“Anjali, don’t keep opening that drawer and taking out all of the diapers.”
Anjali looks at me knowingly while opening the drawer.
“Anjali, you can use the spoon to scoop out your green juice [green smoothie] if you don’t fling the spoon around.”
Anjali scoops out some green juice and waves it until a bunch of it spills on the rug.
“We’re not going up the steps right now sweetie. You can only go up the steps with mama or papa, or another adult.”
Anjali continues up the steps, looking back at me.
Of course, when it’s an issue of safety, one of us has to step in. We’re not going to let her climb the steps without supervision at this point. That’s why we have gates. But when visiting Anjali’s cousins recently, we had to keep telling her not to go up, redirecting her to something else, or grabbing her when she started going up.
I wonder how firm the boundaries we set should be at this point. What kind of rules am I supposed to set?
Around 64 weeks (Anjali is around 61 right now), The Wonder Weeks suggests that toddlers are looking for boundaries. The book says,
“Your toddler is not a baby anymore. Now the time has come to set boundaries. Your toddler is up to it and you can also demand more of him. Indeed, he is looking for boundaries. If he enters the world of ‘principles’, he longs for rules. He varies endlessly to know that. Just as he is hungry and has the right to eat every day, so he has the right to rules. And most of the rules he can only discover when you handed them to him, especially if it concerns social rules. You must make it clear what is appropriate and what not appropriate. By setting rules you not doing him any violence. On the contrary, you are obliged to him. And who can teach him better than someone who loves him?”
Maybe that’s why Anjali looks to us when she’s doing something we don’t want her to do. She sees the boundary and wants to test it.
On the other hand, I can’t help but think she’s still so little, and she’s just exploring her world. So, I should let her make a mess on the floor. I should let her open and close drawers and take stuff out. I should oblige her, when I can, by going up the steps when she wants to.
I’m just trying to find the balance between setting boundaries and letting her explore. There is certainly no disciplinary action I can take at this point, nor do I want to lay the foundation for some parent-child opposition. If she’s going up the steps and I have asked her several times not too, but she continues, I pick her up and tell her why she cannot do that right now. Sometimes she’s fine with this, especially if I redirect her attention to something else. Sometimes she cries. I try not to make a big deal of it. I explain why she can’t use the steps at that moment, and move on.
I think that both of her responses–crying or being fine–exhibit that she understands.
Maybe that’s the goal: to let them explore and have fun, to set boundaries around that exploration and fun, and to have faith that she’s picking up on what’s okay or not okay as we go.
