When Gabriel turned three, something changed. Frustrations became stronger, resistance became more frequent and some meltdowns were much bigger than I had expected.
Sometimes I simply did not know what to do anymore.
When other people’s advice stopped helping
Like many parents, I first listened to the advice around me.
A lot of it came from parents or grandparents who had raised children with a very different view of parenting from mine.
Some of those ideas made me uncomfortable. But when you are tired and starting to wonder whether you are getting everything wrong, you sometimes try them anyway.
I tried a few, without much conviction. They did not work particularly well for us and, more importantly, they did not help me understand what was happening underneath Gabriel’s behaviour.
That was when I turned to How to Talk So Little Kids Will Listen, by Joanna Faber and Julie King.
A book for big feelings and difficult moments
What I liked immediately was that the book did not simply tell me to be patient, empathic or kind.
Because knowing we should stay calm while our child is screaming on the floor does not necessarily tell us what to do next.
Instead, the book offers very practical tools: acknowledge a feeling, set a limit without immediately entering a power struggle, offer choices, use play or imagination, or describe a problem instead of repeating the same instruction ten times.
These are situations we meet constantly with young children.
I also loved the way the book is written. Finding time to read as a parent is already difficult. Here, the chapters are broken into small, manageable sections, with plenty of stories, dialogue and examples from different parents.
You can read a few pages and come away with one concrete idea to try that same day.
What the book changed for me
The book obviously did not make Gabriel’s meltdowns disappear.
But it gave me more ways to respond.
I began to focus less on making the behaviour stop immediately and more on what might be happening underneath. I started acknowledging the feeling before correcting, and making room for frustration while still holding a boundary.
Most importantly, I realised that you can be firm without automatically turning a moment into a power struggle.
Of course, no tool works every time. Sometimes choices help, sometimes they do not. Sometimes play changes everything, sometimes absolutely not.
But the book gave me a toolbox to reach into when I no longer know what else to try.
Looking back, it is probably one of the parenting books that has helped me most, simply because it arrived when I really needed practical ideas.
Find the book
How to Talk So Little Kids Will Listen
One of the books that helped me most when the big meltdowns began.
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