What Happened to My Sweet Baby!?! (Long)

It is so hard when your sweet little one turns into a monster! You still love 'em, but sometimes it is SOOOO hard.

My daughter went through the same thing at about two. My son never really did. I could reason with him! There are a few things that helped us deal with her, so I will share them with you.

- Spanking did not work. She would be so mad that she wouldn't even seem to feel it. And I was upset when I did it, so it wasn't effective.

- Be consistent. And make sure her other caregivers are too. Try to give her predictable outcomes. If she is loud in a restaurant, take her outside. If she is not good at the mall, she doesn't get to play later. It takes a lot of energy, but it will smooth the way.

- Make sure she is not hungry, tired, sick, bored, or thirsty when you are expecting her to be good. She can't communicate her own needs so well yet, so you have to anticipate them.

- Take some toys with you when you go out to eat. Have specials toys that you leave in the car for her to see only when you are out.

- If she hits you again, don't react in a big way. Just say, "You just hurt Mommy, and she is sad. I am not going to talk to you for a few minutes until I feel better." Essentially, you are putting interaction with you in "time out".

- Tell her to "use her words". At this age, kids feel things, but they don't have the words to express themselves, so you have to help her.

- Try putting her dolls and favorite toys in time out.

- Pick your battles. Don't get worked up about everything. If she says that you don't tell her what to do, just say, yes, we are the parents and not another word. Don't let her bait you into an argument!

- Finally, understand that the root of all of this is her desire to be more independent, which is a good thing. She wants to be in control and you do too. It is hard to be a kiddo with no power, so she will try to grab it any way she can. So give her choices often. Make them both alternatives you can live with, but let her pick. "Do you want apple slices or a banana?" or "Do you want to wear your pink shirt or your white shirt?"

I hope this helps! My daughter is now four and generally is a much more pleasant human being. I still do have to go back to these tips above and use these strategies with her, but not nearly as often as when she was two.

Good luck and God Bless!

A.

L.,

My daughter went through the same thing. It was very frusterating, the key was to remain consistant. We do the time out thing, sit in a corner criss cross apple sauce hands in your lap and she sits there until she's ready to get up and make good choices. We would tell her, you have two choices - you can not listen and go to time out or you can use your listening ears and we could (insert fun activity). Eventually she figured out she'd have a lot more fun if she used her listening ears then sitting in a corner. But the key was it is HER choice - that gives her a little bit of power to make her own decisions and guess what - every once in a while she choices time out (that hasn't happened in a while though). She eventually grew out of it. She's four now and all the work we put into her was worth the effort. Keep it up!

Hi L., I am a mother of 4 wonderful children and every one has had different challenges and you pretty much just have to use trial and error with each one, but when they are between 2 and 5 I found what works best is to find out what is most important to your child and remove that privilage when they break the rules or act out in public. My kids are 15, 13, 5 and 9 months. Every day is a challenge but the key seems to be consistency. If you threaten to take something away when they act out, you have to do it! Even if it means you end up suffering more than they do....good luck and I would be happy to help any way I can.....most of my advice comes through experience and every day is a new adventure when you have 4 children......wouldn't change it for the world. Good Luck!

All the discipline books would say that you take her home right then right there. But most of the time, that's exactly what they want. They're bored and would rather go home to their toys.

When my middle kid started this stuff at the age of 4/5 his counselor suggested a book called The Explosive Child by Ross Greene and it worked especially with the physical aggression. this is the stuff that the first poster explained It also worked with my youngest. However it's only a short term because it doesn't translate well to a classroom setting.

When #2 started Kindergarten his Principal would either keep him out of the classroom all day or send him home when he became disruptive. Just what he wanted, he wasn't expected to participate if he was alone and staring at a wall or grounded to his empty room. When I protested she gave me a book Step Training For Effective Parenting. The basic premise is on this website: http://www.lifematters.com/step.asp It helps once you get the really mean stuff under control.

You offer choices, "You have a choice sit quietly or no (whatever her favorite thing is to do, have or see)" Then you can go on to the techniques below and give her a choice between the good action or time out then you can start redirecting her with 2 good choices. Here when I see a tempertantrum coming I can say, "you have a choice, you can play on the computer or go watch a video"

Then his counselor put us in Parent Child Interaction Training because I was at my wits end and felt like our relationship had been destroyed. I really like it because it give them a chance to really be in control for just a little while everyday. It also feeds them good cues. I put it in my blog: http://debbysewninwesttulsa.blogspot.com/2007/06/parent-c... and then the time out technique:
http://debbysewninwesttulsa.blogspot.com/2007/06/pcit-par...

But there's a catch you can't do time out without doing special time steps most days of the week.

Hang in there.

Hi L. R

A suggestion that has worked for us. Visualize 3 baskets.

A basket = situations that either are life threatening or something that you stand firm on...you have to be willing to back up. We even went so far as making a game room and have pretty good luck in locking it. My husband and I sat down one evening and went completly through all the 'tricks' that he will try to pull. (He is 14 and thinks he is old enough to do or say anything.)

B basket = can go either way...it's not life threatening but you need to teach her a life lesson.

C basket = not worth the time invested, and does not contain anything that fits the A & B baskets, and not life threatening.

Your job is to get her eventually into to all A Baskets.

I suggest that you and your husband sit down and write out an agreement so when one of the situations arrive you can identify it as a A, B or C basket quickly and are willing to stand firm on your decision.

We found out that our son was acting out because we had not been consistant. By planning out ahead of time you will be able to stop the inappropriate behavior. We also found out that he was feeding off of our reactions and to what length we are willing to let things go. We teach our kids by example...think of yourself as a mirror.

