Like a week ago my daughter and I were in the Target parking lot walking to our car after a small purchase.

I let her hold the receipt. She actually dropped it and the wind picked it up and blew it out into the street into heavy traffic.

"DADDY! DADDY! WE HAVE TO GO GET THE NOTE!"

"Sorry, sweetpea, it's in the street, we can't get it. It's gone."

"..........NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooOOO!!!"

For like 20 minutes she cried about that receipt. She even asked if we could go home, get her magnifying glass toy and come back and look for it because that's what you do when something gets lost.

Even a week later she still brings up the Lost Note. "Daddy when we go back to Target can we look for the receipt?" Good grief.

"Okay, dude time to brush your teeth!"

Complete breakdown shaking and crying.

"Dude, what's wrong?"

"I made a snow man and I can't show you."

"It hasn't snowed for months, buddy. Where's this snow man?"

"In my dream, and now it's gone."

Not illogical but heart-wrenching for me.

We had plastic cups in several different colors. Two of each color. He wanted the orange cup so I poured his milk into an orange cup. No. He wanted the other, identical, orange cup.

Took the same kid shoe shopping and he wanted these god awful teal Reeboks. He has a fit because he LOVES these shoes. Ok, whatever. Pick your battles. We get home and he opens the box and melts down because he didn't want THESE shoes.

He's 27 now with four kids of his own. When he tells me about the crazy stuff they get upset over, I just laugh.

My two-year-old loves the show Daniel Tiger’s Neighbourhood, which is a cartoon show about a tiger who lives in Mr Rogers’ Land of Make Believe (you know, with the trolly and King Friday and Lady Elaine). Anyways, the doctor who lives in Daniel Tiger’s town is called Dr. Anna. In the show, Daniel has visited Dr. Anna several times.

Whenever my daughter is hurt (even just a bump) she asks to see Dr. Anna. When we try to tell her she’s not real and is only Daniel’s Doctor, she cries hysterically and says, “Dr. Anna is real! Go see Dr. Anna! Need go to Dr. Anna’s house!”

We’ve gone round and round on this for an hour several times and I can’t seem to get it through to her that she can’t go visit a cartoon doctor.

My son wanted me to wrap him like a burrito for bed. So I did. Then he was upset that I wrapped him like a bean burrito...

“I want to be a chicken and rice burrito!”

Took my son to the park. He goes on the climbing frame and down the slide then throws the mother of all hissy fits kicking at the slide. I kneel down all dad like and calm him down then ask why he's kicking the slide.

The answer? "I hate it! It's too fun!"

My nephew is four, his latest thing has been his "pooping corner." He has been potty trained for a while now, like 1.5 years? He has decided that he doesn't like the bathroom anymore for pooping. But peeing is fine, I don't know kids are silly. He will go into the hallway and will poop there. He will squat down and just start pooping. But if you walk in on him pooping or watch him from the living room, he will hold out his hand to block you from seeing him.

This doesn't really work when your 20ft away. If you watch him he will throw himself on the ground and start crying while pooping. He will only do that at home, he has not problem using the bathroom anywhere else.

I think its the most toddler thing ever and cried the first time I saw it. My sister doesn't find it funny and is beside herself with what to do.

My daughter was normally a pretty calm and rational toddler. Tantrums were pretty rare. That was until I started to discipline her little brother. She would absolutely rage at me and tell me that I need to be nice to her baby because he's little and still learning.

They are only 18 months apart so we had no clue how she would take to being a big sister since we had very little time to prepare her (last minute adoption, long story) and she didn't fully grasp what was happening. I thought she might show signs of jealousy but she instead took her role very seriously and wouldn't let anyone, even me, do anything to upset him.

I would try to explain that discipline is part of learning but she wasn't having any of that. She agreed that she should be disciplined for bad behavior but not her baby brother. That's really the only times she would ever throw a full blown screaming tantrum. It was the strangest thing.

They are teenagers now and are still close, but my daughter no longer cares if her brother gets in trouble. Anytime she tries to get him in trouble now I remind her of her orders to never discipline her brother.

