did toddlers have tantrums 50 years ago?

[ClaraBowWasSoLovely]

Apologies - I bunged this in 'somewhere' yesterday due to computer illiteracy.
My children are in their forties and I don't remember any tantrums, no screaming, flailing, writhing on the floor (my marbles are intact).
I was 18 with my first, so was making it up as I went along.
Perhaps the world was quieter, calmer. We left our children outside shops!
No long distance travel.
Apparently (thanks, Google) other cultures don't experience toddler meltdowns. A writer asserted that the 'terrible twos' doesn't exist.
I'm ancient now, so no little ones of my own.
What do you older parents/grandparents think?

I'm 49 and a few years ago I asked my Mother if I had any tantrums. She said she didn't think so but couldn't remember. I'm happy to believe I was a perfect child. I wasn't of course, I was always up to something and the eyes on the back of my Mother's head are proof of that.

In my day, any child tantrumming or making a scene got a walloped backside after a 'Stop that noise or I'll give you something to cry about' and if a couple more wallops didn't work to enforce silence, the child was put into a room or the dark cupboard under the stairs alone until they'd stopped making a noise. All part of the children should be seen and not heard culture.

A couple of very elderly sisters I know told me their mother died when one was 12 and the other 4. the 12 year old was left to raise the 4 year old so when there was a tantrum, the 12 year old just threw a bucket of cold water over her. She had no guidance and did her best.

I'm 39. I know (thanks for the stories, DM!) that I was a total horror for tantrums, on one occasion being so horrible on a train that she got off at a random station in the middle of nowhere because of the dirty looks she was getting from other passengers.

My mum's 68 and remembers her mum saying she was 'very independent' as a toddler and wouldn't let anyone dress her / cuddle her etc. Reminds me of how my friends' toddler is now.

I'm 41, I used to run into people's gardens aged 2 so my mum got some reins. I didn't have tantrums though.

Back in the day it was ok to smack your child in public and that was normal.

In my primary school, teachers could smack or throw things at children. Including reception age children. And several hard snacks which left a mark (not that a light slap would have been acceptable either).

My friends parents could discipline visiting kids as they saw fit, including smacking, time out (being put in the garden etc) and shouting.

It's how it was in the 1970s. Basically children were more scared as they sensed the parents could do whatever they wanted so they didn't push the boundaries.

Occasionally you get naturally well behaved kids who are agreeable, placid and rule-knifing. One of mine is like this. The other one is not. so some are born not made.

Maybe you (op) got two naturally well behaved kids.

That's my take on it.

I remember a friend's toddler throwing an epic tantrum in Tesco, 35 years ago. She threw him at me and ran out of the shop.

Mine were stubborn more than tantrummy.

I am sure that db and I had tantrums.

The phrase I remember was that 'if you don't behave you'll get something to really cry about!'

*rule-obeying!!! Gosh darn auto correct!!

I think that I just depends on the individual child. My DS2 doesn't really have tantrums. He just sort of whines for 30 seconds and then walks off to do sonething more interesting (he's two). It's definitely not a parenting/environmental because DS had epic tantrums-littlebugger really knew how to hold a grudge.

Thinking about it I am in my 60s and I can remember getting a good hiding as my dad was so mortified when I threw a mega tantrum when his mum and sister were visiting. In my defence I had been in hospital, quite seriously ill, and was allowed 45 minute visit per day so I was terrified of not being with my mother and she had gone off to do something and left me with grandmother and I can still remember screaming blue murder because I WANTED MY MUM.

My mam looks after my 3 year old while I'm at work and she claims he doesn't have any tantrums. I don't know who she's trying to kid.

If your toddler had a tantrum in 1967 you might get a few tuts from those in your immediate vicinity. If you didn't want to admit your kids had tantrums you didn't have to.

If your toddler has a tantrum now its unlikely anyone will say anything to you but they may well post a crappy faux concerned status on facebook, tweet a photograph or start a sad faced AIBU on MN.
The toddler's parent might well post something themselves and not get the response they want/need and it can turn into a bunfight.
Even if someone is helpful during the tantrum they probably won't be able to resist virtue signalling all over social media. If a bloke takes time to talk to a peed off kid they become a viral hero these days

So yes, of course toddlers tantrumed 50 years ago. Its not defect, its part of normal development.

We just get to know about the tantrums of toddlers we don't know and may live on a different continent.