Our son has learning disabilities and we have to adjust our baskets...but this works for all children. You just have to make up your mind, stand firm in your assesment of the situation, and be consistant.

If I didn't explain our methods (we learned it in a support group) please feel free to contact me.

Good luck,

W. Q

PS If she acts up in public you need to be able to walk away and leave your grocery store (as an example) and go home. She'll eventually learn that you are prepared to take charge in any situation...private or public. I've had to leave my cart in the middle of the grocery store and go straight home. Don't make a threat that you aren't willing follow through.

i didn't believe in spanking either and believe it or not when I started going to church we looked at the biblical way of disciplening. When the kids need a spanking(which is very very rarely) there is a right way to do it. If the time outs, taking things away etc doesn't work and they do something such as hitting that deserves a spanking we take them to a quiet private place and explain you are getting a spanking for"", they bend over my lap or the bed and they get 3 swats, after that they get a hug we tell them we love them, let them cry a little, and then explain agian why they recieved the spanking. They apologize for what they did and we're done. As for the talking back soap works great get a bar make her hold it in her mouth for 30 sec to a min. and then let her spit and rinse. 2 is not too late but nip it in the bud before it gets worse. It's the hardest thing you will have to do and it really does hurt me more than them but if you make sure you never do it while you are angry and you stay calm and controlled it's out of love. Oh and the bible says spare the rod spoil the child.
HTH's

It's a case of the Terrible Twos preparing for the Horrible Threes. I've gone through this twice and am working on the third currently.

Your daughter is testing limits and boundaries. She is acting out to see how you react. Some things you need to ignore (like screaming at the top of their lungs when they don't get their way), some things you need to pay close attention to. How you react in these situations is how she learns herself to act.

Teaching her that her actions are not appropriate is first and foremost. I find that temper tantrums are best worked out with my children on my lap in a big bear hug. They know that they are in trouble, but they are loved.

And one thing that I repeatedly think of is something that a foster mother told me years ago: The worse a child acts, the more love they need.

Instead of yelling, placing them in time outs, etc... when they are at their absolute worst (kicking, screaming, spitting, saying words I didn't realize they knew, etc.) I drop everything that I am doing, love and kiss on them, sit them in my lap, and tell them that I love them.

Once they calm down, we talk about how they acted and why their ACTIONS were bad. They are not bad children, they just sometimes make bad choices.

It may seem like this behavior lasts forever, but one day it will suddenly dawn on you that they are no longer acting that way. And other parents/grandparents will walk up to you in restaurants and stores and tell you that your children are very well behaved. It is a great day when that happens, and you realize that you really are doing something right!

There are a ton of books that offer all kinds of different dicipline strategies, and the main key to any of them is to remain consistent. I am not against spanking, but it doens't usually work with a child who is in the middle of a tantrum (it only makes things worse). I have an almost-two-year old girl, and at home, she throws her fits in her room. I let her come out after she calms down. (That is usually only about two minutes.) In public, distraction is great, if you can do it quickly enough. For instance, at a restaurant, I could put her straw in her mouth, and she will take a drink and forget to scream. But if that doesn't work, we would go outside to the car, and just sit there (I would not talk to her about it until she was totally calm -- sometimes I won't say anything at all, except that she needs to say sorry to me.) until she is quiet.

One more thing, that will take a little bit of time, is to catch her being good, and praise her for that, also. When you go out, and she is quiet for the first few minutes, tell her she is being so big, so good, whatever. But don't mention the behavior you are trying to avoid ("You are doing so great not making too much noise"), because that will only remind them of it.

M.

It's like my mother says,"That's a case of the tail wagging the dog." Right now...she's the tail wagging you around and for future healthy relationships - both yours and hers - you need to be the leader and model the behavior that tells her you are always in control and your word is the final word. You have to do it calmly and have your game plan ready for whatever situation she tries to put you in. If she has a favorite toy...your threat is to take that away, then do it if she doesn't change her behavior. She has to earn it back. I've seen parents (my next door neighbors) who didn't accomplish this in the early years to be awakened at 3 am by a highway patrolman that their 15 year old daughter had taken her mother's car without a driver's license (snuck out of the house) and flipped it in a curve. The patrolman said, "If this was my daughter, assuming you want to save your daughter from herself, I would go home and take everything away from her...including every stick of furniture in her bedroom until she earned each piece back one at a time." Well, they didn't do it and the middle of the night phone calls continued...the latest was their daughter had been raped. I tell you this to make a point. Children lack the good judgement we as parents have hopefully achieved. We show our children love by teaching them what's best for them, holding them accountable, and protecting them from themselves. It starts out simple and builds. Spanking...a controversial topic...can be a last resort done in complete calm, control. Sometimes all it takes is once and thereafter the threat of counting... Tell her she won't get to go with you to the grocery if she misbehaves; you'll get a sitter instead. I tell mine things like this because it's always much more fun to go with the family on outings than to stay home with a sitter. As our boys have gotten older we have (almost jokingly) threatened to get their most despised teacher to come babysit them. The thought of such evil torture turns them about face in a snap! You have to stay one step ahead. I have three boys and only one ever really tried to throw tantrums...we just ignored them. We would step over him in the floor as he flailed and continue with our work around the house completely ignoring him. The tantrums disappeared. I can honestly say that we have three well-haved boys...it just takes consistency, knowing who's in charge, and gaining their respect. Get yourself a game plan and stick to it. The next time you want to go out to dinner, get a sitter and explain to her that until she thinks she can use her manners and sit politely like a big girl...she will stay at home while you go out. It will only take once. You can do it! Remember to stop letting the tail wag the dog!