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Baby Rabies

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Dr. Harvey Karp

The StoryToddlers

And Then I Met The Man Who Saved My Sanity

by Jill February 25, 2011
written by Jill

Today I got to meet a parenting celebrity, a man I pretty much owe what tiny bit of sanity I managed to cling to the first few months of Kendall’s life. Today, not only did I meet Dr. Harvey Karp, author of Happiest Baby On The Block and Happiest Toddler On the Block, but he also swaddled Leyna up, shooshed in her ear, held her on her side and bounced her while she sucked her pacifier, all while being interviewed by CBS 11’s Tracy Kornet about his magical baby soothing techniques.

Oh, it totally ranked right up there with losing all the baby weight, my first postpartum glass of wine and getting Kendall to sleep through the night as one fantastic moment in parenting.

First, let me just say he is SO kind. And just as helpful in person as his books and DVDs are.

Now, I know, I know, Leyna is not really a baby who needs to be soothed very often, but I also attribute so much of her calm demeanor to our calm approach to soothing her the few times she does need it. And all those techniques we use now are what we learned in Colicky Baby Bootcamp From HELL when Kendall was her age.

Dr. Karp was so good with her, as could be expected. And then he asked me some questions about how Kendall was as a baby. I told him how he was never soothed with *just* the swaddling and/or the white noise, how he always had to be jiggled, VIGOROUSLY. His Happiest Baby On The Block DVD was just what we needed when Kendall was a newborn because it showed us how vigorous we could and needed to be with him. It certainly made us feel much better about how rough we felt we were to get our fragile little velociraptor to calm down.

He told me Kendall was probably one of the 10% of babies that needs that kind of motion to be soothed in the beginning. I guess we are part of the small club of parents who wind up with thighs of steel from bouncing on the end of beds and yoga balls with fussy babies for hours on end. (Jen, you know what I’m talking about!)

We had a good conversation after the interview about the kinds of techniques I can use on Kendall as a toddler. He explains them in his Happiest Toddler On The Block book, and, to be honest, I’ve read it, but it just never really worked for me. I mean, I know there are some things I took away, like repeating back what Kendall’s saying when he’s upsets so I’m validating his feelings, but I never was able to master the toddler-ease, where I’m basically supposed to talk to him like a caveman.

After telling him this, he handed me a copy of the Happiest Toddler On The Block DVD (autographed!). I haven’t watched it yet, but plan to over the weekend. Maybe I’ll grasp the concept a little more and feel a little less silly about it after seeing it. I’ll be sure to let you all know. Goodness knows, my mind is wide open to all approaches to the toddler tantrum these days.

Part of the reason he is in town is his presentation tomorrow morning at the DFW Family Expo. Tickets to the presentation are, unfortunately, sold out (sorry I didn’t tell you all about it sooner!), but if you’re in the DFW area, you should still swing by the DFW Family Expo. There will be SO much going on for families with kids of all ages and stages. Here’s more info:

February 26th, 10 am- 5 pm
Centennial Hall, Fair Park
Tickets are $3 for adults and children 12 and over
$2 children 2-12, children under 2 are free
Tickets available at the door, and all proceeds benefit Children’s Medical Center.

There will be prizes, activities, entertainment and so many amazing companies represented. I plan to be there bright and early. Hope to bump strollers with you!

A BIG thanks to my friends at Metroplex Baby and Kids for thinking of me for this amazing opportunity!

I’ll have video of the interview early next week and will be sure to share it with you all. Leyna was such a little superstar.

Kendall is 2 years, 10 months and Leyna is 8 weeks old.

**Disclosure- All Amazon links are affiliate links. I was not paid for this post or for Leyna’s part of the interview.

February 25, 2011 16 comments
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The StoryToddlers

Would Supernanny approve of a disco ball?

by Jill September 8, 2009
written by Jill

Supernanny is on the Style Network every day now, and I tune in every day despite how terrified that show makes me. No. Seriously.  Before I had Kendall I used to laugh my ass off at that show, now it truly, deeply, emotionally disturbs me, and yet, I can’t look away. It’s not so much the episodes that feature the dimwit parents who are so obviously screwing up their kids that get to me, it’s the ones where the parents appear to have just lost their way. It seems like they started out trying, but just… gave up. Those are the ones that haunt me in my dreams because, in all honesty, that could be me one day.

