r/raisingkids

I had a really embarrassing moment recently where one of my twin girls had a full screaming meltdown in Target because I said no to a toy, and I genuinely felt like every parent around me was silently judging me.

What messed with me more though was how quickly my brain went to “something must be wrong.” I started spiraling thinking maybe she has sensory issues, emotional regulation problems, maybe I’m too strict, maybe not strict enough, maybe too much screen time, maybe too little independent play… literally everything.

And then later in the night I realized… she’s 6. She was tired, overstimulated, hungry, and didn’t get what she wanted.

I honestly think parenting content online has made some of us incapable of seeing normal kid behavior as normal anymore.

So my wife and I have guardianship of three of our grandchildren. Two are 18 now and one is 14. We went and got them from NC when their mother and her bf were running out of money to live in hotels after they got evicted from their apartment for the third time living down there. (“Drugs in the relation”)We brought them to Ohio under the promise that at least Mom would be up in two weeks to help w them and get back on her feet. Well, in July it will be two years. Kids are pretty good. Good students. Quiet but respectful. We helped the oldest get her license and a car to help getting the other two to school. She actually graduates today! They all have jobs too.

Last night at 1:50am we got a call from local police that they were all in custody after being pulled over. We didn’t even know they had left. Granddaughter was driving. Car smelled like weed. All got searched. Driver clean and sober thank goodness. But both boys were holding THC vapes. One had a roach. Ashes all over his pants. And clearly both boys stoned to the bone. They had us come get the 14 year old. Told the other two to go home. Took their weed pens and didn’t charge them with anything.

They got pretty lucky I’d say. Thing is now we don’t know what to do about discipline. It’s not like we wanted them arrested! What a hassle! But they have never had much discipline ever. And we don’t want to push them back to their parents who already have an obvious drug problem. But I feel like something has to be done. Helping them get jobs. To and from jobs. Just to spend that money on weed doesn’t sit right. We have no problem with adult cannabis use. But firm believer that kids have no business getting high. What advice does anyone have as to what’s next? I don’t feel that telling them “don’t ever do that again!” is gonna be enough. But the two 18 year olds could say I’m outta here if we’re not careful. Man. I didn’t sign up for this.

My 5 yo son takes an exceptionally long time to get dressed in the morning. He will change in and out of his clothes several times before deciding on his final outfit. It seems like he is hyper focused on what he is wearing and will become extremely upset, and often cry, if we encourage him to choose something that he doesn’t want to wear. He’s often late to school because he can’t decide on an outfit. We try to be supportive and encourage his individuality but it’s affecting his morning routine. Anyone experience this?

Sorry in advance for the rant.

I’ve been under a stupid amount of stress lately. Work has been brutal, money’s tight, and between two kids and trying to keep life from falling apart, it feels like every day is just putting out fires.

Last week I almost missed my younger daughter’s kindergarten graduation because of work. Not because I wanted to. Just one of those “important last-minute meetings” that somehow always seem to happen when life is happening too. I was venting about it during a doctor’s appointment and he said something that honestly bothered me more than I expected.He basically told me dads today put too much pressure on themselves to attend every little kid event. Said when he was growing up, fathers showed up “when they could.”

And maybe that works for some people, but my dad also “showed up when he could.” He was an alcoholic. In and out of my life. Did the bare minimum until he legally didn’t have to anymore. So hearing that hit a nerve.Because I still remember every single time I looked into a crowd hoping he’d actually be there.

Kids remember that stuff.

And honestly, part of why I started using Screen Earn in our house was because I realized I was becoming the dad who was physically present but mentally exhausted all the time. Every night was chores arguments, screen time fights, repeating myself 900 times, losing patience over dumb little things.Now the expectations are just… there.The girls know what needs to get done. The screen time unlocks itself after. Less yelling. Less negotiating. Less turning into the bad guy every evening.And weirdly, it gave me back energy for the stuff that actually matters. Like sitting in a tiny kindergarten chair watching my daughter scan the room looking for me.

I made the graduation by the way.The second she saw me, her whole face changed.That alone was worth more than the meeting.

My daughter is 2.5, and for a long time, floor time felt like something I had to endure. I love her, but sitting there watching her move the same block from one side to the other for so long was doing something to my brain.

I started doing my own stuff nearby instead of just sitting there performing interest. I wasn't ignoring her, just actually doing something. I fold laundry on the living room floor while she plays, and she honestly plays longer because I am not hovering. I started doing a puzzle at the coffee table, and she will come look, go back to her stuff, and come look again. Sometimes I do my skincare right there on the floor next to her corner, and she watches me like I am the most interesting thing in the room. That is a lot of pressure, but also kind of sweet.

