2 year old really struggling with his tantrums

[blaka]

He is so adorable and I do have experience with tantrums from my first but his tantrums last sooooo long..

10 to 15 minutes.

Usually when a fun activity ends or in the car, he doesn't like to stay strapped in.

He is able to comprehend that he needs to stop screaming sometimes, which surprises me... for example the other Day I said ' do you want to go to the fire truck ? ' he said yes. I responded that we will only go to the fire truck if he stops screaming, which he then did ! Of course once the ride was over, he was inconsolable.

But then today he screamed for a good 15 minutes and threw himself all over the place because he wanted to play with the hairdryer. No distracting or validating his feelings made any difference.

Usually, the best thing to do with tantrums is just to ignore. Really hard to do but the only way. You are accepting his tantrums and prolonging them by giving him options.

And distractions don't work either. Just ignore

Don't bribe like the situation with the fire truck or it will get worse as they soon realise if they do act in a certain way they almost get rewarded.
If at home, ignore. Sit quietly on the floor next to them. When they have finished offer a hug. Then when they are fully calm discuss what wasn't okay with their choices. When I did this my son realised that I wasn't going to leave him but I also wasn't going to give him any positive or negative attention behaving that way. If in public I'd remove him and do the same once we got to the car or somewhere we weren't disturbing others.
Everytime I spoke to my son or daughter during that time resulted in dragging it out.
If they hit or anything of that nature I prevent them and repeat I won't let you hurt anyone.
It is so hard. My son's tantrums went to 45mins at one point. Then when I started doing this within a couple of months I realised one day he hadn't had that type of reaction in over a month.
I don't believe in leaving them alone because really they are crying out for help and don't want to be left alone.
Once they have reached that level they are more than likely not able to be reasoned with. Any option you give won't be right as their feelings are so big that is all that can think about. Best to stay quiet.

Oh no ! I didn't realise that was bribing !

Agree with just ignoring.
Also get some earplugs - they won't stop the noise fully, so it's not unsafe, but it'll make it slightly more bearable.

We used to give lots of warnings about when an activity would be finishing. I think sometimes if they're having a great time & then suddenly they get taken away with no notice then they can get a bit worked up.

I just used to step over DD and leave her to it and I'd go to another room

After a while I decided on a different tactic

I'd give her a massive bear hug even though she'd be thrashing about and I'd kiss her face all over

This would calm her down

She stopped her tantrums soon enough

Distract- I’m off to xxx loudly to no one in particular and wander off. You said it yourself - he doesn’t understand.

Lots of warnings before an activity ends. I used to kneel down and just cuddle DS which calmed him down and then we would chat about feelings. How much of that he understood I don't know but it worked.

I wear headphones or the kid's ear defenders 😭😂😂😂😂