To just not really have my kids ‘ under control ‘ a lot of the time.. 3 and 5 years old

[jomek]

I don’t really know how to describe it in detail. I will try.

I just don’t know if it’s normal, or if I’m just not very good at being a mum.

But I just feel like my kids are often just NOT LISTENING to me at all.

the simplest things, become a massive thing.

like when I pick them up form school. They’re always running off, rolling around on the grass and just generally not listening. God forbid I try to have a conversation with a teacher or something, they just constantly run off. I am often left chasing after them.

it’s so embarrassing.

at home it’s similar with all sorts of stuff. The only way they ever listen is if I really shout. I hate to do it and they get upset. But they’re just running rings around me constantly. I try to get them to bed and they spend a good 10 minutes just racing around/ chasing each other laughing / running away from me.

I can’t take them anywhere by myself really as I just don’t trust them not to just wonder off. I take them to the shop after school sometimes and it’s like herding sheep. It’s all quite stressful. I just wish they’d listen.

am I expecting to much?

Sorry haven't read all the replies so probably repeating others but yes mine were like this despite me being quite a quiet reserved person. They're generally much better now, especially separately, but can still be a handful together, they just get very very silly with each other. My older one is like a Duracell bunny, just never seems to get tired.

I don't have all the answers but my suggestions:

Accept that children are different and you don't have quiet calm children. As someone else said some little kids will just sit and colour and some won't. So be realistic and avoid situations where they are expected to sit down and be quiet. I never took them out to eat except to McDonald's when they were that age, especially both together.

Pick your battles: rolling around and bouncing in an area with plenty of space - fine (even if it's embarrassing to you, believe me I've been there...). Rolling around and bouncing by a road/in the path of an unsteady elderly person= not fine.

Safety first: backpack reins for 3 year old and strict staying nearby rule for 5 year old when near roads/crossing roads.

Spend many many hours in play parks/soft play/swimming/whatever else burns off energy safely. Outdoors in all weathers. We still don't do 'quiet days at home' like some families seem to manage and my older one is 11...!

Choose what you most want to work on first and come up with a strategy for that, don't try to 'fix' everything at once.

(Sorry if I missed this somewhere but are they both boys by any chance...?)

My 3 year old likes to run off a lot, it used to be terrible but I'm just super strict now. If I say she has to walk next to me, but she runs off - she has to hold my hand. If she won't hold my hand then we go straight back to the car immediately or go home. If it's somewhere I can't go home from (like the school run) then I tell her she won't get any chocolate / TV / whatever her favourite thing is that day, and I mean it.
Unfortunately it does mean being quite brutal and following through consistently, but now they are much better as they know what will happen if they don't behave.
Of course, she's 3 so still needs reminding regularly not to run too far ahead, so it's about being realistic too. I used to use the buggy often purely for crowd control when she was smaller because I could strap her in for times when I needed the safety net. You could take a buggy and tell them if they don't stay with you, they'll get strapped in the buggy!
Just start being consistent and follow through with consequences.

If you can take one kid out at a time and just practice the basics. So go to yhe shop and they either have to hold your hand, hold the trolley or stay close. Don't actually go for a real purpose, go as a training exercise. Then eventually do it with both kids when they both understand the expectations.
Before getting out of the car I ask my two the question, 'what do we need to do to be successful?' Taken time to get them to give me the answers but repetition works.
If either of my two don't listen, then they have to hold my hand, no option, no conversation, taken straight back to the car/house on the school run.
While walking out of school I have points they can run to safely, they birst out of school with so much energy! So our school has two gates, they have to stop at the first gate and wait for me to catch up, then second gate, then tree. Cross the road and then to each tree down the road type of thing. Sometimes they need guidance like be a dinosaur, who can be the fastest, walk backwards (slows them down), crab walking. Eldest is 6 with adhd, so I need to focus his energy or it is mayhem!
I still have so many doubts and I swear my kids seem 'more' than any of the others. But I now remind myself that these rebellious, energetic balls of crazy will work to their benefit in the real world... I'll suffer a bit longer and try not to knock it out of them haha!

A lot of this is true. You had said you apologised when you shouted? Yes later on I would explain why I shouted but you need to feel in charge here. You don't have to be their friend all the time, not at this age. Sometimes you just lay down the law and that's it. Whatever you say is what everyone does..if not have some consequences... go home/no icecream/no tablet or tv. Whatever it takes.

