Post Punk Kitchen Forum

I figure lots of people wonder if other kids do what their kids do, so feel free to post your own stories in this thread.

I'll start with mine. Last Sunday we (me & my partner) brought Kai to the grocery store, and got him one of the big car carts to keep him happy. That worked well until he looked real fidgety just as we were getting on line. So while my husband packed & paid for the food, I let Kai out of the cart to walk around.

Well, let me tell you, he TORE around the store. I kept telling him to hold my hand or I wouldn't let him walk, but he'd whip his hand out of mine and start running down the aisles/check-outs/trying to get out the doors. I picked him up a few times but he struggled so much I let him down again, and sure enough he took off careening away. Luckily he only touched a few things, so it just seemed like he was so excited to be able to run around on his own.

But I don't see other kids doing this so much. Is this normal? (I kind of worry he may have adhd)

How old is Kai now? That is exactly how Silas would have reacted a year ago (till he was 2 1/2 or so). Totally normal, I say.

Oh I should have mentioned that. He's 20 months. So phew! Glad Silas was the same.

Oh yes. poopiebaby is 23 months, and that's pretty much how he acts too. I say normal!

2 is way too young to diagnose ADHD. I think that's pretty normal 2 year old grocery store behavior... I avoid it by um, pretty much never letting the Emperor walk in the store. Now that he's approaching 3, sometimes I let him walk on short trips or I let him push the tiny child cart verrrrry slowly. I'm kind of a stick in the mud.

Phew! Yay thanks ladies.
I mean I knew it was too young to diagnose adhd, so I guess I should say that. I even told my mom that last weekend, because she is usually the one who adds to whatever tiny fear I might have.
But I haven't been around many kids so it is a relief to know your kids act like that too!

20 months is totally the age for that!

Is that just little boys? It sounds nervewracking ::hopes::

My 19.5 month old daughter does the same thing (sorry Tofulish). I can't grocery shop with her these days because she tries to fling herself out of the cart if I put her in the seat, and she just goes crazy running around if she's not in the cart.

I also have some other bad news for you, if Leela is almost walking...running comes next. And they don't know to come back when you call them for a while.

Yep, that's Inez too. I usually just don't let her down in stores (I either wear her or put her in the cart - and the cart typically only works for quick trips). I took her to have passport photos made at the drugstore a couple months ago and it was like Benny Hill up in there. They weren't really set up for kids, so we were trying to rig up a backdrop out of posterboard and she kept running off squealing and I'd go chasing after her. The poor photographher was so patient!

Inez's probably-normal-but-still-makes-me-wig-out-a-little thing is hitting herself in the head. Sometimes she does it softly like she's just testing it out but she does it harder when she's mad, too. Or even when she's fake crying to try and like make herself cry more convincingly. Do other kids do this?

Turns out ladies learn how to run and play, just like the fellas.

Yes, that was a pretty dumb comment of mine. A friend has a 2 year old boy who is like a wind-up destructo-robot of doom (and insanely cute) and she told me that she thought that little girls might be easier. I think she was trying to make me feel better.

What do you when they just have to run and don't listen and are being unsafe? Just try and keep them safe and remove if needed?

I was just joking. I got so many comments about Silas being "all boy" until he calmed down that I'm sensitive to it now. I know you weren't being discriminatory. I always had fun telling people how my niece must be more "boy" than any I'd ever met because she's 9 and hasn't slowed down much at all ;) Honestly, some kids are just super energetic and just need to explore all of the time and then some are more chill and want to watch, you just never know. Definitely just go with the flow, I didn't let Silas walk in the store with me unless it was a super fast trip until he started doing really well on those fast trips. We had to play in his wagon at soccer games until he finally stopped trying to run on the field in front of cleats and balls, etc.

Yeah, I agree with Kelly. Even just at this age I can see such a difference in Greys friends. Grey is SO curious and was dying to get moving. He wants to touch everything and explore everything on his own. He has other friends who are his age and haven't started crawling yet and they are happy to sit back and just take things in.

Peter hits himself in the head when he's upset sometimes. It worried me at first, but when I asked his pediatrician about it she said it's a pretty common thing and nothing to worry about unless it's accompanied by lots of other behavioral 'red flags'.

This is so Walter. He didn't crawl until a year and was perfectly content to watch the world go by. He's 18.5 months now, so I hope I don't jinx things by saying it, but so far he has been very easy to contain in public. At home he's a wild man, but out in the world he is very cautious. If I put him on the floor in the grocery store he would either stand frozen or hold onto my leg. We took a music class that lasted 10 weeks, where the kids get to play with drums and bells and scarves and stuff, and it took 9 weeks for Walter to decide it was okay to get off my lap to get an instrument.

He is the extreme opposite of most toddlers we run into, and I feel like a lot of parents don't realize that long periods of quiet observing are normal, too. Almost daily I hear somebody tell their kid they're going to leave the park if they don't start playing with somebody, or "why did we even come if you're not going to do anything?" So I guess my point is "normal" has a wide range.

I super mega agree with this.

Yup, normal. Kids gotta move. I like to give them movement games to do that are socially acceptable within the space you are at. Like if they need to move, have them spin in a circle ten times, or jump up and down 20 times.

mwuahahahaha... this was tzipi to a T at 18 months. now, at nearly 2 1/2, she has been getting progressively wilder and harder to contain. she is "that kid" at our swimming class. the one who doesn't listen and tears across the deck for the deep end at every opportunity, the one who throws herself down the water slide without bothering to check if i am going to catch her, the one leaping off the edge of the pool and trying to drown herself. we can't go to restaurants. or to the grocery store. or any place that might require that she sit still and preferably not screaming for more than 5 minutes. she is still reserved at our gym class, but not reserved like quiet or sitting still, but reserved in that she'll shoot daggers at you if you try to get her to follow their stupid circle time instead of doing mad tricks on the parallel bars.

my advice: TREASURE THE NEXT 9 MONTHS. because it will probably be the last time you get to do anything in relative peace and quiet for a long time. clingy, shy kids can be a bit of a drain (i'll admit to the same feeling of "if you weren't going to do anything, we could have stayed home!") but i now very much appreciate her very long spell of observing and taking in.

I'm a nanny for 14-month old twins and the boy has started to slam his head against the floor when he gets frustrated. And he gets frustrated all the time. His forehead is is constantly covered in bruises.

We're working on night weaning. Last night Walter went to bed at 8, woke up at 10:15, and was up screaming and thrashing and clawing until at least 1 before he finally fell asleep. My husband and I both tried to comfort him in other ways, but once he realized he wasn't getting boobed he was furious. Is a 3 hour long middle of the night meltdown normal? I think it is, my husband thinks nobody else's kid is like this and that we've spoiled him.

Nope, normal.

If I had tried to night wean Silas at that age, he would have done the exact same thing. Sorry you're going through this! I very vividly remember the desperation for sleep and free boob!

Kai cried before bed the other night absolutely hysterically for no reason at all! Must have been for at least a good half hour, if not closer to an hour. We tried everything to comfort him but he just kept crying. I think once he starts crying he gets himself so upset that he can't stop. So for some reason he starts, then continues because he is upset that he's upset! So yeah, I'd say that's perfectly normal.

I have a new question: is it normal for 21 months old to get frustrated super easilly? Kai will only try something once or twice, and freak out if he can't do it. Like the other day he has this toy with cogs that you can stack, but only some of the cogs are stackable. Well he was trying to stack one that wasn't stackable, freaked out and threw every single cog on the floor and hit the toy a couple times. I am worried this means he'll never learn to try, and that's the most important thing for success! Is this just an age thing or is that his personality?