The other thing that changed was giving her a corner that is actually hers: a low shelf she can reach herself, a few things on the wall she can do while standing up, and books in a basket on the floor. Once everything was at her level, she stopped needing me to start things for her. She wakes up and just goes to her corner now most mornings while I make coffee.

Nobody told me the secret was to just stop making floor time about floor time. Do your thing nearby, let her do hers, and somehow it works better than when you are fully focused on entertaining her.

So I will be homeschooling next year. Grades 7, 3, 2, and K. My oldest got left so far behind in reading and writing. She was in kindergarten when Covid hit and we had moved so much in that time frame that a lot of the basic phonics knowledge went over her head and they moved past it. So that being said I want to start her at basics and move our way up to see where the missing pieces are. I’d love to start it as a group with oldest three and branch off individually when we hit where they are. My question is does anyone have any suggestions curriculum to use for this? Either online, work books, or printable materials?

I am a representative of HDFC Pension. I have an activity to complete. I need to understand why parents are not choosing NPS Vatsalya for their kids.

To brief everyone else,

NPS Vatsalya is a govt. Of India initiated scheme for the kids from age 0-18. It is market linked giving it higher growth potential as compared to Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana. Moreover this is for both boy and girl child.

When comparing with mutual funds, first thing is lower fund management cost, which is on average 0.30 %. Another benefit over mutual funds is the tax that one needs to pay on withdrawal. For Mutual funds, one needs to pay LTCG(12.5%) when gains exceed 1.5 L after one year of keeping it invested.

In NPS Vatsalya, the whole amount at withdrawal remains tax free, as there is no income of child. If corpus is less than 8L, one can get 100% lumpsum. If it is greater than 8L, the upto 80% can be taken as lumpsum taxfree and remaining 20% will act as Pension for life for the child.

If there is no exit till 21, then this account will transition to Tier 1 NPS Account of the child.

For old tax regime, under section 80ccd1(b), the parents can also get maximum 50000 tax deductions (apart from corporate contribution towards nps)

I think if I can engage more audience, maybe that will help in this. How can I reach more schools or daycare centers to conduct a session for nps vatsalya for the parents?

What are your best tips for helping keep kiddos aged 1 and 3 happy during service?

Sharing this in case another sleep-deprived parent needs to hear it. We tried melatonin, but it really was not a good fit for us. It seemed to make sleep more restless and the weird dreams were not worth it. What helped the most was getting much more consistent with the bedtime routine. Same wind-down time every night with very dim lights, bath or quiet play (nothing to get him excited), books, white noise, and keeping the room cool and non-melatonin sleep support. Stuck with the routine instead of changing things every few nights.

After a couple weeks, things felt a lot calmer and everyone in the house was sleeping better. I’m glad I knew how to search Reddit because some random parent threads ended up helping way more than Google or any pediatrician did.

What kind of crafts or activities would girls between ages 9-14 like to do at a birthday party? Looking for something easy to clean up but something they really like. Something unique would be great. Bday girl likes horses, nature, skin care, etc. but it doesn’t have to be any of those themes.

I really just need some assurance and advice.

My first grader will be wrapping up school this week. We received his report card earlier this week and he's categorized as "persistently at risk". The graph showed that he started out the year strong but went on a downward slope. His teacher said students who categorize as "persistently at risk" have not mastered the first grade skills or can't apply the skills fluently enough. He's going to be retested next fall to see if he will need additional help.

I've kept close communication with his teacher throughout the year to pinpoint areas that he can improve academically and behaviourally. We made sure to have him read at home and practice his math. He does well at home but not so much in school. My son has trouble paying attention in class and it's something that we are still trying to work on but I'm not going to lie, I'm struggling. His teacher said because of this, he's missing out on a lot of the instructions in class hence, the disconnect.

So I reached out to her again this week to see what we can work on in the summer, hoping to catch him up. I also expressed my concerns if it will be enough. She suggested getting a tutor (which I already did) but she then proceeded to say she doubts that would completely catch him up. I just feel like that was a punch to the gut. Like is there anything we are doing going to be enough?

My six-year-old daughter is about to finish kindergarten and she has throughout the year struggled having steady friends.

She is a very social and happy, loving kid. She is good friends with my friends’ kids, I have observed her behavior with them. She’s one of the highest scorers in the class and is doing very good academically. She’s my only kid.

She has reported to me several times through out the year that during the recess time, none of the girls play with her. They all have besties, but she doesn’t have one and she usually just plays in the sand or with the rocks alone by herself. When she asks them to play with them, they say yes and then started to ignore her during the game.

Whenever I try to bring up the topic, she gets sad and looks away. She doesn’t want to talk about it. I have to really act like I am her buddy and friend and try to get it out of her. When I spoke to her teacher, she told me that the girls may have some issues. Where sometimes these girls do not get along because my daughter gets rude when she’s angry and so they quarrel sometimes. The teacher said she doesn’t hit anyone or doesn’t use bad words, but get mopey when angry.

