Terrible twos.

[flamed12]

My daughter is 2.5 and I need some advice.

examples of her behaviour -

1. I’ll say good morning and she’ll do an annoyed groan.
2. If my OH (her dad) gets her out of her cot in the morning instead of me she will throw the biggest tantrum which can last hours. Screaming and crying and throwing herself on the floor.
3. I’ll offer her 3 choices for breakfast. She’ll ask for x. Sometimes she wants a mixture of x and y. When she gets to the table she will demand z and if I say no she’ll toss the whole thing on the floor.
4. After dinner she asks for a yoghurt. I’ll bring her one and she’ll say “no two!” If I refuse she throws the yogurt everywhere.
5. In the car she will request her favourite song. Sometimes I don’t want to listen to it over and over so I’ll say no mummy’s song just now. And she’ll kick and scream and tantrum for the entire journey.
6. Hitting and scratching if she doesn’t get her own way.

Is this all normal? What can I do expect ride it out and stick to my guns and hope her attitude changes?

Quite normal!
Cut down on choices though. Offer the same two choices for breakfast every day, ie toast or Weetabix. Asking little children to make decisions often overwhelms them.

They often contradict themselves from one moment to the next which is as baffling to the child as it's annoying for the parent.
Keep calm and carry on!

One of mine went through a phase of only wanting me to do everything and would kick off if DH did it. where/when possible I did do what she wanted (within reason!) but if I was out she had to accept DH doing it or go without. Sometimes she chose to go without!
It was a phase and lasted no more than 6 months. which might seem ages but, relatively speaking, was a small amount of time to get her over the hurdle.

The hitting/scratching would be a firm zero tolerance from us. We would remove them (or ourselves as appropriate) and walk away stating that we would talk when they stopped hitting. No engagement till it stops even if they fall asleep exhausted (which was sometimes the crux of it - they were tired).

Yep had all that with my son and now going through it with my daughter who is 2.5

What baffles me are the meltdowns over the tiny inconsequential stuff that reaches drama of epic proportion! So if I say the sky is blue she'll go Noooooo its pink whaaaaaaa!!!!! Cue proper stropping.

Then its over in a minute and she's on to the next thing. It's hard to keep up and exhausting.

But it does pass. Around 3+ I noticed things were calmer and tantrums more focused

Hang in there its just a phase.

Agree that lashing out needs to dealt with head on. We've just started introducing timeout and it's working quite well. Any hitting/biting/scratching it's a 2 min time out and say sorry. Seems to be having an impact.

We do time out for hitting on the bottom stair but she just runs off it and refuses to stay there. If I sit with her and restrain her then I get slapped and scratched and kicked over. I ended up putting her in her cot for a time out as I needed a breather. I don’t want her to associate her cot with punishment however so I’m not sure if this is a good idea.

My son was genuinely a great toddler. No terrible twos so this is all completely new. She’s incredibly stubborn and will quite easily scream for 3 or 4 hours if she feels she needs to.

Yeah, it's rough. Agree that cot possibly isn't the best place for a time out as you said OP. Do you have a travel cot or playpen you could use for it instead. Otherwise I think you are just going to have to get better at restraining her (easier said than done I know).

I know it's both hard and exhausting but, personally, I would keep calmly taking her back to the step and repeat what you said.

Something along the lines of "Hitting is not nice and we don't hit in this family. Sit there for 2 minutes and when you come back we'll carry on the game/puzzle/whatever she's been removed from".

If you can put the time in now you will reap the rewards later when a warning of removal will have the desired effect.

Don't restrain, just carry on taking her back and sitting her down