5 year old boy is very huffy!

[Hungrycaterpillarsmummy]

Just looking for tips and tricks to help my boy out. He gets very huffy over small things and I want to try and give him techniques to change his mindset or to snap him out of a huff.

So far tonight we had a huff because he knocked his tower over himself by accident. I said to build something else and he just grunts and then rubbed the blocks all over the carpet in defiance at them.
We gave him a big spoon rather than a small spoon as they were all in the dishwasher. Cue a huff. If his brother has a toy that he wants he throws a strop...arms wrapped around himself and proper "humph, fine that's it I'm not playing with you" and takes himself to a corner and turns away!

I know he's still young but he is more huffy than our 2.5 yr old!

Ignore.
Huffing, whining, sulking... = zero attention. Asking nicely for preferred spoon, or alternative... praise.

I think its a mixture of approaches. Broken lego, bit of empathy about it, do you want some help to rebuild? Too small spoon, acknowledge he prefers the bigger one but what a shame they need washing right now, you can use one next time. I'm not playing with you, oh what a shame, come back when you are ready. Perhaps you can share the toy in a while.
I find the language about having a huff a bit dismissive , he's just communicating. It doesn't mean you need to go over the top and make it feel like you agree the world has ended, but empathise , suggest a way to move on then brightly move on yourself .

DS1 can be like this and I find it really hard. Sometimes if we're both in the right mood I can turn it around by being slightly silly. Tonight he was indignant because he'd mildly hurt himself being careless on the sofa, and so I said I was going to turn his being careful dial up to 100, then he was furious because it was already at 100, so I said I'd turn it up to 200 and then we kept on going to bigger and bigger numbers.

But sometimes I'm so done with the attitude that I can't manage to be playful.

Doingmybest12 I did suggest I help him rebuild and also gave suggestions of a new thing we could have built together.
My DH did say the spoons were all in the dishes so that was the only one unfortunately.

He actually stomped all the way down the hall bringing his knees up almost to his head and stomping the floor with every step and then slammed the living room door.

Being silly does work sometimes but I didn't have it in me today.

What about the empathy bit?
There are lots of resources on line about emotions and helping children to cope with emotions, books, cards, toys.
Is it a problem for him at school or with friends.
It might just be one of those things he will grow out of.
I think it's about acknowledging then not feeding it for me and then offering a way back and moving on.

Ignore it - the more you give it attention, the more he'll do it.

I wouldn't accept a five year old slamming doors though.

My dc5 is the same. Except he's quite violent with it, at best he will air punch and kick and storm about, at worst he hits me. We try and calmly explain it's not acceptable or we've tried giving him a time out, we've tried time ins (worked v well with DC1 but not at all with dc2), ignoring. The best thing that works is to explain that the grunts and shouts are silly baby noises and we are quite happy to listen to his complaints but he needs to talk like a proper 5 year old big boy and communicate his concerns rather than punching the kitchen cupboards.

What was the consequence for slamming the door ? That's not acceptable it's spoilt brat behaviour.

Try reflecti g his emotion back to him, just so he feels heard.

How frustrating!
That didn't go as planned!
Oh no, do you feel unprepared?
Does this feel overwhelming?

Just enough so he feels heard. I think even as adults we need this, and we feel able to move out of our own boredom/frustration/disappointment as soon as it's HEARD

Stick the foam door protectors on - that way there isn't a risk of severing a younger sibling's finger or a cat's tail during the huff.

Reacting to it only escalates things.

I definitely do say things like "that's really frustrating" or "that's disappointing" etc but I could probably do more.

I actually don't think we did a consequence for slamming the door last night. We had just got dinner on the table and we left him to be alone in the living room whilst the rest of us ate in peace. But yes there should've been a consequence there.

I'm not of the school that there always has to be an extra consequence. I think him being told its not ok to slam the door with a disapproving voice is enough.

We tried the approach in the book about talking so little kids will listen.

"I can see you're feeling annoyed...and that must be really upsetting/tough...but the problem is...you can't throw my saucepan across the room and you've dented the floor and you can't hear me above your screaming anyway so wtf is the point of this technique"

Lol!

Well tonight he had a tantrum on way home from nursery and when we got home I talked to him calmly then just left him to play. After dh got home he was a different boy. He did a poo (he's a witholder so maybe that was why he was in an extra bad mood), he got himself into his jammies, he brushed his teeth and washed his face all of his own accord. Happily got into bed.

It's crazy how they can go from one extreme to the other