Dealing with Toddler/Preschooler tantrums, especially outside the home

"let children be children" these are the exact words told by one of our family friends when we took dd to a construction site here and she was totally excited with the sand and stones there. i had to give her a quick shower right outside the site.

however, like latha said, not all accept a child so well. recently we had to take dd along to a bank. like we expected, she started running around the huge space that wasn't crowded much. there was a lady there with 2 kids and this girl straight went there and started talking to those kids (not just talking, also asked whatever was in their hands) :hide:. the lady throwing a "look at my well behaved kids, and look at yours" kind of glances on me. if she was doing something wrong, i would have gone behind her. but i was carrying a sleeping baby in my hands and dd wasn't doing anything majorly wrong (we started in exactly 5 mins else couldn't have given this statement). so just let her play around. but i really wondered how those kids could behave so adult-like in public.

these days none of those stern looks and controlling works in public especially if ds is also present or she straight says "lift me like adi and i will be nice too". she only starts doing them more in order to get our attention. all that i said earlier works only at home; am still finding the one that would work in public.

 

Anitha, trying to go with what Sindhu says. Only some children do settle down quicker in certain aspects while others take a long time. DS has comepletely stopped tantrums in retail spaces, stopped spitting, but he will still do some violent behaviour, like hitting himself or the family around him. I am finding it difficult to re-direct that.
Our strategy with tantrums has been to tell K cannot have something, when it is dangerous. If it is not and if it is just something like a certain music we just give in. Picking our fights was a lesson we learnt when we realised while visiting a friend that we used something like 50 "Nos" in the time frame of 30 minutes ;-). Dangerous stuff, stuff that will interfere with his eating like a sweet snack, destructive stuff etc are still a strict "No".
Spitting for DS was his way of showing he did not like the texture or was full. It took me a while to recognise the texture issue.
Asha, I saw this post somewhere, I forget where in these forums. A poster, who had not yet had children talking about how ill-behaved children are in restaurants. I wanted to tell her most people who are not yet parents feel that way then they realise that the child is not misbehaving when he/she is running around in a restaurant but is exploring and learning processes of social integration.
There are moms who are affected more easily by what the world will think of her if the child is "misbehaving" and then there are mothers who are more in the child and let the child explore the world within a certain framework of safety and nondestructive behaviour. What your DD did was perfectly normal behaviour for a three year old. Sad the other mom is more bothered about what others think of her.

 

Asha,

me too always wondered how another child of the same age as my boy could be so quiet and listening to his parents. Then I realised the simple basic logic : no 2 kids are the same. my boy is the one who'll want to know the reason behind everything. that is simply his nature. and also the reason given by Tikka... that's absolutely true.

the moment i started stopped thinking about 'others' when my child is cranky i felt i had better control of the situation. when i kept on saying 'oh god everyone is looking at us, can you please stop this now' it became worse. because the child felt his mom isn't understanding his woes and rather worrying about her position at that point. i also admit still i'm not 100% that kind of detached when a tantrum arises in public places. i do get annoyed but i'm able to quickly tune in to the child and not worry about those 'stares' and 'murmurs'

 

OMG, this thread is like a saviour to me.. I was just thinking this morning to ask you guys to write me a four liner that would remind me every day that DS is just a 3 yr old and we need to be easy on him..

You know I expect so much out of DS.. most of the times I feel DS should understand, should listen immidiately, should do as mom and dad say and when sometimes the time-out does not work at all, when we parents are in a hurry, I often feel DS is not well behaved.. but I felt so bad thinking from the child's POV - he is just 3 yrs old.. I was telling my DH - thanks to the timely self realisations, confessions by both of us - when we 30 yrs old still do not understand certain simple things, still do not listen to our parents at all times, still create tantrums, still stubborn, still not perfect in most things.. how can we expect a 3 yr old to be a perfect little being? we have given birth to a human being with a little heart and a mind of his own, not a robot or a doll that will dance to our tunes at our free will..

oh I wish I remember this every single day. now am inspired to read more into this thread so I have it registered in my head/ heart. more thoughts and advices needed..

 

Read thru the thread..

Anitha, good advices from others.. best is to see which way of disciplining Nilu is comfortable with.. do just that.

