Roll With The Punches

When you have a two year old (or two), you can either try to fit them into an adult world, with almost certain unpleasant repercussions, or you can plan around them. Up until now, I had always viewed it as somewhat of a failure in my role as a parent and disciplinarian to yield to a two year old.

I believe in giving children their own sense of power - to make choices and have (limited) control over their environment, and successfully maintain the facade that it's real, and not just a parental stunt. It's the eternal child/parent tug of war. And we all know what happens when parents give too much slack on that rope...

But where is the balance of power so that I'm not squelching their fragile independence and creating future therapy-worthy topics?

There's no equation, of course, much to my chagrin. I'm learning it's case by case, just like everything else in life.

Most important for me is to learn to roll with the punches - end an activity or outing even though it may have been pre-planned or expensive. Just like adults, toddlers get to a point where they've had enough, but can't communicate it - that's my job. Maybe if I stop thinking of parenting as a dictatorship and start looking at my children and me as a team, I'll have more success.