The Terrible Twos

Last night, Hubby was talking on his cell phone and Babygirl desperately wanted the phone. She pointed at the phone and when that didn't work she tried climbing up Hubby's leg. She started to whine, so I handed her an old cell phone that we don't use. She looked at the old cell phone I handed her, got upset, and threw it. She pointed at Hubby's cell phone again, stomped her feet, and whined. We ignored her, so she picked up the old cell phone that she threw and threw it again! She threw it a couple more times and when she realized it wasn't getting her what she wanted she lay down on the floor and had a tantrum - kicking her feet, rolling her head back and forth, and crying/screaming (without any tears of course).

I, being the excellent parent that I am, decided to tape her little tantrum. Babygirl stopped crying/screaming for a second when she heard the camera turn on, but when she realized that I wasn't giving her what she wanted she continued with her fit. After a few minutes, her tantrum wasn't satisfying enough, so she rolled over onto her tummy (still crying/screaming) and looked around. She saw the old cell phone again, reached for it, and threw it. So now she's on the floor having a tantrum and periodically reaching for the old cell phone and throwing it.

Hubby and I decide to completely ignore her so I stopped taping and we went over to the kitchen to start prepping her lunch for the next day. After a few minutes, Babygirl realized we weren't even paying attention to her so she got up, walked over to us, and really started to cry. I knelt down, held her hands, looked her in the eye, and said, "I love you sweetie, but you can't throw things or have tantrums whenever you don't get what you want." Which of course worked so well that Babygirl immediately threw herself on the ground again and had another tantrum. This time she hit her head on the kitchen table leg and started crying in pain. I tried to pick her up to comfort her, but she wouldn't have anything to do with me. She squirmed to get out of my arms, crying, "Da da. Da da." over and over again. Finally Hubby came over and picked her up. It took a few minutes but she eventually calmed down and just whined in his arms.

At this point, we decided to take her up to bed early. Hubby put her in bed with her blanky and pacifier. She crawled around whining a little and then threw her pacifier! But after her pacifier was gone, she started whining louder because she wanted her pacifier. She grabbed her pacifier and put it back in her mouth but then she realized she was still angry so she threw her pacifier again! She did this a few more times before she finally got too tired to throw her pacifier again and fell asleep.


Aren't the Terrible Twos supposed to start at age 2?