Are 3-year-olds a nightmare or am I just a crap mother?

[madamez]

DS is now 3 and I don't think we get through a sinlge day without a meltdown of some kind. He whines, he mills rond my legs, he refuses to do what he's told, he makes simulataneous contradictory requests and then just screams...
OK there are plenty of times when he's cute and funny and cuddly but sometimes I am just so tired and grouchy that I don't know what to do.

bauble, I'm getting myself a ring made with that very message engraved on it!! It's very grounding.

wow, I'm so glad to have seen this
dd2 is 3 in april and she is turning into a nightmare
I thought I was doing something wrong
but I guess she is just turning three

Much sympathy from me. My DD1 is 3 and a bit and is such hard work at times, exactly the same as how you have described DS.
I also have a 13 month old DD2 and am pregnant with #3 and boy is it hard work already.
I have had some great advice on here before from the like of Twig, OliveOil etc. Just remind yourself that it is a phase and you will all get through it soon enough

I've had the usual toddler tantrums with both mine in that age range of 1 - 3. From 3+ something strange happens to them. My 2 year old will is a rising 3 and is currently going through The Change to become the dreaded Threenager. This is why pre-schools start from around 3 years

Omg thank the lord for this thread my ds was 3 in july and he tests my patience everyday !!!!!!!!!!!! His poor little sister who is 11 months will defo be a tom boy living with him . I think because they have to be good at nursery even though my ds misbehaves there they think they can push us when they get home.

mine were vile from 3.5 ish until starting school

never had terrible twos just threenagers

pleased I saw this thread too. I had started my own the other day. It's so good to know you're not the only one. DD is delightful at times but nowhere near as much as i'd like and she's hard work. All the things you all describe. She will be 3 in April. Not helped just lately as i have a broken foot and it's hard to get around and we can't get out as much.

oh yes preschool for 2 days a week has saved my life
it's shut for 3 weeks over CHristmas/New Year and everytime I remember this I want to weep

Your words describe DS to a tea! He drives me crazy. But then yesterday he comes out with the line 'i love ladybirds', completely at random and I'm so pleased he is exactly as he is.

He has just come over (trying to get himself dressed) in distress because he has put his hooded top on the wrong way round 'I can't see! I can't see mummy!'

So many threads on this subject lately!
From my limited experience, 3 worse than 2 because they are so verbal and argumentative and yet stubborn and pretend they don't get it when it suits them.
DS now 3.8 and getting much better......school gives respite.

Haha! this makes me both laugh and be relieved at the same time. Dd will be 3 in april and while she can be completely gorgeous, she can also make me want to give her away. augh! have of course been making it worse for myself by reading those parenting books that advocate never losing your temper/bribing/putting her in another room to think about things/counting to 3,5,10,whatever.... Horrid shouty mummy suddenly becomes the mummy that will surely see her children in early therapy for not having felt unconditionally loved every single minute of every day.

It's a minefield.

Dd (3.3) is also a complete nightmare and am struggling with her. She doesn't ask for things, she demands them. She will ask the same thing over and over again in the hope she will get an answer she likes and worst of all, when she does not get her demands met (and I don't do demands so this is quite a lot), she screams and boy does she go for it. I am seriously losing patience with her and at the moment and struggling to enjoy spending time with her. I'm hoping my beautiful little girl will return and this stroppy monster will go away soon (please!!!!!)

I am so relieved to have found this thread- my dd (2.11) has been a nasty piece of work for about 2 months.

She is physically abusive to my DS (6) bites, pinches, hits. Attacks the dog who now spends a lot of time hiding from her... she screams blue murder about everything possible, blackmails people to get what she wants ("I'll love you forever if you buy me a present daddy!!!!!").

Takes her clothes off, refuses to do anything I want and when she starts to see me lose my temper she marches off to the time out area and sits down and then refuses to move.

She draws on walls, letters, clothes, toys, everything possible, she moves chairs to get to the cupboards she cant reach. Yesterday I found her on the windowsill waving to the people in the street- we live in a 1st floor flat!!!

I think someone has taken my happy loving baby away! Nursery say that she is a joy to teach- so have just signed her up to do 4 sessions a week in January!!! ahhh peace!!

sounds normal to me - my sil calls them three-nagers 'cos they act like mini teenagers! mine was horrible. was so glad when he started pre-school. now he's 4 and he's much nicer so there is light at the end of the tunnel!

