To punish my sons attention seeking SCREAMING?

[WhiteTrash]

ArraaahhhARGH!! I feel like screaming!

My 5 year old is a lovely child. BUT hes being a little bugger just recently. His baby brother is 8 months old, the adore one another. DS1 is absolutely lovely to his brother.

The last 3-4 weeks (since he broke up from school hes been back 1.5 weeks) hes started attention seeking fake crying. Its loud, its dry eyed, its often monotone, it can continue for 2 hours and can and cannot continue into a full blown tantrum.

It frightens the baby, I HAVE to tend to him when it happens as hes scared. DC1 will refuse to coverse during these times so I simply say "Youre frightening DC2, so I'll have to comfort him now. I'll talk to you when you stop crying."
Trying to talk to him about equals him 'crying' harder. These episodes occur over the smallest things, sometimes over nothing.

He gets a LOT of one on one attention. More so with his Dad (we've noticed the more alone time he has with his Dad the worse his behaviour is. We have no idea why but we plod along regardless.) I often ask him to do stuff with me, just us but nearly always says no he'd rather do it with his Dad. But he does spend time with me too.

DC2 is in my bed Dp on the sofa. Once a week or so DC1 will wake, plod down stairs and join his dad. His dad will try and persuade him to go back to bed, he refuses, DP relents. They sleep.

Only last night he started screaming. It was 1am. It lasted an hour, it woke the baby who was scared out his witts despite being upstaira behind a closed door with me. I was LIVID. Literally never been so cross. He KNOWS it effects his brother thus me which is why he did it.

Id NEVER dare do something like that as a child.
He lost all his lego for a week but doesnt seem to give a crap.

AIBU to be considering further punishment?! I know its a no-no to punish twice but this had got to stop! Reward charts have never worked with him. Although we have a marble jar for good behaviour. It does not work.

Yes last year we tried drawing things that made him happy and things that made him unhappy. There were no revelations. I did figure out that he gets stressed with upcoming events though.

We've been through this as well. Ignoring works sometimes, playing/playfighting other times. There was one horrendous night with screaming similar to what you describe - ignored that one and thankfully although he continued for a while he never did it again - but strangely the most difficult thing was all the times we tried to avoid him getting upset, pandering to him to avoid shouting at night, was almost worst than just ignoring the screaming and accepting the fallout.

DS2 is a similiar age to yours - he'll be 5 in May and has the same issue with build up to big events. IME punishment doesn't work, but firm/kind boundaries does...eventually!

my ds2 is a screamer at the moment.

I put him outside the door when he is screaming his head off for no reason. I find speration from family is the best form of punishment, non violent but effective. So he gets about five chances of me counting to 5 and telling him if he keeps screaming I will put him outside the door, then I do it.

I've only had to do it maybe 5 times. He knows I will follow through and he does respond to that threat most of the time.

Don't know if that's any help for the middle of the night shenanigans, obviously I'm not advising it for any time after bedtime. But if you followed through during the day you might be able to threaten the outside the door punishment late at night.

I think it's just jealousy. He has probably overheard you talking about the baby waking you (and now he wants that attention - wake you ; even if it is negative attention).

Imissbluesky, Im glad im not the only one who has a child who stresses at upcoming events.

Molly - outside the door as in room? Or outside the house? Two people have suggested the latter I could never do that he'd get scared.

Hes home from school now we had a long calm chat in which he listened. It felt as though he listened. One can only hope.

I wonder why he stresses at upcoming events. Perhaps you could talk him through exactly what will happen at event, who does what, when this happens, when that so it is less of an issue.

I put him outside the house, gate closed (he can't open it) and I stay at the other side of the door. Usually he is there for approx a minute, then I open the door and ask him is he going to stop screaming, if so he can come back into the house. We live in a suburb, once gate is closed he can't run onto the street, I could see if anyone aproached.

One time it was dark so I stood outside the door with him until he calmed down and could go back into the house to his dad, brother, the tv.

WhiteTrash - I love you for the comment; ">tries to hide protruding rod with a muslin

Try to see it from his side. Until very recently he got all the attention - now someone else is snuggled up with you in bed every night while he has to be on his own. Imagine if your partner left you for someone else - this is how he feels right now.

He needs attention. He is getting it in the only way he knows how, and I honestly think that punishing him by shutting him away in his room will make him worse.

Children don't have the emotional intelligence to tell you what's wrong. As far as he's concerned, you're punishing him for not being happy, which isn't very fair.

I can understand how frustrated you must be though and don't blame you for losing it.

These are just my random thoughts, I don't mean to preach, and I really feel for you.

Maybe hes a bit lost/lonely and doesn't know how to identify the feeling or talk to you about it.

I know I often expect my eldest to behave better than he wants to because he seems so grown up in comparision to the little one. Then he behaves worse than ever! Not saying this is what you are doing but maybe something to think about.

Could your husband sleep on an airbed in the same room as DS1? If DS2 gets to sleep with a parent I can understand DS1 feeling its unfair. But then try and have less DS1 & DH one to one time when they're awake, so DS1 sees DH looking after the baby and you available for playing etc with him.

Finally I'd do a sticker chart for something DS1 would really like, once he has got ten stickers for 'having a calm night all night long'. ie its ok for him to talk to you/DH if he wakes up with a problem but not to scream. But thats prob just because sticker charts for specific problems are what work for my children when all else seems to fail. I think they like the structure of it.

