3 Year Old Discipline - Abbyville,KS

Why are you feeling guilty for showing our daughter discipline? Children need boundaries, rules, consequences, it make them feel loved and safe. Your friends are correct, no one WANTS to see our children upset, or cry, we all want to give our children the world, however if you don't start gaining control you are going to have even bigger problems as she grows. When a child misbehaves there has to be consequences. If my daughter didn't listen I would have walked over taken her hand and told her she had to stand by me while I paid. If she resisted when we got home she would have consequences. If you are consistent with consequences her behavior should change. It doesn't take long if she as intelligent as you say to see she isn't going to get her way. Warn her before you go somewhere, if she doesn't listen then you will leave, and then DO IT!!! Praise her when she does listen, she will love the praise and hate the consequences!!Do not ever feel guilty for teaching your child right from wrong, it is our job as parents. Being a parent is a tough job, it is so much easier to take the path of least resistance, but in the long run it will come back to bite you!!! Good luck, and stay strong!!

Please don't take the actions of a three year old all that seriously.

If she acts up someplace, leave. Some places are not meant for three year olds, like bookstores. If she accidentally knocks over a display, apologize and leave. No harm done.

She sounds like a normal three year old. You haven't "lost" her.

You must be consistent when you decide to do something. Consistency is the key to everything. If she's acting up, just take her home and let her play quietly in her room for a while.

You won't damage her by disciplining her a little. What are you doing that you think is "too hard" on her?

3-year-olds test their limits. It's part of an important psychological process where they realize that they and their parents are separate beings.

It might be helpful to remember: 3-year-olds need immediate consequences, but they don't need long-lasting consequences.

So, if she knocks down a display in a store, say immediately, "Uh oh, bad behavior. Looks like we can't buy you a present from this store." Then apologize profusely to the store owner and leave. But after that, you don't need to lecture her or impose a longer-lasting punishment. The incident is over.

If she does something similar somewhere else, you owe her an identical response. "Uh oh, bad behavior. Now we can't go to this fun place today."

Another thing to remember is, toddlers determine their emotions by your emotions. If you express anger to them, they'll immediately get angry back. But if you say, "Oh, you didn't listen. That makes mommy sad" (and give her a super-sad face and voice), they'll immediately feel regret. So model the reaction you want from her.

I agree with the logical consequences and the consistency. One part of consistency is if you want her to listen make sure you don't repeat requests without action. For consistency to work it might mean that the person at the counter has to wait while you deal with your daughter. Otherwise, your actions are telling her that it is ok to ignore you. Additionally, I have found that parent given choices can make a lot of difference with "strong-willed" children. My son was extremely difficult when he was younger. My children were 19 months apart so I didn't have a lot of spare arms. Although thinking up choices could be challenging at the time, it saved a lot of time with useless battles. He is now 10, much easier, and mostly well behaved. He still has quirks but everyone does. The choices have to be ones logical to whatever it is you are dealing with and something that is ok with you. It can mean do you want to hold mommy's hand or do you want to go in the shopping cart (or whatever you can think of, break out the stroller if need be). We also did practice runs with different behavior. If my son ran, I might say - We walk together when we are going across the parking lot. Let's go back and try that again. Think of discipline as guidance instead of punishment. As long as you are respectful in how you do it and consistent in your expectations you are not damaging your child. You are just guiding her to make better choices. Also, choose your battles wisely. Some challenging behaviors that she might have now if guided in the right direction are great character traits in adults.

3 can be a very hard age. For starters, they don't listen because they are way too busy. So, you need to get in their face! Go down to their level, look them in the eye, and then talk to them. Also, reverse psychology works great with this age. "Oh I don't think your tantrum is big enough? Are you sure you don't want to lay down and kick your feet?"

Insist on a normal, calm voice. Let your child know that you will only talk to her when she uses her normal, calm voice, Ignore, ignore, ignore. My son knows he is not allowed to say "no" to mommy. He can tell me what he wants to do instead, but he can't just say "no" and ignore me.

Believe it or not, but ignoring is the best thing you can do with a trying to be independent 3 year old. This is when they start testing. We play the "he's invisible game." My son will take something of his sisters to irritate her, and we will ignore him. He quickly drops the object and then tries to engage with us. He refuses to clear his place setting. Fine, I just tell him that if he wants that plate for his next meal, it's his responsibilitiy to make sure it gets into the sink to get washed. After him not clearing it for two meals, and realizing his plate went into a TO, he quickly got back on track. You don't want to get dressed? Fine, you can stay in your room and play quietly until you decide to get dressed. You don't want to cooperate with mom and have her help, fine, let me know when you are ready to cooperate, until then, I'm doing housework, I'm not sitting here watching you play and be off task.

Also, you need to give options. Asking them questions confuses their little brain and it makes it easier to get them to do things. It also empowers them.

Most importantly, don't let her drive you crazy. It will just feed the little monster within. This age is all about feeling power over others by irritating and driving them nuts. So, remain calm, and if she does something that makes you want to scream, leave the room.

Get the book 1-2-3 Magic.

Your feeling guilty and not wanting to have your daughter feel upset are getting in the way of your ability to discipline. We need to understand that our children will not like us from time to time and that is okay. Trying to make them happy all the time does not serve them.

Children need the opportunity to learn to deal with all kinds of emotions including disappointment, frustration, and sadness. Our children can't learn if we constantly rob them of thier own responsibilty and rescue them from consequences and "bad" feelings.

Your friends have given you the best answer yet you ask us who don't even get to observe you with her???? Duh.