Parent Coaching Case Studies

Two and a half years old

Tom was an only child who was very insecure and clingy.  He had very few boundaries and controlled the house with temper tantrums and refused to go to bed constantly waking throughout the night seeking his parent’s attention. 

When we initially contacted Cradle 2 Kindy, we were desperately in need of professional help.  Our two and a half-year old son Tom, an only child at the time and not a good sleeper at the best of times, had become impossible to settle.  He woke constantly at night and was clingy, cranky and insecure during the day.
Things had degenerated to the point where we drove him around to put him to sleep at about 7 pm and sometimes even in the middle of the night when he woke and wouldn’t be resettled.

When our parenting coach arrived at 4 pm on the first day of her four-day stay, we were all stressed, cranky and exhausted.  She watched as we went through the evening routine with Tom and she had assessed the situation within minutes.  ‘He doesn’t know his limits.  That’s what’s making him so clingy and insecure,’ she said.

With the help of the new strategies, we were able to take charge of the routine.  The methods guided us through the dinner, bath, bedtime process, essentially making the routine firmer.  Dinner took approximately twenty minutes, bath time about the same, and with far fewer protests than usual Jack was put to bed with a firm ‘goodnight’.  We then sat down to talk about what had been happening and why.

It emerged that the catalyst for Tom’s behaviour was an innocent enough event from months before.  Something he’d watched on a video had given him a fright.  Taking his fears seriously, we consoled him, explained it wasn’t real and when he said he was too scared to sleep by himself, one of us had slept in his room. 

As a bright, opportunistic child, Tom turned a real, although passing, fear to his advantage.  (Yes, he conned us!)  The result was a vicious circle.  The more we pandered to his fears, the more clingy he became. 

The four days our coach was with us were a learning experience for us as a family.  We have an extremely strong-willed son who given an inch will take a mile.  We were taught some excellent long-term strategies to help us deal with Tom more effectively.  Despite his various protests and ploys, he was firmly guided back to bed whenever he came out, both at bedtime and throughout the night. 

Better sleep and the feeling that we had more control over the situation resulted in a far happier family life for us all.  The most interesting change however was in Tom.  Contrary to our expectations, he totally lost his fears and became a much happier, more confident child.

As many new parents have said, babies and children don’t come with a manual.  The next best thing is to get professional from Cradle 2 Kindy to help when you need it.  The long-term benefits to us have been immeasurable.            Woollahra, NSW

Jasmine a four and a half year old needed not only guidelines for a bedtime routine but also boundaries and limits to prepare her for school. 

Our daughter, due to travel and living in an apartment, did not have her own room till she was nearly three years old, when we finally settled in our own house.  Because of this she had often slept in our bed.  I was physically worn down from constant disturbed nights and disrupted daily routines.  At this point I didn’t realise there was a problem.  I was just trying to keep life in some kind of order which included sleeping Jasmine in her own room.  During the night, she would sneak across the hall and hop into my bed.  Her constant kicking exhausted me, but instead of taking her back to her bed I would sleep semi-comatose till the morning.  I thought I was going quite mad.  As I became more and more sleep deprived, I became more intent on teaching her to stay in her bed.  It worked three times.  After being vigilant for five nights, I could get her to stay in her bed.  However, travel would disrupt the whole routine and I’d be back to square one.  Being a tired exhausted, angry wreck, my perseverance was wearing thin so the vicious cycle would start again.  At my wits end, I told a neighbour, who told me about the success of these settling techniques. 

I instantly rang Cradle 2 Kindy to arrange for a parenting coach to visit us and felt extraordinarily comforted because she had obviously heard it all before.  However, the most inspiring part for me - wait for this - she wasn’t phased in the slightest that our daughter was now four years old (In some ways I’d given up on getting help, thinking in very clichéd terms that there was no-one out there who could help … (I’d thought I’d missed the ‘learning to sleep’ boat.)

Now this progress was very exciting and then the most marvellous incident occurred. Because our daughter was four and perhaps at her most negotiable stage, the process was utterly un-traumatic all round.

After the first two easy nights initiating the technique, the third proved the roughest.  But non-the-less very verbally negotiable.  I had secretly expected the process to be easy at the first, because I knew our daughter would find it all very amusing and fall into line until she realised we meant business, and obviously, any initial reactions are due to the temperament and character of the child.  After six nights, she learnt not to creep into my bed and to stay in her bed.  Since, I have heard her get up and go to do a wee (we keep a potty in her room as the toilet is downstairs) and get back into bed.  When her clock turns seven o’clock, she knows she is allowed to come into Mummy and Daddy’s room. 

Our coach insisted that both parents should learn the technique.  Now I have once again found deep sleep, thanks to these techniques.  Woollahra, NSW

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