After spending so much time talking about sleep, we thought it'd be fun to get our moms on the podcast and hear their perspectives! We dive into:

-How they handled sleep as parents

-If they faced any unwanted sleep advice when we were babies

-What their perspective was regarding how we handled sleep with our own children

-Their advice for talking to your own mom about your child's sleep situation

 

It was definitely a unique episode and one we enjoyed thoroughly! We hope you enjoy it too!

 

For more resources on handling caregivers and sleep, check out this blog post: Communication your child's sleep needs to caregivers

 

Available on Apple Podcasts, Google, Spotify, and Stitcher

Click here for a quick link to your desired podcast app

Welcome back to the sleep talking moms podcast. And today we are really excited because we have a special episode planned for you guys. So this was really really fun to do. We got our moms involved in the conversation surrounding baby sleep, their experience of with it, their experiences grandparents with it, and just kind of what it's like to be a mom, and then be somebody is mom who is a mom.

So it's been, I don't know, it was really, really fun. Also very interesting to see how very alike they were despite raising us very differently.

Yeah. So if you guys have any experience with having the tough conversations with your moms about how you're choosing to schedule baby sleep, this might be a really, really good one for you guys. Yeah. So we hope you enjoy it and thanks to our moms for being willing to record with us and I know they were both a little nervous about it. But thank you moms for joining us. Thank you hope you guys enjoy.

Interview with Linda (Kayla's Mom)

I'm excited to introduce you all to Linda Kayla's mom. Linda, do you want to say hi to everyone? Hi everybody. Hi, Mom. Hi, Kayla. We're so glad that you're here and just that you're willing to just talk about sleep and your experiences as a mom and as a grandma and thank you for being with us. Well, thank you for asking me. I'm very happy to share Well, why don't you start by telling us how was Kayla as a sleeper.

I was fortunate enough to have very good sleepers. However, Kayla was a preemie and she was hospitalized. At two weeks old for asthma. And for whatever reason it always happened the middle of the night. Oh, we we have a lot of interruptions for the first couple years of her life until things got regulated a little better. And we got more answers, the older she got.

So I spent many times next to her crib, patting her back or rocking her or, you know, just making sure she was okay and trying to get her back to sleep. Yeah, I can imagine that that was probably very nerve wracking. Since you felt like they did happen. You know that those kind of episodes where she would have issues what happened at night. That that just was hard to handle.

Yeah, it was very scary often, but as far as like a nap, or Kayla has always required a great deal of sleep. And she gets that honestly. She's, you know, she's my kid that on a Friday night would be in bed. By 738 o'clock. Even in high school.

 

She didn't spend the night with very many friends because he couldn't hang on go stayed awake all night long. She required sleep and I was thankful for that much rather have it that way then my opposite. Uh huh. Yeah, yeah, that's very true. Well, let me ask you, Linda, did you feel like your situation how you handled sleep with with both of your girls, did you ever feel judged for the way that you handled sleep?

Or you know, did you ever get like, you know, any pushback from family members or your own mom about sleep or what was that experience? Like?

No, I didn't get any pushback. My mom was a licensed daycare person, pretty much all my life. And so I I followed her lead and when, when my girls were tired, a went to sleep.

When they woke up, they woke up. There were times that I would wake them up late in the afternoon, you know, get them up at a certain time so that they would go to sleep in the evening. They always had a set bed time. You know, between 730 and eight, they were in bed, but you know when they were new babies and when they were toddlers it was just kind of the routine that you know, like breakfast and then play a little and then naptime.

And then you know, get up and have a snack and get ready for lunch and wait for a little while and go down for nap or was never as structured as Kayla was. Or is I was more in tune to you know what the baby was telling me. And thankfully I didn't have trouble all you know, I didn't have trouble with them. Going down and sleeping. If I had I probably would have had a different approach. But they were always good sleepers.

 

And I was following my mom's bleed. So you know, I kind of didn't care what anybody else thought. I mean, that's kind of my personality is that, you know, okay, you had your turn. You. You need to quiet down now. Unless you're asked. Just, yeah. Zipit. Uh huh. Yes, yes.

And I think that is a really good quality to have as a mom, you know, it's one of those things if you don't have that quality naturally, when you become a mom, you kind of have to get you learn it, you know, you kind of get that thicker skin where you're like, I actually don't need anybody else's opinion.