When my buddy's son was 2, he started showing him wrestling moves by performing the moves on him. One of his son's favorites was the chokeslam. He would pretend to grab his son by the neck, while actually lifting him up by his butt, and then slowly "slamming" him on the bean bag chair.

I was over there one time, and my buddy chokeslammed his son a few times. Then, my buddy told his son that that was enough when he kept coming back for more. His son proceeded to have a fit, screaming, "CHOKE ME DADDY!" over and over and over. We literally were roaring with laughter.

Inconsolably screaming: "I WANT NOTHING!"

My kid is either a complete nihilist or a young Buddha.

Wasn’t exactly a full blown tantrum but still nonsensical.

Three year old “why do doctors have eyes?”

Me: “Eyes? Or ice?” (Thinking maybe it was going to make sense, silly me!)

Three: “EYES!!!!” (Like I’m the idiot.)

Me: “Because they are human beings?”

Three: “No! Why do they have eyes!?!?”

Me: “So they can see?”

Three: “No! Why?!?!”

Like, what answer do you want man? The question doesn’t even make sense! I don’t even want to admit how long this went on.

I blew up a glove to make a balloon and drew a turkey face on it.

2yo: (screaming hysterically) MAKE IT NOT A BALLOON!!!

So I poke a hole to let air out.

2yo: NO NO NO...THE TURKEY, THE TURKEY IS DEAD! NOOOO! Rage screams for 40 minutes.

Yesterday, our youngest son (1.5 years old) had a meltdown because I wouldn't let him pour his apple juice on the cat.

I saw him start to, grabbed his cup, he just looked at me with a mixture of anger and sadness and cried "bath" for about 10 minutes. Our cat is amazing with children but even she wouldn't appreciate an apple juice bath.

My two year old son heard my wife crumble up a receipt in the car tonight and for the next hour lost his mind that we had a cookie we were holding out on him. No amount of explaining could fix the situation.

She just started crying and said I broke her heart. After a few times of asking and calming her down, she told me it was because I ruined her birthday. Her birthday had been like 8 months before.

I tried asking her how I ruined her birthday, but those were the only two sentences she would say.

My daughter dropped a pretzel and the dog ate it. She started bawling and threw her entire cup of pretzels on the floor. Spoiler alert: the dog at those too.

My girlfriend at the time texted me when she was looking after her 3-year-old brother.

"Josh is crying because he doesn't want an ice cream. He already finished eating it. This was 15 minutes go."

“Mommy, I’m hungry.”

“Okay Buddy, what would you like to eat?”

Child throws himself on the floor and is immediately in full lizard brain meltdown mode

“I DON’T WANNA EAT AAAAAANYTHIIIIING!!!”

He loved being tickled so I was tickling him one day. He let out a huge fart and suddenly started crying and screaming. I ask him why he’s screaming and he replies with - "I was saving that for later." How and why would you save a fart?

She had a meltdown because her paintbrush "wasn't green."

Mind you, there was a green paintbrush available within reach, but the fact that the one in her hand wasn't green was a problem, and "I can't make this one green for you" was unacceptable. She did eventually relent and decide it was okay to just pretend the red one was green.

Image by

Elevators will make my daughter lose her mind, guaranteed. My kid thinks people get on them to die! I have shown her that it’s okay, even ridden one up and down with her (while she screamed the entire time). I just don’t get it. She yells at people not to get on the elevator! Screeches and is terrified if someone she loves gets on one.

She pointed to the fridge and said, “Milk!”

Filled her cup with milk and handed it to her.

She took one sip, threw it on the ground, and screeched, “JUICE!”

Left her to writhe and cry on the floor.

I babysat a kid who, for the first couple of months that I babysat her, called all beverages "wawa" (water) and all songs "shark" (as in Baby Shark). This led to many, many conversations that all followed the same structure:

Kid: A shark!

Me: You want to listen to Baby Shark?

Kid: Yes!

Me: [puts on Baby Shark]

Kid: No! A shark.

