Kind of as the title says, really. We bought our first car a few months ago and since then, we've been keen to get out and about, try some soft play places we couldn't get to before, more family trips out, etc. Except we have a problem: DS (3) generally refuses to get out of the car on arrival. And it's starting to get really wearing!
He's done this to DM as well over Christmas so not just us, and he is very used to car travel. But this refusal to get out is wearing. And once we eventually get him out (persuasion, sergeant-major style, bribery, force - you name it, we've tried it), he often refuses to do whatever it is we've gone to do.
Now, a trip to a country park: no problem, he can ride in the buggy.
But today was a trip to an activity place - he was excited, I asked him if he wanted to go and he said yes, we drove there, and he refused to get out of the car. Eventually agreed, we got him into the activity place - and he refused to participate. After 35 minutes, we gave up and came home.
I can't work out what is going on, which affects how we handle it. I think it's a mixture of anxiety about anything new/unfamiliar, and a control/power thing - he is a proper threenager at the moment and is really flexing his muscles some days. But today, it was a parent-child activity so it's not like he would have had to go off by himself - I would have been, quite literally, holding his hand.
Of course, the simple solution is that for the next month or so, we'll avoid trips out to anywhere with an entry fee where the buggy is not an option. But I'd be interested to know how others would handle it and what we might do to break the cycle?