I trust what I'm doing. You were the parent before and now it's it's my turn, you know? Yeah, I think that's a very good quality to have as a mom or to gain.

So let's fast forward a little bit because you you kind of alluded to this already, Linda but do you remember having an opinion about the way that Kayla handled sleep with with her own two boys what she had kids do remember having an opinion and how did you guys kind of approach you know, any difference in opinions there?

I really just took my lead from Kay and she was very structured the whole day revolved around the sleep schedule. You know if that's it, she was not flexible in altering that at all. Kayla's phase right now is Yeah, sounds about right. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. And I was more you know, if they were ready for a nap at 1230 Okay, if they were ready for a nap at one.

Okay, you know, it wasn't that set. But you know, it has worked beautifully for Kayla, you know, the boys are are great sleepers. One thing that I did have a lot of issue with was crying having the boys be in their bed and it's not time to get them up yet. Or if they're not quite ready to go down yet, but it's time so you're going and they would cry and I I just never ever let my girls cry for that long.

I would have gone in and you know, give them an A hug and sang them a song and rock them for a few minutes to settle them down. And but you know, again, that was how I was brought up so I just I struggled with that. It was very hard for me to stay out of the bedrooms when the when the boys were would cry.

 

Yeah. And you're definitely not alone. In that I hear that from a lot of grandparents, especially what I when I work with families and you know, maybe a grandparent watches them on a regular basis or you know maybe in some cases they live with the grandparents and and that there is there does seem to be just that that generational difference there and and I don't know if I'm sure part of it is the way that they handled sleep kind of like what you said that just wasn't how you did it.

I think in other ways, it just becomes harder when you are the parent right? So the grandparents a lot of times get the child when they're on their best behavior. They're excited to be with Grandma, you know, they get all the fun good stuff, and sometimes they get to skip out on the not so fun side. And so I think that makes it can make it harder to Does that make sense?

Yeah. One thing that you know, I'm an early childhood special education teacher. I've been doing this for 20 years. One thing that I think kind of reinforces my my need to not let them the boys cry is because we have so much of a push for social emotional development in the school systems right now and with my my three to five year olds who are developmentally little, it's it's like when siblings fight you know, and you stop being the referee as a parent and you just let them work it out. Well, you know, that's, that's not done in a classroom.

In a classroom. I would intervene. I would talk to each child. We we would, you know, apologize and, you know, shake hands or give a hug or whatever and, and we would work it out. And so, you know, if a child is sad, then you know you you're at that child's side immediately with a book or a teddy bear or, you know, come sit on my lap or you know, something like that.

And with the boys. It's hard to switch gears for me because it's so ingrained in my mind of what I have to do in my classroom. Compared to respecting my daughter's wishes, you know, and letting not that your social emotional needs are not getting met because they absolutely are.

Kayla is a fabulous mom. Ah, but she is she is i i could not be prouder guys, I'm gonna cry. There are times when I see her with the boys or when she sends me a video or whatever, then I want to cry because I'm just so proud of who she's become. But I still have that teacher pull. Yeah,

I'm glad you said that because I hadn't really thought about that. But I mean, it makes total sense. You know, because there is, there is a difference between if you're a teacher or a daycare, provider, you know, a caregiver of any kind. The way that you respond there isn't automatically the same as you know, a mom with her kids. 24/7 is going to respond.

So yeah, thank you for kind of explaining that that that makes total sense in my head. And hopefully that will help anyone else who's listening that may feel you know, like they're in a similar situation. I hope so.

Yeah. Let me let me ask you one more thing, Linda, if you could give any advice for new parents? What what would it be whether it's sleep or or otherwise related, what advice would you have? Give yourself some grace? Because Because infancy and the toddler stages go by in a blink of an eye and you feel at the time. We're so tired, and your house is a wreck and your hormonal and you feel fat that that is all consuming and it feels like that stage goes on for forever. It has. It is so brief.

And I would just say you know, give yourself some grace and above all, you know, find, find joy in that baby, every single day. Even if that baby has cried has had, you know breast milk diarrhea forever. You've changed outfits 20 times the child has not sleep been you just find the joy of wow, I'm here. I get to hold this baby. I get to rock this baby. I get to change this baby 20 times. Yay.

Because tomorrow will be different. They change so fast, so fast, but at the same time, speaking as you know, my five year old has been throwing tantrums today. They also changed so slowly it feels like do how was it both at the same time? I don't know.