So I’m taking this whole raising a button-pushing toddler to become a well-behaved child thing pretty seriously.  I feel like I’ve got to jump ahead of him, be ready for the first big tantrum in the mall, be ready for the first time he bites someone. I refuse to be the parent who gets so overwhelmed they just give up. I can’t have “that kid” that haunts me in my dreams. DO NOT WANT. Yes, I get that no matter how much you discipline or re-direct, you can never avoid these meltdowns. It’s not that I’m looking to avoid them, just preparing my arsenal so that I’m capable of dealing with them.

The problem is, well, nothing I’m trying is really working. First I bought Happiest Toddler on the Block by one of my true loves, Dr. Harvey Karp (who taught me how to get my colicky baby to sleep with his first book, Happiest Baby on the Block). Everything was going well until I actually tried to speak Toddlerease (basically you are speaking to your kid like a caveman… no, really, that’s exactly how it’s described) to Kendall when he broke down and had a little fit when I would not let him have the box of fruit leathers I tossed in the cart at Target.

“Kendall’s MAD. Kendall wants snacks NOW! Kendall wants that box. right. now!”

::man pushing cart coming toward me looks at me with eyebrows raised::
::flash smile to man who thinks I’m crazy::
::fight back uncontrollable urge to laugh out loud at myself::

Kendall was still fussing for the box, and I know Dr. Karp says that at that point I needed to be a little louder, a little more enthusiastic with the Toddlerease, but I just… I just couldn’t demoralize myself like that in public anymore, at least not with a straight face. I handed Kendall the box of fruit leathers and went straight to checkout. FAIL.

Okay, clearly we are going to need to try another method. So I fell back on the mental notes I’ve been taking from Supernanny and decided to designate a “naughty corner” for timeouts. That’s right. I will be putting my 16 month old in timeout, and before you go laughing at me for being so ridiculous (just like I laughed at myself for contemplating something so ridiculous), I will just say that I’ve heard from many moms that they can actually get their 16 month olds to sit in time out for up to a minute. They insist it just takes persistence the first few times. You have to keep walking them back to the timeout spot you’ve designated until they learn to stay where you put them.

After climbing up on the spinny office chair for the 50th time in one day last week (this was pre big amazing gate called George), I decided it was the perfect time to try out timeout. I warned him three times that if he climbed on the chair he would go to timeout, and he laughed at me and ignored me each time so I took him to the corner.

“Kendall, you are in TIME OUT because you didn’t listen to mommy and.. Hey! Come back here!”

::Kendall runs away, cackling like an evil warlock, looking over his shoulder with glee::
::chase him, bring him back, start over::

“Kendall you are in timeout because you didn’t listen to mommy and climbed on the dangerous chair,” said, really, really fast this time with one arm sticking out so as to stop him from running off again.

He tried to break free probably three more times. Then, just as I was trying to tell him that I would let him out if he stayed in the corner for 10 seconds, Kanye West’s “Heartless” started playing over surround sound and Kendall breaks out in a serious rump shake. I’m talking some straight up clubbing moves. I swear, I really don’t know where he got it… really.

He gives me this look as if to say, “Whazzup mom? A’ight. I’ll just stay here and get low, low, low, low.”  Operation Be a Serious Mommy who Means Business flew right out the window as I laughed so hard I literally had to cross my legs to keep myself from peeing, all the while trying to get out, “Kendall…no… I’m SERIOUS… no… stop…timeout…be…what are you doing?!”

But, he DID stay there and dance for at least 10 seconds, and when it was over he totally forgot about the spinny chair and instead ran to the stereo and signed “please” while saying “boo boom!” (which meant that he desperately wanted to break it down to some “Boom Boom Pow”)… so that counts, yes?

I’m thinking I just need to throw a disco ball over the “naughty corner” and maybe pimp it out with some black lights. I could really be on to something here, OR I could just be setting myself up for a really embarrassing visit from Supernanny. This is probably also a sign that I should select my Ipod playlists more carefully when it’s not naptime.

Kendall is 16 months and one week old

September 8, 2009 9 comments
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