To be concerned

[gotroundtoit]

My DD is three and for the last six months or so, I've noticed she has started leaving one item out and placing or hiding it somewhere - it could be a character toy, a piece from a game, a piece of puzzle, a train track, a book from a book set etc. She is normally very happy, but gets extremely upset if I move the separated item. It's getting more and more frequent. Today it's now progressed to food where at lunchtime she got hugely upset when I went to throw away part of her sandwich that she wasn't eating. Tonight whilst "helping" me make spaghetti (breaking it in half), she's had a total meltdown when I went to throw a stray piece of uncooked spaghetti away as she wants to keep onto it and had deliberately separated/hidden it. Does anyone have a clue what this is about or how to manage it?

Sounds totally normal for a three year old to me. It’s called a phase. They can be odd bods!

As a friend said when my 3 yr old grandson was doing something very peculiar "3yr olds just are surreal".

Yes I agree it's normal. My dd used to cry and get so upset for example, if I halved a banana for her to eat, well in fact if anything that should be a whole was made into more than it's whole piece iyswim

Definitely sounds like a typical three year old and I really wouldn't worry. Just go along with it and let her do whatever she wants to rather than upsetting her. It'll all make sense in her little head and you'll be seen as ruining it and she probably won't understand why you don't like odd bits of things left lying around! I have a three year old DD and they're definitely odd little things.

My 3 year old collects lots of different little things and gets very upset if someone touches or moves anything.

Yesterday he cried because I cut some cheese for him and called him into the kitchen to come and get it. He didn't come for a few mminutes then came and cried and threw it on the floor because he'd forgotten to come and get it

Oh yeah it's normal.

Oh ffs.

Things not thugs.

Though tbf they are also thugs.

Google "child development schema".

They g through loads of these phases.

At 3 none of my dc would eat a biscuit unless it was completely intact. Even a tiny corner and they wanted a different one. Even if they were offered the broken bit to go with the big bit!!

At 3 years old my DS had a pet potato that went everywhere with him and he kept under his pillow when he went to bed.

I remember my three year old for some mystery tot reason didn't want anything "red" to come into contact with him in any way. That was fun.
Thankfully, yes, just a phase.

When my little boy was 3, he went through a phase of getting upset that the food he had eaten was gone and couldn’t be brought back. One memorable dinner time saw us sitting eating pizza around an unopened, uncooked pizza so he could look at a complete one. As a pp said...surreal

ShouldHave 😂😂😂😂
Glad we can laugh about it now.
My MIL says my husband when he was 6 would only eat with a knife. Cereal, pasta, soup. With a knife. For 3 months!!

That's a relief. I'll just suck it up then! Loved the pet potato!

I had this and sadly 😂 still do! For me it was separation anxiety thing. I felt sorry for the stray piece . I collected apple cores as I couldn't bear to throw them away and also because I felt sorry for not eating them!

I still get this, I hate separating something or discarding it as I worry it will feel rejected. I know I'm batshit 😂. I am normal most of the time too!

My eldest used to get attached to packaging such a crisp packets or sweet wrappers when he was three. He would scream if I chucked them out. I wouldn’t worry!

my daughter used to do a kind of wiggly dance after eating pom bears. Apparently it was so that all of the teddy bear parts could find each other again inside her tummy, because she couldn't bear the idea of them being all chewed up

For gods sake, whatever you do, don’t give her the pink plate. Even when she asks for the pink plate and has had the pink plate all week and says the pink plate is her most favouriteist.

And never. I repeat NEVER put the green lid on the yellow tommee tippie cup. It goes on the blue one.

When our girl was three, I snapped a hair bobble when putting it on her hair. She cried for half an hour. She didn’t want any of the other ten identical bobbles instead, they would not do, because the broken one was her faaaaaaaaavourite. She only stopped crying because, the miracle, oh look, I’ve managed to fix it.

dancinfeet, genius!

I went through this with DD at 3- very extreme and tedious. I was very worried because her behaviour was more intense and 'ocd' than what you're describing. She's 7 now and there's not a hint of it in her character/behaviour.
DS2 is now 3 and going through this and frankly, it's depressing me. He's been one of those kids who's ticked every single difficult phase box, so my stamina has evaporated. I find it depleting. It will pass and I can't wait... until the next phase.

Some of these are so cute and funny.
It's a phase and in her head it all makes sence I'm sure.

@monr0e, my DS had a pet potato too. When he was about five. We only discovered it by tracking down the smell of a rotting potato with creatures in it in a drawer in his room! It was the most disgusting thing I’ve ever touched in the dark. I still shudder when I remember it. He’s in his 20s now and is relatively normal, so they do grow out of it, OP

My boy was fickle. Any potato would do so when they started rotting he was happy to swap for a fresh one.

He once spent the afternoon at a friend's house rolling their potatoes across the kitchen floor like tennis balls.

He dropped one down the stairs once. There is a video of me saying "oh no, have you dropped your potato?" Not a hint of sarcasm either

My DSis and her DH have a useful saying for this: Toddlers - they’re known weirdos.

Some of these are hilarious. I'll just try to grit my teeth that no game or puzzle etc will be complete for a while. It's just infuriating when she'll hide one piece of her brother's train track etc, like we don't spend enough time looking for stuff already, without her hiding it too!