One Cries, They All Cry

This is my first post, and my first week as a new daycare provider.

I have an 11 month old son.

I have a 6 and 8 year old set of siblings that I watch before school; that part of my day is going great.

Starting in March, I will have a 9 month old and 2 year old in my care part time. The 6 and 8 year old will be gone before my little ones arrive, so I cannot build them into my solution.

I interviewed this family with the 9 month and 2 year old around Christmas, and they are lovely. They were my first family that I interviewed, and the first family that signed on, and our personalities and parenting styles mesh well. Because of that, I really want to make this work.

Last week, me and the Mom decided to do a couple of "getting to know you" trial runs. Mom brought her kids for an hour long visit last week, and she was present the whole time. The 8 month old screamed and cried almost the entire time, even with Mom holding her, which set off my 11 month son screaming and crying, and eventually the 2 year old. That was how it went until they left.

The next visit was today, and this time, we decided to try it with Mom not present. Both babies were happy to start. "2 year old" decided that he wanted to play with the trains that my son was playing with and that "trains were not for babies". When I told him that he would have to share and that "11 month old" was taking a turn right now and tried to redirect his attention to something else, he started screaming and biting and having a tantrum.

I tried to reason with "2 year old" that everyone gets a turn with the toys at my house, and tried to get him interested in something else instead, but then he just screamed at the top of his lungs for his mom, and kept running out of the room to other rooms in the house. Anytime I talked, he screamed louder. Anytime I tried to get him back to our main area, he ran back.

With all three children now screaming and crying, and singing all our favorite songs over and over to distract not working, and all the sparkly scensory bottles (along with every other flashy distracting toy I could think of) not working, I decided to give mom a call and call it a day and try again next time.

I guess Im just feeling discouraged. Any advice (or encouragement) would be greatly appreciated. How do you deal with 3 of them all at the same time when they are that upset?? Did I bite off more than I could chew taking on such young children?? Besides the before school crew, these are the only children I will be taking on until at least summer, if not longer, depending on how it is going.

My husband is laid off as of Monday and will be home to help for the next 6 weeks. We figure that he will be able to take my son off my hands so that I can focus on getting to know the 8 month old and 2 year old. Do you think that is the good idea? Or could that just be delaying the transition?? My thoughts are that if I get to know the new little ones better, they will be more comfortable, and then we can introduce my son in small chunks.

Im sure he is wondering who the heck is intruding on his space too!! :p

Thanks Ladies for listening, and any advice you can give.

Aw sweetie, it'll get better! I know how you feel and have been there. Everyone just needs time to adjust. Your son needs to have time to get used to having other children in his home. You need time to get used to having this new situation. The daycare children need time to adjust. It takes time to find your stride, but it will happen. I've been doing this for almost 12 years and I promise it will get better....but it takes time. There's ALWAYS a transition period. Reasoning with a 2 yr old can be tough. You did absolutely the right thing and handled it appropriately. I will say this - be FIRM! Don't ever waver on your decisions, boundaries or discipline. That, for me anyway, has been absolutely key. Once you start to waver, it's like a snowball effect and before you know it, you're just putting out fires constantly. And your son will adjust to the new scenario as well. He's going to have little friends to play with once he's old enough to grasp that concept. It's all just so new now.

One thing I've done with new children is to find something to bond over. For my last little guy (15 mos at the time of enrollment) it ended up being something as silly as a banana smoothie my daughter brought home for me. This child cried, cried, cried every day. Then one day, my daughter gave me a smoothie. I noticed him eyeballing it so offered him a sip. That was it. We shared the whole thing and BOOM - bonded :) Sometimes, it's the silliest little things that break the ice, then suddenly it's smooth sailing, and that's a fantastic moment. It's great that your husband is coming to help out. Lucky you! What about asking him to help in the daycare to manage your son in that setting while things smooth over rather than taking him out of the equation? Then you can work toward adjusting everyone, with an extra pair of hands available if things get hairy....just kind of in the background until you need him.

It is really hard in the beginning...a huge adjustment for you and the kids! Give it time! I remember those days being often in the beginning when the kids would all stereocry and I felt like I was going to lose m mind. Now two years in, I am happy to say that it rarely happens. I think the kids feel our insecurity in the beginning too and it makes them feel even less secure and thus they cry more. Try to stay calm and don't worry about planning any fancy activities...just do what you have to do to survive in the beginning until you and they start feeling more confident and secure. You are very wise to start with just these two and wait until you are ready before adding more. I did the same thing and now easily handle 5 dck's plus my own...but I started with one dck and went slowly. You can do it! Just take one day at a time and stay positive :)