I need some advice!

[mommytoavery]

And I wish I could say that I have time to read and research but honestly I just spent 3 hours alone tonight doing just that and I don't think I am at any better of a place then I was before. Here is the problem: I have a 3.5 year old dd and a 11 month old dd. My dd1 is very intelligent especially verbally. She will try to negotiate and talks back a lot. She can also be mean to dd2. I know that that is somewhat typical but I am exhausted because I have to monitor them both all day long or put dd2 in the Ergo on my back so I can get some stuff done, which then leads to me being exhausted and my back hurting. Her are some examples of the problems:

• She will yell at her sister whenever she thinks her sister is doing something she isn't supposed to do
• She will go to hug her sister but then won't let go of her.
• I will ask her to do something and she says in a mean voice "No I'm not going to do it...You do it."
• I will ask her to be nice to her sister and she says "Well then you be nice to me"
• I will ask her to please pick up her toys and she responds in a very mean toy "You are going to help me".

I am trying super hard to take a gentle approach to this but I will be honest...I grew up with a mom that always yelled and I used to yell a lot. I have stopped that almost completely for a few months now. I now talk to her in a gentle and calm voice. I spend a lot of one on one time with her but it doesn't seem to be helping. We talk about what she is feeling but she just can't seem to control her outbursts toward her sister. Is this all normal? Am I overreacting? Some people have said that it is typical but other moms have told me that their children never exhibited this kind of behavior. I was so proud of us for finally sticking to our guns and using gentle discipline but I am so extremely frustrated at this point. Any suggestions would be great.

[ssh]

This is very normal behavior. 3 can be a difficult age for a lot of kids. My DD went through a very emotional period at 3.5, getting upset easily and yelling. Keep modeling polite behavior for her and say calmly "that hurts my/sister's feelings when you yell/use an unfriendly voice, use a friendlier voice please". Smile and keep modeling the behavior you want your DD to use and she will, eventually. Kids usually go through periods of calm and periods of discordance. So they are fine and then they are in a rude, bossy, fragile feelings, or whatever kind of phase. The half ages, 2.5 or 3.5, seem to be when my DD goes through less pleasant phases. Though we did have a bossy one right after she turned 4. We're not at 4.5 yet but things seem to be really nice right now. The book Kids, Parents and Power Struggles is my favorite book. The thing to remind yourself is that most of the annoying behavior is just a phase and will go away on it's own soon, but the relationship you're building is permanent.

Also if you've yelled before it could be harder for your DD to understand how inappropriate yelling is. It might help if you talked with her about how yelling hurts peoples ears and feelings and that's why you stopped yelling .... and so on.

[mom2grrls]

I don't know if you've read playful parenting or not but it's a perfect book for this age. Rather than saying "you do this" turn it into a game of some sort