The Princess has become a handful ever since she entered the Terrible Twos stage. But as we go along and observe what works and what doesn’t, I realized that it doesn’t have to be that bad — parents just need to understand toddlers.
Here are three things that worked for us:
My toddler is a picky eater.
The Princess is very hard to please when it comes to food. She doesn’t like anything dry unless it’s fried chicken, nuggets or fries. To veer her away from fried and processed food, I make meals that look interesting and taste good (of course).
She especially loves soupy meals like Sinigang, Tinola, Nilaga and Afritada. The Princess’ favorite, though, is spaghetti. To make it healthier, I add mushrooms and carrots to the sauce instead of ground meat and hotdog.
The trick is to find out what your toddler loves to eat and serve those for her meals (add veggies and fruits as much as possible).
My toddler won’t finish her meal!
I often find myself asking whether The Princess is getting enough nutrients because she doesn’t usually finish her meals. I used to sit in front of her high chair and tell her firmly to finish her meal or else she won’t be allowed to go down. This led to fits and raised voices. I also noticed that this only made her not look forward to meal times.
And so I tried a different approach. Our little ones have tiny tummies that can hold only a small amount of food at a time. To encourage The Princess to finish her meal, I started giving her smaller portions of food and only served more if she asked for another round.
Since she eats smaller portions, I made meal times more frequent by adding healthy snacks (instead of a bottle of milk) in between the “main” meals of the day. I also make sure that she gets extra protection from illnesses through her chewable vitamins.
My toddler wants everything… and she wants them NOW!
This can be very frustrating for parents — especially when we’re busy with work or chores. We want to get things done, but with a toddler throwing tantrums every time we ask for a few minutes, getting things done can be impossible sometimes.
Our number one rule is to prioritize the kids over anything else. BUT, if we are doing something urgent (i.e. I have a client call), I divert The Princess’ attention somewhere else. Sometimes I offer her a piece of paper and crayons. If that doesn’t work, I let her pick an educational DVD from her collection and I let her watch it. I’ve also tried putting a timer in front of her and would let her watch time tick. The last one’s funny, but it works!
How do/did you change the Terrible Twos to Terrific Twos?