Okay smart people I need your help!

Every morning we have to go down two flights of stairs to get to the car. Every morning one or the other has a meltdown on the stairs.

"Mommy pickyooup" (Pick me up) "Mommy cawwyyme" (Carry me). I cannot physically do it without having to take multiple trips up and down the stairs (I'm usually a packmule in the morning, carrying multiple things down the stairs from bags to diapers to trash). I understand that they don't want to walk down the stairs, but dammit, I don't want to walk back up the stairs!!

So I get frustrated. I blew up this morning. I am tired of this.

I try bribery: "If you walk down the stairs all by yourself, you'll get TWO stickers in the car!"

I try food: "Walk down the stairs and I'll give you your juicebox in the car."

I try reasoning (hahaha): "I cannot carry you, you are too heavy for me to carry with all of these other things."

I try playing: "Go down the stairs like a puppy!" "Bark bark bark"

I try to emphasize the fun stuff that is coming, "We're going to school to do projects and play with our friends, come down the stairs!"

And every morning, one or the other, or both, start crying, "I don't want to go down the stairs." I get frustrated with them every morning, most mornings I hold it in. I praise the heck out of them when they go down by themselves, they get stickers (the one being carried doesn't) or whatever bribe I had selected.

Someone PLEASE give me the magic wand to float them down the stairs and I will stop getting frustrated and they won't have to be carried. (And it's not that they're afraid of the stairs, they go down them with no issues any other time of the day.) Or tell me that this is just a really long phase (6 months already.) Or tell me if I'm missing some way of getting them down the stairs (and I have 5 sets of neighbors that I have to worry about, so I really just can't let them tantrum at the top step.)

 

Have you tried discipline? Unfortunatley, at times that is the only thing that works for me. ardon: Almost every morning that we need to go out, my one sons throws a fit when I turn off Curious George or Sid the Science Kid. I have told him we are leaving in ____minutes to go to _____, but it does not matter. I've done the whole making a game of it, being happy and trying to race him to get his shoes and coat on but he still tells me no and will begin to cry.

He will even do it when the tv is not on so it's not as simple as no turning it on in the first place.


The only thing that works is threatening a TO and that gets him moving. He'll whimper for a minute until we walk out of the house then he'll run to the car like nothing happened. :headbang:

 

Hahaa, lucky. My two happily agree to TOs when it's stair time. They tell me when I start counting, "I want a time out". :headbang:

 

What about a little reverse psychology? Or making it a race? Threatening to leave them behind always works with my two.

 

Yup---- once we 'left' one DD behind with DH while I took the other to school. She would not get in the car/put on her shoes/etc....I came back and took her to school 'late'. She was upset, but we have not had a problem since. She was a bit older though and KNEW she was dwadling on purpose so the natural concequence was for her to 'be late' and miss the first part of school.

We also do the reverse psych thing at bed time. "Ohhhh I bet you dont want to get in the comfy cozy bed and want to sleep on the hard cold floor....." HAHA they practically jump in bed.

But I am careful not to over use it.

Can you 'pack' more in the car the night before?? I would NOT get started carrying them...they will only get bigger and heavier....

 

My kids have a tough time going down the stairs because they like to stand on the steps and play :wacko: What seems to work around here is counting to three and then they come down. I hope they get through this stage pretty quick!

 

I have a solution!! Go me!

I changed my hours at work. I'm no longer taking them to daycare, my husband is. :girl_devil: I'll have the fun job of taking them home from daycare when they're good and happy and awake.