Why does the child sleep on the floor? Psychologist's answer
How often, while reading forums, do you come across messages from mothers that after three years the problem resolves itself? Often. Here's why: by falling on the floor at home or in public, the baby expresses his protest to his parents. This is a peculiar manifestation of hysteria, perhaps not even accompanied by screams or crying at night. Most likely, the child is waiting for someone to find him and fuss around him, but without waiting and due to his age, he falls asleep on his own. Such a protest has a psychological background, which for everyone consists of many situations in the past and present. Only parents or close people can unravel the true reason for this behavior of the baby. At one or two years of age - generally at this time the child likes to sleep on the floor - the child is not yet able to express his emotions in words and actively shows his anger through actions. After three years, kids learn to control their emotions , and such incidents become rare.
If you want to check whether this is true specifically for your case or not, then take a closer look at your child. Have you ever had a child fall to the floor during whims and tantrums? This can happen completely silently. My two-year-old daughter, for example, when she doesn’t want to come home from a walk or leave a store, lies down on the floor in the entrance or on the threshold of a shopping center in absolutely silence . Until I received a consultation from a neurologist, I had no idea that this was hysteria. I checked her like this: when she once again went to sleep on the floor, I went into another room, as if not noticing her. My daughter got up, looked at me, looked at me carefully, came back and defiantly lay down on the floor again. It became clear to me that I was being trained. But at least I understood the reasons. After all, it’s easier to influence the situation this way.
LOW BEDS: WHY DO CHILDREN SLEEP ON THE FLOOR?
You won't find traditional cribs in Montessori kindergartens and schools. Usually children sleep either on low beds or on special napmat mattresses, which in Russia are called nepmats. In any case, whether it is a crib or a napmat, the child sleeps quite low, one might say, almost on the floor. Some parents worry about the lack of "normal" beds. It would seem that it would be easier to buy ordinary cribs for a kindergarten or school, sold in any store, and arrange them in neat rows. It’s definitely no more expensive than making low beds to order or purchasing napmats abroad. And certainly these beds will not raise any questions from parents. But what are Montessori teachers guided by?
The main principle of Montessori pedagogy is respect for the child in every sense. Respect for his personality, for his interests, for his physiology. That is why in Montessori classrooms all household items correspond to the child’s growth. We will not find a hanger that the child needs to reach or a sink that the child must stand on a chair to use. Children can independently use what is intended for them. This applies not only to children's institutions, but also to homes in which the space is arranged in accordance with the principles of Maria Montessori. In this case, an ordinary (high) crib is a departure from the ideas of Montessori pedagogy. The child cannot climb onto a high bed on his own; when he wakes up, he cannot get out of bed on his own (especially if the bed has high sides). Then the child can no longer do on his own what he could do on his own. And this is a violation of Montessori principles in action. The child becomes completely dependent on adults. When he wakes up, he must shout to his parents to come to him. While from a low bed a child can get up on his own and come to mom (dad).
The height of the bed is not only important in the context of independence. Where did high beds come from anyway? As you know, previously in Russia, babies slept in cradles that hung in the middle of the room, quite high from the ground. The babies did not sleep on the floor. Why is this so? Rats were a big problem. Naturally, they could harm a child sleeping low. Moreover, the rats actively ran not only along the floor, but also along the walls of the house. The only effective way to protect the child was to hang the cradle so that the rats could not reach him. Another reason was the extremely inadequate heating system. A house that was heated in the evening often cooled down by morning. And heat, as you know, rises. Those. It was simply cold to sleep on the floor or low bed. By the way, adults also preferred to sleep higher from the ground (on a stove, on a high bed) precisely for the same reasons. Now, you see, there are no such problems. We live in nice, warm houses and we are not bothered by rats. Sometimes parents talk about low beds being unhygienic. Of course, if a child lives in a house where the floor is usually dirty, then a high bed is justified. If the house is kept clean, then this argument is untenable. Children sit on the floor, sometimes lie, crawl. Sleeping low to the floor is not unhygienic.
