parents of obsessive? stubborn? independent? toddlers please help me

[bebemoojem]

My dd1, 3, is having trouble. Basically it's new clothes/shoes/jackets ... they cause HUGE tantrums.
Normally she's thoughtful/reasonable and you can reason with her and have conversations with her even when she's upset.
BUT pull out something new to wear it's like she panics.

I've been patient. I've been reassuring. I've been stern and forceful. It does not do anything. She refuses. And when I say refuses, she downright refuses, you cannot force her (anyone who says/thinks you can force a child her age please don't even respond). She ends up hysterical and inconsolable and the rest of the day is pretty much ruined because she cannot let it go and move on easily. After she finally does calm down if you even mention the offending item again (even days later) she puts her hands over her face or ears and starts saying 'no no no...'
I've tried to let her choose what she wears/and pick out new clothes herself at the shop... she says she likes them in the shop and when we get home it's the same deal...NO NO it's NEW I DON't like it...I cannot wear it. It's too different....and then begins the any excuse she can think of...too tight, too big, too small, too fuzzy, too new, too old, too Mommy's, etc etc etc.
I've tried the pretend it isn't new and just put it on her...but the second she realises it's not something she's worn before she starts ripping at it and pulling it off and panicking until she gets it off again.
I don't know what to do..she's growing...she needs new clothes and shoes. She cannot stay in the same stuff...
But then again it is going to be summer soon...guess she can run around nekked and shooless

It depends how much of a big deal it really is to you, sometimes you have to pick your battles. My DS2 has Aspergers and has been wearing the same t-shirt and shorts for months! (I have to wash them at night and get them dry in time . I have given up being bothered what he looks like as long as he is comfortable.

BUT if it is a big deal, try offering her a choice of two (too much choice seems to make it worse). She will eventually get the message that you won't back down. If you get new shoes that she likes in the shop, make sure she knows that you will be taking the old ones to the charity shop immediately as someone else needs them. If they are not there, she won't be able to wear them will she . I do sympathise, DS2 is incredibly stubborn still (he's 8 now).

Well it's a big deal because anything that is too tight or too small also cannot be worn for those reasons... We've only got this far because she's only just really got bad about it...before I could just get the same ish t-shirts and jeans or skirts and then after a few times she wouldn't notice they were 'new'

As for the shoes... when we got her these new ones we took the old ones away (she searched for them for days and kept saying she wanted them even tho they were way too small) ...since then she's been wearing her wellies or her crocs (which are now starting to pinch so I've got to get new ones of those- I was going to try to the same red color and hope it goes unnoticed) or she's been going without shoes...

I already offer a choice of outfits (skirt or trousers) and she'll dress in typical toddler fashion (bit fussy, but gets there in the end). If it's new clothes she simply won't have it... right now we have 1 pair of trousers that fit and 2 skirts. All the new things that were bought bring on these fits.

That rings alarm bells to me. I think she might have sensory issues, don't mean to panic anybody but i would research sensory processing disorder or dyspraxia.

Read this post and it may well be that your daughter isn`t actively trying to be annoying or controlling, but these things HURT HER.

I have this severely and still after over 20 years the feel off denim, wool, really tight or seamy things, lace, certain styles of shoes, sandels with thongs or lots of stitching on and certain labels/skirts/dresses/tights either feel like im itching all over or feel like I have sunburn and someone is scratching it! I can also hear phone chargers buzzing, people whispering 50 paces away and if someone tries to blend a food with stuff I hate I can detect it in minute quantities. I also find it hard to process background sounds and conversations at the same time, I can't describe it, my brain just overloads if I try and do more than one thing at a time and can get worse if im tired or stressed. Fluorescent lights also flicker loads for me.

Please try to understand why she does what she does if this is the case. I still remember being dragged around clothes shops and changing rooms by my mum in my late teens bursting into tears because I found the experience so painful. My mum would try to understand but sometimes she would get frustrated and yell at me and tell me had to become more tolerant. People may disagree but this is the equivilant of something scratching you with a knife and the next room doing the same thing, now imagine how horrible you would feel after six hours? Pretty shitty right? And how about if someone told you to stop being irritating and put up with the pain? You would want to tell them to piss right off wouldn't you? That's how we feel but insteadimagine you have sunburn all over your body...that's how it feels when you have spd and someone insists you try some clothes on you can't tolerate.

Please don't get angry with her, she can't help it if this is the case, I don't have kids but dint want to read and run.

Btw feel free to ask me any questions. I have learnt if I can tolerate something, get it in loads of different colours and sizes. My mum mail orders and sends them back if they don't fit/can't tolerate them. If your dd is the same as me, until I was about 13 I practically lived in tracksuits and combats/long sleaved tops.

