Help!! I don't think I'm a very big fan of this age. (Just want to make sure you know I'm still a huge fan of my son! :) ) Since Christmas Trey has started saying mine to everything. He even says that outside is his or "mine". I have bruises on my legs from him biting me and he even broke skin on my back. Today he threw a softball right on my toe. OUCH!! and slapped me across the face. He doesn't do it when he is mad at me he'll just randomly come up to me and bite me or slap me. After he hurts me he gives me a kiss, signs sorry and then proceeds to do it again. Timeouts are not working. Does any of this sound familiar to any of you? I am hoping so. What do I do? Please say this is a very short stage!! I've already cried twice from pain in the last two days. Never knew a toddler could be so powerful :) I would love ANY comments ya'll would like to give. (Stina, how do you discipline over there in Sweden? Clara is probably well behaved :))
This book describes how I feel very well. I think it's so cute!
You are my I LOVE YOU by Maryann K Cusimano
I am your parent; you are my child. I am your quiet place; you are my wild.
I am your calm face; you are my giggle. I am your wait; you are my wiggle.
I am your carriage ride; you are my king. I am your push; you are my swing.
I am your audience; you are my clown. I am your London Bridge; you are my falling down.
I am your carrot sticks; you are my licorice. I am your dandelion; you are my first wish.
I am your water wings; you are my deep. I am your open arms; you are my running leap.
I am your way home; you are my new path. I am your dry towel; you are my wet bath.
I am your dinner; you are my chocolate cake. I am your bedtime; you are my wide awake.
I am your finish line; you are my race. I am your praying hands; you are my saying grace.
I am your favorite book; you are my new lines. I am your night-light; you are my starshine.
I am your lullaby; you are my peekaboo. I am your good-night kiss; you are my I love you.
7 comments:
Sometimes I think you have to stand up for your Nos when you say them and be consistent and then give all the love and praise when they do the right things. That way you can nib all the naughtiness in the bud. What do I know though, my child is only going to be one.
Our car is a 2004 Honda Pilot. We bought it with 88,000 miles on it and we absolutely love it. It has so much growing room with a third seat, but still has the style of a crossover and not a minivan. It is also great in the snow.
Poor Crystal! He sounds like such a handful! I have no parenting advice yet... But I'm sure he will get past this at least some of this sooner than later. Cute book by the way!
I asked my Infants and Toddlers teacher and class. All they could come up with was that toddlers like to test their moms' patience, they are just looking for a reaction, and don't let it continue. I asked if that was normal and they said that anything is normal for a 2 year old. haha. not much help. But if it's worth anything, you have my sympathy! Love you! -Brother Ben
I second what Dani said. Time outs didn't work well for Makenna, until we found a place in the house that she hated to be. (The cold laundry room- sounds cruel but it has worked wonders.) She isn't allowed to come out of time out until she is ready to behave nicely, and say sorry. When he is doing good things, praise him like there is no tomorrow so he know attention comes from positive behavior, not negative. Don't give him the reaction he craves when he bites/hits. In fact you may not want to say anything to him except no, just stick him in time out right away.
He sure is cute! Hard to believe they can be such a pain with such adorable grins!!
Hi! Well, I don't know if we do things very differently over here.. Apart from that spanking is illegal. Remember when we talked about that in Katrineholm? I remember we had different opinions about that one. =) I could probably write a whole essay on the subject of forbidding spanking... =P
But anyways, I understand that it is hard with Trey. But it WILL be better eventually.. We actually haven't had that much trouble with Clara (on that subject..) She never just hits me, but sometimes she does other stuff..
Like this morning, I was sitting on my chair in the kitchen and she comes and wants to push me off the chair. She does that a lot. Whenever she feels like it, I guess when she wants the chair herself, she can just come and push and push until you get up. Obviously she is not allowed to do that..
It's kind of hard to tackle it. We haven't tried time outs yet. It's very common to use time outs here now, but personally I feel I don't know enough about it yet. We have to read and investigate it more before we decide to use it or not..
So for now what I do when she screams because there is something that she want's that she can't have or because I won't get off the chair is that I pick her up and hold her pretty tight and talk to her until she calms down. Because usually when these things happen there is always something else bothering her too. Like she is tired or bored or something. Then it can be really hard for a two year-old to behave well.
I listen to the way she cries. Often it sounds like she really is sad (especially when she is tired - which is not very uncommon for a girl that often refuses to take her afternoon nap) and then the hugging works well. But sometimes when she screams I can hear that she is not sad at all, just very angry (like this morning) and then hugging me might be the last thing she wants to do.. Sometimes she throws herself on the floor screaming and then I just let her lay there and complain for a while. Then I focus on keeping myself calm and talk to her gently while I keep on doing whatever I was doing before, trying not to pay that much attention to her. Usually it doesn't take very long until she has "left the anger enough" to be okay with me holding her or even suggesting it herself.
Afterwards she needs love of course and I try to talk to her about what just happen. She hasn't learned how to say sorry yet though...=) And sometimes I ask her to get something for me or tell her to put a towell in the laundry basket or some other little task like that, or I just simply say "let's go and..." as to show her everything is fine and we shouldn't dwell on it.
Something else I've learned and I believe strongly in is that when a young child is sad it's good to tell them why they are sad.. Because they haven't learned everything about their emotions yet. They haven't come in contact with every emotion before, a lot is new to them. For instance, when Clara cried this morning (yep, a lot of crying today) because she wanted something that she couldn't have (my lipgloss, she has too many on her conscience already), Mattias was holdning her and he talked gently to her and said for example "You are sad and crying because you want mommy's lipgloss and you are not allowed to have it. I understand that you are sad because you think it's fun playing with it, but you can't have it, it's mommy's." It might sound weird, but I think it's really good because it helps her understand what she is feeling and why. And it also feels really good to have something productive to say and not just "såja, såja, ta det lugnt nu.." or risking loosing your temper, becoming angry and then making everything worse. 'Cause it's not like Clara is mean or anything, she just wanted something and she couldn't understand why she couldn't have it.
Wow, this was another long comment. Maybe I should have send you an email instead. =)
But good luck tou you. I am SURE that you are an awesome mum and that Trey is a really happy boy. It will be better.. Clara aslo says "min" or "mina" about everything. It think it will take a while before they stop that.. I've heard kids are like five years old before they realize they are not the centre of the universe. =)
Puss och kram från Stina
Hi again!
I'm sorry if I didn't make myself clear. I never thought you spanked Trey. But I do remember that we talked about in on our mission, both with the elders and alone. I remember elder Simmons.. I don't remember exactly what I told him though, but I'm pretty sure I didn't say all I wanted to. =P But he ended up marrying sister Williams, right? Maybe he has changed his mind? =)
When we talked about it alone in our apartment you defended those that spanked their children not when they were angry, but when they were calm and then using something like a spatula on the child's butt. And not hard of course. I probably only remember this because that's how I learned the word "spatula". =)
I only brought up spanking because you asked for differences between SWE and US and that's the only one I could think of.. Because here it is forbidden by law. But as I said, I never thought you were a spanker and I'm convinced that you are an excellent, wonderful, loving and super fun mother to Trey. I so wish we could get together and let our kids get to know each other.
By the way, Trey looks sooo much like you on the mascara picture! I always thought he looked more like Kyle, but now I'm not so sure.. =)
Kramar till er alla!
/Stina
Post a Comment