Good luck and make sure you look after yourself too!

Marking spot as ds2 is 4 and finding having new baby tricky.

Basically, he knows that he can get/do whatever he wants by having a (surprisingly controlled) tantrum. You absolutely need to get a grip of this before it gets any more ingrained. Maybe flick cold water in his face if he makes a noise or gets out of control. The shock will stop him.

Flick cold water into his face?! WTF? How would you feel if someone did that to you?!

Grateful, if it helped me grow up into a happier person! There's a post somewhere on a thread on here where a teacher had to do it to calm a child.

What is he, a cat?

I think you have to look at the root cause of this and surely it is jealousy and insecurity. I agree that it is not good to reward his bad behaviour, but at the same time pushing him away (in his eyes) by putting him in another room etc is probably counter productive. I have known several children for whom time out = pushed out, and they need a different approach. I don't know what it is but bear hugs and upping the 1-1 time is probably a good start.

Yeah, grateful or maybe just like an animal? Children who are treated with respect will grow up to be happy. I wouldn't say spraying someone with water is respectful. However you would feel about this as an adult is exactly how a child feels. I really don't think you'd be happy about it.

Oh grow up! Who mentioned spraying? Flicking a few drops of water won't traumatise him! It should work enough to give him a seconds thought. Letting a child grow up to think he can scream to get his own way is worse treatment than you would give an animal, he will end up being a very angry unhappy adult.

Lisaro - I don't think that anyone is suggesting that this boy should grow up thinking he can scream to get his way - people have been supportive to the OP, and have offered suggestions of things that might help, and things that might be causing this behaviour.

And when yellowraincoat objects to one method, that you happened to suggest, she is not saying 'do nothing, let this child carry on behaving like this forever' - and it is ridiculous to suggest she is, imo.

Lisaro, you are brave. Hat's off to you. Anyone would think you were advocating H2SO4 not H2O from the reaction you have got!!

When I was 5 you would have been placed over the knee and spanked 'to give you something to cry about' if you did this sort of thing! We didn't indulge in this behaviour as a result.

Hasten to say I never did this to my kids, but I sometimes think we err on the self sacrifice side too much regarding parenting these days. I mean hours of screaming at 1am, FFS that is parent abuse!

I dont think YABU.
I think I would try a carrot and stick approach though.
Reward all good behaviour, however small, with praise, and ignore as far as you can the bad, but at some point you have to have punishments.

What I always do wrong is say too much when I get riled, rather than meting out the punishment quietly.
I get into arguments with ds with obviously is pointless and fuels the fire.
But I feel for you OP because I am struggling with a very tanrummy 5 year old too.

I'm asking you how you'd feel if you had water sprayed/flicked/whatever in your face. You know, because it would calm you down.

I didn't say anything about it traumatising him, did I? Those are your words.

I think he would feel degraded and disrespected, especially if it was done on a regular basis. And I really doubt it would stop his screaming.

She didn't object to a method I suggested, and she's still probably deliberately misquoting. 3 or 4 drops of water will slightly shock him into stopping screaming. Then it's time to address things. Yellow, do stop dramatising to make a point.

I agree.
Anger met with more anger, or agression is not helpful, and doesnt work.
It is the hardest thing in the world to not get angry when you are pushed to the limit (and tbh my limit at 1 am for screaming would be about 3 minutes not 45!) but you have to keep saying in your head "I am the grown up".
Or at least I do!
He porb is feeling pushed out, so you need to address that, but at the same time, no matter how he is feeling he can't be allowed to continue to disrupt the whole house whenever he feels like it.
Maybe when he screams tell him if he doesn't stop you will remove favorite toy, and then walk away. And follow thru if the screaming doesn't stop.
Then when he is being nice, tell him what a good boy he is/how helpful.
And tell him he is still your baby too!

I need to press that I havent shut him in his room at all. I tried last year, I was heavily pregnant at the end of my tether. It did not work.

Since his brother's been born Id never, ever do anything to physically shut him out (I nearly said shit him out then, gawd one glass of wine!) in anyway. Not into his room, definitely not outside. Im not up for the 'flicking water' idea either.

And I agree, he IS jealous. This was very apparent this evening. I asked him to help me in the kitchen 'just us' he jumped at the idea and his behaviour immediately improved. I feel a bit of a wanker for not seeing the wooda for the trees. Hes just SO lovely to his brother, good at sharing.

When I was a child we'd get The Belt. My DP is in his mid 40's and his punishments were harsh too.

I absolutely do not to want to rule by fear though.

As hard as it is I think you need to be more consistent and understanding.

With regards to the sleeping on the sofa- if your h relents then he will always try his luck as in his 5 year old brain, this time is no different to last so it's confusing to him why he can sleep on the sofa some nights but not on others.

I think that many children love their siblings but are also jealous of them at the same time. Your ds1 sees hisyounger brother getting your attention when he cries and he's doing the same as in his mind negative attention is still attention so why not do it?
Does he know that he'll get your attention if he just simply asks and that the screaming will not work?

Gaining a sibling is apparently as big a deal as your oh bringing home a second wife/husband and the older ones need reassuring that things have changed but they are as important as ever.

As hard as it is, I hope that this phase ends soon.