[mammafish78]

im sure its just a faze but my 2 yr old is driving me nut! i give him choices, for example a green shirt and a blue shirt. he says that one mommy pointing at the blue shirt, so i give him the blue shirt. just as soon as i give him his choice he throws a fit saying i dont want it, so i take it and give him the green shirt. then he screams i want it i want it. so then he will take the blue one he chose first. he does it with everything, juice or milk, outside or inside. it is makeing us nuts! he also is really independent and wants to do everything, we cant leave the house without him opening up the door or come in without him opening the door. if we open the door he goes crazy! is this happening to anyone else? what should i do. will it go away? should i just ignore it and work with it or what? im so confused

 

[captain optimism]

If choices are freaking him out, don't offer them. My son can be like this also. It's good to give choices, but don't worry if you take a vacation from them for awhile. He'll have his whole life to be completely independent. Right now he's two and if you offer one choice with enthusiasm, usually he'll take it!

It's great that he's independent, I think it's normal but also very good. Mine is a big climber, he returns repeatedly to the scene of the climb (

) even when we try to divert him to other activities. It takes sitting down with him and a book or toy to divert him fully, and even then he will go back to trying to climb as soon as that's done!

 

[P-chan]

I agree with the captain that it could be a matter of too many choices. I have never given my two-year-old many choices--not out of control issues but to keep things simple. If I'm getting A ready and he requests B, then I am (almost always) happy to give him B; even better, I feel like B is what he really wants. Anyway, I've noticed that when he does get a choice he'll always choose the last option he hears, so I'm not sure how accurate his response is!

So when we get dressed in the morning, for example, he'll be playing or zipping around and I'll pull some clothes out of the drawer. We take off pajamas and talk about our day and sing songs and look at books while I slip the clothes on him. We'll talk about the color of his pants or the stripes on his shirt as I put them on, but the rest of his clothes are out of sight. The whole operation is matter-of-fact.

As a counterexample, yesterday I was getting him some dry cereal to munch on and I put it in a little cup. He started crying and managed to sob out, "Big cereal." So I put it in a bowl instead and all was sunshiny again. I suppose that offering a choice would have avoided a minor melt-down, but I felt like it was a good opportunity for him to express himself and for me to learn how to listen.

The independence is so great, but it can be a challenge too! What my son needs to do by himself changes daily. Right now he has to be the one who buckles the chest clip on his car seat. I try to work with it, as long as it does not harm him. They've got to learn somehow!