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Speaker 1: This is the Happy Family's podcast with doctor Justin Coulson.

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Speaker 1: We are Luke and Suzie and this is the podcast

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Speaker 1: for time poor parents who just want answers now.

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Speaker 2: And let's ask a question.

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Speaker 3: Lake.

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Speaker 2: She said, my two year old is refusing to sleep

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Speaker 2: in his own bed. He insists on sleeping with me

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Speaker 2: and refuses to go to bed until I'm going to bed,

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Speaker 2: screams the house down. If I go to bed when

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Speaker 2: he's meant to be going, I get no downtime and

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Speaker 2: often fall asleep without getting the dishes done, et cetera.

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Speaker 2: Any suggestions on how to get him to love his

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Speaker 2: bed again?

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Speaker 1: Well, well, I like that question. It's a great love

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Speaker 1: his bed again. Whether or not we have an answer for.

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Speaker 2: You, Well, we've brought him the expert, Dr Justin Coulson,

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Speaker 2: parenting expert from Happy Families dot com dot au. How

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Speaker 2: do you get a two year old to love his

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Speaker 2: bed again?

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Speaker 3: That's a great question. I don't.

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Speaker 4: I mean, as an adult, I just don't relate. Right,

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Speaker 4: My bed is one of my fast things in the world.

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Speaker 1: One isn't four my bed my pillow Like. We went

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Speaker 1: on a holiday recently and we stayed in some wonderful

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Speaker 1: places could not wait to get to my bed with my.

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Speaker 3: Now, what is it with two year olds?

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Speaker 4: I don't have a specific answer how they can love

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Speaker 4: their bed again, but certainly I've got a few ideas

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Speaker 4: that can help us to calm our children and help

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Speaker 4: them to go to sleep well.

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Speaker 3: So let me go with a few of the obvious ones. First.

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Speaker 4: I'm sure that most parents have thought about this, but

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Speaker 4: it's worth highlighting them anyway. So the first thing we

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Speaker 4: need to consider is what we call sleep hygiene. What's

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Speaker 4: the room temperature? Is it too hot? Too cold? Is

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Speaker 4: our child going to be comfortable? Is the bed nice?

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Speaker 4: Is it dark enough?

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Speaker 3: Are they scared of the dark?

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Speaker 4: Do we need to have a tiny little lamp that's

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Speaker 4: plugged in somewhere. We want to look at how much

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Speaker 4: noise is happening. You know, they're big siblings that are

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Speaker 4: running up and down the corridor or playing Fortnite in

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Speaker 4: the lounge room and screaming at the screen.

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Speaker 3: Is it conducive to sleep?

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Speaker 4: If we've got all those things happening, then the next

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Speaker 4: thing I'd say is how much screen time is your

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Speaker 4: child getting? Because research tells us clearly increased screen time,

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Speaker 4: especially close to bedtime is associated with less sleep and

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Speaker 4: poorer quality sleep. The brain's so stimulated, so that leads

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Speaker 4: us to the next thing. Is there a nice routine?

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Speaker 4: Do we have a nice calming routine after dinner? Is

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Speaker 4: at bath time and could time and singing and stories

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Speaker 4: and all of those things that are calming and soothing

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Speaker 4: on a personal level in our home. We've just started

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Speaker 4: doing something kind of different and I feel a little

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Speaker 4: funny mentioning it, but let's do it anyway. We've just

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Speaker 4: had a friend who got us out of those essential

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Speaker 4: oils the thing at the moment, and they gave us

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Speaker 4: some oils and they said, try this on your kids.

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Speaker 4: And so we've been just getting the oil thing happening,

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Speaker 4: and our children have gone to sleep in about two

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Speaker 4: or three minutes. With one of the kids, we put

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Speaker 4: a little bit on their feet. With another one of

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Speaker 4: the kids, we've just got a diffuser in the room.

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Speaker 4: With another one, we just put it on their neck

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Speaker 4: or behind their ears or whatever. These oils are sending

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Speaker 4: our kids to sleep. It's beautiful and they it's like

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Speaker 4: the smell just calms them.

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Speaker 3: It's legal and it's legal.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, these are these are these things I mean,

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Speaker 4: it's beautiful, and what type of.

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Speaker 1: Oil it is? Shopping shopping online now.

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Speaker 3: I would have to check with my wife to find out.

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Speaker 4: I know one of them loves this wild orange and

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Speaker 4: the other one loves lavender, so lavender oil and wild orange,

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Speaker 4: different kids have different responses. But there's something about the smell.

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Speaker 4: It's so soothing and it just calms them instantly, and

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Speaker 4: so we found that to be an extraordinarily.

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Speaker 3: Bathing just go to sleep forever. So I think that's it.

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Speaker 4: And the one other tip that I'd give is, you

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Speaker 4: know when you when you know you've got a headache,

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Speaker 4: and you put your thumb on one eyebrow and your

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Speaker 4: index finger on another one and you just kind of

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Speaker 4: rub across your forehead. Doing that with your kids, it

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Speaker 4: seems to actually calm them. You put your thumb on

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Speaker 4: one eyebrow one of your other fingers and you just

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Speaker 4: stretch your fingers out across their horrid of their eyebrows

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Speaker 4: and it's really calming. And again, I'd never read a

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Speaker 4: great scientific paper saying that oils or a forehead rub

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Speaker 4: will do it for you, But these are the sorts

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Speaker 4: of things that parents consistently say help.