I’m not surprised they’re on the wild side. They’re 3 and 5 and no doubt razzing each other up all the time! The 5 year old is probably acting sillier because he has a younger sibling too.
Anyway all you can do is be really firm
about your expectations and start punishing them for pissing around. The penny will drop but you have to be really consistent and really quite strict to get them to learn and comply

"tonight my 5 year old said I’m ’hurting Her feelings’ because I shouted."

Oh that's a shame - you hurt my feelings when you were rolling about on the grass and not listening.

Wow you sound full of hate. Unruly I would give you, but spiteful? Where has OP or anyone given information that could lead you to call such young children spiteful?

Yes, @MyOliveHelper is just enjoying being dramatic (and not very nice).

Of course children can be very spiteful. You’ve never seen a young child poke or push a pet or sibling? They have very little empathy, big frustrations and a need to test boundaries. Of course they can be deliberately peevish. There are generations of children’s literature that characatures it!

Eek. OP came here being vulnerable and asking for advice. You've given her advice from a very particular school of parenting - which people here may or may not agree with - but fair enough, she specifically asked for advice and you gave it.

However, the tone in which you've dispensed your wisdom has been incredibly belittling. And in several of your responses, you've implied (on the basis of precious little) that parents have monumentally failed their children by not being strict enough by age 3, and will be lucky to claw it back now.

There is a certain "brand" of midwife who treats their vulnerable patients just like that - making them feel like they've failed as a mother even before they've started. Perhaps you're kind and supportive at work. But it's ever so tempting to join the dots here...

This is what I would have said, my two boys of a similar age are exactly the same at home. Luckily not so bad out and about but more so on the school run where they feel quite secure. I don’t think you have done anything wrong, or anything is wrong with them. They are lively, young kids. It is what it is. They will be ok. The strategies suggested above are what I would go with. Like I said, mine are better in public so we go out lots and I do have a ‘I really mean this mode’ where I will be very stern in public and stop whatever is happening and call them out on whatever is going on. However at home it’s a different picture. They get super hyped up where their reasonable mind has just left the building and they are just very loud and silly. Usually we go outside, have a bath or I wait til they pass through the other side into tears mode. Not recommending as best practice 😂😭

This sounds kinda like my normal.

I've lost count of the times people have said to me 'they're a handful'!

My two are 2 and 5 and it's like having two crazy puppies. In the supermarket I put one in the trolley and my 5 year old does follow us around at least because he doesn't like to be separated.

Some days all I feel I do is nag at them but I know this is age related / they have tons of energy / them bouncing off each other.

I just expect life to be what I'd call 'messy' at this stage and age & I just try to focus on bad behaviour rather than general crazy. Although it does frazzle and test you doesn't it.

Not relevant to the OP’s children but I hate to say my friends DD definitely showed signs of spite at age 3. One particular incident I remember she had my sunglasses and was playing with them and bending them a little and I asked for them back, clearly telling her that bending would break them. She looked me dead in the eye, bent them right back, snapped them in half and laughed in my face. I was gobsmacked. Another time I was with my young DD in the park and friends DD was spinning her around on a spinner seat thing and I said not too fast because she’ll be sick, and she said to me “I want her to be sick”

To be fair she’s actually grown into a sweet older girl now, and I’m not a psychologist but there was more than a few occasions at 3yo that she appeared spiteful

Sorry I know that’s not really relevant to OP’s post - I absolutely do not think your children are spiteful OP and sympathise massively with your situation. I only have one and they’re bloody hard work!

Just coming on to say that I have a child who, at least since she was 3, has usually been very well behaved in public. And it's absolutely not because I'm a great parent, it's because that's her nature - she hates being stared at, or standing out. As one pp said, they have to parent far harder than I do (on this issue at least). I just wanted to say you're not a failure; you've simply got it tough.

All children are different. I know this to be true because I have given birth to two of the most different children imaginable. Same parents scrambling their DNA. Same circumstances. Two very different humans.

First child is polite, attentive and rule-abiding, almost to a fault. I had a good few years of smugly imagining I was nailing parenting. Until... Second child comes along and HUMBLES ME with his wild ways. Suddenly, I'm the mum at the school gate surrounded by shrieking and chaos and impromptu re-enactments of dinosaur fights.

