By Rick Kaempfer
Every new parent fears “the terrible twos.” As soon as parents bring that precious pooping machine home from the hospital, they are warned...”Just wait until he’s two. They don’t call them the terrible two’s for nothing.”
Yes they do.
Don’t get me wrong. Two can be a tough age. Your baby has just gone from an irresistibly cute toddler learning to walk and say a few words, to a demanding brat. That can be a tough transition. But now that I’m going through this the third time, I’m more convinced than ever that the twos are nowhere near as terrible as the threes.
Two year olds are merely demanding and whiny. Three year olds are sociopaths.
I know that sounds a little strong, but think of it this way. Three year olds are mature enough to know what is wrong, but they do it anyway because they simply don’t care. That’s almost the textbook definition of sociopath.
My own darling three year old son Sean is a perfect example. He’s cute (“put him in commercials” cute), and he knows it. At my grandmother’s nursing home, the old women literally fight each other to get close to him. When they get near him, he flaps his long eyelashes a few times, looks at them with his piercing baby blue eyes, flashes them his dazzling white smile, and says something he knows he shouldn’t say...
“Do you have any candy?”
If these women could still walk, they would sprint to their rooms. As it is, they do a pretty fair walker-shuffle.
“Sean,” I scold. “It’s not nice to ask people for candy.”
“Oh don’t be so hard on him,” they all say.
Cute three-year-olds quickly discover they have allies against Mom and Dad in almost every public situation. They also discover that there are no limits to what they can get away with when Mom and Dad are not around. Within a few minutes, a three year old can sniff out any person’s hot buttons—and start pressing.
Grandmothers are especially susceptible to this; even my German mother. Sean has discovered that all rules can be dispensed with at the drop of a hat if he says the magic words to her: “I’m hungry.”
The food request never goes unanswered. By the time I pick him up after a visit, he has eaten 10-15 meals. He’s also jumped on the furniture, broken a few dishes, escaped down the street, and left a trail of crumbs behind him—all without consequences.
That’s why being the bad cop of a three year old is a particularly thankless job. Policing this behavior in public is almost impossible. Society is not on your side. They are on the side of the cute, blinking, “aw shucks I’m adorable” child. I’ve seen the look from strangers. You know what look I’m talking about—the “let the boy have a gigantic bag of M&Ms, it won’t kill him” look.
So I pick and choose my battles in public. Instead, I focus on policing him at home. Only at home can I reject his ridiculous demands like “Mom has to put on my shoes” without getting the look. Only at home will an outrageous comment like “You’re not the boss of me” get the reaction it deserves. This is the place where negotiations end, rules and boundaries are established, and manners are drummed home. Unfortunately, this is also the place where his true self comes out all day long—and that fake charm is a distant memory.
In a way, that’s a shame. I fell in love with it too. He’s a cutie.
But while I really do miss those batting eyelashes, my tough love approach has helped me discover that I was absolutely right about his manipulative machinations. One day when he was crying about having to follow one of my draconian rules—like no playing with the steak knives—I calmly told him about the newest house rule.
”There’s no crying in the kitchen,” I said. Sean looked up at me mid-cry. When he saw I wasn’t mad, and I wasn’t cracking a smile, he took it seriously. And wouldn’t you know it? The little bugger stopped crying. Just like that.
I couldn’t believe that actually worked. I’m in my eleventh year of parenting, and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard that fake crying, yet it had never even occurred to me to officially ban it. I’ve since told him it’s also against the rules to cry in the car, on the couch, in the bathroom, and in the backyard. Each time I told him the rule, he stopped crying immediately. Even the times I thought it was real crying. Even in public.
Who knew?
Maybe it takes three tries to get this three-year-old thing right.
On the other hand, maybe I just got lucky.
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