To think this child’s crying outbursts are too much?

[ForgotTheBiscuits]

My DS’s friend, 4, has almighty meltdowns whenever he has to do something he doesn’t want.

For example, I collected both my DS and his friend from a party, and as soon as it was time to go, this kid begins crying, not actually tears but just the sounds, lots of sound. He refused to say thank you to the hosts or wish the kid ‘happy birthday’ before we left. It went on for the entire 20 minutes journey home. It bothers me that I can’t attend to my own child at all when this is happening, as dealing with the meltdown takes all my attention.

There is no consoling, I have tried on many different occasions when this happens (it’s very frequent!) to reassure, comfort, give hugs, distractions, humour - nothing works! He just commits to the crying and won’t engage at all, won’t listen or even make eye contact. And it goes on for a very long time!

When this boy is playing and doing what he wants, he’s has pretty good manners and makes eye contact, is affectionate and talkative.

His mum is incredibly gentle and I don’t think he even gets short shrift at any time from her. I would spontaneously combust if my kid did this all the time, it’s bloody annoying to say the least.

I’m good with kids generally, having worked with hundreds of them over the years, and have always been able to find a way to calm a child down somehow, but this kid has me at a loss and drives me insane!!

Is this Highly Sensitive Personality or something else?

If it continues all the way home, even without his mother or a sensitive audience that suggests to me that it is more than just a temper tantrum.

This isn’t necessarily true. My DD used to be like this. I never gave in to her demands. She could throw a fit and scream for 45mins because i didnt buy her sweets at the shops etc. it never ended in me buying it for her at the end.
Everytime she heard the word no her face would just fall and she went to the ground screaming. This went on from age 1-5ish. Then it slowly got better.
I learnt how to manage it better, but it was a very hard time.
My first born never did anything like this, so it was very new for us and you are right it did drive us crazy too.

You need to make sure that he understands what your terms are before you get to the party.

before you arrive explain that there will be no crying in leaving. It will
chamge nothing. That you will give him a 5 minute warning before you leave so he can prepare and leaving isn’t a big shock that way he can finish his game/whatever and as someone else has said at the first sign of whinging you nip it in the but -
so no - and then just ignore it. (easier said than done I know. He sounds like he does t have boundaries at home.

It sounds as if a) he struggles with transitions b) he's struggling with his mother's health problems. Going home to the worry after a party where he's been able to be a child like any other for a bit must be difficult. 4yos don't tend to have a wide range of appropriate means to express that at their disposal.

I wouldn't be so quick to write this off as 'spoilt brattism' (nice).

Is his mother getting all the support she needs? She does seem to be leaning heavily on you.

This. His mother’s ‘gentle’ bollocks parenting means he is growing up a brat.

He's being rewarded with attention for the way he misbehaves. What does anyone think is going to happen. He's now been trained to think he can act out and get to keep doing what he wants or he's does what's asked of him and what he wants to do doesn't always happen.

Is he having an actual meltdown @ForgotTheBiscuits or do you believe it’s a tantrum? Because they’re different things. A meltdown is a total loss of emotional (and sometimes physical) control. There’s nothing that bribing, name calling or humiliating the poor child will do to stop it. A 4 year old has difficulty regulating emotions regardless, they are still essentially toddlers, especially if they’re emotionally delayed. Developmental milestones aren’t just walking/talking. Adding in a poorly mum and quite frankly I think the least anyone can do is find some huge amount of patience for the poor boy. Or stop taking him about and save him from any more of your scorn.

I strongly agree with this. This sounds to me much more like a neurodivergent difficulty in dealing with transitions and it may well be worth suggesting a word with the GP about it.

I have a nearly four year old who behaves like this and some of the responses on this thread are heartbreaking to read.

My child struggles with all transitions and has epic meltdown that can last for over 30 minutes. I am not a passive parent who overindulges. He's on the waiting list to be assessed for ASD.

It makes me so sad to think that other people (I'm assuming based on this thread women and mothers) would just assume he's a brat that needs ignoring or shaming. I'm broken and exhausted and doing my best to help my child and the judgment on this thread about a very young child struggling is hideous.

To be honest I had to check back at the op because I thought I'd misread the age from some of the responses! I'm sure thinking back to reception and nursery parties lots of 4 year olds struggle to regulate their emotions. There was always someone crying about something! And it's very young for sleepovers, so not surprised that was hard.

