The scene is Disneyland at the end of a long day. I am with my two daughters, aged 8 and 12 at the time, a cousin and her boyfriend. It is hot and sticky in that East coast kind of way, and though everyone is exhausted, we have decided to stay for the fireworks finale. A few feet in front of us is another family with younger children, who appear to be in a more advanced state of exhausted-clinging-crying-why-are-we-still-here-dom. Both parents are simultaneously yelling at the two children, and finally the dad whacks the toddler twice, who then falls on the ground and ups the level of crying to a new decibel range while climbing up dad’s leg, as the fireworks begin and the violence simmers. My cousin’s boyfriend wants to punch his lights out, and my children are paying more attention to this scene than the cascade of brilliant colors overhead. What to do?

Many cultures around the world have unique ways of honoring their children. In Bali, for example, there is the celebration known as Nyambutan, a ceremony when a baby is first allowed to touch the ground. Until a few months of age, babies are believed to still be part of the spirit world, and are carried everywhere. The Navajo people have Chidelglo, a special celebration of a baby’s first laugh; the party is put on by whomever first elicited the laughter, which is revered as a special form of prayer. The Boran people of Kenya embody the “takes a village” theme, as they gather for a two day-long special naming and welcoming event known as the Jilla.

In any culture, the blessings of a young baby sometimes get lost in the difficulties of endless caretaking in the early years. The fatigue, frustration and lack of experience sometimes slip over into abusive behavior, even when the initial bonding connection was well established. A pediatrician in Colorado looked at ten years of fatal child abuse data, and found that over 90% of such tragedies were triggered by seven normal development phases.

Colic, those fussy nothing-can-make-me-feel-better scenarios in the first few months.

Poor sleeping habits, before routines get established, when baby wants to be up in the middle of the night when the world is more toned down and womb-like.

Separation anxiety around 9 months of age, when clingyness achieves unparalleled levels. Between one and a half, and two and a half years, four additional challenging developmental aspects emerge:

Normal negativism when the mantra is “no!”, which the toddler screams for the tenth time in as many minutes.

Normal exploratory behavior, as in the joys of trying to keep a toddler in a chair who doesn’t want to be there, and would rather be scooting around on the restaurant floor.

Normal poor appetite. Most babies triple their birth weight by one year of age, and then proceed to gain only 3-5 pounds a year, seemingly existing at times on nothing but air sandwiches, peanut butter and carrot sticks.

Toilet training. This is guaranteed to be a frustrating time, unless one is willing to continuously give up personal expectations, and let nature take its own natural time.

These seven situations are when new parents are most likely to have a tantrum themselves and do damage to their young by shaking, hitting or worse.

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Mariposa Men’s Wellness Institute was founded in 2001

to help men become emotionally healthy.