 

Interview with Sherry (Carianna's mom)

Alright everyone and I have for you guys, Carrie Anna's mom, Sherry. Hi, Sherry.

Hi, Kayla.

Also, sometimes I may call her my second mom because it was basically what she was for the entire time that I lived here. So you hear either one of those names. It is Sherry. Alright, so you're gonna have to think back but not too far. We're still very young army here. Yeah, no, no. Do you have any or can you share your memories or experience with Carianna and how she slept as a young child, baby toddler age.

I have wonderful memories, because she was the kind of baby and I just remember this this morning. I had six weeks off from work when I had her. And she started sleeping through the night at week number five. So I got a whole week's worth of good sleep before I had to go back to my job. She was one of them to prep. Yes, you later down at 7pm and you woke her? It was it was perfect.

That's so funny because my mom was just saying that I was a sleeper as well. And then that's how Carianna and I continued throughout our entire childhood. into high school all is it any wonder that we have a podcast talking about sleep? Right? It was meant

for us? That's right. That's right. But you know you didn't ask me this question. But something that I thought of was I didn't really know people had sleep issues with their kids. But right before I had her, I found an article just kind of stumbled on one that talks about how babies have to learn to put themselves to sleep. And I really remembered that didn't ever have to put it into practice. But I tried to share that with some of my friends because I had some friends going through terrible sleeping situations.

Interesting. Okay, well that kind of brings me to my next question. Did you have a specific philosophy around sleep? I don't know. I don't I don't some of your life a lot of your life but like you were working. I do like I mean, I've known you forever. I've been alive forever. And you have so much more left to go so much. Did you have any specific philosophy around sleep or was there anything that you asked your caregiver to do in terms of Carianna and her napping and bedtime? Anything like that? That you remember?

You know, aside from that article, I had nothing and my caregiver had been a mother for a lot longer than me. So I just left her in her hands and figured she's probably going to do a lot better job than I am so no I really went into being a mother kind of blind as far as sleep goes.

Oh, wow. So calm.

I'm not sure I was calm but I had Mark to keep me calm. So

no, ah, and then did your mom or do you remember anybody giving you any like comments or anything about how you were handling sleep or really any part of parenting that you can remember I guess if Carianna was just sleeping then people probably didn't have anything to say they were probably just like, cool. You got to sleep.

You know, I remember my mom coming over to see me sometime during my six weeks. And of course Carianna was sleeping I was in the living room writing thank you notes. And she said, wow, everything just seems so peaceful here. I said well, the baby's sleeping the houses clean. I'm getting caught up on my work. Yeah, things are going great. I just kept thinking this. This gig is

really easy. Like where's the catch is there what's gonna happen? What's coming. Alright, so fast forward. Carianna is now a mom. Do you remember having an opinion on how she was handling sleep? Because I know her whole career kind of started from her hiring a sleep consultant when Ethan was four months old. Is that correct? Carianna so there when Yeah, when he was four, we didn't work with asleep consult then but I found a sleep consultants blog and read all the things and was like okay, we're sleep training. Let's do it. Okay, so I'm sure that you remember before sleep training and then after, but did you have an opinion on how she was handling sleep?

Well, it was funny because there was a lot of rigmarole that she was going through to try to get him to fall asleep. And I remember thinking that poor couple if they make it through mean, that scented lotion gave him to relax. And I mean, I could go on and on. But you know the swaddling and they were just trying everything. Out of desperation. So I didn't have that much of an opinion because I felt so bad for Thank you God, but that didn't happen to me

that's hilarious. Okay, so did so you didn't really aside from like, I feel bad that you guys are dealing with us. He didn't really have an opinion on her trying anything then because it was like you do what you got to do. For your marriage and for your child

and for your own sleep. Which was so important to me. Right. And I knew Derek was someone who had a hard time sleeping himself. So it's like between the two of them. They got to get a good night's sleep.

Yeah. And then in what ways did Carrie and I get you on board with her sleep philosophy? Like did you notice a change in how Ethan was sleeping and did that kind of just tell you? Okay, what they're doing is working or did you kind of have to be persuaded?