Me: You want the monkey banana song?

Kid: Yes.

Me: [puts on monkey banana song]

Kid: NO! A SHARK.

Me: You want to listen to the duck song?

Kid: Yes.

And so on and so forth into eternity. Eventually I'd get it right, but yeesh.

Every morning with my 2-year-old:

“Do you want to go to the park?” “Yeah! Play dirt!” “Ok go to the door for shoes and jacket” “No! Stay home!” “But don’t you want to go to the park to play in the sandbox?” “Yeah!” “Ok so we need to go get shoes and get in the car” “No!”

Full meltdown follows. And repeat this exchange for another 5 minutes until he realizes that we can’t both stay home and go to the park simultaneously. Then repeat again when leaving the park.

One time, my nephew was a toddler he asked my sister if she drank soda while she was pregnant with him. She said that she did have a glass or two and he freaked out and cried for and hour because “babies can’t drink Dr. Pepper it’s not healthy! Only milk!” They got him settled down and he asked if she ate Cheez-Its when she was pregnant. She said “oh,no. Babies only drink milk so I didn’t eat Cheez-Its.” He cried harder because “I would have probably liked to have some Cheez-Its!” Melt down for another hour.

Potty training my daughter.

She does a dump no problem while sitting on her training potty that has a flush sound maker.

Me: shows her how to flush on real potty

Her: flushes with her fake potty.

Me: Pulling out the container she just pooped in

Her: DISLIKES that I took the container out, screams, and grabs the container with both hands and pulls.

Now I'm in a bloody tug of war for my daughter’s crap!

Poop ends up on the floor with my daughter freaking out and screaming "oh no, poop! Are you okay?" while crying

I wouldn't let her put crayons in my ear.

Full-on dropping to the ground, wailing and sobbing like I'd killed our cat in front of her. I would tell her we don't put stuff in our ears, which would make her sob louder.

Thankfully she's a young toddler and easily distracted, so it only lasted a few minutes.

Not my child, but it's my niece.

She said she wanted milk so I made her a cup of it. Came back. She said she didn't want it. Threw a fit because she didn't want the milk. I told her she's the one who asked for it. She literally stopped crying and went, "oh" took the milk and went back to watching her iPad.

Another one would be that I gave her milk but the cup was freshly washed. Didn't think a few drips of water on the side was going to cause trouble. Nope. She screamed and cried because she got a DROP OF WATER on her hand and didn't want to wipe it on her shirt...

He lost his dog. He never had a dog... but he lost it.

It turned out to be my fault because I taught him to jump too high.

I was put in time out and he took a nap.

I just want to also add 2 more stories.

He once asked me, "We happy?"

"Ya, man. We are happy!"

Him: "Good... you can stay.... now..."

I'm guessing I answered right and I'm scared to know what would happen if I had said anything different.

Another time, he walked into my room at 4 am (I get up at 3:30 for work) and said "I want it." Me, "Ok man, you want what?"

Him: "All of It!" Me: "... Um ok, man. If you work hard you can have it." Him: "Good. I'll take it!" And then he walked back into his bedroom and started playing with is Big Blocks with new purpose.

I think I'm raising a future dictator.

Peanut: Mom, do cats always won?

Me: Yeah, I guess so.

Peanut (not satisfied): No! Do cats won?

Me (entirely confused): Yeah, they win some and they lose some.

Peanut (frustrated, tears streaming down her face): NO!! DO CATS WON?

Me: Calm down. Don't get frustrated. I'm just trying to figure out what you're saying.

Peanut: Won...

Me: ....

Also Me: Can you use the word in a sentence so I can try to figure out what you're saying?

Peanut: Sometimes you walk and sometimes you...

Me: OH! RUN? Yeah, cats run...

Heck of a five minutes, let me tell you.

He enjoys My Little Pony. However, we cannot refer to it as "My Little Pony". He can say My Little Pony, but my wife and I must refer to it as "Your Little Pony" or he loses his little mind.

It's adorable in the worst possible way.