It doesn't necessarily mean the parents give in too easily. I always really dig my heels in if my kids had a tantrum but they still did sometimes because they struggled to know what else to do I think. Admittedly now they are older I am starting to wonder if they are in the asd spectrum for other reasons so maybe that is a sign, but certainly at 4 it didn't seem that unusual. And that's without issues if I'll parents.

What's he like in school do you know? Mine were angelic in school and at play dates etc but took it out on us, but perhaps if you look after this child a lot he is comfortable enough with you to let it out so you are seeing that side note than you might usually from your child's friends - doesn't mean more of them aren't like it at home.

However, if you are finding it a lot it's quite reasonable to cut down on looking after him, especially on your own child's birthday. It's nice to help out if mum is ill, but it's not all your responsibility.

I didn't read this If his mum is struggling and you are helping her out then I think you can definitely start trying to give him the same boundaries as your son. The mum might have all sorts of emotions over her illness going on and she might be struggling with him at home and indulging him but you don't have to.

There are lots of kids whose parents give in to this. He may get a treat or something when he does this to cheer him up. In any case I would give it zero attention. Put in earugs if necessary and focus on chatting to your dc. He may just drop it if it isn't getting the reaction he wants.

This sounds quite normal to me? Particularly with an unsettled home life and a sick mum. In each of my children's classes there has been at least one child like this who has been quite sensitive and emotionally developmentally slow and seems to cry at everything. One child used to cry and tantrum at every school drop off for two years. A sleepover for a 4 year old sounds very young too, I get it's probably out of necessity but even my very well behaved and calm children would struggle with one at that age. If you're struggling though can't you see if others from the class can help a bit more or just be honest with the mum that you're finding it too much.

Loop earplugs or similar might help with the noise aspect op.

In terms of transitions, one of the best techniques I’ve found is to talk, in very general terms, about what’s happening later (I wonder what your dad is cooking for tea tonight, or I wonder what you’ll play on your iPad later) no direct question, or demand. But it gently helps direct thoughts past the transition.

If you can arrive a few minutes early, send them back in for their last go/last two minutes etc so that it’s not an abrupt transition. I used to do a countdown with my dc, showing 5 fingers for 5 minutes, all the way down to one.

Do you pick him up too?

Spend the way there explaining what is going to happen. (You can get a social story for this if you think it would help -have a google for "going to a party social story")
Explain that at the end of the party it will be time to go home. Tell him you will warn him 10 minutes, 5 minutes and 2 minutes before it's time to leave. Remind him you might feel sad when it's time to leave, but it's not safe to shout in the car, what does he think the answer is?
Choose to listen to Paw patrol or Thomas (or whatever) music in the car and/or fidget with (whatever) or have his party bag (if you're ok with that?) Listen to his solutions.

Try and head the crying off before it starts.

Sounds like the op offered.

I said if she's not willing to work out what's going on with this boy, she should stop looking after him. At the very least, a bit of empathy.

I feel you, DD is autistic and possibly PDA profile. Probably to the uniformed it looks like were very lax/permissive/coddling but it's just ableist to hold everyone to the same standards

Uninformed*

That sounds draining, especially the constant wailing whilst trying to drive. I think you know the child and mother well enough by now to have a short sharp ENOUGH and then dround him out with the radio. I wouldn’t be offering any more lifts or play dates and encouraging other friendships for my child.

This entirely. That behaviour needs to be totally ignored. Even negative attention is good attention for that kid.

I think they’d see you, as the parent dealing with it as best you can and so realising it’s not a fault of the parent but a sign of something else.

This differs from the OP.

Some kids just find transitions hard. Some of those kids also find fun quite hard to deal with. DD was like this, and for a period of a few years, it felt as though most of our fun trips out ended in massive crying fits.

As she got older, she learned to express herself in other ways, and to tell me when things got too much and she needed space, and she learned to anticipate that fun things would come to an end, and she grew out of it.

But until that happened, all I could do was make sure she had some calm time, talk to her in advance about what helped/made things worse when her feelings got too big to handle, prepare her for the transition and then ride out any upsets when they happened.

I had one like this. They weren’t “indulged” or given in to or whatever (and I have two other children who behave(d) differently) and nor were they ignored or shamed. No one else was expected to deal with it but us as parents. They grew out of it.

So do you think it was just personality/tempremant @Tinybrother

I don't think this thread is very kind.

He's only four, he has a mum who is clearly quite unwell and as a result, he is doing a lot of things on his own or with a relative stranger taking him. That must be quite overwhelming for a child who has barely started reception.

I wouldn't be indulging the tantrums and would probably just ignore them but I don't think it's nice to come on and start a thread that will just encourage people to bash his mum and call him a brat.