5 Tips on How to Keep Kids Quiet with a Night Shift Spouse
"Shh, Daddy's Sleeping": How to Survive Daytime With Kids When Your Partner Works Nights
Before we dive in: grab my free 3 Keys to Knowing He’s Got Your Back training so you can drop the solo-parenting resentment and feel like a team again.
Have you ever stood in your living room at 9:30 in the morning shushing a toddler or a crying baby because your police, fire, or military partner just got home from night shift and is trying to sleep down the hall?
When his job makes him unreliable help during the day, it is so easy to feel like a single mom who's married. For the eight years my husband worked night shift, trying to keep young kids quiet inside the house left me walking on eggshells and feeling overwhelmed.
Everything got easier when I stopped waiting around the house trying to keep the kids silent and built an Independent Daily Routine that got us out the door right after breakfast, paired with Gentle Observation and Assertive Trauma Informed Communication so my husband and I could plan our family schedule as teammates. When one of my coaching clients used Assertive Trauma Informed Communication to ask her husband for help once instead of hinting or holding it in, he did the dishes and opened up to her about his shift that same week.
Here is what eight years of night shift with kids taught me, and five practical ways to make daytime sleep work for everyone.
My husband worked the past 8 years on night shift. It is a struggle. As a police officer’s wife, there are many complications that occur due to having a night shift spouse including loneliness. Another complication occurs once children arrive; how do I keep a screaming baby quiet during the day while my spouse is trying to sleep? In all honesty, it’s nearly impossible to keep children quiet during the day, but if you would like to try to help the situation, here are some ideas:
click here to see this police children’s book
Take your kids outside to make as much noise as they want if the weather is decent. Other ideas for poor weather conditions include indoor play places, community libraries, children’s museums, and other community events. Anticipate days when you know your children’s noise may be an issue and plan ahead. I like planning one activity outside the house that I’m going to do with my kids each day. I intentionally plan this activity to be right after breakfast time. You may want to draw pictures of these activities on a whiteboard family calendar (like this calendar that I love), so you’re kids can look forward to the fun activities as well.
Accept that kids will be kids. Thus, try to make your husband as comfortable as possible to sleep with the following tips:
Get a box fan, which is the best white noise machine, for your spouse. Other white noise machines are not quite as loud as a traditional box fan. Box fans work wonders for white noise machines for babies too!
Get your husband ear plugs. Ear plugs may be uncomfortable but losing sleep is worse. See if your police spouse is willing to wear ear plugs.
Put up black-out curtains in your bedroom. Black-out curtains can help your spouse to feel like it’s time for his body to sleep during the day.
If you struggle with sleeping during the night when your spouse is working, check out this blog for police wife sleeping tips.
Picture this:
Right after breakfast, you and the kids head out for a planned morning activity on your Independent Daily Routine instead of tiptoeing around the house.
Your kids check the family whiteboard calendar and look forward to the day's adventure while their dad sleeps soundly with his box fan and blackout curtains.
When he wakes up, you use Gentle Observation to see where his energy is at before jumping into household logistics.
You use Assertive Trauma Informed Communication to ask once for what you need on his days off, and he gladly steps in.
You no longer feel like a single mom who's married, because you both have each other's back.
You don't have to walk on eggshells all day when your partner works night shift. Start with my free 3 Keys to Knowing He’s Got Your Back training.
Listen: more on night shift and solo parenting in police, fire, or military life on the heelsandholster podcast
Check out my other police wife motherhood blogs:
Fun Families Activities for Solo Parenting Days- Free Printable
How to Thrive with Solo Parenting as a Police Wife
Parenting Children of Police Officers
