I haven’t been on for a good while, but use the site daily and am a regular reader on the forums, so hoping someone might have some advice. Please be kind, I appreciate this will all sound very negative - I’m just laying it all out there. I’m really struggling with my 6 year old son.
He’s always been quite a difficult child and was a very fussy baby and cried most of his first year and still tantrums most days now. I was always told how he’d be easier when he was sitting up, crawling, walking, talking etc etc. I’m still waiting! He’s exceptionally bright - not stealth, but he really is, very loud and extrovert/class clown type show off. He is though also very anxious at times and I feel the class clown show off behaviour hides a lot of this. School have no concerns and he’s only been a bit naughty for them on a couple of occasions over the year and they were pretty minor silly type things. He is still loud /wanting to be centre of attention/know it all, but they seem to deal with it without too much bother from what I see/am told.
He never listens to anything we ask, in fact I am exhausted from calling his name when he’s run off again after I asked him not to (I’ve tried whispering, asking quietly...but he continues to ignore), reminder of no tv/tablet if poor behaviour of running off, jumping on furniture when asked notto, taking toys off siblingsetc etc and continues...and I always follow through on this. We’re quite (well try to be!) easy going parents, but with him he pushes every single button all of the time and if when we have tried different tatics it’s even worse. We have other children, who are a complete breeze compared to him (they are younger and of course still have their moments). If I listed everything, I’d be here all day, but there’s always something with the eldest. Younger two at times copy his behaviour, which the oldest finds hilarious, but then triples the stress!
Whilst a baby, I spoke to the HV numerous times asking for help as to why is he so fussy/restless...”it’s his personality”, which I now see has a lot of truth in, but I cannot believe we have not had one day since he was born that had not had some difficulty. Wash his hair- tantrum of his highest proportions , no tv - tantrum, time to turn tv off - tantrum, someone touching his toys/books etc - tantrum.... This is all day every day.
Am I missing a trick? Should I just accept this is how he is? What are we doing wrong? We love bomb, we always praise for good behaviour, we treat, we do everything we can to give our son and our other children the best life and experiences we can to enrich their lives and show them how much we love and care. We consciously make time to spend with each child so no one is left out etc. We follow through on everything we say we will when disciplining.
He seems pretty popular at school and has literally invited to everyone’s party this school year, but I’m not sure why at times as he can be quite unkind by taking over/showing off/making everything about him. He doesn’t have any real close friends - he is very much a social butterfly and moves from friend to friend/friendship groups each day with no bother and all on his terms.
I know this all sounds very negative :-( I’m literally at breaking point and thinking I am missing a trick to make everyone’s life a little bit better. He is very loving, can be so kind and thoughtful at times, so it’s not all bad! He’s so bright and his mind never switches off, he loves school and learning. It would just be nice to have a day, just one, without any of the negative stuff above.
Many thanks for reading all of this - any advice appreciated!