I hope parents learn from their toddlers. I learn from Ivy all the time. Here is a simple example.
Today we were all sitting on the couch. Sage was cradled in my left arm. Beth was sitting to my right with Ivy in her lap. Bengie, our aging dog, was between us.
Ivy was doing peaceful mother-daughter stuff with Beth. Seemed boring to me. Plus, I was getting bored with what I was doing on my computer. So I reached over and poked Ivy. It was intended to be a tickle, normally Ivy’s favorite. But in that moment of peace, she did NOT like it. She scowled at me and turned away.
I apologized for an improper time to play. Ivy and Beth continued to peacefully interact.
A few minutes later, Ivy reached out and smacked Bengie. He understandably got annoyed by this intrusion on his peace and snapped back. This upset Ivy. Wanting to utilize a learning opportunity, I said to Ivy, “Ivy, don’t smack Bengie if you don’t want him to do that. He’s just laying there and you bothered him.” I continued, “How would you feel if I did that to you?…”
Oh.
I realized what I was saying. I had just done that to her. It was just moments later that she did the same thing to Bengie. I was close to missing that simple and obvious realization.
I put my hand on Ivy’s head and said, “That’s probably why you did that to Bengie, huh?”
A learning experience.
I’m not sure how much Ivy learned from it, but I did. I was reminded that Ivy is watching, replicating, repeating, and behaving in the ways she sees me act. When she disrupts Bengie’s peace, well, I’d just disrupted her peace. When she loses her temper, she’s seen me lose my temper. When she gets upset, she’s seen me get upset.
Obviously, Ivy is her own person and has her own emotions and actions. But it’s amazing to see how much she copies me. If she does something I’m disappointed in, it’s beneficial for me as a parent to stop and wonder, “is this something she learned from me?”
I fear sometimes that parents don’t take enough responsibility for how we mold our children. Again, toddlers get angry and frustrated and do completely irrational things that they aren’t copying from us. But sometimes, a lot of the time, their behavior can be traced directly to something they saw us do.
When we realize this, our every movement, word, and reaction around our children becomes something important.
No Coincidences 