It's actually very challenging to parent them both in the same household, as they need such different things from us. First child needs freedom and gentle encouragement, second needs super strict boundaries and clear consequences for overstepping them. I need a lie down.

Which is to say: I don't have any easy answers, but if you're having a decent go at parenting (which it sounds like you certainly are!), the chaos that surrounds you might just be your lot in life for now and doesn't necessarily reflect poorly on you. The calm, obedient kids might just be naturally quieter, calmer personalities.

And one other thing - the "well behaved" kids you see around the place might just be having a good day. I had to take both kids to a medical appointment for my youngest after school recently, and I looked like Mother Of The Bloody Year. They were both polite, responsive and sweet. Eldest sat and read to himself, while youngest charmed the hell out of the nurse, and I glided around the place on a cloud of smug. Half an hour earlier, youngest was refusing to walk properly out of the playground and insisting on running back and forth at "Cheetah Speed", getting in everyone's way at pickup. Back at home two hours later, I can't hear myself think over their hollering, and enter the sitting room to find a huge mess and youngest with his bum out pretending to be a baboon. But for that blissful 30 minute appointment, anyone who saw us would've wondered which parenting manuals I was reading and where they could get a copy.

I had one just like this, OP! The judgy looks I got, smug helpful comments (that were usually just "be consistent"), fewer social invitations. I thought I was trying hard with parenting, and following the rules etc.

Then I had another, who does listen and generally follow the rules. Revelation! Children are different. Sadly older winds up younger a lot of the time, so still chaos - but they're in primary school now and on the whole life is much calmer.

You sound like you're doing a great job, and I see all the work you're putting in from your posts

I agree with this. Though I think so many parents behave the opposite that being firm with your children is now seen as being unnecessarily harsh. A couple of times recently Ive been reminding my son of a boundary (mostly to do with safety on the street but also about the way he was speaking to me) and passers-by have stopped and watched as if ready to intervene! I hadn’t been shouting or being physical in any way, just asking him to put his toy in his pocket so he doesn’t bump into people or cross the street without looking (he’s much older than a toddler btw).

Slight left-field but I would just have a think about their diet to make sure it isn’t full of E numbers, sugar and UPFs, all of which can have an impact on mood and behaviour.

You're letting them run rings round you. And that's down to you, not the child.

Which one is the parent???

I think the problem that a lot of parents face is that it takes a long time to build up good authority and behavior management. It can't be fixed by a simple quick change of approach or new thing to say, or new punishment.

It is the same with teaching. Every class is different, just like every child. Some are easy (Lucky!) and some are challenging. But all can and need to be dealt with. Teachers who struggle with badly behaved classes often come and ask teachers with controlled classes what they should do, expecting a trick that will solve it. But the reality is that the teachers who can manage behavior do it form day 1. They build up that atmosphere and culture, and then after that its easy to manage small issues as they arise.

As for how - my personal approach, and the one I have seen work well both in parenting and education is that you have to have a balance of a high level of both discipline and consequences, but also warmth and giving.

A child or a student quickly learns that with someone like this, if they are out of line it is bad... but if they stay in line, they are given respect, fun times, nice things, and treated really well.

If you do too much of the warmth, and not enough discipline = you get spoiled children who don't respect their parents. The result is parents who dislike spending time with their children because they are out of control.

If you do too much of the discipline and consequences = you get scared and timid children who fear their parents. The result is children who dislike spending time with their parents because they are too harsh.

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Any family can shift and re-address the balance, but the results take months or years to show. So you need to be patient. A lot of parents say "My kid just grew out of it or got better". I personally believe that they are missing their own contribution, and what often happens is that they gradually improved their approach, slowly got better at dealing with their child, not that their child just grew up and became nice.

Reminds me of Muffin Heeler from Bluey.

Parents need to parent and not be their child's BFF

Is your 5yo NT ? 5 seems very late be having to hold your hand. Mine both had basic road sense by 2.5-3, just running off with no sense of danger is morectoddler behaviour IME.

I don’t think you can judge any child as spiteful based on their behaviour towards a newborn or a pregnant mother. It’s a massive change. For all my DS can be stubborn, he isn’t mean, but he was two and a half when I had his sister and he certainly tried to pinch her and slap her on a few occasions (obviously didn’t let him.)

That isn’t spite, it’s a way of communicating a huge change.