I did not. Have to be persuaded and I kept him five or four mornings a week. I kept Tim's from like, seven in the morning until lunchtime. So she kept me in the loop all the way because I had to be on board with it. You know, I had to carry on what she was doing at home. I had to do it my house as far as the way she had him going to bed and stuff. So yeah, I was on board with it. I wanted them to find a solution. And I wanted him to get a good night's sleep, a good day's sleep. You know, he was a little bitty baby. And it was just hard to hear. He was struggling so much with it. So I was on board for beginning.

That's so great. Like, not every family has that experience. And so when you say like, oh, I had to go with whatever she was doing for the sake of consistency. That's not how it works for everybody. And so yeah, yeah, both of you are so lucky to have each other kind of work together to make sure that what was best for Ethan was what was happening anymore.

I mean, who wouldn't want that for their grandchild? You know,

right? Yeah. And I she she also put up with a lot for me because when we did sleep train him at four months, we were so scared of going backwards. To you know, he was sleep training all the sudden he started sleeping 12 hours, which we weren't expecting or trying for but it just started doing it. We were so scared of going backwards that I gave her like I would write out an exact schedule for her followed these wake windows. Exactly. Do not put him down for a nap before after like kind of what your mom was saying Kayla I was pretty rigid and very clear in my instructions. And I'm sure she on one hand was like oh my gosh, this girl is crazy. But I just was like this is working and I do not want to miss it.

Yeah, yes. I was thankful to have those rigid instructions. Because I'm kind of i The book person. And if I don't have a book, I'm going to make up my own. And I really appreciated having it all written. down for me. In fact, I told her that I was always in a panic that I would lose those notes. And then what would I do? I mean, how would I take care of him if I didn't have that?

List? That's so funny. It just reminds me when I was having Imre, Nick was gone. He was deployed. And so it was just mother in law and my mom with me. I had a binder of how to take care of Ellis while I was in the hospital, and it was like wake up at this time then this is what you do. This is breakfast and then I would put like what he likes to eat for breakfast and it was like so bad, like, timed. And I just remember my mother in law was the one that was dealing with Ellis. She was like I'm so grateful that I had that I thought I was being annoying. But she was like, This is so great. I was just like, you can't mess up the schedule. You can't mess up the structure. If you do that. Then he's like gonna bring this at home and everything's gonna spin out of control. And so it's just really funny. You think you're being annoying, but here we have two moms that are saying no, give us the notes.

I'm not proud. I know I do not know at all.

That's a great trait to have. It really is. Do you have any advice for new parents when it comes? To speaking to their parents about the decisions that they're making for their children's children, whether it's sleep or potty training, any of those things that you have to do where you're kind of teaching your kid do you have any advice on how they can talk to their own parents? about their choices? Well, I'm

sure it varies from you know, parent to child, but I just had so much faith in Carianna and Derek, that they I mean, they're smart people, they research things they don't go off on crazy ideas. I just fully that what they were doing was the right thing. And I think letting us grandparents know what you're doing is the best thing you can do because as long as we were in the loop, and we were being educated, I never doubted it at all. I just felt really comfortable with it. I think I would have been more at my wit's end. If they hadn't been pursuing a way to to fix this. I would have been really frustrated and worried. And I've learned more through my friends than through my own personal experience, that if you can't work with your kids to help their kids, it's not going to work. If I'm not on board with her it's not going to work. She doesn't have to be on board with me. She's in charge of that child, not me. So I'm ready. It's really me that has to be on board.

And yeah, our moms are saying almost the exact same thing. It's really really sweet. So alright, so to kind of wrap up. First of all, how does beam a grandparent feel? How does it feel to watch your child raise children?

It's the best feeling and I am so proud of my child. And I'm so proud of Derek I could cry. I mean, are better parents than we ever dreamt of being? Because I think they're just more purposeful. We just, I don't know, I feel like when we were having you know, we only had one child but when we were having her it it wasn't really thought through as much all the little things. But these guys are great. They just they know what they're doing. And I feel really lucky that my grandkids are being raised by some really competent people.

Ah, that makes me want to cry. I definitely don't know exactly what I'm doing though. So I just want to clear that up.

You don't have to tell me that. Carianna let me think.

Well, Sherry, you did a really, really great job no matter how you feel about oh, you raised She's amazing. She's amazing.

Yeah, she is pretty amazing. But I know that did not come from us. We are just lucky enough to get to claim. So we get the credit.

There you go. All right. Well, yeah, that's all the questions that I had for you. So thank you so much for being here and for sharing your experience.