Advice I was told, listened to, then ignored whilst potty training Little Bear, and was all the happier for it: 

• Toilet training your child before they’re 2 (*if you live in the 1950s maybe*) 
• ‘Stay consistent’ - don’t start using pants and then go back to nappies (feels cruel) 
• Ignore your child when they get upset about the experience of wetting themselves 
• Give your child a treat every time they use the potty (backfired) 
• ‘Stay consistent’ - don’t use toilets/potties and a nappy at the same time (why?)
• Wake your child up in the middle of the night (*insane*) when they ‘make the switch’ so they don’t pee in their sleep 

January this year, I started looking at toilet training Little Bear. I felt under a lot of pressure to make this work, and was slightly terrified about the idea of having to clean poo off the sofa and mop up endless puddles of wee, especially after becoming a nappy changing pro after the last 2 years.  

‘I awake Pappa, Moomin’s awake, I awake, time to wake up, I awake Pappa’

The light starts getting too strong for the blackout blinds and Little Bear climbs into our bed and starts patting my head. I know that any movement will be an admission of being conscious, so I stay perfectly still, and naïvely believe that he will give up after a few minutes and let me go back to sleep. I slowly open one eye.

‘Now you awake Pappa! I awake! Weekabix! You awake Pappa! Mamma look! Pappa awake!’ and the wake up dance and jump on Pappa begins.
 
Getting out the door with a toddler is never easy. But when they’ve moved firmly into the ‘boundary testing stage’ at 2  and a half, it becomes all the more difficult.

Little Bear was happily riding his bike in the garden at nursery the other day when another kid, let’s call him Steve, started following him. Steve got closer and closer until he started playfully bumping into Little Bear’s bike and giggling. Should I intervene?
 
Maybe not, Little Bear is getting cross with Steve but no one’s getting hurt. In fact, Little Bear might even be learning some life skills about dealing with annoying people without parents swooping in. Maybe it’s an opportunity for him to learn how to talk to Steve and persuade him to- Wait! Little Bear’s buddy, Suzie, has just stepped in and pushed over Steve’s bike. Intervene? But how?

Suzie then takes Steve’s bike and rides off in victory shouting ‘My turn! My turn!’ Intervene? Hell no.

​Two and a half thousand years ago, Socrates asked what Justice was. Ever since, adults have struggled with this question. What is fair, how should we live our lives, how should we treat other people? Not so for a toddler. Toddlers have an innate knowledge of justice. They’ve understood it with absolute certainty months before they can even say it. For them, the obvious nature of justice requires swift and outraged retribution for anyone who challenges its unbreakable rules.
 
When a toddler is well rested, then Justice is kinder, calmer and has more giggles. Justice can be reasoned with. On the other hand, the tired toddler has no charity. When their dispensing their Justice, no quarter should be given, and inconsistency is expected and utterly fair. Whether they want the Weetabix dry and wet at the same time, or want their trousers off whilst staying warm, no clemency should be given to the parent who can’t square these circles.