One of you sent me this question recently, and I haven't stopped thinking about it since. I think almost every parent of more than one young kid has lived some version of this exact night.
They are very close and have a dynamic where the older one will start to get dysregulated, tired, hungry, whatever it is, and will begin getting silly, too silly, and then egging her sister on to join. They get to a point where they won't listen or work with us, and if I'm already in a panic or dysregulated, they sense it and it just spirals and gets worse. They laugh harder, get crazier, and it never ends well.
A really common storm that happens is with bedtime. They share a room in a bunk bed and currently have the same bedtime. We can't figure out how to put them down separately without major backlash.
We'll try to move through our routine, and there are nights they get so wild that we end up saying things like, "If you cannot be calm, or lay down in your bed, then we are leaving and will check on you in 2 minutes." Or, "Since you cannot calm down, we will not do songs or story, and we'll come back when you are in your bed calm."
The issue is that they both start screaming and crying, with my youngest now in a panic, running toward us or flailing around in her bed or on the floor, and she ends up getting hurt. If we try to pick her up to keep her safe, it's almost impossible. She flails, kicks, arches her back, climbs over my head. If we leave, I feel like I'm doing the opposite of what I should be doing. But any time we try to help them regulate, nothing works, and I usually end up screaming at them to "just stop!" in a way that even scares me.
These battles happen multiple times a week. I don't feel like I'm being sturdy or helpful in any way. I feel really lost.
If you've ever ended bedtime by yelling something you didn't mean, wondered whether leaving the room is helping or hurting, or stood there with two kids screaming and no idea what to do with your hands, this issue is for you.
Let's talk about what's actually happening at bedtime, and what to do instead when it all falls apart.
