Impatience and Crying in Young Children and Toddlers

So many child psychologists and so much advice on what is best for your child. Wow! What do you do? Who do you believe? Well, I for one do not believe in the 'it takes a village to raise a child' theory. Children are not stone soup. Children are people, small as they might be, and they have their own feelings, their own wants, and their own opinions. I do believe, and very strongly so, in attachment parenting. I believe that if you love your child, you will want to be near your child, and that you will want your child to be happy, healthy, content, and safe from harm. Adding in your neighbors', coworkers, friends', and all of your relatives' advice to your parenting repertoire is, honestly, only going to make for a confused parent and an unhappy child. This confusion and unhappiness is going to lead to friction between the parent and the child. The parent's obligation is to the child, to raise him or her to be a responsible adult, which in turn aids that child in fulfilling his or her obligations to society as a whole.

Denying a child's feelings only leads to that child feeling resentful and angry, and this is where behavior problems start. It's just like in the adult world -- when a person feels frustrated, they do something about it. When a child feels frustrated, they also are going to do something about it. Denying that this frustration is real to the child is only going to make matters worse.

I find so many people, on an almost daily basis, who tell me that I should do this or that with my child, simply because my child is demanding something that he wants. He wants it, he tells me and makes his wishes known, and when he cannot get what he wants immediately, he cries. This is disagreeable to many people. They feel my child, at 21 months old, should just give up, to quit wanting what he wants, and for his Mommy to let someone else make a decision for our family. These are the people that I want to tell, 'you can't buy that bottle of pop, and you're just going to have to wait for it.' These are the same people who will become visibly impatient when they have to wait in line longer because someone in front of them has to redo a check, or their debit card has glitched and they have to swipe their card again. They know approximately how long they are going to have to wait, and it's really not that long. It's just that they have to wait, and they find it an inconvenience, so they show their discomfort. I'm sure you've heard that loud sigh at the line, or even made one yourself. It's impatience. Society is impatient. So are children. Why, though, do so many people think it is acceptable to expect a toddler to have more patience than they themselves do?

When your child is crying, it means he or she wants something. Otherwise, your child wouldn't be crying. Making fun of your child, or telling them to 'stop it' isn't going to do any good, and for those that it does work for, I wonder if that child in the grocery store is being abused at home and how many bruises there are underneath that shirt that nobody can see. Children don't go from crying to not crying without a good reason. Either they received what they were crying for, or they perceive a threat to themselves if the crying continues. It follows along the same lines as battered wife syndrome. For those that say, 'well, maybe that child is just very well-behaved and that is why the crying stopped when the parent said to stop crying,' ask yourself if the child was well-behaved enough to listen that well to start with, why was there any crying going on in the first place?

Think back to a time when you wanted something that you felt that you deserved, but that you couldn't have, and it didn't really makes sense why you couldn't have what you wanted. It might have been a promotion, or a continued relationship with a romantic partner who wanted out, or even a particular option on a vehicle. When you were told 'no', you felt a pang of denial. Toddlers do not do well when they feel that pang.

They need to be helped along the way towards developing not only patience, but also an understanding of how things work in the world. This understanding needs to include the why's and the how's of why they can have what is alright for them to have and why what they cannot have is not alright, as well as how they might get it in the future. Perhaps a toy is not in their age level, or another child is playing with it. Waiting, either for a long period of time, or a shorter one, is going to feel like an insurmountable task to them at first. Calendars, especially for older toddlers who have mastered the concept of what 'day' means, and timers that ding, are good for teaching that it is the amount of time that passed, not the duration or amount of crying, that lead to the acquisition of the demanded toy.

One reason that time seems so different to toddlers than it does to adults is because of the ratio of any given length of time to their respective lifespan. In other words, what is a week to an 18 month old is about twelve times longer to him or her than what it would be to an 18 year old adult. You know there is a big difference between one minute and 12 minutes.

I am 40, and my youngest child is 21 months old. A day, or an hour, or a minute, goes much faster for me than what it does for him -- more than 20 times faster. So if I have to wait an hour for something, it seems almost like one entire day to him. Expecting to see a toddler remain patient for a period of time that would seem to be rather short takes on a new perspective when the ratio is taken into consideration. Punishing a child that young for failing to 'control himself or herself' seems like abuse to me.

And yes, I have kept religion out of this so far, but to those who say the Bible says to not spare the rod, that verse has come under scrutiny in regards to what it meant. Most now say it meant to guide your child, as shepherds did their flocks, and to bring back an errant child. Shepherds didn't beat their sheep. Parents shouldn't beat their children, either. A verse that parents who wish to keep the Bible in mind might wish to remember the one that admonishes parents to not exasperate their children. This starts from birth, not when it is convenient for the parent, and it needs to be consistent all throughout childhood. The verse itself can be found at Colossians 3:21. Patience is a virtue. Don't expect more from your child, or other's children, than what you can demonstrate yourself.