I’m so feeling this this morning. I asked the 4yo if he wanted cereal or yogurt for breakfast. He screams “I’m not hungry! I want mama!”, runs to his room and slams the door. Two minutes later he comes out and punches me in the dick while I’m making lunches.
I mean, the dick punch was really unnecessary but I am glad that other families experience… Weirdness, I guess. And exclusion of a parent.
I can’t count how often I read and heard the advice to “just present your kid with two options to choose from”.
My kid, even before she became verbal, always wanted option C when presented with two options.
“Do you want this hat or this cap?” “Neither”
“Do you want this blue pants or these red sweatpants?” “I want… a green… dress” we don’t even have a green dress.
“Shall we go to the zoo today or do you want to go to the playground with Anna?” “I want to go on the trampoline” .
Yeah the first time I tried the two options for clothes on my then-two year old, he snatched both options out of my hands, threw them on the ground, and screamed NO CLOTHES
I present two options. If my kid doesn’t pick one of those two options, either by not responding or by requesting a third thing, I’m picking one of the two options for him. And I’m always picking what he’s least likely to want.
I had to do a variant of this with my now wife. She never wanted to pick restaurants, so I’d suggest something i was okay with but knew she hated. She got a lot more willing to give her opinions after a few years. Now we can discuss it like equals instead of me making the decision all the time.
A friend of mine does that for group lunches. If everyone is humming and hawing about where to go, he’ll suggest McDonald’s. This reduces the threshold of making suggestions significantly for the others, because they no longer need to find a great place. They only need to come up with somewhere better than McDonald’s.
And I’m always picking what he’s least likely to want.
So parents can be assholes too.
I’m not a total asshole: After he’s had his “oh shit” moment I give him one more chance to choose. He’s usually a lot better at picking one of the two options on his second try.
Bonus points for finally settling for one of the options, only to throw a tantrum afterwards, that the other option was the preferred one.
The problem with parenting advice is every kid is different. This becomes clear after raised a gaggle of them. Anyone with one child that is giving advice is clueless.
My suggestion is not to give that type of child options. Tell them what’s happening. Then do it. May that not work any better and ignores why you may have started giving them choices.
You didn’t specify an age but typically choices are best for later development. Toddlers are terrorists and one should never negotiate with a terrorist.
To respond to your firat paragraph: This episode of Bluey helped me understand as a first time parent. Though this is less about personality and more about development. The mom with 9 or whatever kids really puts things into perspective.
It’s funny because my own kid is literally Bluey. Super quick to do everything else, refuses to walk.
Your second and third paragraph: thank you for the advice, I’m anticipating that mine will become a terrorist. Already has learned to cry when told no, despite the fact that we’ve never caved in to it.
I love hearing other parents have asshole kids, because it reminds me that I’m not alone.
My kid went through the same phase all kids do of refusing to go to bed.
So one night he’s grabbing on to the baby gate at the top of the stairs like a con in a prison movie, screaming and yelling. I’m at the bottom of the stairs trying to ignore him.
He fixed a stare directly at me, stopped screaming, and shit in his pants.
So yeah, 100% of parents have arsehole kids.
My wife was waiting for me by the exit of Target with my infant son, and a lady rushed up with her cart, a baby in the baby holder, said, “Here, watch him!” and ran in the rest room.
I walked up, and saw my wife with another baby, and said, “We can’t afford two, we’ll have to return one,” and she told me the story. I thought it was hilarious, and couldn’t wait to meet this woman when she came out of the bathroom.
She eventually emerged, and thanked my wife for the help, and I said “You weren’t worried about handing your daughter off to a stranger?” And she replied:
“No, she already had one, I knew she wasn’t about to steal ANOTHER one!”
Well most of times you can differentiate frustration screaming and fear/danger screaming on toddlers
Tbh, definitely not with all kids. You have to specifically train them to not use “emergency” screams when they are frustrated.
My first kid was a perfect baby, she’d sleep 10 hours straight, she was quiet and never bratty, we would take her to restaurants with all our adult friends and she was always well behaved and didn’t need a tablet and would interact with everyone. We used to silently judge leash kid’s parents with the wife.
Then we had our second, an autistic boy with the energy of a thousand suns. Now I know, the leash isnt for me, it’s for all of you! The tablet at the restaurant makes sense now, and I don’t judge parents anymore
I don’t think the apple falls very far from the tree
Hard to tell from so little info. You can make a kid act like that by being a shitty parent, but they can also have issues unbidden that stretch you past your breaking point.
In any case, they don’t seem to have a healthy relationship.
10:1 odds that neither of you currently have a toddler.
Nah, that’s a fools bet lol.
My son fought me getting in the high chair in a restaurant yesterday. Wife had to hold him while I held his legs straight to get in. I feel that
How TF are they so strong!? I also noticed a difference in physical strength between boys and girls - while expected I did not anticipate it being so much different. I really have to use a muscle on my son sometimes and he’s not even 2 yo.
Same for kids and pets… They’re not really strong, it’s just that:
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You’re trying not to hurt them or yourself, they don’t really care. This really levels the playing field.
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You’re trying to accomplish a goal, they’re trying to do anything but that.this gives them a huge advantage.
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