She’s 5 but she spent a full half hour inconsolable, crying so hard she couldn't breathe because I’m a better singer than her and need to stop singing because that fact makes her mad.

I do not let it stop me from singing and I do encourage her to practice her singing talents. She’s an amazing dancer with great flexibility and I asked if it would be fair of me to tell her to stop dancing because she’s better than I am.

She is a DIVA and came into the world as one, so I have tons of “you’re seriously crying over that?” moments but this singing one just came up within the past few days.

She also hates that her sister (7) draws better than she does. Also try to explain that her sister practices A LOT. The girl carries a pencil and a notebook with her at all times in case inspiration strikes but that makes her mad too.

The 5-year-old has lots of things that she is great at but she’s 5 and thinks that she needs to be the BEST at everything. She got her competitiveness from her father FOR SURE.

Not really a toddler at the time, but my kid had a full blown tantrum (cried for like 3 hours and was banging on stuff) because it wasn't the weekend yet. And then when I told her that the weekend started the next day, she cried because she didn't want it to be the weekend yet.

This morning, my daughter lost it because I will not agree to paint our house purple.

Last week, it was because she has a middle name.

My wife just told me that during tonight’s bedtime routine our daughter asked whether our dog has a middle name. My wife told her that she wasn’t sure and that my daughter should ask me in the morning. Not sure what my answer should be. My best option may be to distract her by painting the house purple.

Asked my daughter to guess the dog’s middle name, and can you believe it, she got it on her first try. Our dog’s middle name is T-Rex.

I am now seriously considering paint our front door purple. I mean, why not? There must be some type of purple that parents and child will like.

My daughter went to the bathroom to pee and came out 30 seconds or so later crying. Why? She had been bored sitting on the toilet waiting for all the pee to come out and it occurred to her that she had a whole life of being bored sitting on the toilet for 30-second increments while waiting for all the pee to come out.

He couldn't believe that Ralph from Wreck It Ralph was ignoring him when he was trying to talk to Ralph through the TV.

We refer to my son’s “naps” as “rests,” but sometimes we’ll slip and call it a nap. On Easter, he got some bubbles as a gift and was saying how excited he was to play with them after his “rest.” He asked me if I wanted to play with them, too, and I said “yep, after your nap” and he lost. His. Mind. Crying and screaming about how he wanted to do it after his rest, not his nap.

For an hour.

Because I said “nap” instead of “rest.”

My son loves dinosaurs. Talks about them all the time, watches nothing but dinosaur stuff on YouTube. Put a toy dinosaur in front of him though and he freaks right out. He's a little over two and so I figured it was safe to show him my Amiibo collection. He was amazed by Mario, Luigi, Peach, Pikachu, Donkey Kong. We get to Yoshi and he becomes terrified, starts crying, tries to run away. From Yoshi!

With my son, everything is no.

Want to go to bed? No.

Want to eat a snack? No.

Want to play with your trucks? No.

So, bit of a fight to get him to do anything without intervention. It got to be so bad he'd say no to his own suggestion.

"Play Trucks."

"Okay, let's play trucks."

"No."

"But you said play trucks."

"Yeah."

"Okay, lets play."

"NO!!!"

"Buddy, it was your idea!"

"NOOOO!"

On and on it went. For an hour. Found my wife in the kitchen absolutely dying trying to keep it together.

Well, my little brother had a full on breakdown because he wanted to swing. We had a swing, it was in front of him. He wanted for it to swing only in one direction (as in only to be on one side of the swing when swinging, not going backwards). I had to explain to him it isn't possible, we can't do that.

Little late, but my 2-year-old decided that his real dad was a cartoon dad on TV. He called him "my second dad." So when his real dad came home from work, my son hot all angry and threw a complete temper tantrum... because he didn't want to call him daddy anymore, that his real dad needed a new name since he wanted the TV dad to be his real (AKA first dad). The reason? Because TV dad had a pet lemur. (Yes, it was that show with the two men and the fake lemur.)

