Tonight dd had the mother of all tantrums as we were returning home from pre-school. Aged 3.5, she has had them before but not quite on the scale it was tonight and not quite as public.
Pre-school is not that close to home so we still have a pushchair so she can hop on if she is tired. Half way home about to cross the road she asked to walk. Fine, she walks. Then as she was walking she started dragging comfort blanket on the pavement. I asked her not to do that. She purposefully continued. Then started walking exceedingly slowly. I stopped and asked her if she wanted to go back in the pushchair. No. Then it was a case of her just sitting on the pavement, refusing to either walk or go in the pushchair.
I tried various tactics for 10-15 mins but nothing worked. Eventually I tried carrying her but she fought me off. It took 3/4 hour of crying, rolling on the pavement basically making a complete scene etc for her to accept to move.
Had never had that before. She can have tantrums but they are over in 5-10 mins nothing on this scale. She WAS tired (she is miss perfect at pre-school with great concentration etc) and most probably hungry. Still it's no excuse.
Has anyone had similar tantrums (tiredness linked and triggered by what (I viewed) as the slightest thing) and what did you do to deal with them during and after?
I asked her afterwards why she had done that and told her I was unhappy about it.
When you have had tantrums on this scale, what do you usually do during/after? Any ideas/tips/other angles would be greatly appreciated!
She did say she didn't think what she did was good afterwards, said sorry and basically just wanted cuddles but I just wondered whether just voicing my discontent with her facing no consequences apart from seeing her comfort blanket in the wash was a weak response.
Any ideas/similar experiences? Would love to hear about them.