To think this is not normal behaviour for a 4 year old??

[Pinkoyster795]

I don't know if what he's doing is normal, or not, but I really REALLY find it hard to deal with almost 4 year old DS without losing my temper. I'm trying so bloody hard to avoid shouting at him, and it works mostly, but somedays (today), he's so trying it's unbelievable. I don't know whether I have a low patience threshold though (most fecking probably).

Examples of things he does:

1. Will want to change clothes several times a day. Then has hissy fit if I say no he can't. He will wear only clothes he's picked himself. Hissy fit if I pick his clothes.
2. Will only eat using certain cutlery-hissy fit if not available.
3. Will rearrange entire layout of room on daily basis (rug, all stuff he can move), hissy fit if I move it back (I only do this for logistic reasons-he puts rug in front of his door, and I can't shut his door unless I move the rug back to where it was)
4. Uses all my creams, lotions and potions. Hissy fit if I put them away.
5. Has to know what he's having for packed lunch at nursery that day from the morning. Hissy fit if it's not what he wants.
6. Receiving presents from friends and daily is an absolute minefield-he usually throws it on the floor after he's opened it and says its horrible.
7. His food can't touch-so if we're having shepherds pie or something I have to put the things separately on his plate. There is more but literally it's just too much to mention.

Reading back, I sound pathetic as he probably does stuff most 4 year olds do. But when I'm feuding with him back to back (from the clothes he wears in the morning, to his cutlery at breakfast, then his packed lunch etc etc), it becomes so tiring. I just want him FOR ONE DAY to listen to me. But he won't, unless I raise my voice (which I hate doing). Is what he's doing normal? How can I be a better parent without losing my temper?

He looks utterly miserable sometimes that it makes me so sad :( :(

My 3 yo DD is very, very similar. I know she is trying to control the things she can, but, my goodness it's exhausting. She also goes beserk if I leave the room; will always protest/wail/tantrum if dh tries to do anything for her - help her get dressed, cut up her food, put her to bed - she'll scream and wail "Daddy is not my friend". It's exhausting for me and soul destroying for dh. And Heaven forbid dh or I try to do DS's reading practice with him, or help him with his homework, she's right in there. It's driving us nuts.

I think this is normal boundary-testing behaviour for preschoolers. It's slightly better than DS's poo Witholding at the same age.

Also, not sure if this is useful or not, but I found it on pinterest a while ago and thought it was good and I was thinking of introducing some of these myself as my 2.5yo practically takes herself to the naughty step these days and I'm sick of shouting:

www.imom.com/21-creative-consequences/

Let him have a hissy fit. Don't blame you for shouting, I'd loose my rag too. I have a child that feels the need to control. Shouting makes him worse, so often it's best to give choices but choices that are controlled by you. you can wear this or this, you choose type thing. My sons 5 now and still tries to hissy fit but we tend to knock it down before it starts. It was hard work, I never had to be so hard on my older two and youngest seems to be an easy ride too.
Like I said, let the hissy fit play out. It could last a loooong time too so be prepared. And for what it's worth, no, that's not normal day for a 4 year old, but it doesn't mean your child's not normal, it just means you have to work hard. With 4 kids, three good, one not, I now know, some kids just are harder work.

DD just turned 4 is rather like this. Needs things just so. We're in the system for ASD assessment. My eldest (of 3 DC) is Autistic so I had early suspicions.

DD does what I call tantrum pluses. On the weekend we had a memorable one (might have been two weeks ago now) we asked her to excuse herself before she left the table rather than just wondering off. She screamed for 2.5 hrs solid. Mostly squirming on the floor, at one point whacking her head into the wall, until i intervened and held her thrashing limbs for a fair while. She has a couple of similar outbursts a week. Lots of very frustrated ones but a few lose the plot ones.

Generally she's an angel at nursery, she's very endearing (actually incredibly manipulative) and they do as she tells them. She has lost the plot once and in the end they had to leave her to cry it out as she wouldn't be touched. Poor nursery assistant was in tears herself. She'd not seen a child like it before. Refusing all forms of comfort.

I just received the mumsnet 'now your child is 4' development email. It talks about how the tantrums have probably reduced now as your child feels more self conscious. My DD's are up 50 fold on when she was 2.

Because I have an Autistic child and assessment took time, my thoughts are if you feel in your bones this is significantly beyond what your child's peer group are like then see your GP, get a referral to speech and language who should be able to do a social communication assessment and advise whether they see any issues.

The behaviours that you described are what parents of children with ASD (most likely) have to deal with. So we know our strategies. It doesn't mean your DS has ASD. Sorry if you thought that.

Thanks loopylala for the link. It's actually pretty much stop on.

