The Terrible Twos
We’ve been dealing with a particularly difficult 2 ½ year old little one. He’s sweet as can be most of the time, but boy does he have a temper! When he doesn’t get what he wants, whatever is in his hand or within arm’s length gets thrown across the room or to the floor. On particularly bad days we’ve learned to duck.
He’s our second, so we know intellectually that this is all age appropriate behavior, but you can forget that sometimes when a bowl of oatmeal hits the floor :). So, I recently did some research on how to deal with the terrible twos and some of the most common recommendations I encountered were:
- Be understanding / empathetic with your child
- Acknowledge their motives
- Think like your toddler
- Set Limits / Boundaries
- Reinforce Good Behavior
- Empower your child by letting them make age appropriate decisions.
- Don’t expect your child to act rationally
- Be Silly
- Remove emotion / Act like a robot
- Use time-outs in a positive manner
Of those listed above, for me when I can remember to do it, empathizing and acting silly, seem to work best. It’s hard to step back and remember that they’re only 2 ½, but finding a way to distract them by being silly or responding unemotionally has been very effective. My wife is particularly good at distracting them.
Also, acknowledging what they want by responding stating repeating what they are demanding as forcefully as they are demanding it (“You want mommy…” “Yes…”), and then calmly explaining why they can’t have that right now works too. They understand that they are being heard.
When all else fails, the time out is an effective strategy to allow them to calm down and understand that they can’t act however they were acting. From everything I’ve read, keeping them in a time out for one minute per each year of age is what’s recommended. We’ve just started time outs with him. They worked well for our oldest.
Finally, taking a deep breath and remembering that whatever behavior is driving you absolutely crazy today, will end in a week or a month from now, helps me keep my sanity.
Good luck!
