Help needed to sort out tantrums in 'horrible' (sorry!) little 4yo ds....

[RoseQuartz]

My ds age 4.5 has always been 'adamant' of getting his own way, from being around 2 years old! But we refused to give in to him and he got better over time, though not completely easy-going like the others, but now he's found something else to drive us nuts about.
DH took him along to the shop last week, as we tend to take just one along when we go rather than put us through the pure hell of taking them all with us!!
Anyway, every day since, whenever either dh or myself go to the shop he insists on coming with us, and as we don't want to make a rod for our own backs, we are just as stubborn in saying no to him.
This always leads in a mega, mega tantrum, oh god, he's screaming the house down, and bangs on the windows hard enough to smash the glass, honestly he's enough to make the calmest person on earth snap and smack him! Good job we are against smacking otherwise he'd be in big trouble!!
He doesn't hold his breath , or bang his head against a wall etc like I've heard lots of kids do, but even so, his screaming is enough to make a saint swear, he can keep it up for what seems like hours!!
Any help greatly appreciated, P-L-E-A-S-E!!

My 2 year old is very strong willed too.The only way I can see of preventing her becoming a spoilt brat is to sit her on the naughty step when she deserves it & when she screams even louder,as she probably will,is to tell her that the more she screams,the longer she will stay there.I hold her there if need be.It worked for her elder sister & it does seem to be working for dd2.

The incentive to me,is a close relatives child.She can scream like a demon & therefore pains are taken never to upset her & she is always given in to.Her mother admitted that she dreads taking her anywhere as her dd will even hit her if she doesn't get what she wants.NO WAY is a child of mine behaving like that.

Hang in there-you sound as though you are doing really well.

Try giving him Hobsons choice: stay at home and be a good boy and when Daddy comes back he will play whatever with you or strop like the devil and Daddy will not play with you.

Bad examples I know, but if you give him the choice (which you know is no choice at all!!!) he thinks he has some part to play in the decision and may react better.

It needent be anything huge, perhaps whoever is going to the shop (or wherever) could chat with ds beforehand and choose an activity to do with ds on their return AS LONG AS ds does not strop. If he does strop, no story /puzzle/ football etc. If he is good, he gets an immediate reward