Asha, I have started using this 'sad' 'happy' phrases often now and yes I realise after reading your post that yes DS is able to understand better when I say 'Amma will be sad if ....'..

again yest, the whole day he was cranky.. crying if I touch him, dont touch him, lift him, dont lift him.. I went crazy.. was in tears seeing him like that. but I felt something was bothering him big time and he is not able to understand what is bothering him.. took him around in the car for a while and he was alright.. may be he wanted to get some outside air I thought. Yesterday me and DH talked to him for a while.. there are some words that we dont want DS to use so we told him DS, DH and I do not use those words and to my surprise he has not used it till now.. will need to give it some time to get set in our system, but now I have some hopes.. we told him that he can point to us if we ever say those words by mistake.. that way works with him.

His hitting business has not stopped yet. He royally fights (physically) or tries to fight with my DH and my mom.. no one else, even if I am nearby he will be a doll to me but a fighter with them both.. he seems to have fun fighting with them but DH and especially mom will be in so much pain but still my mom would not spank him even once.. I wonder if that kind if patience is needed during that situation. number of 'NO's or timeouts or even spanking does not work in the long run.. yes he stops for the moment or for the day.. but the next day he does it.. not at all times.. but somewhere between 7 to 9pm, he will get that fighting mood and wants to exhibit his inborn karate skills on them.. all other times, he will be a good boy to them but just those few mins will be like a boxing arena. any ideas on this?

 

krithika, latha - if you remember those days of my DD.. she was an introvert then, and i always thought it would be better for all of us if she were a little more outgoing. After DS and post-GP, she is the other way round. its not usually just tantrums, she gets too easily excited with people around her & new environment - for instance, in the bank the other day, apart from these 2 kids and their mom, she was talking to another staff lady (few whys about her haircut) and the person sitting next to her (asking for his pen & paper to write), then ran to another guy near the lift... all of these in just the 5 mins we were there. she would have easily been a timepass for someone feeling bored there. i do let her do whatever she wants to do, within limits, at least coz I am too lazy to run around carrying DS. your points were reassuring. thank you !

 

AD.. :rotflsorry for that.. but just can't help laughing. i have nothing to contribute. why dont you put him in some karate or mridangam classes close to your mom's place so all his energy is drained out there.
dd's crankiness also peaks when she is too tired, more or less around this time. when i see them starting, i quickly start with dinner, wash & put her to sleep.

is your mom giving some cute reactions to his knocks that he loves to see? she needn't hit back, but she needs to stop reacting to it so it wouldn't interest him anymore.

onething but, no amount of spanking is going to work out positive in the long run. kids would end up thinking, hitting is not wrong afterall, if with a purpose.

 

Asha, good to know you had a laugh.. atleast someone doesnt want to say we are bad parents you got the point.. in my mom's case, yes it is dfntly her reactions.. she either gets scared or laughs it off or she tries to get away from him saying he is too strong for her to control.. and P loves her reactions.. he gets excited seeing her that way and trust me she is not able to change her reactions at all.. atleast with DH he defends and finally in turn P gets it back but I am more worried abt mom because she just cannot compete with him physically.

Apart from this, after my rants here, I was reminding myself what I learnt from here yesterday.. and I was sooooo patient in dealing with him. Instead of advicing him, I tried to advice the others at home to talk to him in the way that we would expect from him.. some tried to defend but they saw for themselves that yes they were talking wrong to him.. so he returns the same.

I dont know if I am talking clearly now (I am too happy that I am dealing with DS the right way now, so my words are may not be well written) but I hope some of you get the jist of what I am trying to say )

 

AD,

i agree with Asha on the spanking part after having shed the belief that spanking would discipline my son. One day he told me it hurts and the other day he was spanking his sis because he thought that was the norm. I have woken up And know what sunday he told me 'you shout when you are angry but why not I'... so that's something i must work on.

Now I mentioned in the other thread about the book i read y'day. I would like to quote this from the book which I thought would help us all:

Try to be positive in your dealings with your child. Find another way to tell her things so you can avoid using such words as 'don't', 'can't', 'must not', 'shouldn't, and 'wrong'. If, for example, your child is pounding her fists on the table, explain calmly that the table is for eating and that she can use clay for pounding - then direct her to the clay. If your child has been wiping a table and has overlooked a spot, you need only point to it, or perhaps say, 'one more spot and the table will be perfect'. Negative words make your child feel badly about herself; positive, helpful reactions help her feel independent and successful.