While struggling through Emma's defiant 2 year old (and beyond) years, I purchased a book, at full price in desperation, called Raising your Spirited Child, by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka. It has some great ideas and includes a few personality tests, helping the parent to understand where a child's spirited behavior comes from (Emma's exactly like her mother I discovered). The "terrible twos" were a difficult time in my life as a mom and I was thankful the author portrayed spiritedness in a positive light. One of the author's recommendations was water therapy as a way to calm a child. Essentially the therapy is just letting a child play in water. The water is calming, is a great teacher of cause and effect, and is pretty easy to clean up. Emma loves playing in water to this day and uses her imagination to mix extravagant meals and desserts. Yesterday I walked into the kitchen to find Mandy included in the at least daily water therapy ritual. It was precious.
Emma actually lost interest in the water long before Mandy.
She filled her little container over and over again. And over again, watching the water fall, sometimes over the edge. Thanks to Emma's difficult stage, I know that cleaning up a little water and changing a wet baby is far easier than the trouble a defiant child causes.
"Do I look like someone who needs water therapy?"
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