toddler tantrums / preventing and how to deal with them
Many as you know Capri has just turned two and if you know what that means...she has entered the "terrible twos" I started to notice her personality change early May with getting frustrated at times, and lash out very easily. We thought it was to do with William entering her world, which can be part of the reason, but it's also much more. Connor and I have been home since the pandemic (me on matt leave and Connor just working from home) Capri has been so use to having all the attention on her.
One of my favourite books that I recently got is called " Gentle Discipline" which I will link below. When you have kids you really don't think of what "discipline" you'll practice with your child. What will you do when your child lashes out? screams at you? has a tantrum in public? will you do timeouts? These are all questions we don't think of. One thing this book as taught me is that when your child Is born you are teaching them discipline from that very moment. One thing to remember is that YOU are your child's greatest teacher and your children learn from you all day long. You just being you and doing life is teaching them. Your child will model what you do.
Being patient is really challenging for us as adults, but we have to try our best as we are their models. Temper tantrums are VERY normal and it's nothing to think that they are being "bad" us as adults also have tantrums so why should we shame our children? We can't expect our children to not have tantrums, when us as adults get frustrated and feel the need to sometimes lash out in our own way. The book Gentle Discipline also talks about self regulation and how the children's brain develops.
Prevention : How can we prevent a tantrum from delaying it
Basic Needs - how is your child feeling? Are they tired? Did they nap? Sleep is so important for your little one as thats their time to have downtime from all the playing they did in the morning, catching up on sleep they may have lost the night before. If your child naps at 12:30 every day and they miss it, they will get cranky. I have seen it with Capri, and thats why I stick to our schedule as much as I can. If its nap time its nap time. Lets face it, even when we are tired as adults we get angry. Little basic needs helps your child in a better mood.
Communicate with your child - Your child understands what your saying when you have conversations with them. Communicate what your doing, what you'll do that day, what day it is, if its raining communicate that. If it's cold outside and your child wants to go outside communicate WHY you can't go outside. Simple conversations can help A LOT. Keep your children in the loop of what your doing. Keep your schedule with your children.
Control - Letting your child take the lead and control. Think about it we control all our kids aspects of their life. When its time to eat, play, what to play with. Having your child also take the lead in this can help with your child feeling that they are also in control in the choices they make, and being apart of decisions. This gives your children self confidence as it makes them feel good about themselves and choices they can make. I have a shelf of toys with Capri's toys and she is able to pick and choose which toys she wants to play with. Snacks where Capri can reach if she is hungry is accessible for her. Giving Capri choices and sense of independence is very important.
Timing - Giving your child a "timer" very very important. Putting a timer for your child sets up a warning for when the activity is about to finish or if we have to go have dinner, have a bath etc. Putting a visual timer or a timer with fun noise is good. Getting your child involved with starting the timer, is also fun for them. Timing things for toddlers is very important because they don't have a sense of "time" If we are in the middle of doing something for ourselves and someone just cuts us off, you yourself would get frustrated so imagine a toddler? Who's having fun in the middle of building something in their play room. It's not fair for them to stop what they are doing. Being respectful and giving them a warning is very important.
Things to remember that isn't very effective on your child is when your about to leave somewhere and your child isn't listening, doesn't want to leave and then we tend to use the phrase. " Okay well mommy is leaving without you see you" It's so easy to use that phrase and believe me I've used it a million times but after doing lots of reading on tantrums I myself noticed it wasn't really working and it just lead to the tantrum getting worse and worse. So now instead of that I tend to say " mommy and William or mommy and daddy are going to go do something else would you like to come?"" This now gives your toddler the choice,, feeling included in the decision and of course Capri always wants to be doing what her brother is doing or with Connor or myself so it does work. When we say "we are leaving you here" would make the child feel that they are not wanted and of course make them feel sad.
Tantrums
EYE contact being at your child's eye level is VERY important so your child doesn't feel that you are overstepping them and feeling so superior over them. I am a big fan of biglittlefeelings on instagram I will link their Instagram handle below and they have amazing tantrum talk and share lots of information. What they've taught me is - Let your child know that you know what they are doing If they are throwing themselves on the floor or throwing their toys acknowledge it. Let your child know " I see your upset, I hear that your upset," Let them know you see and hear them. Saying "its okay to be upset and feel this way" and then adding "its okay to feel upset, but it's not okay to hit or throw" Then switch it to giving them two options "do you want to have this now or do you want that" giving them an option to say YES and of course then its important to REPEAT it all over again... because reputation is KEY. Also redirecting is also very important, which is what your doing when your giving your child two different options that they can walk away from. For example Capri wanted to have a snack before dinner, but of course that would spoil her dinner so luckily it was raining and we told Capri " we see you are upset by dumping out all your toys but we can't have a snack right now because dinner is almost ready. Do you want to go walk to the front door or back door to watch the rain fall down" instantly Capri forgot what she was doing and why she was upset and giving her the two options and the option to saying "yes" worked! Capri came back from watching the rain singing "rain rain go away" it was a perfect redirection!
Another great thing we have done which I have posted in my instagram is having books accessible for Capri to understand her feelings, books for "downtime" accessible is very important because just like us adults we want something to "cool" down from.
Keeping it "cool" in front of your child is very important because at the end of the day it's important for your child to see your not phased by their actions, your clam about it because the moment you get frustrated, screaming they will sense that and their tantrum tends to get worse. Using a calm voice is very important. Also, your toddler LOVES to use their "fake" whining and crying to get more of a reaction from you. I know its hard and frustrating but one thing we need to do is start off by approaching your child in a calm manner, listen to what your toddler is trying to say. When you are calm and approaching your toddler when they are worked up it actually reflects a "mirroring" which your child will start to calm down and mirror your calm behaviour. Then you talk to your child and tell them that you hear them and you know what they want to do or what they need but they have to "wait" to get what they want or do what they want to do. Then setting boundaries is very important because it sets your child up to learn they cannot walk all over you!
One thing to remember negative attention is still giving your child attention.
I really hope you take something from this and that what worked for me works for you!
I promise the tantrums get better and us mamas and dads are in this together!
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