The terrible two's

I know that this time period is called the terrible twos', and it must be called that for a reason. But nobody told me how bad it would be. Everyone warns you about newborns, and teething. But no-one stopped and told me that having a toddler would leave you exhausted, feeling incompetent, useless, and terrible at being a mother.

We are having a challenging time with Charlotte at the moment. I don't think her behaviour is any different to most two year olds, but I feel like I am the only one going through it. She is testing her boundaries. In a big way. And they are big boundaries. I am trying to be consistent, to praise good behaviour blah blah blah. It is very difficult when she is constantly running away from you, yelling, or climbing up to get things she shouldn't.

Of course her language is developing well too. Which means we get lots of "nos". Although that is a simple response now. She has moved on to "Go away mummy!". And also (with arms crossed and a petulant pout) "I'm not very happy with you right now mummy". But when she said to me "whatever" I knew we were in trouble. Surely she is too young to be acting like a teenager??

Yesterday was a particularly trying day. We are trying to toilet train as well (which I will write about separately) but there has been alot of defiance and also alot of cleaning. We were all going to go to the shops but I wanted Charlotte to either sit on the potty first, or put a nappy on. She refused either option, so I told James just to go on his own with Angus. Well that was it, the world was ending. She started to scream and cry at the front door. I couldn't close the door as she was leaning against it, and wouldn't move, so was just standing at the screen door. Then she wet herself. I stripped her and was cleaning up the puddle while she was screaming. She kept saying "I want to go to the shops with Daddy and Angus". Except it sounded more like "IWANNNASHOOPPSDADDYAAAAANGUUSSS". So there she was standing at the screen door, half naked, screaming (and drooling) at the top of her lungs. God knows what the neighbours thought. Since she wouldn't move I figured that I would start the vacuuming and managed to finish that before James came home. She was still going but I had manged to dress her and close the door by then. James said that he could hear her halfway down the street. At least I got the vacuuming done.

I keep trying to tell myself that it is just a stage, it will pass (until Angus goes through it that is). When I have mentioned how hard I'm finding this stage to other, more experienced parents I get that all knowing smile and a nod and an "aaah, just you wait until they are..."