What did you find harder? Parenting a toddler, or parenting a teen?

[Toooldhmm]

Just that really!

Not sure what the teen years will be like. But the twos and threes (while lovely) have been one big emotional rollercoaster! Lack of sleep, lots of tantrums, and so on

Teens are harder than toddlers.

Last night I was up until 12:30 looking out of the window waiting for him to come home in high winds. When he was a toddler, if he woke you just put him in my bed and we went back to sleep. Collecting from parties is also quite tiring, and can be stressful, but thankfully not often. Anyone who's got a teen through GCSEs and the prom and the after party am has achieved something great and probably a few grey hairs.

Oh, and they're bloody expensive.

The later primary years are a doddle in comparison.

Don't whatever you do have both at the same time.
I did. My face aged 20 years in 5 actual years.

Definitely the teenage years are more difficult 😔

Definitely easier with a teen - although I only have the one. Toddler years: the guilt of long nursery days, getting home/fed/story/bed, hoping she'd sleep until morning, holiday clubs. The teen years by comparison were very easy and we worked as a team.

I have both. They are both awful! The toddler is relentless however she goes to bed at 6.30.

The teen is a nightmare, i am currently covered in massive bruises from where he kicked me when i took his playstation away.

My name says it all

Teenagers were far far harder for me. A million times harder. They were very easy babies and pre teens though.

Teenagers, a million times over.

It's like comparing carrots and peas; they're both veg but aside from that they've nothing in common.

DS1 is in his teens and so far is a lovely kid. He's ignorant at times, and selfish on occasion, but he's also just a lovely human being and that is still his strongest feature. DS2 is younger but I am convinced he'll put us through the wringer as a teen as he's just feral.

Whoever said teens are mentally tougher and toddlers are physically tougher has it spot on.

You worry in a different way about teens, for sure, and there are far more challenges for them to face (social life, hormonal emotions, exams etc) and that can be exhausting.

But so far I prefer the teen stage a million times over to the toddler one. Toddlers are just relentless.

I really hope teenagers are easier. Hated the toddler years. The sheer relentlessness of it - you need to pop to the shops for 1 minute but it’s impossible as you can’t leave the toddler alone for even a second.
I felt trapped for a lot of the toddler years. Have a feeling dd is going to make a spectacularly tricky teen though.

Neither that hard so far, but my eldest is 14 and my youngest 11, so there's plenty of time for teenage troubles yet. Mine were fairly easy as toddlers go. They both had a slightly stroppy pre-teen patch, but nothing too terrible!

Teen every time x 200

Toddler without a doubt

Parenting a teen is hands down harder than dealing with Toddler Tantrums.

I think it depends on the children and on your own personality and circumstances. Mine were good sleepers but I was a SAHM and had no family help at all and had a small age gap so the toddler years were not easy and we didn't go out as a couple for years but I coped and I quite enjoyed that stage. As others have said the teenage years are physically easier and you get time to yourself but it can be emotionally much harder, you are not in control, the issues can be very serious. My son wasn't a difficult teen but my daughter was a nightmare from 12 to 19, and I was menopausal so not the best mix!

Teens.
You can’t kiss it better. You can’t actually solve a lot of their problems.
You need to learn to let go when your instincts say hold on.
You feel your child doesn’t like you.
Your child actually doesn’t like you!
You don’t like your child.
You worry, constantly.

Toddler. No question.

Toddlers were so much tougher.

Exactly @Isadora2007

Am parenting a teen DS15 with newly diagnosed ASD andADD a whole different ball game! It's like a war zone. Teen DD14 still hard work but I can sort of reason with her. DS7 is lovely he still loves me!

Having toddlers was hard for me.

I enjoyed parenting teens, that was easy and fun.

'Parenting' young adults however, with the support they still need at times, well I really was not expecting it to be as difficult as it can be. I am emotionally wrung out at times.

You can generally easily placate a toddler. You can’t magic away depression, self harming, eating disorders, drug use, friendship issues, exam stress etc (I haven’t dealt with all of these but some

Ahh you see like I said in PP everyone is different.

My toddlers were not easily placated at all, one of them, once in tantrum it could last for hours and we had holes kicked in doors, stair spindles regularly kicked out. This carried on into reception age(although not at school just home) we fought for ages to to get him assessed for autism.

oh I can't even bear to think about those years with too under 5 year olds. We had no family around no support and as other have said didn't get to go out as a couple for years, it.was.relentless.

As teens we've dealt with depression and Anxiety, self harming, anger issues, been through CAMHS, private counselling, Friendship issues, Exam pressure, bullying.

All of the teen stuff although bigger I could cope with better, because I had time to myself to recoup and tackle each problem fresh faced rather then a shadow of myself I was when they were toddlers. Plus the teens are great company and funny.

I think I’ve been lucky so far with the teen, reading the lists, touch wood fingers crossed.