How do you discipline a 2 year old (apart from thinking of putting them in the wheelie bin)?

[oliveoil]

dd2 is 2.4 and dreadful and not very nice to be around.

EVERYTHING is a battle.

Does the naughty step or whatever work at this age, I think she is too young, not sure.

dd1 was soooooooooooooooooo good in comparison and I am at a loss of what to do.

She screamed for 20 mins this morning - at 7AM - as she didn't want her nappy changing. But she had to have it changed, so how would you play that one out? Tried distraction (and shouting) and in the end did it whilst dh held her arms!

Am supposed to be potty training this month ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

Thank you!!

personally i think positive attention (rewards, praise, involvement, distraction etc) help a lot more than shouting and time out.
at your DD2's age, DD used to sit on the naughty step hitting herself because she wanted to get a reaction out of us. looking back i wish i had never bothered with the naughty step.

Pinning down is the only way at nappy time. I'm assuming you tried giving her things to hold etc.

The only thing I can really do with ds3 (2.3) is put him in his cot for 'time out'. I usually do this when he bites or hits (quite a lot at the moment).

ooooh, I hadn't thought about the wheelie bin before! It's just the right depth isn't it?

Do you clean it out first?

I do the positive praise thing - although at the moment it is for very small things like breathing as she is not good AT ALL MOST OF THE SODDING TIME

atm she can go in with the carrot peelings

I do naughty step/sitting on bed with my DD who is just a few months older (May b'day). She is also much more of a trial than my DS was, but so lovely and bright and amusing at times.

I do a lot of distraction around areas like dressing etc. And come up with silly reasons for doing things. "look wear these pants DD they have a little bow on like your pyjamsa", "oh look at piglet what is he doing sleeping on pooh's back" while I quickly ram her legs in her trousers.

Step is more useful when she is hitting or deliberately trashing DS's things.

She is potty trained and fantastic at it, but still sometimes it is an issue to get her to have a wee before bed. So I say "shh let's listen to hear DD's wee". Nice, eh?

For the nappy I would either pin down (and be very matter of fact about it and not feel bad) or make her sit on her bed until she was ready to have it changed. Not sure because I cunningly got DD trained before she got to full levels of stroppiness. She does though sit on the toilet with her arms folded refusing to perform at times.

LOL @ 'refusing to perform'!! How on earth can you keep a wee in if you need one?! Kids eh?! They are amazing!

We are nowhere near potty training with ds3 yet. I waiting till about 2.9 with the older two so I'll do the same for him! Can't face it!

I have been putting of the potty training, or as I justify it "lets get Christmas out of the way first yes???"

Dh has just phoned and said he had to stay at his mums house for 45 mins this morning as she was still tantrumming away.

I LOVE WORKING!

My ds is 20 months and an absolute monster for most of each day. We do use the naughty step when he has bitten or hit his sister and it has had an effect. When he starts now we ask if he wants to sit on the naughty step and 70% of the time he will now stop. I try to use lots of positive encouagement and distraction but I am a bit shouty

gdg as a mother of 3 I doubt very much that your pelvic floor is anywhere near as good as my DDs - she is 2.7. She amazes me. She has a wee before her bath at about 7 pm so I try to get her to have one in the morning before we leave for school at 8.45. She won't. So sometimes I end up having to take her (and inevitably her friend) into the school toilets. Other times she can go from 7pm to 11 am. But then will need to go immediately.

oo I agree - toilet training and Christmas do not agree.

ANd dh started on about putting him in a big bed this morning! What, now? Er, no.

she is staying in that cot till she leaves home

errrm.... put off the potty training for a bit?

Useful help:

Lots of praise for good behaviour, lots of chatting as you go about your day - keep her interested.
Encourage her to spend sometime playing by herself (with DS I leave him with his train set)
Take her for a walk at least once a day - even if it's only for 10 mins (burning off some excess energy is great for calming down)
Distraction should be a first port of call rather than discipline.

When she's naughty don't shout but very VERY firmly say NO, you do not (insert offecnce) - mummy doesn't like it!
With DS1 I really don't believe the step works as 'discipline' - it's for calming down. I don't put a time limit on it I just say 'you need to calm down, sit here until you can come and play nicely'. If he comes back into the lounge screaming still I just calmly take him back to the step and repeat. When he does comeback calm I just get on with playing with him like nothing happened. Took a few weeks to get him into it but now it works a treat.
With nappy changes - DS1 hates them and screams and shouts - I just ignore him and get on with it really calmly - I changed to this approach a few weeks ago from 'cajoling' and asking nicely (now I just say 'right, time for a new napy, come on') There was no change last week but this week I'm seeing slow improvement - actually had a crying-free nappy change yesterday!

Sorry about the essy - hope it's of help! I use a book called 'the pocket parent' and have found it very useful and it's in very short, indexed sections so you can look something up in an instant. It has a lot of 'sanity savers' too - snippets designed for you to read to help you stay calm!

Haven't done the 'big bed' thing yet though so it might all go belly up in the new year...

Do you know being potty trained and being in a bed are the least of my worries with DD. Apart from when she loses the ELC chocolate ice-cream which is her current comforter down the back of the bed in the middle of the night and screams until I find it. And you should have seen the trouble I got into when the night I substituted a strawberry one and she didn't realise until morning.

I do find that I take her less seriously than I did DS.

all my hopes are pinned on the ELC Sizzling kitchen that they are getting for Christmas

next week when I am off, they will both play for hours on their own, whilst I fester in the other room eating sweets and reading magazines.

I think this doable. And I am sure you will all agree.

LOL Olive!

whaddya mean LOL?

I am most deadly serious!

Ahh, OO, I really feel for you. DS now 5 was the perfect uber-toddler. I assumed this was due to my superior parent techniques, and even was a bit free with passing on my handy tips . DD, now 3, is, I suspect, the spawn of the devil: she has what older relatives say, with a tight-lipped sumile, a "strong personality".

I think there are 2 different things. For biting and hitting I always removed DD immediately from the room. Absolute zero-tolerence - would say really firmly "we do NOT bite" and remove her to the next room or the bottom of the stairs or whatever. Now this didn't actually stop her biting, obviously, but it made me feel like I had a strategy and was in control. The rest we either ignored, corrected or jollied along. I think you have to work out what you can put up with and then turn a bit of a blind eye to the rest. If it is any consolation, I would say that DD at 3.3 is hugely better than she was at 2.3 - the year between 2 and 3 seems to be the worst. She is still a colossal whinger on occasions (and I suspect always will be ), but we just tend to jolly her along or ignore the muttering. (Obviously we praise the good stuff, but that is not really an adequte solution for maga strops because she wants to wear everything purple today).

I categorically would not potty train at the moment - it gives them too much power!

Hmm sizzling kitchen has been known to the centre of arguments for us. Also handy for laying in bed on a Sunday and getting the children to make you "breakfast".