002: Rebekah Sleeps Sitting Up, Ryan Gets TONS of Sleep!

01/16/19 • 21 min

Ryan asks Rebekah, “How do you get through the day when you are very tired? “

Rebekah talks about how sleep deprivation is blowing up her world right now and not in a good way. It’s been going on for a long time since she is nursing our youngest Ari.

Ari grew out of the co-sleeper bed and we live in a one bedroom apartment with two kids who sleep in the room with us. Liam has a toddler bed in the corner, and we set up a pack and play for Ari, but he will not sleep in it. So Rebekah holds the baby all night in bed. She has worked it out so he fits in a good spot, but she ends up sleeping sitting up. She is getting out of that stage and things are getting better.

When Liam was a baby, it was a whole different story. We had a traumatic birth which prevented Rebekah from being able to nurse him. Ryan ended up sharing the feeding responsibilities which formed a special bond with Ryan and Liam. For a long time, he only wanted Ryan to put him to bed at night.

Now since Rebekah is nursing, Ari refuses a bottle and Ryan gets TONS of sleep!

We are beginning to move into a new stage where Ari is able to eat real food! He loves those baby-food-squeeze-packs. This is allowing Ryan to start helping with feeding and Rebekah is able to get out of the house with friends...but not without feeling baby-withdrawals.

Our 3 year old savors his food, which we just realized. We share a story about how he recently got a cake pop from his Grandmother and made it last for 2 days! The other day, he was given a Starbucks card with 5 dollars on it. We let him pick out chocolate milk and pay for it himself....it was the first time he had ever had chocolate milk and it blew his mind. He would only take the tiniest sips to make it last as long as possible. He would tell us, “I need to save it for later”...

We have a feeling that Ari, is going to have the opposite relationship with food and that we may need to guard Liam’s food from him.

Rebekah shares a poop story — Our toddler playing with his poop in the shower!

Newsflash: We have successfully potty trained Liam!! We utilized bribery and hollowed candy. This has changed our lives!!! Sometimes we think things will never change or get better. But then something clicks and we move onto the next stage.

Ryan asks Rebekah, “How do you get through the day when you are very tired? “

Rebekah talks about how sleep deprivation is blowing up her world right now and not in a good way. It’s been going on for a long time since she is nursing our youngest Ari.

Now since Rebekah is nursing, Ari refuses a bottle and Ryan gets TONS of sleep!

We have a feeling that Ari, is going to have the opposite relationship with food and that we may need to guard Liam’s food from him.

Rebekah shares a poop story — Our toddler playing with his poop in the shower!

Previous Episode

001: Parent Affirmation, Kids Change Quick, & The Most Epic Poop Story

Welcome to the Good Job Mom, Good Job Dad Podcast with Ryan and Rebekah Frost. This is our first podcast episode together!

This is a podcast about parenting. Not about parenting advice. We want to share our enthusiasm of parenting.

Ryan talks about how he has to remind himself that the kids will not remain the same always as they are in this moment. Children change drastically faster than adults do. Rebekah talks about how babies change each week

Why did we choose “Good Job Mom, Good Job Dad” as a title? We tell the story about how this came to be and the roots in Hawaii where we bought a used car while our 9 month old was having a melt-down. We were affirmed as parents by the folks who sold it to us, and it left a great impression.

We talk about the struggle of being a tired parent, and glossing over real moments that our children are having. Small things to us, may be their entire world in that moment and it’s important as a parent to be patient and take the time to interact. Rebekah shares a story of being a small child with her grandmother while she let her help make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and how that left an impact on her.

We share stories of interacting with our son in the kitchen while grating cheese and victorious moments while building hot wheels tracks that took over the living room.

We finish strong with a poop story. A true horror story for Ryan. This is the one that made us feel like a true story. Waterfall diarrhea in a movie theater that got all over Ryan...its bad...poop trauma

Share your poop stories in the comments!

LINKS: http://www.runningforgracemovie.com/

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Next Episode

003: Chore Charts, Robot Karate, and Toddlers at Bedtime

The Chore Chart: a new strategy we are considering since our 3 year old gets a huge sense of accomplishment when he does something by himself.

Ryan shares about his memories of the family chore chart when he was growing up.

***Our 8 month old Ari is awake and with us, squeaking into the microphone.***

We share what Liam loves to clean up including his many different “train tracks”, Ryan puts Rebekah on the spot and has her sing the "In The Bag" clean up song that she uses to inspire Liam to clean. (See Disney's "In The Bag" here)

How do we get things to be less clutter around the house? We get Liam to help us in the cleaning.

Ryan talks about how he built a tower with Liam, who refused to let Ryan knock it down while filming in slow motion. Ryan decided to play “Robot” with Liam, and attempted to karate-chop the tower down, but Liam would take off after Ryan, shouting “No!!! No!!!!” then poke Ryan (like pressing a robot button) which stopped the Robot. Then we’d declare that “Liam Saved The Day!”

Ryan talks about how he is so tired at night and it is hard to play with the kids. He tries to engage with the kids, but gets exhausted after only a few minutes.

Rebekah talks about how exhausting it is to do simple errands during the day because she has to get both kids ready to go out.

We realized that Liam is confused and very concerned when we tell him we are “pooped”...

We talk about how our energy is not the same as it was in our 20’s...

One solution Ryan has come up with in the evenings is, owning the fact that he is tired and just picking one thing to do with Liam. Including watching some videos with him — not the best advice — but it does allow us to connect.

We discuss how Liam learning to put on his own “jammies” at night could be a game changer, because getting him dressed for bed is an exhausting endeavor.

Thought of the day from Rebekah: Give your kids something to accomplish.

Thought of the day from Ryan: Don’t judge yourself.