"Put the baby down"

[ShwarmaQueen]

So I know most older siblings want to hold their baby sibling, but at what age can you trust them not to drop the baby? I know in some places/ages a 5 year old could probably be trusted to pick up their baby sibling but I cannot allow it! We let her hold him all she wants during "supervised" holding (either me or DH sitting next to them). I'm not sure if she knows he's a real person who can be seriously injured if he's dropped from several feet up...despite my best attempts (and frightening tactics) to convince her.

I'm going out of my mind here! Every time I turn around and leave baby on the floor (since he's now rolling and trying to sit up), DD comes to play with him and eventually picks him up. No amount of "Leave him on the floor, do not pick him up, etc" will get her to stop. Today, I cracked. I screamed at her. And then I actually spanked her once on her bum. Sadly it didn't even affect her.

I don't want to be a screaming psycho mom. I don't feel like I yell a lot, but wow, lately...I'm just there. DH gives me breaks most days when he takes the kids for a walk (like an hour, but it means so much to have a quiet soak in the tub or watch an hour of uninterrupted TV ) so I'm not overstretched in that way. I'm just extremely frustrated that I can't get her to not pick him up. Am I being overparanoid? Isn't she too young? I don't want to put him in swing/bouncy chair always, he prefers to be stretched out on the floor (and it's good for him too) or stuck on me...I wear him when I can but sometimes it's just not practical to put him in the carrier when I'm just going to the bathroom or stirring dinner.

I'm trying to keep their relationship loving and growing and staying out of it, but obviously protecting DS is my first priority....gahh!!

I'm at my wits end...suggestions for moms who've BTDT?

[Chamomile Girl]

I haven't personally been there but I have a good friend whose children have the same age gap and I know she has had this issue too. What she did with some success is talk about personal boundries with her 5 (now 6) yr old. Said child could/would not understand that picking up the baby might be dangerous, but she got that all humans need personal space and you have to be careful sometimes not to violate boundries. Especially when the little human doesn't have words yet to tell you so.

When they came to visit me for a week their baby was 18 months old so it wasn't much of an issue there anymore...but MY baby was 7mo old so I got to see the whole plan in action.

[mamalisa]

Mine are about that far apart and honestly, I just let him carry her around a bit. Only over carpet, only when he asked, but overall, babies are much tougher than we think. He never dropped her (actually still hasn't and he carts her everywhere now that she's 4), I wish I could say that but I dropped her more than once!

I was more concerned about him feeding her!!

[MJB]

My boys are only 3 yrs. apart and my oldest was allowed to carry his little brother around as a baby. Just not on the stairs! My youngest son will be 4.5 when his sister is born this summer, and I expect both boys to carry her around quite a bit.
Really, I don't think there's much danger in letting a 5 yr. old hold a baby, unless the floor is especially hard (like concrete) or they are on/near stairs. Get some area rugs if it'll make you feel more comfortable!

[ShwarmaQueen]

Originally Posted by MJB

Really, I don't think there's much danger in letting a 5 yr. old hold a baby, unless the floor is especially hard (like concrete) or they are on/near stairs. Get some area rugs if it'll make you feel more comfortable!

Really? Even like a 5 month old? I don't usually consider myself a nagging mom but it is really getting to me. Today, for example, what made me just snap was that she picked him up off the floor into standing, then went to lay him back down and came within 2 inches of banging his head on the coffee table. It's like she doesn't have the awareness yet and I feel he's in danger.

We have a rug, but still from her height, a fall could seriously injure him, am I wrong?

[zeldamomma]

I think that there isn't a hard and fast rule for when a child is old enough to be trusted holding a baby. I imagine there are 4 year olds who would be very careful, and adults who wouldn't.

In your case, I think that I would stop trying to convince her that she can't be safe enough (when clearly she's sure that you're wrong) and just tell her she may not hold the baby unless [insert exceptions here]. Then if she breaks the rule, have a consequence ready (e.g. having to sit where you can see she's not picking up the baby).

We didn't have a baby at that point, but my oldest was sure she could handle ANYTHING at age 5, and would respond to my telling her something was dangerous by saying "I CAN BE CAREFUL!" It was frustrating.

ZM

[mysticmomma]

Well, my 5 year old carried our newborn around the house, and still does at 6 months. No steps, no concrete, and really she's only like 2 feet off the ground.

[MJB]

I don't think a fall from a 5 yr. old's arms (which are what, 3 1/2 feet high?) onto a rug could seriously injure a 4 month old. I'd definitely try to get her to watch out for sharp corners on tables and such (or pad them) but in the unlikely case that she dropped him, I don't think he'd be hurt.

[claras_mom]

We let dd1 carry dd2 as a newborn. : Dd1 was 4y 3m at the time. Appeared that it would happen whether we wanted it to or not, so we took the option of teaching her to do it safely, and laying down firm ground rules. In a year, she's fallen with her sister only 3 or 4 times; each time, she's cushioned the fall so that her sister hasn't been harmed. I was way more worried about shaking/squeezing the baby, so that's where we've put the teeth in our policies.

