Anyone else ever wonder if they’re actually going to come out of parenting a toddler alive?! The toddler phase can truly be one of the hardest phases to navigate as a parent. If only it came with an instruction manual!
My three-nager Benjamin has very big emotions. Sometimes those emotions translate into unwanted behaviors that are really hard for us to understand, which leaves us feeling helpless and frustrated. After several weeks of meltdowns, aggressive behavior, failed time-outs, and lots of tears, I knew I needed to work on better understanding him so that I can serve him better!
I purchased a course called “Winning the Toddler Stage” from the ladies over at Big Little Feelings. Parent coach Kristin wrangles two toddlers on a daily basis, and Deena is a child therapist, parent coach, and a mom. I follow them on Instagram and have gleaned so much useful insight from their content. I was so happy to see they offered a detailed course on toddlerhood!
The course is $99. It gets you SO much amazing content and it never expires, so you can come back to it at any time (even years down the road with another child!). It consists of 63 different instructional videos that fall under the below categories:
I took high-level notes from the first module that I wanted to share! These are the key takeaways that I felt were most helpful, but I highly recommend purchasing the course on your own if you have the means. I’ve followed them on Instagram for a while now and have learned so much from the free content they share there, so I was happy to support them by buying this course!
Part 1: Neuroscience for Toddlers
- Your toddlers mind and brain are trying to understand everything. Their brain is exploding! The fastest amount of brain development in our lifetime happens between birth and age three.
- Your toddlers brain hasn’t developed some critical areas yet (things like speech abilities, emotional awareness, body control, empathy, and neurological reasoning, etc.). The pre-frontal cortex is responsible for helping us make sense of/understand our emotions, and it’s not fully developed in our toddlers yet. All of their massive emotions are expressed through their bodies, instead of their words. That’s developmentally appropriate.
- Your toddler’s brain is obsessed with control.
- For your toddler to be calm, they must feel both physically and emotionally safe. This means they need to know that you’re in charge of keeping them safe as they continue to push boundaries and explore. They should also feel emotionally safe, so that they know it’s okay to feel however they’re feeling inside (without getting in trouble). This helps them learn to rely on us for support, and will help them openly talk about their feelings with us as parents.
- Your toddler’s brain needs attention, acceptance, and unconditional love to thrive. Our toddlers are wired to be extremely connected to us. This makes them super sensitive to our opinions of them! They want to be loved by us. Sometimes they resort to using bad behavior just to get us to notice them.
Part 2: Keeping Kids In-The-Know
- Our kids’ brains want to be “in the know” about everything.
- All humans thrive on consistency, structure, and predictability.
- Having a series of predictable events can really help toddlers feel secure (a loose “schedule” is recommended).
- On days that might look different, do your best to prep their little brains for what’s to come. Put them in charge of something small to make them feel valued/powerful.
Part 3: All the Feels
- What should we do/how should we react to the HUGE feelings? We need to OK/accept the way they’re feeling, no matter how ridiculous. We have to shift our mindset. It’s not bad to feel angry. It’s not weak to feel sad. Crying is not suffering. There is no such thing as positive or negative feelings. Feelings are feelings!
- When toddlers get mad, our instinct is to send them to timeout, tell them to “stop crying”, etc. but that just teaches them mad=bad.
- The FEELING is okay, the behavior is NOT.
- We need to start with acknowledging the way they’re feeling:
- This helps them feel heard, valued, and understood.
- Helps your child cultivate authenticity, honesty, and a resilient mind and brain.
- A lot of us were never taught how to handle our own emotions, so we push them down and don’t talk about them! We can instill emotionally security and help break the generational issue of unhealthy coping skills in our kids.
- SEE THEM — OK THE FEELING!
Part 3: Bumpers
- Think of bumpers at a bowling alley: no matter how wildly you drop the ball at the start of the lane, it gently bounces off the bumpers and finds its way down the lane. We want to put those bumpers up, just enough to keep our toddlers safe.
- Example: your toddler is watching the iPad. You preface it by saying “you can watch ONE show and then we are putting it away.” When you go to take it away, he throws a fit and you give in. But the day before that, you actually took it away like you said you would. Now your toddler is confused, which causes even more frustration because of the unpredictability of your behavior. When we use boundaries (or bumpers) inconsistently, we create uncertainty, which puts our toddlers on edge.
