curiosity, they lose all sleep. In order to attract adults\’ attention, they will say that they are thirsty, hungry or need to pee. Or he would stretch his long neck to watch with you, even if he couldn\’t understand what was on the screen at all. In fact, all the behaviors of children are designed to make adults look away from their mobile phones and focus on themselves. Therefore, I suggested that Erin focus on putting her daughter to bed at night and not bring her mobile phone to bed. If she can do this, her daughter will definitely be able to fall into sweet sleep in less than twenty minutes. Yesterday Erin told me on WeChat that my method really works. I will never play with my mobile phone in front of my children again. Focus on spending time with your children and putting them to sleep. Even if you want to play, you will wait until the child falls asleep before playing. The famous psychologist William James said: Sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny. Habits can make or break a person. If you want your children to have good habits, parents need to take action, consciously guide and cultivate them, and persist in them. Therefore, as parents, we should show more love and patience to encourageChildren develop good sleeping habits. Let children feel that sleeping is also a happy thing.