It happens to just about every parent—it seems that overnight your cute, acquiescent, adorable and bubbly baby turns into an independent monster overnight shouting “No!” and “Mine!” at every interval. Alas, you may be expecting the arrival of the terrible twos but surprised to find that they don’t always wait until after the second birthday…
I think that parents of the newly verbal, vocal, and opinionated toddler need to hear that they have done their job! Congratulations are in order if your child is starting to assert her independence and has learned how to make her wishes, wants, and needs known. We really do want our children to begin the road to independence, we just often have no idea how loud and painful the process is going to be. It is not unusual for children to start asserting themselves even younger than two and I have talked to many parents wondering how to handle or manage a “terrible” 18-month-old. “Hang in there,” I tell them, “this is only the beginning.”
If your child isn’t waiting for the calendar to tell him that he is no longer a baby, you can look at this as an opportunity to move along with your child into the next developmental stage. You might have thought you had a little more time, but this is a good reminder that we parents are not necessarily running the developmental time clock. As a parent of a sixteen-year-old who just got her G.E.D. and is starting college at the end of this month, I can attest that sometimes our children are in a bigger hurry to get on with things than we would like.
A wise person once told me to parent my children at the stages they are, not the stages I wish they were at. If you start out with consistency, understanding and flexibility in disciplining your almost-two-year-old, you can adjust as her stages and needs change.