Apart from the fact that I’m long overdue for a decent ‘Andrew’ post, I’m not sure that I’ve actually written any ‘Parenting for Dummies’ posts yet. So… here goes!
I discovered quite a while ago that Andrew loves it when I whisper in his ear. He’ll just sit there with his head pressed against up against my face for ages if I start whispering. I don’t even necessarily have to say anything in particular, either, although I tend to whisper ‘secret, secret, secret’ over and over which seems to work pretty well.
I guess I’ve been doing this on and off for a while now (6 months?) just as something to keep him amused for five minutes, but realised last night that it’s a great way to calm him down if he’s getting cranky.
We had just finished Andrew’s bath, had dried him off and finished brushing his teeth. When I say brushing it’s more like he’s chewing on his toothbrush, but it’s a start I guess. After he’d finished rinsing his mouth by drinking a little bit of water out of his Thomas cup I started to try to lay him down to put his nappy on and get him ready for bed. As soon as I started tipping him back, Andrew started arching his back and complaining. I’m not sure why I did it, but I just leaned over and started whispering ‘calm down, mister’ repeatedly into his ear. As soon as I started he quietened down, stuck his fingers in his mouth, started sucking and relaxed. He was pretty much fine after that.
We tried it again tonight after his bath and it worked then too. I had just laid him down to put on his nappy and he started getting cranky again. This time Jules whispered in his ear and he calmed down so much he nearly fell asleep on the change table! Impressive!
I suppose we shouldn’t use this all the time, but it seems to work pretty well as a ‘secret weapon’ against potential tantrums. I’d be interested to see how well it works if Andrew gets really worked up first, but it’s probably a good idea if I don’t initiate that one.
TTFN
//Daniel//