Lovely baby turning into troublesome toddler

[Maria101]

My DD is 18-months-old and was always a smiley, easy going baby who loved her little friends, right up until about two months ago. She's fine when she's with adults, but she's started to play up around other children and often swipes at their heads and snatches toys away. At playgroups or during play dates (especially at our house) she gets territorial about her toys and nearly always tries to hit the other babies. I have to watch her like a hawk. It's so embarrassing and I feel like a sh*t parent when the other toddlers are playing nicely and mine is basically being a complete little git. I tell her firmly no, take her away from the situation, distract her with a book etc. But she still does it and it's driving me nuts because I can't stay in the house with her everyday and avoid all other toddlers during what I hope is this awful phase. Has anybody else experienced this?

Please try to relax. There is no such thing as a good or bad toddler, they all have lovely phases and naughty phases. If people are looking all they are thinking is 'thank god its not just mine because it probably will be next time'. It will pass.

absolutely, she's just a toddler..its what they do and so long as you do react appropriately no other reasonable parent is going to be thinking anything judgy at all. 18m is very young yet, and she is far too young to really be disciplined or be expected to understand a telling off. You can really only remove her from a situation, distract and apologise! 99% of parents would absolutely laugh it off - if you read AIBU often you'll see that the only thing that really hacks people off is if the parent of a toddler doesn't intervene or apologise (even though the apology is almost understood to be not necessary too!)

What trixie123 said 100%. I would never think bad of a parent with a toddler behaving like yours IF that parent were aware and were trying to demonstrate to their child that it wasn't acceptable (within reason as your DD is very young). She's just learning so you need to keep taking her into these situations so she can learn. Don't worry about it-normal

I always apologise immediately to the mum & baby and gently explain to mine why she can't hit/pull hair/snatch toys away etc. It's just awful at the moment because it's only MY toddler who is doing it. They're an NCT group so they're all the same age, yet none of the others hit each other. Hence why I feel so crap about it.

I have 2 boys close in age and both have been exactly like this and I always feel like my child is the only bad one and the others are all good and yes I have always felt crap about it and sat at home worrying about it but the phase DOES pass, it may take a while but it's just their age. With my 2nd child who is 27months now, the children that he used to be naughty with are now starting to be like that with him because they are getting a bit older and he has stopped doing it and I am so glad because it now makes me think that I hope if the mothers were thinking that my child was a little monkey that they are now eating their words. Good luck and trust me, it will pass eventually.