Keep losing patience with 4 year old - help me get it back!

[YoniBottsBumgina]

I'm finding him really frustrating at the moment. If I try to do something nice with him, he ruins it by getting stroppy, too overexcited, or trying to put his own overcomplicated rules in. If I try to do something by myself he has to come and sabotage it. And then the constant repeating himself, demands of "Look at me, look at ME!!" because he wants to tell me something and he can't fathom that I might be able to hear him while I'm looking at something which is actually important that I don't stop looking at it, like, say, driving or cooking.

I just feel like my temper/patience is really short with him. When he was younger it was easier to spend time with him or if he came to see what I was doing for example I could get him to help with something and it felt vaguely educational, even if if he wasn't actually helping. Now he doesn't listen OR help, in fact just makes stuff worse so it seems totally pointless to do anything with him.

Trying to do things that he wants to do like painting or cooking or board games or whatever starts off fun but then he gets silly, or makes up new rules which are really overcomplicated.

And then if I try to do something on my own he comes up and starts licking me, poking me with little things, kicking my chair etc, trying to "have a hug" in weird positions and WON'T LEAVE ME ALONE. I can't even put him in his room any more to get some space as he won't stay there.

But anyway, I don't know if that is the issue, the issue is I would like to be able to do things with him, either fun things for him or useful learning/teaching type things like sorting the washing out or whatever without me getting so annoyed that it seems not worth it. I'm sure it's me :( other parents of four year olds seem to be able to do nice things with their DC without shouting all the time. And I feel awful, it must be horrible for him to be stuck with a mum who doesn't even seem to like him and gets annoyed at him all of the time. (Obviously I don't but it feels like it to me, must be worse for him.)

I can't go on like this! Does anyone have any advice?

I totally understand and sympathise. My dd is nearly four and we have times like this. What turned it round for me, and I keep going back to it frequently, is a book called 'Calmer, Easier, Happier Parenting'

It's available on kindle too. An instant result for us, although, as I said, I do have to keep revisiting.

Thanks :). I must admit I keep seeing that mentioned on here but I tried to read the webchat before and found it really smug. I'll have another look though.

Oh god, I could have written this! Hating myself for getting in a shouting/grumpy rut with him; I know he's playing up because he's bored, but then I feel if I take him out it's like 'rewarding' him for the earlier bad behaviour. I'm being a really crap parent - and six weeks to go ......

Off to look for that book.

Hmm, well, read through the webchat and didn't really find anything of any substance at all. You're not supposed to tell off ever but descriptively praise everything. Well my descriptive praise right now would be "Oh well done DS, you're not running naked down the street, I'm so glad you're in the same house as your bed at least. Maybe next we could attempt the same floor?"

And on the website "Never ask twice" well what are you supposed to do the second time? If her advice is the one I keep reading where you're supposed to gently take the little darling's hand and lead them to the activity you want them to do while saying "Thank you for letting me know you needed help darling!" then clearly my child is some sort of DEMON and shouldn't exist. Great. Thank you.

You're not alone!I could have written that yesterday.Today was better.Mine is nearly 4 and a day with him is a mixture of thinking he is lovely and fun one minute and completely frustrating the next.It doesn't help that he's got 2 younger brothers so we don't get much time alone.
I am quite a patient person but I often find myself shouting at him.I usually apologise afterwards and when I have done he says sorry for being so naughty and is quite sweet.
I think most normal people must get frustrated with 3-4 year olds so am just going to ride it out.He is already much more reasonable than he was a year ago.
I don't know about you but I find mine is much better when he's outdoors so I'm going to try and get him out as much as possible over the summer,make sure he never gets too hungry and let him watch TV when he's getting tired.
Not read any parenting books but at this age they seem to crave attention but are also testing the boundaries and need some consistent ground rules.

Mine was way more reasonable when he was 2. Maybe I just understood him better then?

