Baby Steps: 3 years old, going on 13

Back talk, rude behavior, sarcasm, snide remarks -- if I didn't know better, I would think I had a teenager, not a 3-year-old. Cooper has always been "wise beyond his years," but lately, he has been acting like a 13-year-old, not a 3-year-old.

I was not prepared for the attitude that is coming out of my baby. I'm not a saint; just ask my mother -- I had my fair share of attitude issues, and back talk was second nature for me. The difference is, I was in junior high and high school, whereas my baby hasn't even made it to preschool yet.

Where does that innate need to respond to everything I say with, "No you're a (insert noun/adjective here)," come from? I don't remember even daring to talk back to my mother until I was at least 8, and after the stern look and the soap in my mouth, I was scared into submission until I was a teenager raging with hormones and jonesing for a rush of adrenaline.

Cooper is supposed to be sweet and innocent until at least kindergarten, when he learns all sorts of things from his new school friends. I am unprepared. I have no idea how to react. How do you punish a 3-year-old for sarcasm? Does he even know what he is doing?

Nothing I have tried thus far has been helpful, and he has decided to take his one-man show on the road. Now it's not just at home where devil Cooper comes out. He is everywhere: the grocery store, the sitter's house, even church. This has to stop! Do I lock him in the house until after puberty hits and my sweet boy comes back? Should I send him to live at the circus like my mom always threatened my sister?

Only time will tell how much longer this child feels like he needs to test his boundaries. Hopefully, he is on his last leg, because I'm not sure how much more of this my sanity can take!

Kristen Pind, a native of small-town Gower, Mo., came to Southeast Missouri State University with big dreams of being the next Katie Couric or Diane Sawyer. She never thought that in her 20s, she'd be married with two kids and living in Cape Girardeau. Keep up with Kristen's adventures as a young mom who's still trying to figure out how her own life fits together. Turns out, she's living a dream she never knew she had, and loving every minute of it. Kristen invites moms of all types to find her "Baby Steps" page on Facebook.