Toddlers feelings

age 3!!!

Tabitha had a really nice birthday, we went to the Yorkshire sculpture park with family and friends, and did lots of running around and climbing and looking for trolls and had a big picnic with a pink birthday cake that she helped decorate. all in all a lovely day. Tabitha is growing so fast! shes really tall and so so clever. she can now count to 10 fairly reliably and her vocabulary and imagination is growing daily.

Also...Congratulations little sister on the birth of your baby!!! Welcome to the world little Isla!!!!

Any way...

Children's feelings.

Its really easy as an adult to see kids emotions and reactions as not as valid and real as adult emotions. and lets be honest, when your toddler is having a meltdown because I refuse to let her eat gravel, its pretty funny, and reacting to the frustration of toddler crying with humor is perfectly valid.
but to the child its real, and the upset is real. children don't have the same sense of perspective as adults have, they haven't experienced the same rejection and disappointment as you have. little pains are big to them because they haven't experienced the pain of wisdom tooth removal or broken bones, to them falling down and hurting their knees is literally the worst pain they have any memory of feeling. And the same goes for emotional pain. it may seem really silly and funny to us to get upset over something little, but small children haven't felt any big rejections or traumas yet. as an adult I have watched friends die slowly of cancer, I've had long term loving relationships ending, I've not got into the university I wanted to go to...but to kids you saying "We don't have time to play right now, we have to go to nursery" IS a big rejection and disappointment.

Children also simply don't have the language skills yet to explain their feelings and reasons. Maybe she never intended to actually eat the gravel, maybe she had spotted a pretty little stone in there that she wanted to clean in her mouth and then keep it. but then I made her drop it on the ground and be lost forever. She would have no way really of accurately telling me any of that or explaining. She doesn't have the words or the knowledge to explain that she had a bad nights sleep and is feeling fragile right now. She doesn't have the language to explain that though she enjoys nursery once she's there, leaving me for a couple of hours still feels scary and intimidating. she doesn't know how to say that she worries that mummy might stop loving her if she also loves daddy.

I think the real killer is aiming the accusation at children that they are only crying for attention or manipulation. saying they are faking or doing crocodile tears. Children are capable of emotional manipulation, but their aims are simply to get love and approval from the people around them. telling them that their tears or upset is fake and funny would be desperately hurtful to a adult, and the same goes for children. no one wants to be told that their emotions and emotional reaction isn't valid or real. because to you, it is real. if a child is crying, it is because they want or need comfort. You should still hold firm on things, but you can do that while still validating that theirs emotions are very real "I'm really sorry I'm saying you can't play right now, I know it makes you feel sad, but you will have a great time at nursery and I promise we will play when we get home" or "I know you really want to see what that stone tastes like, but its been on the floor and is dirty so could make you feel sick" it also helps to give them the vocabulary to slowly learn how to express negative feelings and to deal with them by talking and explaining rather than feeling they have no other way of coping other than hitting or screaming.