Just like most mamas-to-be, I had the pregnancy books. I read them. A lot. I also had the parenting books but I didn’t read those as much. I flipped through the sections on early milestones and advice on breastfeeding and how to stop being a maniac and checking 65 times a night to see if your baby is still breathing (kidding – sadly, none of the books I read offered advice on that).
I know there are books out there on toddlers – I probably even have some that address this stage, but I guarantee they don’t include stuff like this:
- One day your toddler will eat something normal for breakfast, like eggs or yogurt. The next day he will empty the whole cupboard looking for just the right thing, rejecting many options in the process, and then choose plain coarse bread crumbs. The day after he will insist on eating a tortilla. Just the tortilla – nothing in it or on it.
- Telling parents-to-be “what to expect” should really include the fact that offering the wrong bowl or spoon can lead to an epic meltdown.
- Kids like to lick their mother’s face. At least mine does. (Why is this?!)
- A child who is always hot and generally opts for no pants will sometimes insist on wearing fleece pants. In the summer.
- Sleep books should all include this line: “Some kids just don’t sleep much. If you get one of those, sorry about that, but you should probably just accept it.” (This might have prevented Go the F*ck to Sleep from becoming a bestseller, but that book is too late for me anyway.) This one little line might, just possibly, have saved my sanity.
- Toddlers can form attachments to weird things. Like a dog crate that’s been in storage and then brought out to be sold, the idea of which prompts floods of tears.
- This same toddler might reject anything and everything you suggest that might offer comfort – including things that are much softer and generally more comfortable than a dog crate – and insist on rubbing his mother’s wrist all.the.time. (Speaking of my sanity…)
- Sometimes it’s not the mother who will feel sentimental about wee baby clothes when putting them away, but the toddler who insists we can’t possibly pack these things up.
- A kid who hates getting his hands dirty while eating – and will whine as if his hands are crawling with spiders until you wipe them off – will then jump down from the table and immediately make a gigantic mess somewhere else. With his hands.
- In some cases, small boys will go from being totally fascinated by bugs to completely freaking out when there’s a fly in the house. And then he will go outside and find a caterpillar and make it a home with leaves and insist that it needs to live inside.
Come to think of it, all of this could be summed up in one line (which would make for much shorter books): Toddlers are weird- just go with it.
With a good pair of boots you can do pretty much anything.
