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You know that scene in Jurassic park where the raptors figure how to use doorknobs? That's my entire loving life with a toddler. Oh awesome they're developing their motor skills quickly turns to oh gently caress they're developing their motor skills.  Daddy, are you in there? 
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May 31, 2025 22:07
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| # ? Jan 21, 2026 01:21 |
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I went over to my friend’s house to play nerd games and planned to bring the baby along. Partner convinced me to also take the older kids to play with friend’s older kid. Other parent brought along his kids and his newborn. It was generally chaos but not the worst version it could’ve been. In total there were nine kids in the house ranging between 16 and a couple weeks. Additional friend without any kids must be peacefully savoring his extremely chill evening at his own pace now that we’ve all gone home.
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Jun 1, 2025 00:36
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Rasputin on the Ritz posted:You know that scene in Jurassic park where the raptors figure how to use doorknobs? Once my 2.5yo figures out locks, it's over for us. Toddlerdom is full of those complicated feelings where you're like...amazed at what they can do and want to help them learn core skills like opening things, but then you realize that all your child safety strategies were based around their inability to do anything.
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Jun 1, 2025 05:34
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Nearly every time I'm in the bathroom I hear a little "do you wanna build a snowman?" at the door, when I tell her "not right now" I get a real sad "Ok byeee"
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Jun 1, 2025 05:47
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Wrong thread
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Jun 1, 2025 06:11
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Well six months after being toilet trained we got our first bath poo. Apparently she was worried about getting cold if she got out for the toilet.
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Jun 1, 2025 11:54
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Scapegoat posted:Well six months after being toilet trained we got our first bath poo. Apparently she was worried about getting cold if she got out for the toilet. Same, scapekid
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Jun 1, 2025 15:51
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We came across a dead squirrel at the park. My 4 year old has never shown interest in the idea, but now my entire Sunday is a discussion about death.
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Jun 1, 2025 19:06
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Tom Smykowski posted:We came across a dead squirrel at the park. My 4 year old has never shown interest in the idea, but now my entire Sunday is a discussion about death. I get to discuss it practically every bedtime
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Jun 1, 2025 20:07
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someone here suggested a book that touches lightly on death, we got it and it's a decent read, someone pointed out the mom breaks into the kids house which is kind of a funny observation. but yeah it sorta outlines the process of getting old and dying without introducing a complex about death
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Jun 1, 2025 20:16
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Hadlock posted:introducing a complex about death What do you mean by this?
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Jun 1, 2025 20:26
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Ask brawnfire I recall watching a PBS show Nova when I was like six, and the narrator pointed out the sun will continue to expand for the next 4 billion years and will eventually engulf the earth 4 billion years as we all know is longer than we'll be making fun of lowtax, but to a six year old that might be next week or next month. I didn't sleep well for about two weeks knowing everything and everyone would eventually be consumed by fire. I'm sure it presents in other, more extreme ways My kiddos grandpa died and our cat died within about a month of each other when she was about 2 so I guess she's got a general concept of it, but younger families might not have anyone die until you're much older so it's more surprising. The first death in the family for me was when I was 16 Hadlock fucked around with this message at 20:35 on Jun 1, 2025 |
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Jun 1, 2025 20:32
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Oh. Uh, I'd worry that shielding my kid from basic realities would make them less resilient overall. Maybe its easy for me to say this as my kids aren't born yet.
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Jun 1, 2025 20:37
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Yeah it varies My FIL passed away peacefully in the hospital, we brought our kiddo at 2 to see him one last time. My wife's sister and brother in law left their 14 and 10yo kids at home based on whatever reasoning. How it's presented matters a lot probably "people get old and die one day" vs "you could get in a car wreck, or just run down on the sidewalk at any time! and then you just wink out of existence and in five years nobody would care anymore. or worse, you could have an undiagnosed brain aneurysm and just drop dead at any moment" are two extremes and finding a dead squirrel in the park is gonna be a 2 for some people and an 8 for others
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Jun 1, 2025 20:46
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Yeah I guess there are better and worse ways of broaching the subject
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Jun 1, 2025 20:49
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4.5 year old went from being scooter-unsure and uncoordinated to zipping along in her swimsuit with one foot high in the air like a figure a skater this weekend. We were with family who had those lean-to-steer ones and apparently that was all it took for it to click, so I went to buy one and it’s like 150+ dollars. Hopefully my 4 year old can’t tell we got the 40 dollar knockoffs.
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Jun 1, 2025 22:15
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meanolmrcloud posted:4.5 year old went from being scooter-unsure and uncoordinated to zipping along in her swimsuit with one foot high in the air like a figure a skater this weekend. Just put some ribbons or LED lights on it and they'll like it way more.
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Jun 2, 2025 00:08
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8mo was farting on my lap and laughing for like 15 minutes straight today.
