[delta508]

DD1 turns 3 in a few weeks; she's a delightful, happy little girl who (for the most part!) is a sheer joy to be around. But DH and I are struggling to get her to do almost anything that we'd like her to do.... at least not without some sort of bribe/reward. For example:

1. Dinner time - we have about a 50% success rate here, sometimes she eats dinner without too much fuss, but other times she just plays around with it. Lately we've resorted to saying 'if you eat 3 more mouthfuls you can have XYZ' (XYZ usually being ice-cream or a biscuit or some other treat). We know this isn't ideal but we're struggling to get her to eat her dinner 'just because she has to', and we don't want to get into the habit of having her only eat her dinner if there's a reward afterwards.

2. Bed time - again, she's a born negotiator! She'll only put on her PJs only after she's had a glass of milk; she'll only go to sleep after we've read her a book... or two... or three.... She'll only clean her teeth if she can use Daddy's toothbrush... and on it goes.

3. Getting dressed - I pick out an outfit for her because it's weather appropriate. But she refuses to wear it, insisting that she wears bathers and leggings!! So again we resort to 'bribing' her with a reward of some sort (which may be as simple as 'letting' her carry her own bag to the car, but still...)

and so on...picking up her toys, cleaning up after herself, having a bath, etc. etc.

We just want to get to a point where she just accepts that these are things that are expected of her because she is part of the family, and not because she will be rewarded in some way for doing them. I realise this is probably perfectly normal behaviour, but it's soooooo frustrating!

So... how do you deal with it?

Thanks!

[EBeditor]

It can be a really frustrating age. My 3 tips would be:

1. Have set rules and routines around mealtimes and bedtimes, so there is no negotiating.

2. Limit choices to two. So give her a choice of outfits and she can choose 1 or she's going out in her pyjamas. Another option is to let her wear what she wants but have a back-up outfit in the car for when she realises outfit is inappropriate.

3. Reward good behaviour with praise, and (if she needs something tangible) stamps & stickers.

[with the goo goo...]

With bedtime, can you set up some kind of routine chart for her, which lists everything that she must do in order? You might want to attach a reward to it, if that kind of thing motivates her.

My friend has done this for her four year old son and she took pictures of him doing each step and he thinks it is pretty cool to mark off each step.

No idea for the others, sorry. We're also stuck on the bribes for dinner thing at the moment and Owen could not care less what he wears.

[*mylittleprince*]

I wouldn't negotiate or let a toddler dictate to you. With meal times, she either eats what is given (as long as you know there is something there that she actually likes and will eat) or doesn't get dinner. I would set up a routine for bedtime, either verbally or with a chart of some sort - dinner, bath, teeth, dress, stories, bed, etc.

I would offer choice where possible. Pick two outfits and she can choose one. Do you want to hop like a kangaroo or slither like a snake to the bathroom for bath time (we do this with DS who will be 3 in April).

Good luck! It is hard when they don't listen. I don't like to shout or smack and it's hard when you have to constantly have to ask for things to be done/co-operation. Hopefully it's gets easier with age.

[clm1982]

I have no advice as we have the same issues here

[deejie]

Aaah DS1 is turning 3 shortly too. What a frustrating (but fun!) age!

1. I am very no-nonsense at dinner time. Dinner is put on table, if DS1 doesn't want to eat it then it is removed after I finish mine with no fuss. No bribes are offered. If he doesn't eat dinner, he doesn't get dessert. No other food is offered before bedtime. He goes to sleep and wakes up for a normal sized breakfast. He goes to bed 1-3 times per week on nothing or just a few mouthfuls-- he is not going to starve himself and eats okay through the day. It's not worth the angst/fuss/stress to negotiate and I don't like giving him the impression he has any power

2. Same with bed. No negotiation. Bath, PJs, brush teeth, watch a TV show (usually he picks Night Garden) then stories. We read 2 stories-- I pick one, he picks one. then lights out. If he gets out of bed, he is marched back to bed, tucked back in "it's bedtime, DS1. Go to sleep now." After a few nights, he got the picture. If he throws a wobbly over brushing his teeth, he doesn't watch his TV show and yes I absolutely follow through (boy does that work a treat!)

3. DS1 can pick what he wears, I lay out 2 choices each morning. If he doesn't pick one quick, I decide for him.

Look, I might sound like a cold, harsh parent, but I'm really not. I tell DS1 all the time, "you are not in charge, you are a child!" Like you, I expect him to do certain things as part of being in a family. I'm not saying he never throws a wobby at dinner or bedtime... of course he does! He is nearly 3! BUT by being consistent in what I do, it happens a LOT less than it used to.

[Hattie]

MY DS is just about to turn 4 and thankfully is coming out of the really bloody difficult 3 year old stage! Your story sounds very familiar, pretty much everything becomes a battle unless you have clear rules and strategies. Ours were similar to the PP:

1. Don't make mealtimes a fight. I saw a dietician about DS's eating (or lack thereof!) and her advice was that no healthy child ever starved being offered healthy food. So we stick to this. DS usually gets the same meal as us, but I always ensure there are at least two things on his plate I know he will like (eg potatoes, cheese). He used to gag to the point of vomitting if we tried to get him to try new foods, but that has improved a lot and now will normally try at least one mouthful of new things. We never force him to eat anything, if he chooses to eat nothing then he knows there will be nothing more until the next meal time, whereas if he eats some of his dinner he will be allowed to have a piece of fruit or a drink of milk.

