Now that Angel is almost three, well 2 more months to go, but
looking at my frequency of posting, I might as well write this post now since
it has come to my mind rather than umm never!
Twos, more popularly known as the terrible twos, which is that
developmental stage of toddlers which involves refusals and temper tantrums. I
have seen my friend’s son literally lying on the floor and demanding cold
drink, and not just any other cold drink, but a specific cola brand.
It is unavoidable or so we thought, after all, parenting is also
about experimenting and adapting the things which suit you the best, however
Angel’s two’s are not terrible at all. They are terrific to say the least.
While J* and I do believe that we got lucky, but there are also certain things
which we have been doing and we feel that we have done it right. So this post
is to share my wisdom tips which made our lives easier and which might help the
other first time parents too.
Its not that Angel never throws tantrums, but whenever she does, I
always give her a benefit of doubt, that is, I ask myself whether she is
hungry/sleepy/tired. If the answer to that is yes, I try to address that first.
Then there were those 15 dreadful initial days at playschool. It
was the time that she took to settle down. She used to cry in the morning while
going to school. Although I sat in the common area at her school for a week, my being there made her crankier, so I left her on her own and then J*
started to drop her to school instead of me. At home, the story was no
different. She used to cry at the drop of the hat. She used to get up from her
sleep at the middle of the night and start howling. The teachers at the play school were very
supportive. It was separation anxiety for her. My usually well behaved baby had
turned into a crying, wailing monster. We used to counsel her at home that when
we were young, we used to go to school and her cousins go to school and blah
blah blah, I believe that the teachers did the same and one fine day she woke
up and was ready to go to school. Now she loves her school so much that she
wishes to go to school even on the weekends. Sometimes after her afternoon
naps, she asks whether she has to go to school now. Eventually, she was back to
her cheerful self.
When she asks for something, I have learnt to attend her as soon
as possible, the sooner the better. For example, when she wants to explore the
jaltarang while I am cooking in the morning, I keep aside my cooking for a
while and arrange the apparatus for her. Now she gets really busy for the next
15 minutes and I get some precious trouble free morning cooking minutes. Moms with toddlers would know its importance. If I tell her to wait until my
cooking is finished, she would come to me after every 2 minutes which would be
frustrating for both of us. So this technique is for my sanity as well. If at
all I cannot leave what I am working on, I turn to J* and make sure that what
she want to discover is provided to her. Here the good old distraction
technique will not work as it’s very difficult to distract a 2 year old. She
gets distracted for a while but comes back to the initial point, so it beats
the whole purpose of distraction and I am back to square one.
There are certain rules which are to be followed, no exceptions.
Like we have clean up the room before we go to the park. She now gets stars on
her hands from school which she proudly shows off as she helps the teachers
clean up the classroom. I was told about it in the parents-teachers meeting
too. Once when she was not in the mood and refused to tidy up, we actually
didn’t go to the park that evening. So yes I am wicked, which reminds me that I
have been told the same in a not so subtle manner by people when I tell them
that she has not tasted chocolates yet or she doesn’t watch TV. I have seen
children as young as 6 months being fed chocolates. When I go to my mom’s place
I have to actually fight with my relatives for not feeding her chocolates.
Well, my point is chocolates are empty calories and I don't feel that she is
deprived of anything. Then they ask me that when I will start giving her
chocolates. Angel knows about chocolates and she holds them and loves the
colorful wrappers, but she has never demanded to eat them so I have never
really thought about it and I will prolong it as much as I can. That may be
because she doesn’t like eating – anything. Coming to TV, research has proved
that TV switches off the brain and the exposure to TV before 2 years should be
zero. I would rather that she watches and runs after the butterflies in the
park than seeing about butterflies on TV. Moreover, this is the time for her to
be out and about as she has her whole adult life to be glued to screen(I hope
not though) Well, she does watch rhymes and other videos on YouTube and it does
come as a boon when while feeding her when nothing else works. And I will have
to admit that I make her watch this series while drinking milk these days and
its down in 5 minutes which would otherwise take more than 30 minutes.
She loves to talk, in fact, just today my neighbor was telling me
that she loves Angel’s voice and how can someone that small talk so much :D I
believe that is because we have talked to her – A LOT, since the time I got pregnant.
So at 1 year she was able to recognize at least 10 of her body parts and by 18
months she could say around 120 words which she actually understood apart from
the other ones that she just repeated. I describe everything around her in
minute detail and I try to answer all her questions as age appropriately as I
can. So now when she sees a crow, she doesn’t just say a crow, she actually
talks to the crow and makes both sides of the conversations and sometimes when
I pitch in, she is ready with her version to counter me. We are also trying to
make her multi lingual. We used to speak to her in our mother tongue while she
started talking and now we have switched to Hindi as we felt it was important
for her to convey her needs in school and overall survive in our country, while
the grandparents stick to the mother tongue. She is picking up English as well
at her school.
Angel loves books. We have read to her and shown her the books
ever since she was very young and I could see that she was fascinated with all
the colors and pictures. We have joined a library and we try to go there
regularly. She insists to accompany me and she loves to pick her own books.
Books open a different, magical world altogether. It also boosts the
imagination which I feel is very important for the young ones. She is still not
ready to listen to stories which are not perfect, that is, when someone is
troubled she gets very upset. I have never killed anyone in her stories yet.
For stories like ‘Lion King’ and ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’, I have to
coax her a lot to let me go till the end as there is a happy ending in
waiting!
Two magical words which she learnt quite early was ‘aape’ which
meant ‘apne aap’ or on my own and ‘try’. She loves to try everything and we let
her as long as its harmless and she is proud of that. So our brushing time is
fun as she loves to brush her teeth on her own. Our play time is fun. Our park
time is no fuss at all. (Let me not go to the eating thing) As a result, I was
told by her teachers that she is very independent for her age. She knows how to
open her bottle and snack box unlike other children who wait for the teachers
to help them. She uses the loo, flushes the toilet, washes her hands and wipes
them all by herself. Surprisingly, she doesn’t like to be fed in school and
wants to do that on her own. When I tell her that a particular thing is not
possible, like fitting a bigger cap in smaller one, she persuades me to ‘try’
And finally its never too early to teach them manners and to
respect the others, books and toys.
So here were a few things that helped us sail through this time. I
am no expert and I have learnt all this after a lot of trial and error and
reading. Meanwhile, we are preparing for an even more challenging thing –
tantrum three’s or threenage it is called!