Anyway this went on for weeks, my son throwing a fit every time he forgot and called his daddy...daddy. He threw a fit when dad tucked him, played with him, gave him a bath, read him a story. Because he wanted second dad to do these things.It was a rough couple weeks.

Not to mention... trying to explain to my husband that there wasn't a man coming over in the daytime pretending to by my son's dad. Yeah ROUGH couple weeks.

He threw a toy car in my general direction and I took the car away and told him sternly that we don't throw our toys at people. He got upset and cried, as toddlers do. But he's a cuddly one, and when he's upset, he likes to be held. But I was the one who made him upset, so he didn't want me. But he was upset and he wanted to be held, but didn't want to be held by me because I made him upset. But he was upset...

My niece, known for being a perfect child (no disobedience, no temper tantrums, no crying fits of any sort) was having what could only be described as a perfect potty training experience. No accidents at all. It’s all fitting as she is the daughter of my perfect sister.

While helping my parents watch her one weekend, I heard this horrible shrieking from the bathroom, like a banshee’s wail. I run to the other end of the house to find her on the toilet, crying giant tears and in a full panic.

“What’s wrong, sweetie?”

“I have to pee!”

“Well, go ahead, you’re on the potty!”

“I can’t!”

She’s turning redder every second and she’s gritting her teeth.

“You can’t? Does it hurt?”

“No. I need to pee but the poopy wants to come out first!”

She was having a meltdown because she needed to poop but wanted to only pee, then poop separately.

Friends of mine have two toddlers, boy and a slightly younger girl. While on a car ride, the boy pretended he had a lollipop (yes, an imaginary lollipop) and refused to share it with his sister.

It escalated to the point that the girl was bawling her eyes out, screaming for him to share this nonexistent lollipop, and the mother screaming at the son to share the damn lollipop.

Our mower was serviced. The guy came and picked up the mower and was to drop it off afterwards. My son cried for 30 minutes solid then off and on every 5 to 15 minutes until he dropped it back off. I tried explaining that he was only fixing the mower and would bring it right back to him. My sobbing almost 3-year-old would reply, while wiping his tears, "okay. I'm okay. It's okay".

Wash, rinse, repeat for 2 hours.

With toddlers, you quickly learn how to say non-acknowledgements like “oh, yeah?”, and “wow, that’s interesting!”, because a good chunk of what they say is nonsensical.

Earlier today, I was driving to the store and from his car seat in the back, my toddler yelled at me, “I want the biv!”

He then proceeded to melt down about the “biv”.

I attempted to figure out what in the world he was talking about, but had no luck.

“What is a biv? I don’t know what you are talking about. Can you point at it? What is a biv?”

He paused for a moment, then admitted reluctantly, “I forgot the word”.

I still don’t know what he was talking about.

So my daughter and I were getting ice cream from a drive-thru. All of a sudden, she starts crying hysterically about how she doesn't want to be "long." I'm trying to figure out what she's talking about, so I ask her what she means by long, and she points at her feet. I don't get it, and she starts throwing a fit because she doesn't want to be long.

It clicks, and I ask her,"You mean long like me and Mommy?" And she says, "Yeah, I like being little!"

She didn't want to grow up and be boring like an adult. Wisdom beyond her years, that one.

When my younger brother was about 3, he would ask for milk to be poured into a cup for him to drink. However, he couldn't pour it himself because he'd spill and make a mess.

So, instead, he would do the next best thing and ask our mother to pour the milk. However, he would refuse to drink the milk if someone else poured it, Mom was the only one allowed to pour it because it 'tasted good' only when she poured it.

Naturally, this is terribly silly and inconvenient. So, my mom goes into the kitchen and pretends to pour it while he is in the other room, and then has me pour it. She comes into the room and gives him it, and he is content. "Tastes good?" He agrees. Then, my mom, in an attempt to prove that her pouring it has no effect on the flavor, reveals that I was the one that poured it.

My brother did not like this outcome. He said something along the lines of "Actually, you know, it's not very good" and refused the rest of the cup.

At some point in the near future following that, he decided that it only tastes good if my mom pours it AND he watches.