A toddler parenting question, and a prayer request please!

[Ophelia23]

I have a parenting question for anyone with a toddler. Here is a brief background: My little girl is 2 and a half right now. She is a sweet girl, very energetic and full of excitement and brightness. I currently am a working mother, but we are working as hard as we can to become an at-home mom. My husband wants this so badly for me, and I want it so badly as well. But for now, I work. My daughter has been with the same babysitter since she was an infant. She spends her day with the babysitter, and the sitter’s two children. It’s a good situation. My daughter loves her sitter, and the sitter and I are on the same page about religion, education, rewards and punishment. I am a big proponent of consistency… I think it’s so important!!

For the last week and a half, my daughter has been with a different sitter because ours went on a Mission trip to Haiti. She is now back with her normal sitter as of yesterday.

The last several days have been tough, though. My daughter is scowling and growling a lot. At first I thought she was just experimenting with emotions, which is perfectly normal. But I am starting to become concerned. Today, rather than just pretending to be a kitty, she wanted to pretend to be an angry kitty. Or a crying kitty. I’ve tried encouraging her to make a happy face (just to get that scowl away!) but she says she doesn’t want to. She is melting down quickly and easily, over very little things. Do I have need for concern here? My hunch is that she is a little stressed out about all of the changes in the past week, and that this will settle in as she gets back to her normal routine. But she seems so upset. Last night, she was crying in her sleep. She has been having nightmares, but I don’t know what about. When I wake her up, she just wants to give me kisses and she goes right back to sleep. Is this just a little girl being 2?

Either way, please offer prayers for my little girl. Her happiness and health mean the entire world for me.

Thanks for any advice you can give!

 

[Joe_5859]

Did the substitute sitter put something scary on TV or something? Scary can be relative, of course. My 3 year old is terrified of Murray from Sesame Street.

Kids do go through phases, though. I wouldn’t necessarily be overly concerned at this point, especially in light of the change in routine. I don’t think it’s bad for kids to express negative emotions in their play sometimes. Better that than not expressing what they’re feeling.

 

[mountee]

Up until the week with someone new you described a perfect daycare situation. If I valued the caregiver I would ask her if she has seen any of what you are seeing and get her (name removed by moderator)ut. I have always believed that God blesses His parents with great sensitivity to their children and if you feel something is wrong you are probably right. But, it could be any number of things including illness. Talk it over with the caregiver and see if she sheds any light on the situation. God bless you with wisdom and insight.

 

[hieroglyph]

I have a parenting question for anyone with a toddler. Here is a brief background: My little girl is 2 and a half right now. She is a sweet girl, very energetic and full of excitement and brightness. I currently am a working mother, but we are working as hard as we can to become an at-home mom. My husband wants this so badly for me, and I want it so badly as well. But for now, I work. My daughter has been with the same babysitter since she was an infant. She spends her day with the babysitter, and the sitter’s two children. It’s a good situation. My daughter loves her sitter, and the sitter and I are on the same page about religion, education, rewards and punishment. I am a big proponent of consistency… I think it’s so important!!

For the last week and a half, my daughter has been with a different sitter because ours went on a Mission trip to Haiti. She is now back with her normal sitter as of yesterday.

The last several days have been tough, though. My daughter is scowling and growling a lot. At first I thought she was just experimenting with emotions, which is perfectly normal. But I am starting to become concerned. Today, rather than just pretending to be a kitty, she wanted to pretend to be an angry kitty. Or a crying kitty. I’ve tried encouraging her to make a happy face (just to get that scowl away!) but she says she doesn’t want to. She is melting down quickly and easily, over very little things. Do I have need for concern here? My hunch is that she is a little stressed out about all of the changes in the past week, and that this will settle in as she gets back to her normal routine. But she seems so upset. Last night, she was crying in her sleep. She has been having nightmares, but I don’t know what about. When I wake her up, she just wants to give me kisses and she goes right back to sleep. Is this just a little girl being 2?

Either way, please offer prayers for my little girl. Her happiness and health mean the entire world for me.

Thanks for any advice you can give!

I would be very concerned that something happened with the substitute sitter and I would not use her again.

 

[Regina_Love]

I would inquire of both sitters if anything happened that scared her recently. It may be that your regular sitter, & her children are all tired from their trip. The kids may be acting out, and grumpy! Some times even a diet change, or movie can set off an active imagination, and cause nightmares. Also it’s our brains way of trying to process our thoughts, fears and possible scenarios.

I would keep my eye on things, looking for clues, but don’t stress over it. As a foster mom for five years, I learned the most important thing is to focus on today. Children develop strong emotions at an early age, and need adults to show them how to handle it. I would tolerate angry kitty once in a while, but not if she was doing it a lot of the time. I’d encourage her to use good kitty manners, or angry kitty will need to go to her room until she is ready to play nicely. 2 year olds discover that anger is power, and they have a growing, strong desire to get their own way at this stage. Thus the tantrums, and mini dictator behavior, we frequently dub the terrrible twos.

Your job is to teach her how to assert herself respectfully. When they demanded, or growled at me, I would tell my kids, “I can’t hear your request, because you are not using your good manners.” Suddenly it was…“May I please have more crackers?” That met with instant success! Which made them highly motivated to behave well.

 

[Ophelia23]

All helpful advice indeed. Thank you for all of it. I spoke with my neighbor who did the fill-in babysitting, and she said she couldn’t think of anything that could have happened to frighten her. I hope it is true. Either way, I think that I will allow her to play angry kitty a little bit, but maybe use it as a chance to learn more. Tonight I am going to ask her while we are playing (if it comes up, of course) what makes kitty angry. Things like that. Our normal sitter has noticed the behavior I have mentioned as well, and she is a remarkably patient and loving woman… she is making an extra effort in helping Amelia feel back at home in the routine again.

Regina Love, thanks for your advice. I try so hard to teach her how to handle her emotions! I try to help her identify them. I will say things like, “You are frustrated because…” or “You are upset right now because… I understand that.” And I try to tell her that it’s ok to be upset or frustrated, and show her healthy ways of handling it. But these past few days, I’ve been reviewing myself as a parent and feeling rather defeated. Thank you for the reminder that this phase, if it is THE phase (You know those 2’s…) that this phase is quite normal indeed.



Now I’m eager to go home and play kitty to see what I can learn.

 

[Aggies08]

Ask her why the kitty is “sad” etc. Play out the stoyline with her, letting her take the lead as much as possible- ask questions, and ask her what you should do (she’ll probably give you a role, or ask “and who am I?”

Has she been watching Dora or Diego- anything like that?

This sounds very, very normal in terms of behavior. growling/being sad/mad/etc- trying out emotions “look, I know sad people LOOK or ACT like this” is very normal at this age.

You may very well be correct- something spurred this on, or another child was playing like this/ with her like this.* Either way, as long as that part is in the past and she’s no longer BEING scared by it, I’d work on helping her to work through whatever it was.*

I’m a long-time 2-4yr old teacher. This type of behavior is VERY normal. As it is new for YOU- try and work through it with her, let he know what is and is not OK “if you need to cry, you may cry in your room” etc for tantrums, and be patient with her. PM me if you think I could be of any more assistance.

Also- be careful with the news on in front of her. I’ve had more than a few kids come to school and be scared or worried because of what they have seen on the news, and it seems to start around this age.