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Jun 2, 2025 00:22
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:Six months from now you probably won’t even remember this happened I think this will be burned into our memories as part of a general Week from Hell now lol. Don't think I got more than 3-4 consecutive hours of sleep in the last 7 days. 6 month vaccine fussiness has transformed my pretty good sleeper into a demon with no ability to self-soothe. Now that the stomach bug has passed I've got whatever is giving him a very phlegmy hacking cough. I felt a little guilty at how much I looked forward to dropping him at daycare today, but we both desperately need a break to do things in peace. Around 4AM on Saturday, as the sweat rolled down my back while I bounced and rocked and shushed him, I considered texting both grandmas telling them we need them and how soon can they be here. But one is on the east coast, the other is going to be helping with caring for my sister after sister's cancer surgery. It felt very...claustrophobic.
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Jun 2, 2025 16:07
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Love vacations. Paying money to be sicker and less comfortable in a new and exciting place.
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Jun 2, 2025 16:22
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Teething started on #2. Hopefully we learned enough from #1 to make it a little easier. Oldest had a ballet recital yesterday, which was an adorable disaster. 2 year old ballet is the best.
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Jun 2, 2025 17:21
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SpaceViking posted:Teething started on #2. Hopefully we learned enough from #1 to make it a little easier. 6 year old ballet is still adorable! (The class is 6-8, they are all fumbling beginners and its so cute! They were butterflies coming out of their cocoons!) Hippie Hedgehog fucked around with this message at 19:16 on Jun 2, 2025 |
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Jun 2, 2025 19:09
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SpaceViking posted:Oldest had a ballet recital yesterday, which was an adorable disaster. 2 year old ballet is the best. Almost-4 had a ballet recital this weekend too, “adorable disaster” is apt. I’m impressed she seems to have almost no stage fright though - hopefully she doesn’t learn it. Then after her class performed a gnarly wind storm blew a bunch of dust and pollen around and we fled as quickly as we could. I had to drop my load of camp chairs to chase my hat down the road
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Jun 2, 2025 21:36
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Gay Nudist Dad posted:seems to have almost no stage fright though - hopefully she doesn’t learn it that's pretty much the entire point of middle school right
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Jun 2, 2025 22:36
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space uncle posted:Love vacations. Paying money to be sicker and less comfortable in a new and exciting place. I guess on this topic, instead of the usual beach vacation, the in-laws organized a trip to Niagara with the entire family. 9 kids from 9 years to 4 months (my newborn) all staying in a gigantic airbnb right near the falls. This is definitive proof of my in-laws mental decline, as they not only got super pissy when I suggested taking a 4 month old might be tough, but thought the beach would be too much work. The beach is great. Slather the kids up and send ‘em on their way. What the gently caress is there to do at Niagara for a 4 year old? I don’t like setting expectations, but this does not seem like a promising trip.
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Jun 2, 2025 22:44
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Any tips on managing the trauma of a 4 year old bring thrust into a court ordered shared parenting scenario? Long story short, my soon to be ex wife kept me from my daughter for almost a month, the court in its first hearing found her to be full of poo poo and gave me primary custody during the divorce. So now I'm dropping the kid off at autism therapy in the morning, Mom picks her up and then I get her from Mom after her two hours are done. Whenever I even walk towards a car without her, she starts screaming like she's never going to see me again. It's obvious my daughter is terrified of me abandoning her (which I will never do!) and is less than enthused about her time with Mom. How can I help a nonverbal autistic 4 year old cope with this? 
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Jun 2, 2025 23:37
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Slaan posted:Any tips on managing the trauma of a 4 year old bring thrust into a court ordered shared parenting scenario? Long story short, my soon to be ex wife kept me from my daughter for almost a month, the court in its first hearing found her to be full of poo poo and gave me primary custody during the divorce. So now I'm dropping the kid off at autism therapy in the morning, Mom picks her up and then I get her from Mom after her two hours are done. IDK but I hope you're able to talk to someone for your own health dude. This poo poo would absolutely rock even healthy people. I would 100% be trying to learn on subject matter experts for stuff like this but hopefully someone ITT will have navigated something similar.
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Jun 2, 2025 23:46
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Slaan posted:. How can I help a nonverbal autistic 4 year old cope with this? Document behaviors and incidents, get independent eye witness written accounts if possible. Are Mom's visits supervised? If so you may be able to watch, though that's not likely. Courts usually expect an adjustment period to go poorly, it's when that period never ends that they look at changes.
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Jun 3, 2025 00:18
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Slaan posted:How can I help a nonverbal autistic 4 year old cope with this? I hope you can get some help, but this sounds way out of the paygrade of a thread with TARDIS in the title.
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Jun 3, 2025 01:02
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Slaan posted:Any tips on managing the trauma of a 4 year old bring thrust into a court ordered shared parenting scenario? Long story short, my soon to be ex wife kept me from my daughter for almost a month, the court in its first hearing found her to be full of poo poo and gave me primary custody during the divorce. So now I'm dropping the kid off at autism therapy in the morning, Mom picks her up and then I get her from Mom after her two hours are done. Talk to her autism therapists about getting a child advocate involved to ensure her needs are actually being met by this arrangement. The court will absolutely run roughshod over children's mental health, especially nonverbal ones, and a child advocates entire job is to ensure this doesn't happen.