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Speaker 1: But justin you might get them off to sleep so

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Speaker 1: beautifully well, and then you go to sleep and everything's

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Speaker 1: appropriate and rosy until about one o'clock in the morning

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Speaker 1: or midnight, or fifteen minutes after you go to bed,

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Speaker 1: ver it might be, and children of all ages coming

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Speaker 1: in because they want to sleep in the bed with mum,

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Speaker 1: with mum and dad, with whatever parent is there. And

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Speaker 1: for me that makes no difference. For sues, that means

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Speaker 1: she doesn't sleep a wink for the rest of the night,

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Speaker 1: whatever time that is.

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Speaker 4: Have you noticed that little kids just chase you around

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Speaker 4: the bed no matter how close to the edge you get,

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Speaker 4: they just keep following it.

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Speaker 1: I got an elbowed in the face on a king

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Speaker 1: sized bed with a seven year old and I was

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Speaker 1: on the edge.

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Speaker 3: Get out of bed, dad, go sleep in my bed.

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Speaker 4: It's one of those things where I mean, part of

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Speaker 4: me just oh, I mean, they're kids, and they want

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Speaker 4: to be close, and it's natural for them to want

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Speaker 4: to sleep with us. And you know, tribally, you know, evolutionary,

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Speaker 4: that's what they did. Families slept together, and so in

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Speaker 4: some ways we're kind of we're kind of fighting against

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Speaker 4: human nature by forcing them to sleep in their own bed,

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Speaker 4: on their own in a room five ten twenty thirty.

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Speaker 3: Meters away from ours. That's kind of hard for them.

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Speaker 4: I think we need to be as compassionate as we can.

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Speaker 4: Of course, it's hard to be compassionate at one am

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Speaker 4: when you've just been elbowed in the face by a

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Speaker 4: seven year old.

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Speaker 3: You kind of want to elbow them.

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Speaker 4: Back out of the bed. And so there's a couple

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Speaker 4: of things that I'd suggest. The first is this, we've

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Speaker 4: we've made a decision in our home that our children

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Speaker 4: were not allowed to date, that they won't be allowed

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Speaker 4: to date until they're sixteen and sleeping all night in

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Speaker 4: their own bed.

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Speaker 1: Ah. I'm just trying to picture twenty three year old

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Speaker 1: still not going out on dates going because I'm just

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Speaker 1: not willing to give up.

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Speaker 3: Well so far.

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Speaker 4: Can we explain that to them from the age of

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Speaker 4: about two and they all kind of figure it out

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Speaker 4: by the time they're five or six or seven, and

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Speaker 4: we're like, well you worked that out eight or nine

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Speaker 4: years early.

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Speaker 3: You're doing really well.

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Speaker 4: But on a more practical note, there's a handful of

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Speaker 4: things that you can do. The first is that you

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Speaker 4: can just get out of bed and go and get

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Speaker 4: into theirs, and with a couple of my kids who

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Speaker 4: were just awful in the nighttime, that's what I did

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Speaker 4: for a number of months. And let's face it, you know,

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Speaker 4: can I just be a little bit you know, adult

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Speaker 4: for a second. If you want to have some enjoyable

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Speaker 4: intimacy with one another, chances are that's done by one o'clock.

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Speaker 4: And at one o'clock in the morning, all you want

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Speaker 4: to do is sleep. You don't need to cuddle anymore.

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Speaker 4: You just want to sleep, So get out of bed

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Speaker 4: and go and get into theirs. If that's not suitable

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Speaker 4: for you, you could consider putting a mattress on the

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Speaker 4: floor in your room so that they can sleep in that,

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Speaker 4: or so that you can or you could just pick

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Speaker 4: them up and carry them back into their room and

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Speaker 4: lay on the floor law next to them and pat

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Speaker 4: them back off to sleep and get back into bed. Look,

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Speaker 4: there is no easy answer. Life sometimes is complicated, Life

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Speaker 4: sometimes is tiring. Life sometimes is messy, especially as a parent,

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Speaker 4: And this is one of those things where they will grow.

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Speaker 3: Out of it.

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Speaker 4: The more fuss you make over it, the more anxious

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Speaker 4: and insecure they'll feel, and the more you'll prolong it.

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Speaker 4: The more accepting you are, the more compassionate you are,

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Speaker 4: the more gentle and loving you are, the sooner they

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Speaker 4: will figure it out, the safer they'll feel, and you'll

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Speaker 4: sleep all night.

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Speaker 1: How you feel. So because it doesn't impact me, because

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Speaker 1: I sleep, I'm okay with that.

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Speaker 2: I'm fine with that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so what does that change what we do?

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Speaker 3: We do?

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Speaker 1: We do anything different now?

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Speaker 2: I don't think we need to do anything.

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Speaker 4: I just need to take the cues because otherwise Susan

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Speaker 4: is just going to start kicking you out of bed

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Speaker 4: even if you here's the problem. Though, even if you

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Speaker 4: do that, you'll still get chased around the bed. I've

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Speaker 4: got a whole king size bed and they want to

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Speaker 4: be right next to you on the edge.

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Speaker 1: Doctor Justin Kilson from Justinkilson dot com dot are you.

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Speaker 1: Thank you so much.

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Speaker 2: episode as soon as it is uploaded. For more information

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Speaker 2: on all of doctor Justin Coulson's books, programs, and podcasts,

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Speaker 2: go to Happy Families dot com dot au. Or if

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Speaker 2: you'd like to have doctor Justin Coulson speak at your

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Speaker 2: school or event, go to Justinculson dot com