Terrible Twos- Not a Myth!

I never believed in the term "terrible twos". I always thought people were just exaggerating until we started going through it when our son turned two! He is usually a happy kid but he turns into a baby monster during his rare  emotional outbursts  😁 We tried a lot of things to deal with it but somehow it was so hard to calm down a 3 footer, who is determined to let out his frustration. Once the tantrum starts, it used to get so intense that there was no way we could distract him or calm him down. We had to let him take his time to calm down on his own and finished it off with hugs and assurance. As days passed by we started getting exhausted, we started giving in to his demands sometimes and it only made things worse. 

Somehow we knew we have to find a way to deal with him, not the easy way out but an actual way to help him take charge of his emotions as well. So here are a few tips that worked for us and I hope this might help a few moms out there who have started questioning their sanity!

Patience, Patience and more Patience:

This is one thing we realised over the course of 2.8 years. It is easier said than done because there are times they get to your nerves and chew your brain and it is almost impossible not to shout. They get a huge percentage of traits from the way parents behave so we have no other way but to learn to be calm. When we shout at them, eventually we are showing them that it's okay to shout when you are angry. So as I always say try hard to remain calm and if there's no other go, just walk out of the room. It takes only a few seconds for us to come to our senses and we will be happy we got over a scene without yelling 😁

Listen:

Most of the time, all they want from us is the patience to sit and listen to them. Though they are unable to communicate all their needs, who other than parents can decode their language? ☺ So give them those few minutes when they need our attention.

Replace NO with positive terms:

Instead of stressing on a hundred things they shouldn't be doing, try to keep our conversation positive. For instance he asks for ice cream the moment we reach a restaurant, rather than stressing on "you are not going to have ice cream now" may be rephrase it to "let's have dinner first and then we will order your favorite chocolate ice cream!!". This in a way won't make him feel denied of something and we are actually making them understand we eat dessert after a meal.

Talk to them:

For example our super active son always thinks way ahead of our actions so it made things easier for him when we kept him updated on where we are going or what we will do after a particular activity and so on. May be it helped them picture sequence in their mind which reduced their anxiety about what's coming next.

Teach them to ask for things with a happy face:

We have told him at various occasions that he does not get things done by crying but by asking for it with a happy face. Sometimes when he comes and asks for something with a cranky voice we ask him "how do we ask for things?" and in a second he changes his tone, fixes a smile on his face and repeats his need with a happy face. This might sound funny but trust me eventually they need to learn shouting or crying for things isn't getting them anywhere.

So before you start please stack up all your patience and remember parenting is always a two way act where the kids and parents are equally responsible for the outcome. Don't forget the fact that they are humans too 😄

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