Last night, my 2.5 year old son threw a tantrum the likes of which we’d never experienced with him. Ever. From around 7:00 PM when we tried to start his bedtime routine, until 8:05 PM when he finally settled down while his daddy read him a book, he raged. He jumped up and down. He stomped his feet, threw himself on the floor, screamed and yelled and just lost it.

Poor little guy. Being 2.5 is hard (and so, sometimes, is being his parent).

Perhaps you’ll find it helpful to do your own troubleshooting if I take you through mine, then, because I certainly appreciate insight into how other parents go about parenting.

First, I ask myself, what has changed? We’ve had a few weeks of upheaval, first with an overnight visit to the hospital that threw off the week, then a short school week plus time change, then a trip out of town to stay with his grandparents sans parents plus a time zone change, and now home.

How do I think he experienced that change? Well, he’s had different people with different routines in different homes across different time zones, all of whom love him and want to do our best for him, which also means we’re adjusting as we go. To my toddler, that means when we say something, it’s up for debate. Time for bed? We’ll see about that!

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What does all that mean in his mind, then? I’m guessing he thinks it means he’s in control. My guy is very verbal these days — and very opinionated — so it’s been helpful for the adults to ask him about things big and small as we’ve all transitioned back and forth. Do you want apple juice or milk? Dino undies or blue undies? Two shirts or a jacket? Despite general guidance that providing a couple of acceptable choices to toddlers helps them feel in control and thus not tantrum, with all of the other variability going on, I suspect it’s just given him an elevated sense of his own power. Dude is too big for his britches!

I also think his sudden increases in language have led us to expect more of him than his age permits. Rather than speak in simple, direct sentences, I noticed my husband has been offering long, complicated paragraphs. I also find that I’m more willing to “talk through” something with him than before, which I also attribute to his recent language leaps, but are inappropriate for his age.

So how do we adjust? In our family, we value independence, choice, and a bit of flexibility, but tend to offer too much of the latter before having to adjust, so finding we need to be more structured isn’t a surprise, unfortunately. Because I worry about over-correcting and do want to continue to have my husband and I manage different parts of our nightly routine, simplicity and a minimal but consistent structure seem to be the way to go.

Here’s my plan:

A routine chart. Though my son is a bit young to follow one by himself, a visual reminder of our no-question steps will help my husband and me stay consistent. Eventually our son can follow the chart on his own, something I suspect he’ll really enjoy.

Printable Bedtime Routine

7:00 Start! Start bath, Go potty

7:15 Get in bath

7:30 Pajamas

7:45 Book

8:00 Lights out!

Defined times for each step. Though we prefer to be less strict about watching the clock, until we all adjust, we’ll need an external timing cadence, so 15 minute intervals it shall be.

A nightly pre-ritual pow-wow with my husband. Once upon a time I would have had us each pick which step we’d always do so we wouldn’t step on each other, but to preserve our ability to trade off, instead we’ll decide each night who will do which step(s).

Bridge transitions with antecedents. For kids (and adults!) who struggle with transitions, antecedents (things that come before) can be really helpful. For a toddler who likes to be helpful, having an object he can carry from one room to another helps him get there, so we might ask him to find a towel and carry it from his room to the bathroom to get started on step one. Once he’s undressed to potty, we could ask him to put his bath boat in the tub, then follow it in. To get out of the bath, we usually ask him if he wants to put toothpaste on his toothbrush himself.

-> Towel, pajamas to bathroom

7:00 Start! Start bath, Go potty

-> Boat into tub, follow it in

7:15 Get in bath

-> Toothpaste on toothbrush, me or you?

7:30 Pajamas

-> Pick two books from the bookshelf

7:45 Book

-> Let’s put teddy in bed, and you go too!

8:00 Lights out!

Add some fun. The bedtime routine has become really stressful and fraught with emotion, so we’ll need to make it fun again. Maybe we can dance our way into the bathroom to start the tub, or sing songs and dance between potty and bath (naked!… him, not us), or put pajamas on teddy and puppy first, or… something, anything to make this less dreadful.

There you go. Had I not been typing, I could have done this in about ten minutes of brainstorming and planning. With typing, it took me 20 minutes, time spent well if tonight’s bedtime sucks less than last night’s.

Was this helpful? Do you have suggestions for making bedtime routines less challenging with a toddler?