She doesn’t have a lot of friends in the neighborhood because we don’t have many kids here that are her age.

How should I handle the situation? How should I teach her to deal with it?

Hi everyone!

I'm a parent, and like many of you, bedtime used to be really difficult in our house. Some nights, my little one (now 5) would take 1–2 hours to finally fall asleep, which honestly became exhausting after long days.

I started experimenting with making calming audio stories to help make bedtime a bit more peaceful and consistent.

One of the characters I created is "Luna the Dream Fox" — she gently guides kids through simple bedtime adventures, with little elements of breathing, emotions, courage, and mindfulness.

To my surprise, it actually started helping. My child now looks forward to "story time" and falls asleep much faster than before. It's also made me feel better about how we wind down at night.

Right now, I'm still in the early stage of figuring out whether this is just something that works for my own child or if it could actually help other families too.

A few questions for you:

1. Do you deal with bedtime struggles? If so, what does that usually look like?

2. Would something like this be useful, or does it not really appeal to you?

3. What would make you skeptical or hesitant to try it?

I'm not trying to sell anything. Just trying to understand if this is worth developing further or if it's just a personal solution that worked for us.

Honest answers (positive or negative) are really helpful!

Not my child, but I live in the home and I've been a bit worried about what I'm noticing. I don't have kids of my own, so I want to acknowledge upfront that I might be off base here.

My 10-year-old niece lives with my husband and me, her dad, and her grandparents. She stays with her mom three weekends a month. Her dad and grandma have told me she doesn't bathe at her mom's, and she comes home with very tangled hair (it's curly).

Some things I've been noticing at home:

• She always wants someone with her upstairs and won't go up by herself.
• Her dad or grandma still bathe her. She hasn't moved toward bathing herself yet.
• Her grandmother handles most of her daily routine, brushing and braiding her hair at night, waking her up in the morning, helping her dress, and staying in the bathroom with her while she brushes her teeth and gets ready. She needs to be witnessed and walked through getting ready, lots of hand-holding.
• She isn't asked to do any chores or tidy up after herself, and her belongings pile up around the house (couches, floor, kitchen table) for days or weeks.
• She's starting to hit that tween stage and has been snarky with the adults lately, including some swearing. I know this can be normal but I haven't heard any corrections for the swears.
• Her dad doesn't work and plays video games most of the day. He does help with her, but when grandma is around he comes across more like a secondary parent figure than the primary one.

The good news is she's doing well in school. I've tried doing little "girl class" sessions with her, making hair brushing fun, offering to teach her French braiding, introducing skincare, and she enjoys the time together, though the hair brushing habit hasn't quite stuck yet.

I've only been living here about 8 months, and I really do know I'm not her parent. But her uncle (my husband) and I both care about her a lot and want to help her build some independence as she grows. Has anyone been in a similar spot? How do you gently encourage independence without stepping on toes?

Edit: She does not have any known mental health conditions or traumas. She's a pretty normal kid otherwise and does well outside the house. Without doxxing myself I am a resident physician and my husband works with children that have developmental disabilities.

I’m going to say something controversial as a parent, and I need to know if anyone else secretly feels this way.

I genuinely think kids today are overstimulated by EVERYTHING!!!!!!

Every toy lights up
Every show is loud
Every app is fast-paced
Every activity has to be “engaging” 24/7

And I honestly think it’s making it harder for kids to just… sit with boredom and use their imagination.

Maybe I’m becoming old or annoying already, but some of my kids’ favorite moments have happened when they had absolutely nothing to do and were forced to figure it out themselves.

Curious if other parents feel this way or if I’m just yelling at clouds now.

My 2.5 year old, who is in day care, sucks his thumb. He also gets sicks all the time, which gets me sick. I mean like constant runny nose, fever maybe once a month, ear infections every 5 months, etc.

Is this simply a day care thing or is it because he sucks his thumb in a daycare setting?

What might be good ways to get him to stop? He sucked his thumb in utero so its been challenge to get his to stop. So far we tried to tell him "yukky thumb" which has helped but not eliminated.

We are bouncing around between hot humid and rainy cold weather here in Ontario, and it's driving my kids a little bonkers. They want to get outside, and 50% of the time it's just not possible, and after a blistering week of lots of outdoor play... they are bereft. Best ways to keep my kids busy when they are cooped up?

Mine say “watch this” before doing absolutely everything.

Jumping off the couch? “watch this.”
Drawing a circle? “watch this.”
Running into the room dramatically for no reason? Also “watch this.”

I hear it at least 50-100 times a day and somehow I still look every single time like it’s going to be something groundbreaking or also probably to look out if they fall or something.

Im going a lil crazy with this but also they're so cute i cant help but look haha