The Terrifying Threes Are Upon Us!

I’ve always known that toddlers go through the “Terrible Twos” which consist of loud, screaming, stomping tantrums and general defiance, but nobody ever warned me about what comes after that.

The TERRIFYING THREES.

A Familiar Scene

I laughed when someone pre-

warned me just before his third birthday a few months ago, as I had never heard that saying and figured they were trying to wind me up.

Oh how wrong I was.

Chunk has had the odd tantrum here and there, where he would walk to a shop front door and then freeze.

For ages.

And then throw himself onto the floor and refuse to move.

For ages. 


And then cry if I dragged him into the shop.

For ages.

And other times he might shout “no” at me, throw something or just cry, but these were not very often or would be over in seconds through the use of distraction.

Now for some reason, the tantrums are climbing up a notch (or three) and seem to be a lot more often. Resuming contact with his father recently may well have something to do with some of it (he is VERY hyper after seeing him, with attitude I would expect from a 15-year-old Kevin and Perry-style child, not my preschooler) but there’s also more aggression, temper and more thought-out sentences to throw at me during these tantrums (I don’t like you being the best).

I now understand where the new phrase “tween” comes from, as he is a teenager inside a preschooler’s body.

He literally huffs, crosses his arm, sticks his bottom lip out and stomps off to his bedroom if he’s not happy with something. He hates losing with a passion and he has regressed to the days of biting or lobbing a toy at me when I resort to using the word “no” which lately seems to be one of the only words in my vocabulary.

My Current Mental State

The threat of time-out is sometimes not worrying him enough to stop behaviour, but thankfully putting him on time-out seems to (eventually) calm him down and minimise his behaviour.


For now. 

My nephew is nearly a year older and I remember he started to be quite defiant so I am reassuring myself that this is normal and may reduce over time, but part of me is concerned that maybe some of it is because of me, or his father, or both?

I’m very aware I am moaning an awful lot at him at the moment as the behaviour drives me to the brink of insanity, so this week I have tried to think of more positive ways to say no, or stop doing that, to try and see if this has a better outcome. So far I have said things such as “what does mummy say about throwing things at people?” and “I can see you are feeling cross” and giving him cuddles.

Sometimes this works, other times he looks at me as if I’m mental.

Any tips would be gratefully received right now!

Follow me on Twitter, Pinterest or Facebook