[Mamabeakley]

DS1 is just turned six, and he's a big & strong guy. He is allowed to hold/carry DD pretty much anywhere except over concrete (and even short distances are allowed there.) We worked up to it gradually - first he could hold her sitting down, then standing, then to move her somewhere for me, now just for fun. And I'm really glad we did it that way and that we had gotten as far as we had when I broke my ankle when she was 6 months old. If I hadn't had him prepared to be able to do this, we would have had to have moved in with family temporarily or something - it was still really hard to be on crutches alone at home w/3 kids, but it was *possible* because he could move her for me if he had to (as well as fetch diapers, water, fix sandwiches, etc.) The other day I strapped her on to him in a mei tei for the first time. Didn't last long, but it was SUPER cute. She seemed content.

I think it was really important to provide this kind of structure for him, because he is a rough kid. And he really could hurt her, and might even choose to if he were mad enough (at me). Giving him boundaries about how he CAN interact with her kind of keeps him from exploring the limits of what he CAN'T, IYKWIM.

DS2 is almost 4, and a lot smaller than DS1. He has carried DD a few times (mostly since I broke my ankle) but she's about half his size so it's much more awkward for him and he's not as into it as DS1 is.

He's also much more inherently gentle (except w/DS1 - there he's a berserker in self-defense), so I don't have the same kind of concerns about providing an appropriate channel.

Just my experience. YMMV.

[Jenne]

I just glanced at the other replies. I have no btdt experience-however-my DH is a 911 operator and he has had *several* calls of dropped babies by older siblings. He had one which was just awful where the *7* year old dropped the baby in a carport (I guess concrete) and the baby was then unresponsive. I just cannot imagine how awful that would be. I think it would be awful as the older sibling to know that you hurt your brother/sister. Even if you were 4 when it happened and didn't understand at the time as one aged that type of understanding would occur. I'd think that could be a massive amount of guilt. I don't know how the baby wound up being--fine or otherwise--but I think it about it frequently.

Sorry to be an alarmist...

I'm sure your older child just wants to be like you and carry the baby. Would a doll help? Holding the baby while seated? Having frequent talks about how it scares you when she picks him up? I have tried to look up good safety limits on how much a young child can carry vs. their weight--you wouldn't want her to hurt herself--but haven't been very successful there. I wish you all the best!

Jenne

[lonegirl]

Have you gone over how to safely carry the baby? Maybe allow it to happen if you are in the room but not if you aren't there.

[ShwarmaQueen]

THanks for all the replies. They help me put things into perspective.

She does have dolls she loves to pretend as her baby, but of course DS is much more fun.

[claras_mom]

Originally Posted by Jenne

I have tried to look up good safety limits on how much a young child can carry vs. their weight--you wouldn't want her to hurt herself--but haven't been very successful there. I wish you all the best!

In my experience, the weight issue is self-regulating. In other words, as dd2 got heavier, dd1 got less interested in carrying her long - or even short - distances. Strength isn't really about weight, in any case, but about muscle and how well it's developed.

So much of this depends on the temperament of the older kid. My older dd is very independent and responds really well to being taught how to do things properly. She's very maternal as well. Yeah, there are impulse control issues, but by teaching her how to handle her baby sister safely we not only demonstrated our trust--which helps reinforce what we teach--but we also took away the "forbidden fruit" aspect of the whole thing. The first time she picked up her sister--and she'd been told NOT to--she looked me in the eye and said, "I know how to do this." Or words to that effect - I was having a minor coronary. E. was less than a week old. It took a split second to realize that I had to take control of the situation while it was in front of me; not wait for a time when I couldn't see what was happening. YMMV.

[Norasmomma]

Our DD is 3.5 and she doesn't really pick up her brother when he's on the floor, she used to but we just kept putting him down. Soon it just became a nothing thing for her to see him down there and thus she stopped trying to pick him up. I personally believe like anything the more YOU freak out about it the more the child will just keep trying to do the behavior that is getting a rise out of you. for some reason DD just gets it now, we went over it and over it, but not in a freak out kind of way IDK, she's just one to stop once it becomes a non-issue. The bigger our reaction the more fun it is to push our buttons.

[Ceinwen]

There are (within three weeks ) five years between my two girls.

I had the opposite problem - my older dd did not want to EVER hold/carry her younger sister. Never tried to pick her up, etc.

There were times I would have appreciated the extra hands.

[vrclay]

This might not be a popular "Mothering"-type post but I use a device that was called a "playpen" back in the day. There are only a few on the market that are bigger than the Pack-n-play of today. We got one that is 3 foot sqaure and my little guy loves playing in it. I can set him down for a few minutes and not worry about the dog stepping on him or his big borther hurting him...although I worry about his big brother trying to climb in and play with him...

[claras_mom]

Originally Posted by vrclay

This might not be a popular "Mothering"-type post but I use a device that was called a "playpen" back in the day. There are only a few on the market that are bigger than the Pack-n-play of today. We got one that is 3 foot sqaure and my little guy loves playing in it. I can set him down for a few minutes and not worry about the dog stepping on him or his big borther hurting him...although I worry about his big brother trying to climb in and play with him...

Got one. Dd1 has been known to remove dd2 from it, generally if dd2 is objecting to the temporary confinement (she wrote the book on being in to everything). I've had to tell her that if she removes her sister from where she is placed, she must accept the responsibility of keeping her safe and out of stuff.

[moondiapers]

I'd pick a mild consequence that can happen EVERY time she picks the baby up. Just something to remind her and help it cement in her head.....could even be something almost silly.

Like....every time she picks the baby up, she has to do 5 jumping jacks, or take out the trash, or close her eyes and count to ten slowly....just about anything.