Hello Mums, I was hoping for some wisdom and advice at I am currently at my wits end with my 3yr old Daughter.
For my little one it has been a turbulent 3 months with a lot going on. Before December I can hand on heart say I had a little angel of a tot, with few tantrums except the norm but she was happy, playful. Loved pre-school, to the point where I barely got a goodbye at the door!!!
In October I lost my father to cancer and we tried to explain this to Georgina as best as we could, she knew that Grandpa was unwell but he has gone to a place where he is all better and is a star in the sky. She accepted this and apart from mentioning him every now and again thats it.
It all went wrong in December, as a family (mummy, daddy and Georgina) we went to Canada to stay with friends that lived there for their wedding and also because we all needed a good pre-chistmas holiday. It went VERY wrong! Our friends two year old had a big issue with the sharing and didn't want Georgina around at all, didn't want to share her parents. She is a little girl who spends all her time in nursery so having her parents at home with her was relatively important but a very stressful house due to wedding business. Georgina had a seriously hard time of it, a lot of the relatives that were there, they were impatient, intolerant and on occasion downright mean, they thought she was over 4 yrs (even though at that point I kept saying she hadn't yet turned 3) and came down on her hard including my friend when all Georgina wanted to do was play with her little friend and share toys. It was very intense and Georgina spent most of her time there either confused or in tears. Well we took her out as much as possible and in the end we left almost a week early to come home.
Now after two nasty ear infections, christmas things have really changed. The first week at pre-school was fab she was so pleased to be back. Sadly one day my mother went to pick her up and forgot the car seat, as a result went away again to get it, what we later found out is that Georgina saw Granny come to get her and go without her!!!!! She now won't go to pre-school, won't even go to ballet, she will not take any authority from women. She is a very angry unhappy little girl, she shouts a lot, hits me and screams at pretty much anything. She no longer goes to sleep on her own, I have to stay in the room until she is asleep, she no longer sleeps through the night either.
We haven't done time out for a long time it never worked for her, she would actually challenge more if we tried. Controlled crying also makes her scream non stop and I don't personally agree with it especially as now she is very insecure so walking away when she hits or shouts makes her scream ten times more and she gets herself into a terrible state.
Sadly being a mature student at the moment its like being a working mum as i spend three days a week at uni. We share a house with my mother who is a very stable and structured source for Georgina something we thought would help instill her routine and security, we did this last April when I returned to studying so she doesn't have to have any further childcare than that of pre-school (which is only two days a week). I know this is like an essay but I have tried so many tactics, nothing is working, I understand the reasons and the why she must be feeling the way she is but with no solution to get her through this horrible phase!!!!!