Simple high beds have some disadvantages that cannot be ignored. Typically, children's beds are made the same height as adults. But if for an adult this height is maximum up to the knee, then for a child it can be waist-deep and even higher. And following the principles of Maria Montessori, now let's apply this height to ourselves. Maria Montessori gives us vivid images in her works. Imagine that in order to eat, you need to climb onto a huge chair and sit at a huge table, while your chin will touch the table and you will have to raise your hands high to use a spoon. And in order to use the toilet, you need to climb onto a side chair and sit on a huge toilet, the size of which is so daunting that you are afraid of falling into it. Are you ready to sleep on a bed so high that it’s up to your waist? Will you feel comfortable lying on it? I think it will be easy for you to answer if you describe your sensations and feelings that you experience while lying on the top bunk on the train. Usually adults try to buy a ticket to the bottom bunk and often say that they slept quite restlessly. Because sleeping high off the ground is not very pleasant, and sometimes scary. A child who sleeps high off the ground may experience similar feelings. In this sense, cribs with sides provide some protection (but do not forget that they limit the independence and activity of the child). However, a bed with a high side is not suitable for a child 3-4 years old in height, and a large child who is put into bed and taken out by his parents looks strange. At some point, the child, of course, can learn to climb in and out of high sides, but this, by the way, is quite unsafe. This is why three-year-old children are usually moved to regular beds. This is where problems often begin. The child avoids sleeping in his own bed with all his might and runs to his parents’ bed. Why? It's calmer there. There he sleeps between mom and dad (or against the wall or on the edge, but the parent holds him with his hand). All this is safety for the child. In this case, the risk of falling out of bed is minimal. But it’s quite easy to fall out of your own bed. Which child has never fallen out of bed? Are there any? Don't think. But it’s quite scary to fall on a hard, cold floor on a dark night... Having fallen, children often get very scared, cry, and call their parents. But you won’t be able to fall from a low bed. Even if the child rolls to the floor, fear is unlikely. The child will simply climb onto the bed or continue to sleep on the floor. In any case, this situation is more comfortable than experiencing fear when falling.
Of course, each parent will choose a crib for their child. Large or small, high or low, with or without sides. Just when choosing, try to put yourself in the place of the child who will use this bed. Maybe this will help you in your choice.
What do neurologists say?
There is an opinion that if a child sleeps on the floor, then there is a subtext to this from a neurological point of view. First, the child lies quietly and peacefully on the floor, then he throws a public tantrum and falls down, and then all this can result in epilepsy . Is it so? Here neurologists differed in their diagnoses. As do mothers, most of whom claim that their children did not experience any epileptic seizures after the “fall” period.
However, neurologists strongly recommend not to indulge the whims of children who achieve their goals in such an extravagant way. It is important to gather your willpower, even if hundreds of eyes of passers-by are looking at you, and try to quickly switch the child’s attention to something else. The hysteria continues as long as the little actor has an audience - that is, mom or dad. Remember this and don't pay attention to it . Everything will go away by itself. True, at first you will have to be patient a little. But here it is worth setting your priorities correctly - the opinion of others or the neurological health of your little one.
Why do children sleep with their butts up?
You can immediately reassure young parents if their child sleeps on all fours and his sleep lasts at least 3 hours, the baby is completely calm, does not change position and the mother does not jump up at night from his scream, then there is definitely no reason to worry. Most children sleep this way at night, with their butts sticking out in the air.
Many experts, observing the sleep of infants, come to the conclusion that this position is typical for well-fed infants.
In general, pediatricians do not pay much attention to how newborn babies sleep, but psychologists believe that sleep positions can say a lot about the baby.
From a psychological point of view, each position is interpreted completely differently; it speaks about the future character of the child.
