IT'S NOT DEFIANCE, THE TESTING IS HEALTHY
At 2 years old, Conor is in full swing of testing Valerie and me. Just last night, I told him to stop jumping up the stairs so he wouldn’t accidently fall. He jumped up the next stair and looked back, grinning. I repeated my request and it triggered him to jump up the next step and turn around, grinning. I wondered if I should put him in a timeout for disobeying or pick him up and get him out of the ‘hot’ area.
According to Susanne Ayers Denham, a developmental psychologist, kids aren’t being defiant when they ‘test’ us. She points out that toddlers are trying to grapple with the rules of the family. They’re still trying to figure out if you need to be there to correct them each time and how they can ‘own’ the rule so they follow it even when you’re not there.
When you figure that this ‘testing’ coincides with their increasing need to be independent, it’s hard to read when a child needs to be reprimanded and when a child needs some room to learn and grow. I find this line increasingly blurry and need a constant dose of psychologists to remind me that my amazing son is following human instincts and isn’t just trying to be a pain in the ass on any given day. So thank you, Susanne, for your help today.
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