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A few years ago, I decided to surprise Rhyan with a new bedroom for Christmas. Our guest room was a little bigger than the room she was in and it was right across the hall from my room. I got my uncle to paint it pink and purple, Rhyan’s two favorite colors. I moved her bed and dresser. I set up her bookshelves and added her snow globe collection to them. It looked like such a big girl room compared to the pink and brown polka dot room she had been in since she was a baby. On Christmas morning, after she opened all of her gifts from Santa, I told her that mommy had a surprise for her. She held her eyes closed as she walked down the hall to her “new room”. When she saw it, she was so excited. She loved the colors and her bookshelves and her snow globe collection. She loved it!

Looking back now, I realize that that was the beginning of our bedtime problems. Sleeping in her new room started off pretty good. We had a little bedtime routine and everything went pretty smoothly. Eventually though, Rhyan found her way into my bed. At first, it was just one night a week and it seemed like we just worked our way up slowly until we got to the point where she was sleeping in my bed every night when I wasn’t at work. Over the summer, she did better with sleeping in her own bed because she was able to watch TV until her sleep timer went off. But as that summer went on, she eventually found her way back into my bed again. Kindergarten was approaching and mama was getting grumpy. On one hand, I loved the fact that she wanted to sleep in my bed. I loved the fact that she wanted to be close to me. I told myself “enjoy this time while it lasts because eventually, she won’t want anything to do with you.” But I couldn’t help but to also acknowledge the part of me that didn’t really like sleeping with her. As most children do, Rhyan sleeps WILD! I would spend the whole night getting kicked in the back and elbowed in the head. I was never able to get a good night’s sleep and it was starting to wear on me. So, as the school year got closer, I told her that she wouldn’t be able to start kindergarten if she was still sleeping in my bed. That worked, kind of. Slowly but surely, she moved back into her bed. She was still watching TV in bed and I had the sleep timer set. But every night after the timer went off, she would start crying. I had to lay with her until she fell asleep. But hey, at least she was sleeping in her bed! To me, that was progress. Then, quarantine started. As soon as school ended abruptly, I started to see the little progress that we had made slowly slip away. Eventually, I was either rocking her to sleep in her own bed or I was getting kicked in the back all night again because she was back in my bed.

One night about a month ago, we had a breakthrough. In the middle of a bedtime meltdown, she had the option of sleeping in our guest room, which was her “old room”. And it was in the guest bed that we had an enlightening conversation.

• Me: Do you want to sleep in the guest room for tonight?
• Rhyan: Yes. I love that room It has all the stuff in there from when I was a baby and it reminds me of when I was a baby. I miss all that stuff.
• Me: You miss that room? Is that why you don’t like sleeping in the other room? Because you miss this room?
• R: Yes! I want to sleep in this room because I love this room.
• Me: So if we make this your room again, you would be able to sleep by yourself?
• R: Yes. Definitely!!

So that night, she slept in the guest room and she fell asleep without a single tear drop falling. The next morning when she woke up, she said she slept GREAT! Later that afternoon, she asked if she could sleep in the guest room again. I said yes and once again, she fell asleep without any tears. After the second day in a row, I was convinced that I had solved our entire bedtime issue! No tears two nights in a row may not seem like a big deal to some. But when there are tears literally every night, two nights of peacefully falling asleep is a huge deal. We had another conversation and she said she would love to move back into her old room because she loved sleeping in there. I didn’t want to get too ahead of myself and start moving furniture until I knew for sure. So, I started small. I moved her comforter and a couple of her stuffed animals and decided to give it a trial run for a week before I moved everything. When it was bedtime, we started our new bedtime routine and then she was off to sleep with dry eyes every single night! A week was enough to convince me that she definitely wanted to stay in her “old room”. She decided that she liked the furniture that was in there, so I didn’t even have to move anything around. I’m happy to say that she’s been sleeping in the bed by herself and falling asleep on her own with dry eyes every night since!

Once I started thinking about it, I realized that I never asked her if she wanted to switch rooms. I just packed up all her stuff and made the decision for her. In my 6 1/2 years of doing this parenting thing, I’ve realized how important it is to listen to your kids and validate their opinions. When I was coming up (I know I sound really old right now), and in the many many generations that came before me, children weren’t really allowed to have an opinion on what they wanted. You did what your parents said because they were the parent and you were the child. Giving your kid options was a slim chance. But as I think about this situation, I realize how important it is to allow your children to have *some* input on decisions that will impact them, no matter how small the impact may be. Give them options when possible. They have opinions that deserve to be heard. Switching rooms seems like no big deal, but clearly it was for her and she just never knew how to express that to me in words. Instead, she expressed it every night by having a meltdown at bedtime because she didn’t want to sleep in that new room.

As a parent, I pride myself on the fact that I acknowledge and validate Rhyan’s feelings, especially when she’s angry or sad about something. Bedtime is certainly not the only time we’ve had issues. My girl can throw a fit unlike anyone I’ve ever seen before (except me when I was a child). Over the past several years, there has been a big emphasis on the social/emotional needs of children. With that, we’ve learned that a lot of times, meltdowns happen because they’re feeling an emotion that they don’t know how to express with words, not because they’re “bad”. It’s our job as parents to validate all of those emotions while helping our kids navigate them and learn how to express them in an appropriate way. I am no where near perfect at this. It can be absolutely frustrating when she’s acting a fool for no reason and there have been plenty of times when I’ve lost my cool in the process. But over time, I’ve learned that it’s impossible to reason with her when she’s in the middle of a meltdown. I do my best to remember that and I send her to her room for quiet time and tell her that she can come out when she’s feeling better. She always re-emerges bright eyed and bushy tailed like nothing ever happened. I take that opportunity to talk to her about the way she was behaving and I tell her that even though it’s okay to be angry or sad or whatever emotion she’s feeling, it’s not okay to behave inappropriately nor is it okay to lash out at others because of how we’re feeling.

Too many times, I hear the phrase “big girls don’t cry” and I literally HATE that shit! It’s one of the biggest lies ever told. Big girls do cry. Hell, I cry all the time and I know I’m not the only one! I also hate when people say “boys don’t cry.” Why are we okay with teaching our kids that they need to suppress their emotions? I know I’m not! Cry if you need to. Get that shit out. We all need a good cry sometimes. Why do we fuss at our kids for being sad, angry, frustrated? Why do we expect them to be emotionless robots meanwhile we allow ourselves to feel all the feels? Why are grown ups allowed to have an attitude because they’re having a bad day, but kids get reprimanded for daring to have that same attitude? They aren’t allowed to have a bad day. Why are we allowed to talk to our kids any kind of way but they better not talk to us that same way? “It’s about respect and kids need to respect adults.” Well, that’s true. But what’s more true is that respect is earned and we all need to respect each other. Children are people with feelings and they deserve respect as well. And they deserve the same grace we give ourselves when we’re an emotional wreck.

Again, I’m far from perfect. I’ve yelled, I’ve screamed, I’ve lost my temper, I’ve cried, I’ve spanked when I felt like nothing else was working. But I always apologize. I acknowledge when I fail, I apologize when I hurt her feelings and I always vow to do better. The way we speak to our children will eventually become their inner voice. So I always think about what I want her to hear. How do I want her to talk to herself? I want Rhyan to speak to herself with love and respect, so that is how I choose to speak to her.