3 year old breaking down because he doesn’t want to go to nursery

I would say don’t pick him up early because you can’t sustain it and he’ll expect it going forward. My daughter struggled at this age but we pushed through it with lots of reassurance and cuddles from staff and she is well adjusted now as an older child.

Small children can't always interpret or explain their own emotions. My friend's 5yo had a lengthy crying fit over the weekend because his brother was going to the park, and he both wanted to go with him but also wanted to stay home. He also later cried because he wanted to go on a bit of playground equipment but was scared about it. When asked about things he says "it's too hard to choose" - he gets tired and upset and both wants to do things but is scared or worried about them, or doesn't know how to prioritise. Sometimes adults have to step in and explain that XYZ needs to happen, it's okay to have mixed feelings about things, but if it's not possible to stay home then that's that.

I'd let the staff at the new one know what helped at his last one. It might be that he is understimulated, for whatever reason that is. He does sound quite similar to both my DS1 and DS2. DS1 is at secondary now and is very bright. DS2 has been IQ tested (because it's a thing they do where we live, not because we opted for it specifically!) and is apparently average but is quite hyperactive which is probably stemming from the same understimulation. Both of them needed to be kept busy.

Since you know what helped before, you probably don't need any mass investigation to work out what's going on here, it will likely be a similar pattern. But since he does seem to need more occupation than other children it is worth letting the staff know so that he can build up a positive experience here before he moves up to school, rather than having the same thing happen again where he becomes disruptive first and then they have to solve it.

And how did you put food on the table, oh saintly mother?

There's really no need to be so smarmy. For starters, it's never a good look and secondly, boasting that you can afford to be a SAHM often comes back to bite you on the arse.

It’s hard to tell with childen - if it carries on I would be more concerned but also have a word with the staff

There may not be any real underlying reason. He has been moved to a new setting, with new teachers, new children and new routines. The summer term is also the busiest in school nurseries as this is the last intake of the school year and the nursery will be at capacity. You need to give him time to adapt. I also found that the school nursery was more focused on being school ready than the private nursery my children had previously gone to, which was more homely.

Was there any reason for moving him seeing as he was settled at his old setting?

He’s 3, he’s trying to tell you that he doesn’t feel safe at nursery but is too young to explain exactly why. He’s doing his best to beg you not to take him. It’s up to you whether you ignore him or not. I ignored my daughter when she refused to go to primary school and she wound up with a whole bunch of trauma and stress related illnesses.

Check out Erica Komisar.

’lifestyle’? Yeah, very selfishly my chosen lifestyle was having a roof over our heads and food.

My DD went to nursery full time because I had to work. She didn’t always want to, but I’m willing to bet she’d have wanted to be homeless less. She’s also secure and independent and flown the nest. Bigger and better things is an odd tag in this context. What do you mean?

Role play? See if you can help him express any of it during playing pretend.

Mine did this. It didn't get better. 6 months later and he doesn't go anymore - he did stop crying and getting upset but he never loved it and he'd come home a ball of rage, which he was never like when he was with us.

It's a juggle now, but it's better for all of us. I couldn't make myself feel okay with "losing" this year to him feeling so sad and angry, when he didn't absolutely have to.

A lot of them do that coming into school! When I have a primary one class I always take photos and upload them on the parent communication app very early in the morning so they can see that the little one who was prised off them screaming is now having a fab day while they are no doubt at work worrying! I’ve phoned parents to check in at break time too if a child has had a particularly bad morning - 9/10 times they settle and the poor Mum/Dad is in a worse state than them! Obviously on the rare occasions where kids aren’t settling at all we’d work with the family to try to investigate why.

Lol my eldest ( who had been at nursery from 3.5 months old) went through a crying and not wanting to go stage at about 3. Nursery workers peeled her off me and took her in. 2 mins later I could see through the little window to the room that she was playing quite happily. Was all done for my benefit

Come off it @ssd you’ve been here long enough to know that what you are saying is highly incendiary. And your faux “don’t make this into a SAHP v WOHP debate” naïveté doesn’t wash either - that’s what you started as well you know.

Plus, “get a high earning husband and put your career on hold” isn’t exactly a solution that OP can put into place tomorrow is it? 🙄

@doesntwanttogoto that sounds really distressing. Can you chat do his key worker if you can pick him up earlier today??

So how did you manage to work?

From this post I take it you work from home and he knows that. Also if it is a school setting the after school club will probably have far older children than he has previously encountered. A relative of mine had to acknowledge the change from a 'winding down gently' end to the day at nursery to a wide age range after school club was simply too much for a three year old. I suspect that if you manage to cut back to just school hours for a bit that will help.

I used to have to take one of my charges (was a nanny/housekeeper before going back to university to do a postgrad) to his pre-prep. Some days he was fine, other days he wanted to stay with me.
Luckily his teachers were brilliant. I took him right into school, hung up his coat etc. and took him to his classroom, all the while discussing what to have for supper and what he was going to do that day.
Then I would ask him to go to the window to wave goodbye (sometimes he knew I had to leave swiftly, as I may just have parked on a double yellow line).
To honest I felt dreadful, as I would rather have had him at home and he wasn't even mine!
If you are going to the office, perhaps you could sell pre-school as his "office" and let him help you get ready for your office?
Fingers crossed it is just a brief hiccup and all will be well again soon.

We had a little wobble last week with ours going back after the Easter break. She cried, didn't want to go, said she didn't like learning, wanted to stay home. It's heartbreaking to hear. When she comes out of nursery she's happy and chatty about all the things they have been up to though, so I don't worry really. Does he talk positively about his day when it's not the imminent pressure to leave the house?

One of my DC used to scream if we so much passed the end of the road to nursery on a weekend and he’d absolutely melt down on nursery days. He was 3, it was a small quiet nursery, absolutely lovely staff who I completely trusted and a selection of toys he really liked, but he was massively anxious about separating from me. I insisted he went regardless - nothing bad was happening to him there and he was fine after he’d calmed down, he was just anxious and I don’t believe in letting children avoid hard things just because they’re hard. I’m glad I persevered, though it took a full term before he settled - no way a school reception class teacher would have been able to support him in the transition the way nursery staff could. I’m a SAHM so I didn’t need the childcare, but I did need him to be ready for school.

If you’re confident it’s a good setting and he’s being treated kindly then I’d absolutely keep going. Speak to nursery about how they can support him - we found it helpful to always hand him off to the same member of staff, who immediately went to the quiet sofa, sat him on her lap and when he was calm she read him his favourite story. He took a transition object each day. He had a visual timetable so he understood what was going on. They did some small group work with a couple of other boys to help him begin to make social connections in the class and feel part of things. We talked a lot at home about what he did and didn’t like about nursery, we reenacted nursery with his toys, we watched tv programmes where his favourite characters went to nursery and we read books about nursery. It all helped. He had settled by Christmas of his first year and although he had a small wobble at the start of reception he was generally pretty confident. Your DS will get there.

My son was like this, he would be naughty from getting up, battling to get him ready, then the meltdown would start. It was horrid.
I stood firm and persevered, he settled eventually after several months of it. He ended up going to a different primary school a year later, and it almost started again. I reminded him of nursery, and how it all ended up fine, he'd made great friends and had fun. Something had stuck as other than being a bit clingy to begin with he settled in much quicker - he had learned that he could cope ok and just needed encouragement and reassurance.

I know some have indicated that sometimes you have to put your kids first. This was me putting him first - prolonging it would not have helped him at all in developing his resilience, and it would have prolonged the battle for me too!