My just 4 yo doesn't do any of these but I know a few family children who do. Some children just like lots of control I think - it is exhausting to look after them.

I let DS1 pack his lunch bag - I ask if he want a tuna or hummus sandwiches, and then he picks a piece of fruit, a yogurt and a sweetie to go in. He loves it. I let him pick what to wear every day too but school is approaching so ill need to start talking about uniforms!

*spot on!

I think 1 2 3 Magic would be a better book in this situation than How to talk...

Have a low threshold for whining and complaining e.g. "Is that whining? That's a 1" to nip behaviour in the bud before it escalates to tantrums.

simile, I'm grateful for all the great advice. There are a lot of experienced parents out there, and if they say it seems like asd, then I will follow it through. He definitely doesn't fit any of the signs though, but I guess the signs can be so varied that it would be difficult to say.

I think he sounds totally normal for his age actually! I would let him have as much control in his little life as is practicable. Just because it doesn't make sense to you doesn't invalidate his preferences, he is grappling to control some areas of his life. Decide on a couple of rules that are non negotiable (from that list, personally my only ones would be, cream is for mummy and is kept hidden somewhere, and presents are either appreciated or go to a home that deserves them...and even that one I would give him a day to make a decision and not whip them straight away as sometimes presents can be overwhelming to little ones). A couple of hard as stone rules are more effective than loads of petty ones. If his tiny preferences get annoying, just think how little time it really takes to fulfil them versus how long the meltdown takes. It's a phase, it will pass. Love from another mummy with a toddler tyrant.

That sounds difficult, OP

I can really recommend a book I heard about on MN 'when kids push your buttons' - it's really helping me stay calm when DS has one of his challenging moments. It has made me realise he's not doing it to get at me, which has made me less likely to lose my rag, which in turn has enabled me to diffuse situations which are normally hissy fit fodder.

I honestly don't know whether YABU or not, because my household is full of "reasonable adjustments" for a child who has autism.

1. clothes changing:

The child with ASD went through that precise stage. Is now (some years later) able to articulate the discomfort of certain fabrics, of labels in clothes etc. That child chooses what to wear. If a particular combination of clothes is desired every single day, then I make sure we have multiple copies of each thing (the child wore one, extremely distinctive, combination for six months last year. I kept a few others things around to allow for choice, and now we've moved on to a different preference).

The neurotypical child could not care less what they wear.

2. cutlery

The child with ASD is still in that phase. We have enough copies of the preferred kind of cutlery (stainless steel, never silver plate; fork tines must not be too sharp; spoon must not have got worn through and rough edged).

NT child could not care less.

3. Room rearrangements

Yes, we went through this phase. It was often to do with getting edges lined up in parallel - child can now talk about how painful it is to their brain when things are not at neat angles.

NT child could not care less.

4. Uses all my creams, lotions and potions.

I don't have any creams, lotions and potions ;) I'd have small tester pots for your child's very own, and lock your ones away

5. food control

Child with ASD has a pretty varied diet now, but it wasn't varied at 4. Strong tastes, contrasting textures, non-beige colours were extremely stressful to them in food. I fed the child what they preferred to eat, and gradually introduced other food items one by one, with no expectation that they would be eaten (just touching them was an excellent first step).

NT child is slightly less restricted in their food choices than ASD child was at a similar age, but, frankly, having gone through strong food preferences once, I just don't sweat it, and treat them the same way as child with ASD. The diet will become more flexible when they get older

6. Receiving presents

OK, this is not in my experience. Both my children are uniformly appreciative when they receive gifts (it helps that a lot of the child with ASD's language acquisition comes from DVDs, where the characters always have perfect manners natch - so the response is always pre-scripted and goes "oh, thank you, it's what I [i] always [/i] wanted; and the NT child just copies that way of responding).

I know this sort of graceless social behaviour from other children with ASD, though - it really helps when their disability is out in the open, so people can give a present to be opened quietly later, or ask explicitly what the child would like, or not take it personally when the child expresses discontent that the gift is not what they actually wanted (like, a real laser gun or something).

7. His food can't touch

I know a lot of families where the child has ASD who use those sectioned plates. Or who make sure that the different foods are well spread out on a big plate. We tend to use a series of small plates, and present protein, then veg, then carbs.

Yeah. I'd be looking into diagnosis. I want to say though: I am so grateful to fate/God/the universe/whoever for having sent a child with ASD into my family. We have so much to learn from these glorious humans about what is really important in life, and about how to accept, with love, the quirks of the humans around us.

www.amazon.co.uk/1-2-3-Magic-Effective-Discipline-Children-ebook/dp/B004GB1G2U/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1421784313&sr=1-1&keywords=123+magic

Glad you found it useful. One other thing, I spoke to nursery the other day to ask how DD behaved, explained behaviour at home wasn't exactly going well.