Not quite 50 years ago, but I definitely had tantrums, as did my siblings.

My kids didn’t tantrum. Just luck I think, that they were both quite laid back. I do realise that I was fortunate though.

My mum used to look after my next door neighbour who was two weeks younger than me. She took us to the natural history museum, I wanted to go up the left side of the stairs and she wanted to go up the right, so we both threw ourselves on floor and tantrumed, echoing around the big entrance hall. My mum said an old couple walked past and said "Are they 2?" To which she replied "yes" and the man said "thought so" and the woman said "I don't miss those days" and they both laughed. That was in 1977.

My Mother did say she could take us out anywhere and we would behave. She had and has still got the Mum look and she also would whisper "do you want a smack?" Both those threats would stop us in our tracks.

I did have a tantrum, tears the lot in a shoe shop aged 16. There was no way on earth I would be seen dead in those hideous school shoes she wanted me to have and no my friends wouldn't be jealous.

"I think parents didn't spend so much time with their children 50 yrs ago too."

Are you mistaking 50yrs ago for the Victorian era?

I'm in my 50s.

We always seemed to be doing stuff as a family at weekends-visiting friends/family/out for the day at a NT place or to the coast.

Watching tv together!

I'm almost 40 (where has the time gone?) and I had tantrums as a child. My mum said I didn't have many because I was totally ignored! My dd had some epic tantrums but at 4 has largely stopped, just in time for ds, who's 2, to start.

I was a toddler 50 years ago I obviously don't remember, but I think my mother has mentioned my older brother having a few tantrums, so sure they did.

My own children were toddlers about 12 - 19 years ago. Never a tantrum between the 4 of them.

So I don't think it has anything to do with the time in history. It is down to individual personalities.

There were probably less tantrums, yes. I should imagine it was because of the much less child centred approach to new borns where parenting recommendations were feed four hourly and don't make a rod for your own back by picking them all the time. Babies just gave up as their needs were not met and that carried on through their childhoods. I was described as placid by my parents for my whole childhood. I'm not placid and I rebelled mightily in my teenage years. What I had done was just shut down as a defence mechanism against a scary mother. I think those kind of harsh child rearing practices probably explain why so many of us have problematic relationships with our parents in adulthood, we are not properly bonded. I really hope that today's much more child centred approach will show as we get older and our kids still like us! Or that could just be wishful thinking.

Late 40s and I was more the sit silent and hope it would all go away type of toddler.

My sister's screaming tantrums were legendary, though, well into primary school. Her fondness for tartrazine laden drinks didn't help matters.

I think that 'tantrums' and being stubborn has always been there (apparently I was one of those too)
But this was restricted to the 2yo phase so probably not as wide spread than now.

I would be interested to see what happens in other cultures where they don't have toddler tantrums.

I didn't find two too bad, I think the worst boundary pushing came at 3. I see a pattern of this now and wonder if modern parenting practices causes two to be easier and three to be the crunch point instead. I might be barking up totally the wrong tree but IME it's the stricter parents who seem to struggle more with two.

I think tantrums have been normal toddler behaviour forever, and while I'm sure they did used to get smacked for it I don't think that would have particularly stopped them, TBH.

I was a toddler nearly 50 years ago and my mother still talks about leaving me behind in the street when I had a tantrum.

My tantrums were EPIC.

I am from another culture, btw.

I'm in my 50s and I remember having a tantrum aged around 3. My parents had some friends round and were dashing between kitchen and living room getting drinks etc. I was just bauling my head off in kitchen for some reason. Parents ignored me, except on one of her through trips, my mother casually tipped the drink she was carrying over my head and walked on through to the next room. My Ddad just looked at me screaming next time he came through, made a 'poor you' face and also walked on by!

My DM often commented about what a tantrummy little madam I was, but then I was sandwiched between two brothers, one year apart on each side. I got NO attention!

Lots of cultures still do smack and often with objects so if it does work, perhaps that is why children don't often tantrum there. Or another theory is that children are given everything they want until a much older age so they have no need to tantrum, but even this I find very hard to believe, because toddlers are capable of tantrumming over the most random, unavoidable of things.

I think what probably happens is that children display the same behaviours everywhere but they are explained differently. In Western culture and particularly in the past tantrums are seen as bad behaviour whereas you could just interpret them as being that a child is easily overwhelmed when things don't go as he expected.