Acknowledgments

“The more things change, the more they remain the same.”

—Alphonse Karr, 19th-century French journalist

Ever since I was little, I have been fascinated by trying to understand how everything in our world … makes sense! How all of nature dances and spins, pulls and pushes, and yet, in extraordinary and unexpected ways, always finds its way back to a perfect harmony.

In the work I did with families for nearly thirty years, I came to understand that toddlers also always “make sense”! They dance and spin, pull and push, but they can quickly be led back to harmony—if you know the path. For decades, I traveled that path every day with the toddlers who visited me for their health care. And now, like an adventurer just back from an unexplored land, I am very excited to share the secrets I have discovered about toddlers with parents, grandparents, health professionals, educators, and all others who love young children.

I have many people to thank for shining their light on my explorations and helping me to see toddlerhood in all its funny and satisfying beauty. My embryology professor at SUNY Buffalo, Gordon Swartz, a brawny ex-boxer with a passion for teaching; Arthur H. Parmelee, Jr., my child development professor at UCLA, a kind and patient man with a deep compassion for and understanding of children; and the concise and insightful writings of Carl Rogers, Haim Ginott, Thomas Gordon, Francis Ilg, Louise Bates Ames, Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlich, Stephanie Marston, Hans Miller, and many others.

Thanks as well to my soul mate and treasured wife, Nina, for her constant love and patience, and to my daughter, Lexi, for her good nature during my long hours of distraction and absence; to my late mother, Sophie, who many years ago taught me Alphonse Karr’s words and thus planted the seed for one of the pivotal underpinnings of this book; to the kindness and caring of my father, Joe, and the generous heart of my unofficial stepmother, Celia; to the superb organizing and writing talents of Paula Spencer; to the illustrious imaginations of Margeaux Lucas and C. A. Nobens; to my agent, Suzanne Gluck, who helped keep this project moving forward; and to my always thoughtful and honest editor, Beth Rashbaum, who endured my constant “what-ifs” and “why nots” with considerable (and much appreciated) diplomatic aplomb.

My appreciation also goes out to the many professionals who shared with me their insights into how to teach parents these special techniques, especially Kyle Pruett, Steven Shelov, Morris Green, Janet Serwint, Martin Stein, Roni Leiderman, Jana Clay, and Christine Schoppe Wauls.

And finally, the biggest thanks of all to the trusting parents who chose me as their children’s doctor and allowed me to travel with them into the exotic and extraordinary prehistoric valleys of their toddlers’ minds.

Without the help of all of you this book would not have been possible.