They said 85% of the time DD was absolutely fine, sometimes dug her heels in. Then went on to say, they save it up for the parents, time old story for them, but, and this made me feel a lot better, wasn't it better that way? I was like, what do you mean? well that they behave for other people, it would be worse if they were rude to other people. I guess they are right. Spoke to my teacher mate (primary), and she agreed that on parents evening, half the parents are shocked to hear that their DC are well behaved for her.

Op I always remember ds absolutely fantastic P1 teacher telling me how her room was set up for children for ASD because it made teaching the rest of them so much easier!

There could potentially be some sensory processing issues there. Or even PDA. But if your instincts are saying not ASD then that's fine - I think you will get results if you follow ASD techniques though.

DS does this and did at 4. He has just been diagnosed with ASD, age 6.

Just wanted to post to say thank god I'm not alone.
Thanks to everyone who posted links for the op- I'm hoping they'll help me too!

Lonny, I don't know what my instincts are saying tbh. I'm lost. On the one hand, I think he's perfectly NT, just a bit more 'trying' than other children. On the other, if what I have described resonates with parents of children on asd, I will follow it up. It might help me deal better with him if I know he has it.

my 4yo still has screaming fits when frustrated. only at home though - she holds it together really well at preschool.

Otherwise she absolutely does not fit in with any ASD criteria. She just hasn't matured out of tantrums yet, especially when tired. I try to cut her some slack at the end of the day, but otherwise we motor on through, tantrums or no tantrums. I would say that while still having tantrums at 4 is unsual, it would not per se be indicative of anything other than a strong, immature for age personality and a need for firm, loving boundaries.

my elder child never had a single tantrum so dd2 has come as rather a shock to us all. Definitely agree with the advice to pick your battles as well. I think 4yos have so little control over so many aspects of their lives that the minutiae that they can control becomes really important to them.

What does he like to wear for nursery? Would a 'uniform' of the same clothes help? That way he'd know what he was going to wear and it'd take the pressure off.

I don't see the problem with the cutlery - just use the ones he likes.

The room moving would be non-negotiable for me.

Your lotions need to be put away up high or locked away.

My ds (very severe asd) had the same packed lunch every day until he was 14. If he wants the same thing, let him have it so long as it isn't terribly unhealthy.

Could presents be accepted and thanked for but opened at home? Save you the embarrassment.

And I'd say get him a nice big dinner plate to help keep food from touching.

With any child, you need to pick your battles.

And if he does turn out to be on the spectrum, I know some fantastic, articulate and clever people with autism.

Both of my children are on the spectrum, just at opposite ends of it.

Dd1 is like this and 4 next month. In our case it is definitely about control and a little bit attention - if things have been happening with dd2 like she is ill or jist wanting cuddles lots dd1 is more assertive in her behaviour.
We let her choose her clothes, with a little guidance sometimes parparticularly this week with it being cold. For about a month she always has the 'bubbly cutlery' as that's what she's asled for though she has started offering it to me and dp on occasions now that we don't forget and bring the wrong ones.

We had a huge meltdown this afternoon as she wanted to hold dd2's reigns - that was a no as we were going by roads. We try to go with the flow as much as possible but it's hard sometimes I say no too quickly - she screams and I have to continue as I don't want to give in to the screaming (another thread alaltogether) but afterwards I think to myself why did I say no to that - It's a non-issie really.

Not much advice there but from my view it is 'normal' for a four year old.

My DS (the one who was so challenging at 4) is definitely NT. However he is very argumentative and likes to control situations. It can be soooo tiring.

The fact that it is only for you means that it is most likely boundary testing. It sounds like an slightly extreme version of my 4 year old daughter - in fact you only lost me at point 6 and 7. Lead lined cloud speaks quite a lot of sense. We allow Dd to pick her clothes most days and only step in for special occasions. If she acts out it is off to the naughty step or her room. Yet still she continues to try her luck! When all else fails I find the best course of action is to get out the house and go to the park or soft play. The winter is always the toughest time roll on spring.

Oops, sent too soon.

DS needs to have time to process and get back into routine. For instance, when it was colder we (he and my mindees) would have snack as soon as he got home from school. Now that it's warmer, I've been giving the mindees their snack earlier and taking everyone outside as soon as DS gets home so that we can have more time in the fresh air, and then he has snack as soon as we go inside.

Last week before he went to school I casually mentioned that this would be the case and he was fine. But if I'd forgotten to tell him and just said "we're having snack later" when he got home, he'd have argued and been pouty for awhile.

Also he was at my parents all weekend and was an absolute nightmare this morning. He always is after a huge break to his routine.