What has happened to my 2 year old? *new baby*

[Stressedntired]

i have a 2 year old DD and and 2 week old DS.

DD has always been (on the whole) really well behaved and just a joy really. Since bringing DS home her behaviour has totally changed. She is throwing tantrums over the most basics requests, running off and constantly saying “no”.

DD isn’t taking out on DS in fact she constantly wants to cuddle him but she refused to hug or sit with me when I first came home with the baby. I feel like I’ve lost my little girl. It’s like she hates me.

We spoke constantly about the baby before he came. We bought her gifts from him and we made a fuss over her and made sure we spend alone time with her. Nothing seems to be helping. Anyone dealt with this? How did you handle it?

Feeling like a crap mum.

I went through this. I think it was my hormones making me interpret my dd1s behaviour as rejection. She suddenly would sit with dh more and I cried so much about our 'lost' relationship. I put a lot of effort into one to one time which is bloody difficult but I wore a sling and sat in agony doing play doh so she could see I still had time for her. We would read a lot together.

Long story short, itll come back. Please don't stress!

She’s feeling insecure and jealous. She needs time to see that you love both kids and that tts baby isn’t a threat although some kids can feel sibling rivalry for a while.

It’s very common for the older sibling to regress for a few months. Don’t be surprised if she loses some skills that she previously mastered and wants to be babied for a few months. Things will return but it takes time - apparently gaining a sibling can be as stressful as your spouse taking on a second husband/wife and it takes time for emotions to settle.

This is totally normal! Please don't feel like a crap mum. In our case it lasted about 6 weeks and then things settled back down into a new normal. We just kept giving lots of cuddles, kept routine (nursery etc), tried to stay patient. I spotted a bit of a trigger that breastfeeding DD2 caused some really poor behaviour, so tried to make sure she was always really occupied around feeds. We were the same in that DD1 was really lovely to DD2 but completely awful to DH and I. It will pass ❤️. Congrats on your newborn and hope you are having a good recovery 💐

What’s happened is that you’ve had a new baby. That’s it I reckon! She’ll get used to it. She’s adjusting. It will work out! ❤️