- Consistent boundaries help your toddler feel “in the know” about what to expect. This is what makes your toddler feel the safest. Instead of them thinking “how can I get what I want,” their focus shifts to “I know what’s going to happen here. She’s going to turn off the iPad now.”
- WHY are we giving in: we are avoiding their big feelings. But feelings are okay and we want to welcome them! It’s okay for our toddler to be sad that the iPad time is over. We hear they’re sad, it’s hard to turn off the iPad, but we want to keep the bumper up! Over time it gets easier and easier. Every day becomes less of a battle.
Part 4: You Just Got Promoted
- Imagine your home feels out of control. Your toddler is screaming at you, and you resort to screaming back because you’ve hit your breaking point. We’ve all been there!
- We want to go from being the frazzled, frustrated parent to the cool, confident leader of our home.
- Think back to the worst boss you’ve ever had. Always pointing out the things you did wrong, super inconsistent, one minute they’re blowing up at you and the next they’re inviting you to happy hour, barks orders at you all day long, doesn’t feel like a collaborative team effort, etc. The worst part: they’re in charge of your daily life every single day! How miserable!
- Now think about the best boss ever. They were probably level headed, calm/confident in their leadership, they took charge but you felt safe knowing they would leave you in the right direction. Made you feel heard, invested time into you, etc. We want to act like this leader in our homes! Lead by example and set the tone.
- Your mission: unconditional love, even in the hard/stressful times.
- When toddlers are illogical: we respond kindly, yet firmly.
- YOU decide when it’s time for a nap, what’s being served for dinner, etc. You know how to say no to the requests that aren’t in the best interests of your family. Have confidence in that and feel empowered.
- Your tone of voice is huge. How you sound to your toddler when they’re having a hard moment is everything. You want to resist the urge to meet their chaos with more chaos.
Part 5: Be Consistent
- Consistency helps toddlers feel safe so they’re less likely to descend into survival mode=tantrums!
- They need consistent responses from a calm, confident leader at all times.
- They also need consistency between our words/actions. We want them to trust us!
- Don’t do things like bribing them with a cookie when you get home from the store, and then not give them one because it’s too close to dinner! Don’t say you’ll do things unless you’re actually going to follow-through. It might feel unimportant, but to them its unpredictability which causes anxiety.
- If you haven’t been particularly consistent up to this point, expect the first few days to be pretty rough. But keep going! No matter what, stay consistent and hold your ground with your boundaries. Eventually everyone will be more calm and happy! Toddlers thrive with boundaries, predictability and consistency.
- You must also be consistent in terms of both parents being on the same page! Your toddler won’t be able to settle into this new system if you’re not both on board with these new patterns.
Part 6: Common Pitfalls
- Set reasonable expectations. Their brains are still forming! Manage your expectations for their behavior.
- Avoid dwelling in the negatives and “I Told You So’s” (“You’re being bad! See what you DID? You did XYZ this morning, so we aren’t going to do XYZ tonight because of your behavior.”) Instead, focus your attention on what you DO want.
- Avoid displacing your own emotions onto your toddler (“You’re making mommy feel sad. You hurt me, is that how you want me to feel?”) This is too stressful for them and then they internalize messages that make them feel shameful. And don’t hold grudges against them!
- Watch out for toxic positivity and minimizing experiences. We want our toddlers to feel good and happy inside and have a happy mindset, but don’t go overboard. (“Don’t be sad. Let’s be happy! We always want to be happy!”) This doesn’t teach them it’s okay to feel their feelings!
- Keep an eye out for bribery. You should celebrate when your kid is choosing good behavior, but avoid bribery. We want them to develop internal motivation to choose good behavior on their own. Otherwise we will get stuck trying to one-up ourselves every time.
- Be careful of gender stereotyping. “Girls can cry, but you’re a boy so toughen up.” All boys have emotions, and all girls are strong. All kids deserve to feel seen and valued.
I hope this has been useful for any of you toddler mamas! Shifting my mindset, acknowledging Benji’s feelings more diligently, and setting strict boundaries has already made a huge difference in his behavior in just a couple weeks!
I’ll continue to share as I work my way through the bigger sections of the course, but I definitely think it’s worth the investment!