Babies sleeping on all fours demonstrate that when they grow up, they will obey circumstances, become dependent on their parents, and will be insecure people. Later, children move from this position to sleep on their side, which, from a psychological point of view, means peace and complaisance. Some psychologists, on the contrary, believe that when a baby sleeps on his stomach, this indicates a stubborn character, and that in the future such a person will take everything by storm.
If we talk about health, then the butt-up pose has many advantages for the baby:
- when the baby sleeps on his stomach, with his legs tucked under him, gas flows better, therefore, he is not tormented by intestinal colic. In this position, a natural massage of the abdomen occurs, which has a positive effect on the functioning of the gastrointestinal tract;
- Also, this pose is perfect for the correct development of the hip joints of the baby;
- some experts who observe newborns come to the conclusion that children sleeping on all fours begin to hold their heads up faster than other children;
- Even in this position, the mother does not need to worry that her baby may burp, as he will definitely not choke.
How do other families cope with this?
In most families, parents do not know how to get their child to stop crawling out of the crib and go to sleep on the floor. They simply do the following:
- cotton blankets around the entire perimeter of the bedroom so that the child does not freeze at night;
- if parents and children sleep in the same room, then install a lock on the bedroom door so that the baby does not go out and fall asleep, for example, on bare linoleum or laminate flooring, for example;
- Some people install a fence on the door instead of a lock - if they sleep in different rooms;
- and some even have two fences – one on top of the other, since small “skippers” manage to climb over one fence.
There is another long and tedious method : at first you need to roughly calculate the time when your baby arranges the “Shawshank Redemption”, sits next to the crib and when he tries to escape, return him to the crib. Every day you need to sit further and further away from the crib until you find yourself outside the child’s bedroom door. From there you need to return the child to his place by voice. So the baby will understand that attempts are useless and will leave his whims. In my opinion, complete nonsense. Especially if you have twins and you already get enough.
What about us?
Such bad luck happened to us with Margot. This little “little devil” swings his leg at the bars and, like a boy, jumps over them, like over a fence. Now it happens that we find her sleeping at night in our bed, or more often on the cold floor. It is impossible to always be on the alert - I think the mothers and fathers of twins will understand me, especially since our “landing force” lands very quietly and in the pre-dawn twilight, when the “enemy’s” sleep is deepest. Every time our daughter crawls out of the crib and falls asleep on the floor, we are very worried . As soon as the baby is found on the floor in the morning, a mouse fuss begins in the apartment: dad runs to the pharmacy for Viferon, and I start massaging my daughter’s large muscles to warm her up. I smear my feet with turpentine ointment and wrap them in a blanket. I infuse chamomile tea and then drink it with a warm solution throughout the day.
Surprisingly, Radmilochka is calm in this regard. We have not yet discovered any extremist inclinations in her. In the morning she gets up and calmly waits for someone to help her get out. The other day, dad removed some twigs from her crib and made a hole for her, so she doesn’t use it at night. Only during daytime sleep. Very conscientious little one)
My decision
Of course, sleeping half-heartedly is exhausting, and we will fight it. I'm going to implement a " no spectator, no hysteria " policy and see what happens. Whether I succeeded or not, I’ll post here later.
I hope my article helped you. If you have your own suggestions on how to wean your child from sleeping on the floor , falling on the floor in hysterics and getting out of the crib at night, write in the comments. Beaver everyone) Return to main page Return to section
What are the dangers of sleeping on all fours?
However, sleeping with your butt up can also be dangerous. The fact is that it is in this position that the baby’s risk of sudden death syndrome increases. This phenomenon is the most common cause of death in children under one year of age; it is believed that every 3rd infant who died died from this syndrome. Fact: upon autopsy, such children do not find any damage or abnormalities in the functioning of the body.
Causes that lead to sudden death syndrome:
- the child sleeps on his stomach;
- the air in the room is too dry;
- boys are susceptible to this syndrome;
- it affects children under 3 months of age (less often up to 6 months);
- parents smoke;
- mattress too soft;
- nasal congestion in a baby.
