Dearest Daughters,
Good morning! Shall we talk about toddlers again, now that we’ve gotten through graduating two of your younger siblings and two conferences?
I believe that in my years of mothering toddlers, one of the most important discoveries I’ve made is what I playfully call place value. That is, we must value the place we hold as a mother and the places each of our children hold in whatever season of life they currently occupy.
A toddler occupies the toddler space, and if you’re a mother, you should always occupy the mother space. Never swap places with your child, allowing them to occupy yours and you theirs.
What do I mean by that?
For example, if you are standing on a busy street, you’ll never swap places with your toddler, no matter how much they beg to run across the street to chase after a motorcycle. No matter if they pitch a fit, scream. Regardless of whatever lengths they go to, you will remain the mother, firmly hold their hand, and insist that they obey you.
But often we do not remain so firmly in our place as a mother when it comes to directing and guiding the choices of small children in matters like eating their peas, stopping their whining, and things of that nature.
In my experience, you will get much better obedience with a lot less effort if you simply remain aware of and firmly in your own place at all times.
I am the mom, so in this season of life, I decide what is best for you.
Being swayed by whining, crying, manipulation, temper tantrums, or any other means is ceding your position for your own momentary relief. It disrupts the order of your household and the structure in your child’s mind. Then they will continually be checking out their place, testing to see just what spot they should occupy.
In my opinion, many times the difficult seasons we go through with our toddlers have more to do with them testing their position in the family than with their actual desire to have a certain toy or do a certain thing.
Let me give you a couple of examples.
A toddler can easily walk into a room, notice some pretty bird figurines on the table, glance over at them, and then see a truck on the floor and drop down to play with the truck, ignoring the birds.
But if I say, “Now don’t touch those birds,” immediately they’re completely fascinated by the birds.
Why? Someone just told them not to touch them, so now they need to check out how far they can push this.
The same is true when telling a child to come. If they’re not clear about your position, they’re going to check it out and try to understand just where the give line is.
I remember a time with you, Helen. I was seven months pregnant with your brother Blair, and you were ten months old.
I decided I needed to teach you to come, because a new baby was on the way, and I could just imagine trying to breastfeed him and put him to bed while you disappeared into another room where I wouldn’t know what you were doing!
So we began to practice, and you learned it immediately and loved it!
I made a big game of it.
“Come to Mommy!”
Then I would reward you with praise, affection, a game, a book, a treat—anything to tell you what a good girl you were when you came.
You weren’t even walking yet, but you’d zoom on all fours from whatever room you were in and come to me every time I said, “Come.” I was so proud of you—and myself.
We made it a game all day. Sometimes I parked you in one room and went into another and called, “Come!” With giggles and laughter, you crawled into whatever room I was in, sometimes looking around one door and then the next before you discovered where I was.
Without fail, you came to me every time, all day. So when Dad came home from work, I decided to show him my new discovery and your new trick.
“Watch this,” I said.
I parked you beside the table, sat down in the living room, and said, “Come to Mommy.”
You looked at me, looked at Dad, and then sat back on your haunches and refused to come. You just kept gazing at me and then at Dad, with a smug little look on your face.
“I can’t believe this,” I said to Dad. “She has come to me all day without fail!”
Dad said, “I know what’s wrong. Watch this.”
“Come to Daddy,” he said, and you raced to him instantly.
“Why did she do that?” I wondered.
“Because I could tell you were requesting, not insisting. You weren’t sure she was going to do it, and it showed in the tone in your voice. You have to be certain she’s going to come to you when you call her.”
We tried again. I placed you back in the same spot and said, “Come to Mommy.”
And I really decided to believe with all my heart that you were going to come, because if you didn’t, I was going to go get you. So of course you were going to come!
And instantly you came again.
When we feel shaky and unsure in our role as a mother, unsure whether we’re going to receive obedience, our children sense that uncertainty and begin to explore it. They’re trying to feel out that uncertain spot and discover just where the boundary lies. It’s a boundary line, and we all want to know where the borders of our lives are.
So, as parents, we must exercise absolute certainty that this will happen, and not fudge, because the child is exploring the borders of their place and their submission. This is how they test us!
This became a guiding principle for me in my mothering. Whenever I came up against a difficulty with a toddler, or a child, or a teenager, for that matter, I asked myself: In God’s design, what is their place in this family, and what is mine? And am I crossing borders by making a concession, or am I sticking to being a mother at all times?
Your child will feel safe, confident, and happy when they know exactly what their place is and what yours is.
So value your place and theirs by being a mother and allowing them to fill up the place of a toddler for as long as they are one.
It will be over soon enough.
With all my love,
Mom