The Threenager Stage

It’s 6:00 am and I’m being screamed at to go downstairs. When the screaming doesn’t work, so begins the kicking to the kidneys and being trampled over until I pull myself out of bed just in time to see my toddler run into his bedroom to wake up his 1 year old, sleeping brother. 

Toddler beds may as well be nonexistent. I miss the bars that caged in my 3 year old in his crib. I miss the sleeping through the night and the distant sound of a baby’s babbling letting me know it’s time to start my day. It certainly beats the violence I endure each morning since the terrible twos began. The demanding of juice, iPad, Blaze, going outside and everything else my wonderful first born wishes to have at the very moment he wishes to have it. The terrible twos were more than I ever thought they would be. Not all bad of course, but damn. So imagine my relief when my boy was turning 3!

Now…I was hoping for my boy to magically wake up on his third birthday and be…what’s the word I’m looking for…PLEASANT! But I learned that after the terrible twos come the even worse Threenager year. Holy shit! What the hell? I cannot even believe the attitudes I get now. The tantrums! Public and private. It’s hilarious and at the same time, it’s frustrating. This little fella thinks he runs the world and we all just live in it. I live under the demands of a tiny, 3 foot dictator.

I love love love love love my son, but the echoing screams you hear at Target is most likely him. And what is causing those blood curdling screams you ask? It could be something as simple as him wanting to get out of the cart or something devastating (in his world) as not getting a toy. He must have 1,000 cars and yet, he needs more whenever we are in a store. I probably seem like the worst mother in these public situations or I look like the babysitter who can’t figure out how to calm down another person’s child. Either way, I've learned to have chocolate on hand for any outing, just in case we experience a sporadic meltdown and to not look at him in the eyes. 

He screams and panics during a haircut. He screams during a doctor’s visit. He is still refusing to expand his diet beyond Goldfish most days. He has developed FOMO (fear of missing out) which is the cause for most of the yelling and hitting and biting and other physical assaults that take place on a daily basis. But I have to remind myself that this too shall pass because every once in a while, I get a smile from him and see for an instant this loving, sweet boy who I thought I had lost and that right there reminds me that he loves me, even though he inflicts hell on me, he does it because he is only 3. 

With Threenager status comes an evolved personality. This is the fun part. He has a sense of humor! He finds things funny now. I’m not talking about making silly faces, I’m talking about joking about farting or saying the wrong word by mistake or watching a video of someone falling (he gets that one from me). He can sit and watch movies or tv shows and understand them. He can dance to his favorite songs (anything by Jason Derulo). He is just so smart and wants to learn and try new things! This part makes me proud and makes it all worth it. 

He has become a bit more independent. Wanting to do everything himself, including putting on his shoes. I knew a 7 year old who couldn't put his shoes on by himself. He knows what he wants and doesn’t mind saying it. He is strong willed and a natural born leader on the playground, but so friendly. He loves children and with a tear in my eye, it breaks my heart a little to say this...he asks me to go to school. My little boy is growing up.

He’s also communicating better by putting together more complex sentences. This too is one of the better parts of the third year. Even better? Him repeating every bad word you say. Nothing gets by him. Not even “fongule”. Can’t stop laughing at that one. He can be the cutest kid in the entire world! And then…that damn threenager pops out and ruins it all. 

I’m more than positive that parenting doesn’t get any easier. I think that idea is an urban legend. “Oh just wait until the first year is over”. “Oh it’s only the terrible twos, they will pass.” “Oh you’re kid is 3? Watch out for the threenager stage.” So what the hell comes next!? If by 4 he isn’t a perfectly, well behaved little gentlemen who can ask rather than whine for juice, I may need to trade him in for a more mature, older model.