Punished
Lucy is engaging in love-hate relationship with her father.
It started a few months ago, and I keep thinking it’s a phase and waiting for her to grow out of it. But she hasn’t, and it’s starting to drive us nuts.
(And while I absolutely love 2, the following scenarios are eye-rolling, head-banging, annoyingly, exasperatingly maddening enough for me to wish for the newborn days when at least we could stuff her in a blanket and she’d shut-up be quiet for 20 minutes.)
This evening was a series of examples that are repeated in various forms every. single. day.:
- I pick Lucy up from daycare. While she’s excited that Daddy’s in the car, she will not give him a hug. He cannot put her in the car seat. “Mummy’s turn!” she cries, turning and clinging to me. She actually sheds tears, as if her father’s touch will burn or cause her eyeballs to melt.
- Lucy and I were sitting on the couch, and I asked Eric to please pass me a kleenex. Lucy jumps off the couch, crying, yelling, because she has to get the damn tissue. Eric couldn’t even hand it to her — oh no, she had to take it out of the box and bring it over to me.
- After dinner, we decide to take Spencer for a walk. Eric, who usually does the evening stroll with the dog, likes to push the stroller when we head out as a break from the joy that is dog poop picker-upper. But Eric took one step towards the stroller, and Lucy was howling: “Mummy push the tollar! Mummy do! Mummy’s turn!”
And no, none of this happens when I’m not around, such as Wednesday evenings when I’m out with the ladies.
My theory is this: When Eric comes came home from work in the evenings, Lucy is interpreting this as him intruding on her and I’s time together. Instead of undivided Mummy attention, I’m now split between her and Eric. (This whole issue stems around this, too.) So, Lucy punishes Eric.
This makes sense on weekday evenings, but Lucy is starting to carry it over to the weekends, too. This past weekend, while away at Eric’s Mom’s, it was almost always either “Mummy’s turn” or even more frequently, “Gramie’s turn.”
While Eric is The Adult (and therefore can process and understand toddler ridiculousness), the actions of The Child can be quite hurtful. I mean, you can only be rejected so many times before it starts to sting, grown-up or not. Tonight, as Lucy trotted over to me with the kleenex clutched in her hand, Eric mock raised his fist in the air, waving it at her back.
Any sort of Mummy smugness over being the preferred parent has long worn off. Now it is reaching levels of exasperation, as I become The Only One Who Can Do Anything, Ever. For our household’s well being, Eric and I both need to know that the other can take care of our child(ren). Plus there are times when I just cannot do something for Lucy, and she has to learn that Mummy cannot always be there every single second.
So far, we do not force Lucy to accept Eric doing things she is insistent I do, as this just sends her spiraling out of control (unless I physically cannot do it, or am engaged in something I can’t immediately stop). We also do not want to build further animosity or resentment towards him. And we’ve carved out exclusive Lucy-Eric time — the half hour or so between the end of dinner and bedtime — for the two to bond and play together without me.
But I tell you, it’s still hard being the rational adult. I just wish Lucy would understand us when we say that Daddy can do everything Mummy can, that he loves Lucy as much as Mummy does. We’ve sparingly told her that it hurts Daddy’s feelings, too, to no impact.
Is anyone else going through this, or have you gone through it? Those with older kids, please tell me this is a phase and will end soon. Any thoughts on where this is coming from and what you’d do are welcomed, too.
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We’re going through this too, but it doesn’t sound like it’s as extreme as Lucy–Jacob only wants me to do things for him, but will usually be okay with an explanation that it’s daddy’s turn. The hardest is bedtime, when Jacob wants me to do everything-get him dressed, brush his teeth, read him stories, put his blankets on, etc. The one thing that has seemed to help is that I make a big deal of Paul getting home. About 15 minutes before he gets home, I start talking about daddy coming home and talk about something fun that we’ll do with daddy. He gets excited and it makes the whole transition time easier.
We been there with Annika,as she was 2, I was 8 months pregnant she was on a Daddy trip and I was not able to do anything. Which I have to admit hurt a lot and made me feel bad.Mommyego! And I though she is mad at me for something???Beeing pregnant! But we just let her get on with it,because I was not feeling that great and just went with the flow, when her Daddy was not home, I was able to bring her to bed or bath her.No Problems.
Now where she is almost 3. she wants as to take turns specially when someone had gotten her a timeout then she wants the other parent to be with her.
Thats something where I not agree with. Last time daddy gave her a timeout and then was not able to bring her to bed. I only told her that I am busy and Daddy is going to bring her to bed. As she still was rejecting her Daddy I told her she need to give Daddy a hug and a kiss and Tell him she loves him or there is no story before bed at all.
I think when they first start this with 2 it is the first expierence that they can control their little world, and there is almost now way they want to give it up. Maybe you have to let Eric to something with her what she really really likes.
Annika started to prefer Daddy as I was not able to play with her at the playground or in the house because of my big babybelly. SO Daddy was more fun. Do you remember what happend before she started to act like this??? Maybe a thought worth!
Good Luck with this! I find it amazing how there little minds challenge us everyday.!!!!
yes it ends … when their in their 20s. Luckily that’s only 17.5 more years for you to go before she realizes she needs her Daddy as much as she needs you.
No, you’re not alone. Lexy still does it. She comes flying at me “Moooommmmmeeeeee!!” and ignores Alex. Caity does too. The first couple of times she did this, he was really hurt. Especially as he was the one who bonded with her first because I was sick in the hospital. He’d say stuff like “she used to want only me” … ever see a grown man pout?
It happens, there’s not a lot you can do about it except grin and bear it, unfortunately. It’s frustrating as hell because you’ve been at work all day, you’ve got to come home, pick up the child(ren), make dinner (sometimes in shifts depending on nap times after daycare), clean up after dinner, make the lunches for the next day, do the dishes, any laundry that needs to be done, get the clothes out for the next day, put the kid(s) to bed and finally fall into a coma yourself at about 11-12 o’clock only to do it all again the next morning … yes, a break would be nice, but it’s easier when they stop screaming if you do whatever it is that they are looking for you to do that daddy couldn’t possibly do in a million years or until they’re five whichever comes first … ok I’m outta breath now lol.
That’s kinda how it goes.
Hey Carly, where’d the “preview post” button that used to be at the bottom of the page go?
We have the same sorts of behaviour, but not to the same degree. She prefers me to get her out of the carseat and will patiently wait for me to run in the house to use the potty before coming back to get her. Although in the last week she takes a big jump and slides out of the chair by herself and if you touch her, she climbs back in and does it all again. I do the bedtimes, but daddy needs to do it more. She likes to sit ‘right next’ to me at dinner, but if I’m not around, she adores her daddy and generally adores him anyway. It’s not to the same degree as you’re describing. Our big problem these days is the “I do” stuff. It gets to be annoying waiting for her to decide when she’s going to get in the car seat and when she forces me to walk all the way down the stairs and wait for her at the bottom (even on big outdoor concrete steps).
oh, and can’t Eric pick her up from daycare? She’ll probably get more used to him doing the car seat routine that way.
Eric does drop-off each morning, so it’s not an issue of her being familiar with Daddy and the car seat. It’s purely a power thing.
He could, technically, do drop-offs now, seeing as he’s home job hunting, but we’re doing out best to keep things as consistent/normal as possible. And fair to each other, too.