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Jun 3, 2025 01:31
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thunderdome winner
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Chernobyl Princess posted:Talk to her autism therapists about getting a child advocate involved to ensure her needs are actually being met by this arrangement. The court will absolutely run roughshod over children's mental health, especially nonverbal ones, and a child advocates entire job is to ensure this doesn't happen. Seconding this. I'm an RN working acute mental health and we often have tribunals to determine a consumers capacity for treatment purposes. We always push for consumers to contact one of the local advocacy groups to represent them or at least advise them and the tribunal prefers it too. Dunno what resources you'd have where you are, but having someone knowledgeable advocate for your kid would be massive.
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Jun 3, 2025 01:47
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This is your annual reminder to NOT buy light blue (aka pool camouflage) swimwear for your little kiddos Thanks for attending my TED talk
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Jun 3, 2025 02:28
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Went to the zoo on weekend (we are members and the zoo is quite close so it's a good way to kill some hours and she loves riding on the bus to get there). Asked what she wants to see and she wants to go to the "dark house" (nocturnal house). Walking through the African section to get there she insists she doesn't want to see any of the animals there. We had to drag her to see the lions who were up at the glass pawing and roaring (it's rare to even see them) and then we get to the nocturnal house. We some how luck out and they are feeding the normally sedate animals there so they are all active. Proceeds to walk up to each exhibit ask what animal is called than move on to the next. Intermittently asking loudly what the sign says (it says be quiet). At this stage I'm pretty sure the draw of the zoo is riding the bus and getting a paddle pop after she eats her lunch (which is another battle).
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Jun 3, 2025 02:34
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Slaan posted:Any tips on managing the trauma of a 4 year old bring thrust into a court ordered shared parenting scenario? Long story short, my soon to be ex wife kept me from my daughter for almost a month, the court in its first hearing found her to be full of poo poo and gave me primary custody during the divorce. So now I'm dropping the kid off at autism therapy in the morning, Mom picks her up and then I get her from Mom after her two hours are done. My first kid is autistic and his early intervention therapists and later school therapists would make him social stories and it helped a lot. We read them a ton and it helped him understand the whole series of events and anticipate each one. I could then reference it when he was feeling overwhelmed by a change.
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Jun 3, 2025 02:50
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Slaan posted:Any tips on managing the trauma of a 4 year old bring thrust into a court ordered shared parenting scenario? Long story short, my soon to be ex wife kept me from my daughter for almost a month, the court in its first hearing found her to be full of poo poo and gave me primary custody during the divorce. So now I'm dropping the kid off at autism therapy in the morning, Mom picks her up and then I get her from Mom after her two hours are done. While I don’t know how much autism will modify the advice, the standard foster parent playbook for trauma with a preverbal child is lots of physical reassurance (only if it is comforting), providing multiple reminders of upcoming transitions, developing coregulating routines for tough transitions, and narrating what you perceive the child to be feeling or communicating with their behavior (or facial expression or body language) and empathizing. Some toddlers have a post-bio parent visit routine that includes a comforting snack and a warm bubble bath, and that can make the difference between manageable emotions and a meltdown.
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Jun 3, 2025 03:14
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Yeah, we have a full psych eval of Mom coming and a guardian ad litem for the kid (same person, actually. A psychiatrist ad litem rather than the standard pro bono lawyer). She actually starts the therapy next week full time so there's the normal adjustment to full day daycare going on too. I'll definitely be up front with everything with the clinic so they know exactly what is going on with Mom and the family situation. Hopefully they can adjust what they're doing to maximize comfort more than anything for the first couple of weeks, above and beyond their normal procedures. Thanks for the advice so far. This has been tough on me and I actually know what's going on. It's the little that stresses me more than anything 😞. I'm just glad that this is early enough at 4yo that with proper love and care she'll forget most of this
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Jun 3, 2025 03:25
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Slaan posted:Thanks for the advice so far. This has been tough on me and I actually know what's going on. It's the little that stresses me more than anything 😞. I'm just glad that this is early enough at 4yo that with proper love and care she'll forget most of this Honestly the fact that she’s worried about you going away speaks to developmentally appropriate attachment to you, and that is a protective factor against some long-term impacts of trauma. Kids who were neglected at a very young age can be completely detached or indiscriminately friendly, both of which bode poorly for long term outcomes.
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Jun 3, 2025 03:34
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Successfully washed my daughter's hair without any screaming or crying
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Jun 3, 2025 06:20
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Hadlock posted:Successfully washed my daughter's hair without any screaming or crying We have a splash cap to stop the soap / water getting in her eyes. She likes to wear it as a tutu instead.
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Jun 3, 2025 06:51
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Scapegoat posted:At this stage I'm pretty sure the draw of the zoo is riding the bus and getting a paddle pop after she eats her lunch (which is another battle). Our zoo has a carousel. 1 ride, $3 Unlimited rides, $10 Kids are now old enough to not need the adult standing next to them, and there is a lovely shady bench by the entrance/exit. Go wild children, live your dreams.
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Jun 3, 2025 13:00
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