Looking for tips . . . 2 year old and getting dressed!

[AllesAusLiebe]

Hi everyone,
My DS has recently just turned 2 and has always been quite difficult.

I thought that we were turning a corner in terms of his behaviour recently, but without fail, every morning it is a battle to get him dressed.

I feel ridiculous saying this - I'm 36, he's 2. Every morning I have to almost physically restrain him to get his clothes on. Is this normal? Does anyone have any tips as to how this situation could be made easier?

I've tried encouraging him to try and get himself ready because generally he's better when he's able to take charge of his own stuff but he shows no interest in doing this himself. I've also tried giving him little choices like which t shirt he puts on, for example, but he chooses one thing and then changes his mind and has a meltdown because by this point, he's already dressed.

I'm worried that this is becoming habitual. I try and talk to him all the time and what is worrying me is that even when he knows where we're going and wants to go there, he still battles with me.

I'm really losing patience with this one, so would be grateful for any good tips.

[AllesAusLiebe]

. . . Also, I'm interested to know if there is no solution and its simply just yet another 'phase'. Even if I know that there's nothing I can do to make things easier, it'll be helpful to know that it'll pass and I'm not alone.

[letsmaketea]

Things that helped us were:
Giving a choice of two ('are you going to wear the blue t-shirt, or the red t-shirt?'),
Making it into a game such as pretending the feet have disappeared in the trousers, being relieved when the feet emerge out of the bottom of the legs etc,
Strong statements ('it's time to put your trousers on. Are you going to do it, or shall I do it for you?'),
As a last resort, the good old count to three technique ('I'm going to count to three, and when I get to three, you will put your socks on').

Not all at the same time! These had various levels of success. I started to get a feeling for which was most likely to be successful given the situation.

[RosesandPumpkins]

Yep. Totally normal. It is a phase. My 3 yo is now much more compliant.
I’ve also had phases of always wearing socks/tights in the height of summer. No socks/tights in the depths of winter. Etc etc

You could try letting your DC pick out their outfit. Or give a choice of two if they’re likely to pick something completely unsuitable.
Then try a reward chart. But start small and manageable eg they put their own socks on and build it up.

[Mylittlepony374]

The only way to get my 2 year old into clothes is to put Blippi on YouTube.
No amount of encouragement, cajoling, bribery will work for him. I've held him down and put his leggings on before- he just takes them right back off.
So I put Blippi on every. fucking. morning. I know all his "songs". Before kids I was a world leader in smug judgement of people whose kids had a lot of screen time. So I think Blippi is my punishment for being such a dick 😂.

[AnnaMagnani]

Supernanny did a brilliant episode on this. Gave a choice of 2 so looks like a choice but essentially, you are getting dressed! And no taking out the whole wardrobe to pick between every item.

[Whereland]

Not sure if it will work for you but I distract him by telling him some totally made up dramatic story while I do it - "OH my goodness did I tell you what happened this morning- there was a HUGE fire truck outside and guess what happened then"- big dramatic voice and he's usually enthralled and doesn't notice that I'm dressing him

[DaisyandRoses]

We have this issue. If we’re not going anywhere I just let her wear pyjamas.

Otherwise, I put her favourite TV on just before we’re about to go somewhere and she’s distracted enough to let me dress her!

[Disappointedkoala]

Choice is useful - we do a countdown timer on YouTube and so DD has 5 minutes to get washed, brushed teeth and get dressed. We're a very competitive household so it works we for us!

[AllesAusLiebe]

Thanks soooo much for these ideas! I'm really grateful for the help.

I'll definitely give the reward chart a try - I've been thinking about doing this for putting toys away, nappy changes (also a nightmare) and brushing teeth.

I love the idea of the story telling, too. I'll give that a go tomorrow morning and see how it goes. You know, that might work. He generally responds quite well to distraction so you never know. I just didn't think of it because on a morning, I'm usually pretty time aware and need to get things moving quickly.

Also like the idea of counting to three. We've started counting a lot lately and he joins in.

Will also give the Supernanny episode a watch.

Aaaaand, if all that fails, yes I could try YouTube! I didn't know you could set it to a timer. The reason I banned YouTube in this house was because he watched far too much during the lockdown and it always resulted in a screaming fit when I turned it off. If it goes off automatically, that might work.

Thanks again everyone.

[Abouttimemum]

This has been very helpful for me, DS is 18 months and we appear to be coming into this phase, although he doesn’t really understand choice yet. Tonight he refused to put his pyjama top on and was trying to get in his sleeping bag naked. I had to basically pin him down. Then a few moments later he’s looking at me all red and sweaty wondering what all the fuss is about. They’re so unreasonable 🤣

[FizzingWhizzbee123]

God we went through this. What a battle! We tried clothing choices, you do it/or me etc. He wasn’t interested. He just didn’t want to comply. We just battled through it for a bit and it got better with time. Just before 3, he developed the dexterity to mostly dress himself and that helped.