To wish she’d stop shouting at me

[PennyCrayon85]

Three year old. Lovely and affectionate when she wants to be but goes off her nut if she’s ever told no, not just now etc.

Comes into my room at 4.45am wanting to get up and go downstairs. Is told no, too early, either to back to bed or come in beside us. Kicks off, screaming and shouting at the top of her voice, tantrums etc. This is most mornings and it is soul destroying.

She’s currently shouting the odds because it’s 8.30am and I have said she can’t do a messy craft set until later 😣

We are not shouty here. I don’t know where this is coming from but it’s driving me nuts. She’s the most strong willed child I have ever met. Single minded, will not be distracted. At the same time I do not want to show her that I will capitulate for a quiet life (as tempting as it is sometimes).

Any suggestions?!

Copy fail!

:34Covert20

There are some examples of horrible parenting on this thread. Hold them on the naughty step? Trap them in their bedroom by holding the handle down? Mock them? Really? None of this is better than smacking - what would you say to a woman who said her partner did this to her? And NONE of it, will improve the behaviour of a very strong willed child. You’re reinforcing that all those behaviours are acceptable, which of course they aren’t.

Calm and firm, and never give in. It is VERY hard, but all the “breaking their will” parenting that is required for the naughty step etc, is a very poor idea

I agree with this.

We all have angry, frustrated days whether adult or children and expecting them to have better control of their emotions than many adults is just nuts. Fighting fire with fire is also nuts and while I understand the frustration of dealing with a hollering three year old, you gave to step up and control your temper - how on earth will you cope with a ranting hormonal teenager if you cannot keep your cool with a three year old. So learn to breath deeply, reply calmly but firmly, be consistent and explain, dont demand. Model the behaviour you expect and want of them

There are some examples of horrible parenting on this thread. Hold them on the naughty step? Trap them in their bedroom by holding the handle down? Mock them? Really?

I know, wtf. Can you imagine how it feels to be that small and locked in a room? That's fucked up.

I think the gro clock is a great idea and explaining her emotions to her.

Pretty shocked at the casual advice here for 3 year old shouting: forcibly hold them down on a step, carry them in a room and hold the door shut, “gently” push them out of a room and hold the door shut. Three year olds can be very annoying but these sound like grown adults losing control over much smaller people rather than great tips to be happily passed on.

They want what they see, hide the craft stuff and leave out something you are happy with.

We do “good choices” as in: “We will do messy craft after morning tea but if you keep yelling and we won’t be doing it at all. So after morning tea or not at all? Make a good choice.”

We do similar to this. But I will say it only worked for us after about 4 or 5 once DC had a bit more control over their reactions and behaviour. At 3 it wouldn’t have worked.

Likewise The Explosive Child - great for an older child but not so useful for younger DC as it requires a sense of the medium term and 3 year olds IME are all about NOW. 1, 2, 3 Magic can work pretty well for this age.

This thread describes my 7 year old. Only she doesn't do the 5am thing.
All the sanctimonious people saying just tell her off do not have this kind of child. Clearly.

Tell her off- she doesn't care. Doesn't matter how it's delivered.

Talk quietly - she screams louder because I'm apparently being creepy

Count to 5 - she goes totally ballistic at pressure of the counting

Tell her to go to room - she won't

Take her to her room- she comes out again

Block her exit- she trashes room (fine it's her room) and less acceptably she stamps so hard on ceiling she makes ceiling crack lamps shake downstairs). Tell her - she doesn't care

This is about 1% of what goes on in my house.

In the same boat with my 3 year old - my third child, none of the tactics that worked on the other have helped. Hoping it's just age.

Good luck OP. I was a single mum and had my lovely normal voice and my deep not so nice voice I mastered it and it stopped my son in his tracks. It's hard isn't it x

OP I read your thread title and thought "is it your 3 year old?" Mine is very similar. Shouting back just winds him up and he copies it. I have been known,.sometimes, to pop him on the bottom step and tell him to come back when he's calmer - I wouldn't dream of locking him in a room and sometimes the time away from whatever is pissing him off calms him down very quickly. He gets lots of exercise and has a regular bedtime, what I do find is that he benefits from a 'do nothing' day pottering at home once a week if we can manage it (I over scheduled us with days out in the summer and he was appalling). I'm 50/50 about capitulating - sometimes you have to decide that you're only fighting for the sake of it and to convince yourself you're in control, I think, but when I take a stand I bloody mean it. Seemed to work OK with DD who was hard work at 3 and an absolute delight at 6.

Often “it doesn’t work” is actually “it hasn’t worked yet”

One of the problems we found was, we gave up too quickly if something seemed not to have an effect. This led to us being quite inconsistent and DD was just confused.

When someone pointed out to us we weren’t giving things enough time, we picked a tactic and stuck to it. That made a huge difference. It can take weeks for something to sink in.

Oh and like you, my DS is apparently an absolute angel at preschool, and I've seen how compliant and cooperative he is at his gymnastics class. This makes me less concerned that he'll be a total delinquent in the future, if they're only acting out for the people they trust will always love and forgive them.

Oh, and keep the messy craft kits out of the way. Only mummy chooses when they are done.

I think being upbeat is so important. Really sing song your way out of this one

priceless!

I'm really shocked at the amount of responses that simply say either ignore or shout back

Imagine getting so overwhelmed with your feelings and then someone just ignores you?

Quite sad really.

Get the book 1,2,3 Magic, this changed our whole way of dealing with Ds and his almighty tantrums at that time. Definitely recommended.

We also bought a clock but a normal digital one, although I can’t remember at what age.

Ds is quite chilled now at 14, so don’t worry, it might not mean your dd will grow up to be the same.

Ds was so bad we did take him to be assessed, as I was so worried, his speech was also very good so could be perfectly understood. It was the doctor who assessed him who recommended 1,2,3 Magic, I loved the book, dh was on board too and we never looked back.

I do feel for you though. This was one of the most stressful times (apart from the colic & reflux baby days) and having a ndn who used to bang on the walls and turn the tv up full volume because of a tantrumming toddler really added to that stress.

Good luck

And sometimes give her two options (both of which you don’t mind the outcome of but gives her the sense of choosing) therefore when she got up early this morning you could say ‘would you like to go back to your own bed or come into ours for a while’?

Find an alternative to messy craft. Tell her the night before there’s a teddybear tea party for the morning. Bears. Water in jugs. Tea cups. Story books to be read to the bears.

Also what do you mean by messy craft. If you’re talking pritt-stick and sequins I’d let her get on with it