Wrap it up as a present and leave it in an odd place as a suprise?

Just leave the clothes lying around and don't mention them for a few days so they don't seem new anymore, then try to introduce them?

Stories about new clothes?

my dd is the same with new clothes and has been pretty much since a similar age. I either take her to chose what I buy or I can on the odd ocassion get away with putting things in her wardrobe and just letting her discover them. She then just thinks they are clothes she had forgotten about. She has also chosen and got her self dressed from as young as 2. Luckily I can rely upon her to chose from her wardrobe fairly sensibly.

I know it is alot of contol for a young child to have in buying clothes but the other option is wasting money things that simply never get worn. She will never wear jeans and the 2 pairs she has have had to be boys jeans and she has grown out of them but she now point blank refuses to buy jeans.

she is very sensitive about feel of material, cut of clothing and size etc of labels. just to add my does not have any other signs od sensory processing disorder or anything like that but it is and would be just as distressing if I forced her to wear clothing that was not comfortable. I would allow your dd some control over this.

my dd will only wear crocs or wellies too, but she does wear the btrainers her dad took her to buy for her birthday, so that is a break through. school shoe shopping can be ver very stressfull and the difficult thing is she has really wide feet so only tend to have a choice of 2 clarks styles.

Sigh - my DS (age 4) is like this.

I'd love to see him, one day, in a pair of jeans and a smart gingham shirt - like I saw the other day in JoJoMamanDoodah, but there is nooooooo way.

I suppose we could burn their old clothes and there really wouldn't be any option, would there? I'm pretty sure if you have a kids who wears whatever, they are goggling at how rubbish we are about even letting the kids think they have a choice.

At the moment my DS only wears velour (gak) trackies in grey or brown. He will wear different roundneck tops. No jeans, no shirts, no cargo pants etc. He's effectively a slob. Trying to make him wear something will mean he is able to whine literally for days on end.

I gave up. We had 'the summer of too-small-Gap-secondhand-pyjamas' last summer. Half-mast, worn out ugly PJs he would wear on the beach, etc. My DH was really fed up with how DS looked. He looked like one of those impoverished kids on the charity adverts. But...I kind of figured I had other battles to fight in life and decided that he'd want to wear something else when the weather got colder. And even he saw eventually that the elastic holding his pjs up couldn't be replaced.

As for shoes, if they pinch, she'll have to change them eventually. Make sure she chooses all her clothes (my DS does - they're not what I'd want). You may need to have a few standoffs if you really need to press the point. Otherwise, mend the holes, accept she'll wear ankle swinging trousers, and make sure any clothes in future are the kind you can let down and down again.

BTW - it's not your fault! I also have a DD who is a total fashionista who loves wearing any kind of clothes.

adjustable waists are great you can by two sizes 2 big and ventually the change from turn ups to perfect fit to three quater lenghths they can last a good few years that way

Thinking about it DD1 was and still is a bit like this, not so extreme, but labels, scratchy material, any metallic thread and jeans all get the thumbs down.

She hates trainers and is an absolute nightmare to buy school shoes for. We have had every pair in the shop out and still left with nothing.

She isn't worried about fashion or what other people wear, it has to be right feel right to her.
She's dyslexic and doesn't pick up social cues in general. She never quite fits in with her peer group. What she wears, thinks and does has to feel right to her without reference to anyone else.

I've found I just have to let her choose, accept that some shopping trips we will come back with nothing and others one or two items that will be worn to death.

Yes DD2 is the complete opposite, if it's fashionable she'll wear it. Way less fussy and wears ballet pumps that I suspect aren't very comfy, but are fashionable.

However, DD2 is as bad about food as the OPs daughter is about clothes.

Yeah - DS crap at eating as well.

DD is the same with anything new and it takes a while of leaving it hanging around before she'll (sometimes) try it on ... it ususally helps if said item has peppa pig on but even that is not foolproof! She is generally very stuck in her ways and doesn't like any kind of change - think its just a toddler thing.

How about giving the new clothes a wash? So they smell 'right' and are a bit softer

Does she have any favourite TV/book 'characters'? I hate character clothing with a passion, but my DD also makes a huge/unbearable/life ruining fuss over certain things (putting nappy on at night still, hair washing, hair brushing), so I took her to a shop, let her choose her own, choice of two, made the whole thing a very 'exciting' trip.....treat of hot choc + marshmallows before, trip to park after...now she is a head to toe nightmare of Hello Kitty/Peppa Pig, but...

Can you get anything the same as she has now but just bigger sizes? As someone else said, those adjustable waist trousers/turn ups are brill.

Dressing up dolls/teddies with her older/too small clothes - saying that soemone else needs them now? Or a younger freind/relative....give as presents?

