Hi, this is Janet Landsbury and welcome to Unruffelt.

Today I'm going to be responding to a parent who's noticing a drastic change in her daughter's

behavior since she turned four.

She's become very defiant both physically and verbally and she seems to argue about

anything and everything.

So this mom is feeling exhausted and wondering what's up.

Here's the email that I received.

Dear Janet, we've been reading and listening to you since our daughter turned one and we

have found your gentle and intelligent guidance to be the best statement of our parenting philosophy.

And the most useful resource when we need to tune up our relationship with our now four-year-old

daughter, who's a curious, funny, emotionally intelligent kid.

Four has so far seemed like another planet and to be honest, I'm not sure I have the right

equipment to survive in its cost at the atmosphere.

I feel like a switch has been flipped and I'm just not sure how to handle it.

Instead of the generally good nature toddler we had who experimented with and developed self-confidence

and autonomy, we now seem to have a child who actually enjoys defying us about even the

simplest things.

We're suddenly disagreeing about silly things like hand washing and getting in her car

seat.

Now instead of resisting when we set the limit and responding with a burst of emotions

after we acknowledge them, she just coldly says, I'm not going to do that.

And all of my strategies for sitting with those feelings and still maintaining my limit

...