Have just really lost my temper with DS1

[terriblyguilty]

DS1 is 6. He has always struggled at bedtime, ever since he was a baby. Always been a nightmare to wind down and go to sleep.

Things had been getting better but recently they have slid back again.

We have told him that if he isn't tired at bedtime (8pm) then he can stay in his bed and read with a light on if he wants to. But he doesn't. He gets up, wonders around, climbs on windowsills - the lot. He keeps coming downstairs and sitting in the hall etc.

Last night, it was gone 10pm by the time he went to sleep. All day today he was tired and grumpy, behaviour was horrible.

And again tonight, he had a shower, did some quiet colouring, had a story with DH, a song with me. Bed time at 8:10 but still he keeps going. He came downstairs about 15 minutes ago for the umpteenth time and I really lost my temper. Really shouted at him.

I walked back up to bed with him but he got out of bed again. I ended up slamming his bedroom door and the door handle came off. I don't know what came over me .

If anyone else had done this to him I would have been livid - told them how aggressive, and frightening and downright counter productive it is. I feel awful.

I'm just at the end of my tether. I don't know what to do. I have pains in my chest I feel so worked up but I just don't know what to do.

Mambo, sad to hear you think this was a sign of him trying to wind you up. I'd say he was trying to get yuour attention and to tell you something. It is a completely different thing but your response is what makes it different.

He is on a waiting list to see a child therapist - I am aware there is something wrong - and I was sat there trying to cuddle and reassure him and while he lashed out - but not reacting negatively - I've tried every positive parenting tip there is and am able to mostly distract him - but if I miss the moment - there is no real getting through to him til he is screamed out.

Nonetheless he was stepping up pushing his boundaries deliberately - he knows he doesnt spit, he knows he doesnt throw things and he knows he doesnt hit.

Having reread my previous post - I should clarify - I don't think he was "tantrumming" to wind me up - he is way too far gone for that - but once I wouldn't react - then his upping the ante was to wind me up (didn't work just for the record I remained calm - I have trained myself).

Mambo, are you familiar with Aletha Solter's Tears and tantrums? I wonder if you have tried those approaches. Screaming out is probably a very good approach, I think, but she gives more tips.

NO - that's a new one to me - but tbh - I don't think anything is going to work unless we get him some help with the underlying issue - my theory is he is confused by something that has happened, he doesn't have the words to verbalised his confusion and he is pushing and testing to check his dad/I/siblings won't "leave" him or let him be taken away. Clearly we wouldn't but I don't think he knows that.

I have thought this for a while and yesterday he stated discussing how lonely he would be without mummy and daddy - I don't even know where he got word lonely from which made me think this even more.

Of course I could also just be over analysing and they are just tantrums - that would be the best case scenario!

Sorry OP - didn't mean to hijack

Sorry also to hijack, but this is so intriguing. I suspect that book will offer similar approaches to what many therapists use. THe book deals partly with the topic of children who have gone through trauma and how to help them deal with this and heal from it. You can also check their website www.awareparenting.com
Simply, this therapeutic approach has been extended to childhood in general, also to tantrums. She builds very good parenting advice around the biological fact that crying and expressing feelings has a healing effect if supported in a particular way.
Well, but whatever you do, I do wish you good luck!

Thanks - I will take a look - I'll look at anything!

Anything that may help even - sorry.

Maya thank you so much.

Sat with him at tea time and talked about why he couldn't sleep. He said it was boring. I told him that sometimes I don't sleep if I'm worried.

Put him to bed at 8, went for run. Came back and he was sitting at bottom of stairs. (DH was in lounge). Took him back to bed. He said he is frightened when he goes to bed because he's worried that we might die. His friend's baby brother died in his sleep (about a year ago) and what would happen if one of us did. Have had long chat about old age, illness and how it's important to try hard to stay alive. Now I'm spent!

Still not sure his sleep will be better and I now feel AWFUL for shouting at him.

But thank you, for making me look at it differently.

I am so glad that it helped. It is so very difficult to act with them as if they were little people just like us. I have often read various bits of advice that say - treat your children like your friends: you would not force your friend to eat, you would not shout at them when they say or do something wrong. And I have thought, yeah, sure, just my friends do not whine and demand things from me, and they certainly do not pour the contents of my drawers on the floor or hit me when upset.
Thing is, we probably have to think of children as very special friends from...not sure, Outer Space? Primeval Forest? Take your pick... :) Well, the point is, they deserve to be treated like special friends but we tend to forget that they are actually really, really unknowledgeable of the way our world works. We have been in it for several times longer and have mastered a fraction of it that is relevant to us. They have not yet and their responses to it are inevitably often inadequate. WHen we presume that they know but just do not do things the way that is most comfortable to us - then we will simply get a lot more whining and disrespectful demanding (because we treat them similarly, actually), and most importantly, we will lose their friendship in the longer run...
And sometimes adults are much worse in remembering how they should do things although they should know better....!!! I should start a thread regarding my DH's TOTAL inability to remember not to add random clothes to the washing load. Just found a pair of black pants in my all whites this morning..... :o