Rewind a month ago and I wouldn’t have been composing posts about toddler parenting strategies. No, folks, I would have been drinking wine after a full day of muttering ‘toddlers be toddlers.’ Actually the muttering would have been more profane, but that’s besides the point. And don’t get me wrong—I still feel that way. I still mutter. I still lose my cool. I’m still pushed to the edge. Damn, they’re hard. Kids of all ages—hard. This parenting gig—hard. So. Hard.
But about a month ago, after a particularly harrowing morning, I googled “2.5 year old screams and cries about everything,” and in one of those usually annoying parenting boards, I found a hidden gem. I found Janet Lansbury. I read through her posts, I read her book, and then I started doing something that changed my entire perspective on how I interact with, and I know this sounds dramatic, but really, how I raise my daughter. I started listening to her podcasts. Not only listening, but putting on my running shoes, hitting the pavement, and letting her hypnotic voice of encouragement and understanding burrow into the fiber of my cells and change me from the inside out. About halfway through my running route, I come down a long street, the shimmering ocean unfolds ahead of me, and I’m not even thinking about what she’s saying anymore, but I know it’s getting in. She might have hypnotized me. I don’t care. Janet Lansbury, I’ve fallen for you.
Her fundamentals boil down to this—an interaction in which your kid is freaking out/screaming/etc. is not one to be avoided. No. It’s a positive interaction in which they are using you as a soft and safe place to land their feelings. Is she mad about you not letting her eat (more) toothpaste? No. (not entirely. Yes, she’s mad a little bit about that part.) More likely, she’s releasing a million other strong and real emotions about a million other things. It’s a means to an end. It has to happen. To make it work though, you have to believe her. You have to truly want your kid to be able to express herself to you, regardless of how annoying/unfair/whiny it is. “oh gosh, I hear you are upset that I didn’t allow you to lick batteries/drink bath water/wear a bikini to preschool. I hear you, and you can tell me how you feel about it—thank you for telling me how you’re feeling about it. You can always tell me how you’re feeling.”
It’s an entire paradigm shift. It’s not always easy. I’m only human. But I notice that when I go periods without listening, I get more easily annoyed, less empathetic, more quick to let C push my buttons and find the boundary she’s yearning for. And then I listen to Janet again and am reminded that I’m doing the best I can. That kids are wired to express their emotions, a surprisingly complicated and sophisticated range of feelings for little people still developing the skills to process said feelings. Janet argues not that we should encourage kids to express these emotions, but we must to support their overall sense of well-being. It’s a least something to think about.
I’d start with:
Exhausted by a Whiny, Cranky Child
A Toddler’s Do-It-Myself Attitude Ends in Tantrums
Mom Suffering from Clear Lack of Boundaries
The sun on my running route. We’ve got this, parents.
Subscribed! Especially needed after this morning’s meltdown over the milk level in the cereal bowl…