Its the fight or flight response in all its glory. When cornered your bodies immediate reaction is to do one of those two things. If its flight, then that could mean that everything wants to take flight if you get my drift. Its why you can get that sick feeling in the pit of your stomach when you face confrontation, its the flight aspect.

In saying that, I was the child who would wee on my sisters floor out of spite. I was definitely old enough to know better and I remember me doing it. So does she bahahaha! I think context has a lot to do with these things.

We have never done 123 magic, but have done a parenting the strong willed child course, which never even touched on kids doing these sorts of things as defiance and was all about choosing a response appropriate to the context of the issue at hand. There was no one solution to all problems and there was significantly more focus on positive parenting through attending rather than responsive parenting.