2. Definitely offer limited choices, with everything. Never say 'what do you want for breakfast?' or 'what do you want to wear?' because you will get ridiculous answers and end up in a fight with her. Instead, as PP said, offer two choices 'you can have toast or cereal', 'you can wear the red dress or the pink one'. In our case we say to DS 'you can have toast or cereal or nothing' as he is now old enough to understand the concept of missing out entirely.

3. Use reward charts or bribery systems, whatever works! My DS is very, very driven by extrinsic rewards, so for example if he cleans up his toys he gets to watch a DVD for a hour, if he has a tantrum then we still make him clean up but no DVD. Bad behaviour never gets rewarded.

4. Does your DD go to daycare/kindy or similar? We find that DS has learned so much about how to behave appropriately (sharing, doing your allocated jobs, waiting your turn) from kindy, because he does not want to be the odd one out when everyone else is behaving well.

Good luck, I can assure you that this too shall pass!

Cheers,
Julie

[paddyboo]

I wouldn't negotiate or let a toddler dictate to you. With meal times, she either eats what is given (as long as you know there is something there that she actually likes and will eat) or doesn't get dinner.

agree. Pat is only 20 months but he either eats what he is offered or nothing. If he eats the whole thing, or most of it if it was a large serve, he can have sweets which could be fruit, yoghurt, or occasionally icecream. If he doesn;t eat his dinner in 10 minutes i take it away and if he is hungry half an hour later, he is offered the same thing.

[delta508]

Thanks everyone and yes, she does go to childcare full time so is picking up good habits there. She also eat breakfast and lunch there (with no fuss!) so I'm not concerned about her nutritional intake overall as I think that's fine. It's just so frustrating when DH and I (and our other DD2) are sitting at the dinner table and she's just playing up. We'd even settle for her just sitting there and not eating anything, but it's the 'I want milk', 'I want ice-cream', 'I want, I want, I want....!' that's so infuriating.

We haven't really tried reward charts as such, partly because I think she's been a bit too young (may be old enough now), but also because her 'rewards' are so inconsistent! Sometimes she will do ANYTHING to watch a particular DVD, the next day it's 'I don't like that DVD!'. Sometimes stickers are in favour, other days she couldn't care less. Sigh....

[Working_Mummy]

We just got strict, even for the little things. I was just sick of negotiating and sick of bribing, we decided it was time DS started respecting us and what we said.

We discussed having a nice dinner and a chat about some new rules one thursday and we sat down to the dinner and chat the next day - we spoke about the House being Mummy & Daddy's house and therefore DS had to accept Mummy & Daddy's rules.

I don't really like this looking back on it. It maybe Mummy & Daddy's house BUT its Mummy, Daddy & DS's HOME before anything else.

Anyway - we discussed punishment for not following rules.

Talking back / Rude Talk (He gets an attitude rather than rude words) is punished by a smack and warning that if he repeats being rude will get 3 smacks. The smacks barely touch him but get counted out 1, 2, 3 and seem to be the punishment that works. We found the Rude Talking/Back Chat was always worse when we were away from home - possibly attention seeking.

Asking him to do something and being ignored etc (which usually occurs at home) gets a warning that next time he will get Time Out.
If Time Out doesn't work (Sometimes he accepts it, sits on the mat for 2 minutes & is a wonder child, other times he refuses to sit on the mat - Kicks, Hits, Screams) he gets told "if you can not listen to Mummy & Daddy's rules in Mummy & Daddy's house then you will have to leave the house and sit outside on the step".

We have used this punishment of being sent outside twice and wow the impact it had was amazing.

Our tough times sound like when you have your tough times, around dinner, teeth, bed when they are tired. DS generally starts dinner a few minutes before us (gets a head start) and DH eats fast so DH feeds DS if he is still going when he is done. We try not to make a deal of this - he eats without thinking if DH is feeding / helping him (Using a separate fork) but getting him to do it can be a struggle. He then gets a few minutes (Egg Timer) to finish as we start cleaning up.

From the dinner table our routine is strip, toilet, teeth/face, PJ's then Bed. He was getting to worked up about stories so we make time for them in the mornings instead.

It was really hard, but like you i got sick of negotiating EVERYTHING, somethings he just had to learn to accept and unfortunately it was hard at 3 to be able to negotiate some things and not others, so we had to be strict and had no negotiation its Mum/Dad's way.

DS still gets choices (would you like x or y on your sandwich / would you like a or b for morning tea) but again he gets a choice not posed with the full decision making (What would you like for lunch - because if i can't do it, it leads to further problems)

Like i said we have only used outside punishment twice and I feel it is a bit harsh BUT its what worked for us - we really couldn't find anything else that had an effect.