Being too stern on toddler

[Prinnypeach]

hi all
concerned I am being too stern on my nearly 3 year old. I have a lot of patience but the not listening drives me insane and feel I’m always on her case as I have been trying to set boundaries and be authoritative.

for example getting dressed and ready in the morning can take me an hour and a half some days as it’s just constant chasing her, asking her, reasoning, bargaining, explaining we’re loosing time at the park etc to absolutely no effect, to the point where I’m already stressed before the days begun.

do find it easy to get over things so will carry on as normal but even then when we go out DD won’t listen to me. Went to cinema the other day, had a day all about her, I wanted to go in one shop while she had a snack and it was such hard work with standing up in the pram, asking for things, keep calling mummy, throwing things on the floor despite be asking her not too etc etc, so much so that I just left and came home. Yet my friends are absolute to take their DCs shopping with them and spend hours out and about!

see children walking nicely next to their parents whereas mine will pull on my arm, go weak at the knees, fling herself around and just do a carry on of Tom foolery really.

Im not a mum who shouts, have always been soft with her and felt firm but fair approach was best - it’s only until recently when my friends said im not as firm as I think I’m being that it made me rethink how I’m parenting.

my friends auntie told me recently to not give the kids a choice, tell them once and then take action. Have started doing this and now just feel mum guilt and it makes everything harder as we’re now having lots of tantrums and feel so bad. When the tantrums happen I do sit with her, give cuddles, explain deep breaths etc but still do just feel bad.

accordingly to nursery and other family members; she is good as gold for them and exceeding expectation… the boundary testing just is non stop and the listening skills are non existent with me. I really do give a lot of time to DD, when I’m with her I’m very present, not just on my phone etc, I’m there playing, painting, running, digging, whatever it is she wants to do, yet sometimes I feel that my over involvement is going against me. Everyone says these are the best years but I’m not sure how I feel about that. Love my days with DD and enjoy my time with her but by the end of the day I’m looking forward to bedtime so I can just sit in silence for a bit… just governed by mum guilt at the moment and even more so as I feel I’m wishing away the best years that I’ll never get back and not truly enjoying them the way I should be…

Sorry when I say take action I mean things like, if you ask them to get their shoes on, ask once and if no reaction after a few minutes then simply go and put their shoes on rather than the constant repeating

Bless you, OP! You plainly are not being too stern if it takes an hour and a half to get you both out of the door, and you have to leave the one shop because she is stopping you from buying the thing you want.
The toddler is in charge. You are saying stuff, but you aren't following through. My (now adult) DD used to have mega strops. Took me a while to figure the best way to deal with them. This is what you do. Tell your child what is going to happen next. Then tell child when it's actually happening. If child strops, stop and stand next to her. Calmly repeat what is happening, then break eye contact. Do not reward the behaviour with attention. Continue to calmly say what is happening next. Make sure she can't run off or reach anything. When she's ready to do whatever it is with you, give her a smile and a cuddle, do the thing, move on with your day.
The first couple of times you do this, it could take a long time for her to give in. But she will quickly catch on that the tantrum does not get her what she wants, and that she will still have to do what you want. You have to be consistent. And don't be embarrassed if the tantrum happens by the checkout in Tesco, follow through.

With the shoes - what does she actually do when you ask her to put on her shoes?

I think being firmer makes sense - you won't always have 1.5 hours to leave the house so would be good to find routines and boundaries that allow you to get up and out in a shorter period of time

I have a 2 year old so not in the terrible 3s yet, but our current approach is that we present 2 options to her and if she chooses neither then we choose for her (calmly and non violently but firmly). E.g. do you want these shoes or those shoes? If she fannies about then we just put on whichever shoes are easiest to put on and leave the house or leave the house with no shoes on at all (stick them in a bag for later).

Tooth brushing is probably the worst for us. We try humour and distraction and getting her to do her own teeth first etc. But if she is giving us trouble then unfortunately we have to just do it despite her protests.

She's learning that certain things aren't negotiable and she fusses less about things and with shorter tantrums when she does have them.

For tantrums I think you don't have to fear them - as long as your rules are fair (e.g. to enforce very reasonable boundaries) then you have to just hold the line. In time they learn that tantrums won't work.

We have a rule to never give in to a tantrum, which I think has massively helped. So it's now more of a case of her voicing frustration for a couple of minutes, but nothing like the tantrums she used to have in the beginning where she used to shout for 20 minutes and hyperventilate 🫠

For tantrums we've found they're shortest if we give her a bit of space for a few mins. Then we sit silently beside her and when she looks a little calmer we offer a hug and then talk through her emotions. It's pointless talking to her at the peak of a tantrum as she can't process anything during it.

Take my advice with a pinch of salt obviously, since it might be that 2 is easy and 3 is a massively different beast! 😅

This is perfect. The telling what is happening next approach really helps our kid too.

https://open.spotify.com/show/29bXFwyMDo3qqWc8GOr9tN?si=PxAtSLSITzGEakLNO9Es1Q

listen to this book it’s fantastic! It really helped me communicate with my toddlers. You can also buy a hard copy but Spotify it’s probably easier if you don’t have time to sit and read (as most parents with toddlers don’t)

I’ve s

I second everything @SecretSquid has said
I do the same with my toddler and it's hard because I feel like a mean mummy but it works.

I would also say you shouldn't be engaging with her all the time when playing. That sounds exhausting and not good for anyone
If she is playing independently, even for a minute, don't interrupt. Leave her to it.

Following as I think we could be heading for a similar situation with my 2-and-a-bit year old.

You have my sympathies, it’s so hard to strike the right balance!

I often find myself asking him multiple times to do things. Problem is, he often will listen by the 3rd/4th time I ask him to eg put his shoes on, and asking 4 times is way less hassle than dealing with the meltdown if I put his shoes on for him. Other times I could ask 10 times and he doesn’t listen and I worry I’ve encouraged the behaviour by allowing him multiple chances too often.