Does she dress herself? What about fancy dress outfits?

My DS HAS to have all the labels cut out of everything, very annoying for me but he really does seem to be sensitive to that kind of thing. but I went through a phase of buying second hand off ebay, he did seem to notice that tops felt more 'worn in'...

Thanks all. I am wondering a little about it being 'something more' than the typical toddler stuff because it is so over the top. I'm well used to toddlers and tantrums having a large and close family... and this is nothing like the worst I've seen in part because of the length of time it goes on.

I am looking at it as something she's not completely in control of because when she throws a 'typical' tantrum she actually is still pretty reasonable and doesn't cry with such terrible pitiful wildness... and often times after the tantrum you can still get her to do what she didn't want...NOT the case with these clothes etc.
and I do try very very hard to be patient and understanding, but there are times (when we need to be getting somewhere, and, I admit it, I'm feeling a little self conscious myself about it because we're meeting certain people...) I tend to get frustrated and shouty. Though I know that it certainly does not help and actually makes it much much worse.
So I'm taking your ideas to heart as I really want to do is help her adapt and be more capable. I am very happy for her to take control of the situation...if I can get her to take it.

Part of our problem is that she's a big kid anyhow, wearing clothes that are twice her age (she is in abt 6yo clothes) because of tightness issues (which is where this started -I do wonder if somehow I handled those issues wrong and that's why things have got so bad... tho I cannot say I've handled them any differently so I just don't know...) She's a bit chubby (little kid chubby) still and I'm hoping/praying that at some point we stop needing wider clothes and then she can grow into the lengths...but it's yet to happen.

I was thinking about the buying things big and leaving them in her drawers for her to stumble upon and think they're old...
I also wondered if I could make her things...tho I'm not good with sewing really and would hate to put the time effort and money into it and then they be no good (very much like you've said festi with the shopping)
I actually thought of the 'old clothes' from ebay last night wondering if it was the 'crispness' of new clothes which she doesn't like and so I put a bid in on a few things and will see if that pans out.

I've noticed that wool (fuzziness), and canvas (crinkling??) cause major problems so we're staying away from those

I was super pleased today because I managed to get her to accept a pair of birkenstocks (found cheap at TkMaxx) after some wheedling/bribing to get them on her feet to see if they actually fit (I got her Dad to try some on -she likes him better than me ) so she accepted them after about an hour- which was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be actually tho she's kept telling me they're too different and kept wanting to take them off again... so we're covered for summer 'warm shoes' as long as they're still acceptable when Daddy is not around and her feet don't grow. The old crocs are already 'gone'...

My DD is a bit like this, nowhere near as bad though. She lives in leggings and tops. Sometimes wears a skirt in top of the leggings as she can't feel it then. Adjustable waists are hit and miss as sometimes the elastic button but annoys her, but she's ok if she's wearing a vest underneath and I tuck the vest into her waistband.

She loves zip up tops and tracksuit bottoms. With tops, vest underneath, or let her try on in the shop changing room (if it's not too traumatic). Once I find a top that fits, I buy every colour, and sometimes the next size up as well!

Ps my DD is 5 and it is getting a bit better if that helps. Also, she won't wear sandals or crocs without socks on, so lives in trainer socks with trainers or crocs.

Oh and ergot fleece lined jacket for her which is nice and soft. In the summer, she wore zip up tops instead of a coat, or raincoat if she had on a long sleeved top underneath.

My 2 year old is similar and it drives us insane, being invited to a wedding was terrifying because I jut didn't know what we would be able to get him in. He will only wear tracksuit bottoms which he pulls up above his knees and longsleeved t-shirts.

He also hates new things and your idea about 2nd hand clothes might work - we now have to put a new item in the wash (which he has to see happen) before he wears it (don't know if it's to do with the scent?)

Thank you for posting, I've felt like a failing parent trying to get my son to wear different/new clothes. Nice to know others are the same!

Does anyone ever have a toddler who didn't have obsessive-independent-stubborn phases?

I don't know someone always seems to come on threads like these and say they don't believe in toddlers refusing to do things!

Anyway, I have no experience OP, but fabric sensitivity might be worth looking into?

I think I would try and pick the same fabrics as the clothes she has, and wash them a few times with your other clothes. Put them away in her drawers so she sees them there with her other clothes and on the line etc. If they are familiar looking and feeling you might have more luck.

Step-mum swears blind that her grandson has never had a tantrum. And she doesn't say that in a bragging way, she thinks it's very very weird.

Have they stopped doing doing this ladies pls update ? My 3 year old is same but not for sensory reasons I think he’s too anxious shy about wearing something new self conscious