Yes 3 is horrid (and lovely iykwim) - it is really hard work trying to make evry task a 'fun game' like many of you I just want ds to do as he is told on occasion without having to be convinced/ bribed/ coerced in some way. He is stubborn, contrary and very defiant at times - (favourite phrases 'No I Shan't, no I won't' at the top of his very loud voice)

Previously he saved his extra special bad behaviuor for home, but now he is running away and staging sit-ins at very public and inconvenient locations. Dragging him off the tube last week was embarrassing and dangerous.

So you are not crap being 3 is challenging for parent and child

But it is lovely seeing him get excited about xmas for the 1st time and he can be so sweet and loving... you have to go and look at them when they are asleep to remind yourself of how lovely and innocent they are (just before they wake up at 3am demanding to go downstairs/ in your bed/ etc.).

thank god for this thread
I see red mist with DD1 (3.6) on a daily basis

she is horrid

I also have a colicky 3 month old which has sent DD1 berserk with jealousy and frustration. her favourite trick is to wake her sister up.

I mourn the loss of my sweet girl.

Love this thread. Nervous though, as as I soon as I get through dd being three, ds is hot on her heels.

It is like having a teenagers, I imagine. There are many more points with a three year old thinking that you are a crap mum, than there are thinking that you are a great mum, I think.

Lets find a padded room, preferably with well stocked bar attached, and put them together and let them get on with it whilst we sit in the bar.

Oh, that padded room with a bar sounds lovely. DD overslept this morning, when I went in to her she woke up, all sweet and tousled with sleep, opened her mouth and said 'I want daddy'. Half an hour later she asked a question whilst looking at me and smiling sweetly, when I answered she said 'I was asking daddy' in a tone of the utmost contempt. Just a rubbish start to a rubbish day. She had better look REALLY cute when I go to check on her later.

ah yes, 3 is pretty awful

But then they hit 4, OMG.

Ok here is what I do. On the rare occasion that they manage to do something wholesome, take LOTS of photos (use a digital camera to a. erase without trace the unexpected meltdowns and b. put it on autobracket so you get a load of shots). And then you can look back at them and think, wow, they were very cute and etc. And goodness I must have been a good mummy, they are baking and everything (here I gloss over the fact that said photos are usually taken at their grandma's house).

Or just fecking keep the photos for if they ever go into therapy and whinge at you.

actually I don't see how it CAN be like having teenagers.

Can't you say to teenagers, "yes, do go out and please, don't feel you have to phone or otherwise bother us til 3 am".

Also teenagers strop out of the house in a huff...

CLM - yes, that's probably one of the worst things about a stroppy toddler - you can walk away from a stroppy teen for an hour or so without anyone calling social services

CLM, good call, I shall go and look at my Flickr account. Ah, DD ice skating, at a birthday party, with ballet hair, a picture of the bonkers cake with pink icing and sprinkles we made together, firework party, in a witch costume, choosing a pumpkin, at Legoland* ... hey this works!

• may have to delete the one where she's about to go off on one because I 'wasn't listening to her'

My Dd is 3.7 and most of the time lovely.

BUT, she is the most picky, fussy (nearing ocd behaviour)child i think i have ever met!!

She is fiercely independant, which i know is a good thing really, but when we are in a hurry and shes shouting "I want to do it"
it drives me crazy!

If she asks yoou to do something and its not done exactly how she wants it done there are tears and screaming.

This morning she asked for a yoghurt so i got one from the fridge and took the top off, she burst into tears because she can do it herself, and then she wanted another one so she could do it herself!

And theres me thinking I'd like to do it all again

I have found 3 a challenging age with my two. With DS it was compounded with the birth of DD when he was 3.3. And apart from when he was a non-sleeping newborn that is the hardest stage we had with him. Probably followed by him starting school but that was down to his exhaustion. He is a lovely almost 7yo now. But DD is that 3 1/2 yo.

My daughters high pitched tantrum scream at three actually made me develop tinnitus which was thankfully only temporary. Don't despair as she is now nearly 8 and generally a very chilled, well mannered little girl!