Using the word meltdown when they mean tantrum?

[TheHeadOfTheHouse]

Has anyone noticed that nobody says tantrum anymore?

Every time a child has a tantrum, theres a parent saying they’re having a meltdown.

Theres a massive difference between a tantrum and a meltdown, but it appears hardly anybody likes to say their child is having a tantrum anymore.

Such a first world problem, but it really annoys me 🤣

The thing is tantrums are seen as something a child is doing to misbehave, whereas a meltdown is something that they can't help, but even a neurotypical child having a tantrum is struggling, my daughter has anxiety and goes into fight or flight mode and can't be talked down. I think the use of the word meltdown is more common because we're becoming more understanding of children and their development.

I think it’s useful to have different words for different things, so I’m inclined to support distinguishing between a tantrum and a meltdown, especially because a meltdown doesn’t necessarily look like a tantrum.

I think it’s a problem when words evolve to represent other specific meanings.

My friend got into trouble for saying she had attempted mediation between two of her staff who’d had a fall out. The council’s HR where she worked said “mediation” was a specific HR process. She just meant she’d tried to bring peace to a hostile situation.

Likewise in my husband’s world of work “consultation” is discouraged as they see “consultation” as a specific process that can be challenged legally.

www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/topics/behaviour/meltdowns/all-audiences

I think it’s useful to have different words for different things

😆

To use the word meltdown instead of tantrum is such bad taste and really undermines the sheer struggle someone suffering meltdowns contend with.

You'll never stop it though 🤷‍♂️

See also...

Bullying when someone's being mildly teased

OCD when someone simply likes everything clean and in its rightful place

Anxiety = Being a bit anxious about something that's completely normal, like a job interview for example.

There are many more examples out there of people exaggerating, leading to them to use the wrong word.

That's life.

I think of tantrum in relation to a phase all toddlers go through, exhausting but normal. Meltdown I would apply to an older child or adult with some kind of additional needs as I think to say adult had a tantrum would be rude.

huh

that site isn’t a dictionary

Most children have tantrums at some point in their development. Most children have meltdowns too. Sometimes it can start as a tantrum but then become a meltdown. Meltdowns may be more frequent in ND kids but they’re not exclusive to them and ND kids can have tantrums as well. Often it’s hard to tell the difference unless you know a child well and have seen what the setting events and trigger events were, if a parent tells me their child is having a meltdown I wouldn’t presume to know better and say it’s actually ‘only’ a tantrum.

I agree with you re bullying and OCD, but anxiety is the feeling that someone who's anxious experiences. It's a very normal feeling we all experience as well as a medical condition.

Meltdown is similar IMO, it doesn't just have a medical meaning.

How can you always know though? My dc had a lot of tantrums. About ten years later we learn he is neuro diverse. So were those tantrums meltdowns?

What a ridiculous comment. Are you a man?

Only on MN have I come across this insistence that meltdown is an exclusively ND term. It's not and I don't know anyone in real life who insists that. To me it's just an alternative to tantrum (which isn't a word that seems to be used commonly anymore, as pp said language changes).

“Perfectly normal” kids can get overtired, over stimulated, overwhelmed etc especially little ones. They’re not just being naughty.

That’s the definition CAHMS gave us and how the local autism assessment unit described it to us. It was also on an infographic in the SEN coordinator’s office in the school.

And not just kids!

I personally think that meltdown was used as a describing word before it was associated with autism / ND.

Most people won’t even know the significance of it.

It annoys me to. A child throwing a tantrum because they didn't get the toy they wanted is totally different to a child who is autistic and has had a complete sensory system overload and is in meltdown. This is saud as a mum of 3 kids. 2 who are nuerodivergent and have meltdowns and 1 who loves a tantrum to try get there own way

In a family of neurodiversity I’m very careful to call a spade a spade and a meltdown is never called a tantrum.

Perhaps the Dads should be stepping up and doing some more of the parenting if the situation is as you describe.

Yeah I was going to put 'suffering from anxiety' but couldn't be arsed.

What I'm saying is, people often claim to 'suffer from anxiety' when they're a bit anxious.

goodness, i can just picture you at the school gate! 😆

Unreasonable to start a thread making an assertion without explaining the basis for making it or the reason for irritation.

I've described both of my kids as having meltdowns. They are NT as far as I'm aware. When they were toddlers their mega 'tantrums' would last for 45 minutes+, and they would not stop even if I gave in/gave them what they wanted. They would become so far gone I could have waved a giant bag of Haribo in front of their faces and they wouldn't have even known it was there.

Eyes glazed over, absolutely hysterical, not even able to hear anything I was saying. Hurting themselves, hurting me, vomiting, just like a wild animal. Just had to wait it out until they snapped back out of it. That's a meltdown to me!