Yes being outdoors definitely helps. But I can't be outdoors with him all the time when I need to do stuff in the house or just am having a crappy day where I want to sit around and do nothing (I know this isn't an option with DC but, well, get as close to it as possible!)

Yoni, my 4 yo is so similar and my patience equally thin ! We also have the added complication of a nearly 2 yo who is not a very reliable sleeper. I tried Calmer, Easier, Happier, but it is not paricularly handy when DS ( the 4 yo) pushes his sister ( the younger one) down the stairs. " Well done DS, you didn' t actually kill her".

He starts school in September, a few days before his 5 th birthday, neither he or I can wait.

My DS was absolutely foul to me in the summer before he went to school (and he is a laidback lovely boy). I went from worrying about him being too young for school, as he is a summer baby, to being desperate for him to start . He's just about to turn 7 now and a really pleasant boy.

My DD is now 4yrs and sometimes I really find it hard going. She seems to want so much of me, full attention "mummy, come closer to me, I want to say something". And then she can't remember what the crucially important thing was...

Oh well, works for me.

Hope you find a way to work it out.

Thank you Judy :) I must say I'm glad it works for somebody!

Rhinestone my DS keeps doing that. Insisting I come upstairs, look at him, acknowledge every syllable, before he can tell me the same thing that he's just told me four times while trying to get my attention fully enough.

I do pay him attention honest

I am EXTREMELY heartened to hear you have an older child who has come through this and is now nice and normal.

I was exactly where you are a couple of years ago - I felt horrible as I found the constant demands for attention and non-stop talking at me so draining. The summer before he started school was hideous and I was at the end of my tether by halfway through the six weeks. Once he was settled in school he was better and now at six he is lovely to be around. I can't believe we've had a whole week of the school holidays already and can see them passing in a flash and I want them to last this year.

That's encouraging too! Thank you :)

The attention seeking does get better when they get older and get more satisfaction from their playmates/teachers etc. By the time they are obsessing over the latest text from their girlfriend or following their favourite actor on Twitter, you will be the one pleading for attention.

You also don't have to listen to the interminably long jokes with no point whatsoever. If ds at 13 tells a funny story, chances are it will be a funny story with a real punchline- and it will reach this punchline before midnight.

My DS starts school on 9th September and I am very much looking forward to it.. He is a bloody nightmare at the moment. So glad it's not just me.

my 4 year old dd is like this too, I can't wait til shes at school!

Cory, Im so glad the jokes get better, dd's joke at the minute is
'knock knock'
'who's there?'
'Cabbage soup'

Haha, DS loves knock knock jokes. I tried to teach him the format of them so we ended up with this:

Knock Knock
Who's there?
William
William who?
Move out of the way, William!

(Instead of Will-ya-move out of the way!)

He's not even going to school in September although we will be with DP and he will be going to a German nursery instead so I am sure he will be sufficiently tired/challenged by it.

Fuzzy, that is heartening to hear. My DS has drivemy to tears twice in the last 24 hrs, and I walked out of the house in my PJs this morning. Got in the car and started the engine.... I just don' t know how to look after him anymore.

I have twins that are 5 in two weeks. My daugher is very demanding one minute (and has learned to copy MY line of, "I'm TALKING TO YOU....!!" which I use when I've asked them to come to the dinner table for the seventieth time when they're playing their DSs) and then very solitary the next. It's very difficult because sometimes I don't feel I'm giving her enough attention and the next, when I sit down and engage, she waves me away!

My son, however, does that whole 'making up new rules to a game' thing and they are the most convoluted, ridiculous rules that he simply HAS to explain in MINUTE detail before we can even consider starting. These rules then OBVIOUSLY "don't count" in any instance where he is not winning said game and we have to go through the reasons why in THIS instance, the rules are like THIS...

I have, on the last few weekends and since the holidays started, put a ton of toys out on our decking/patio and filled things with water and given them chalk and left them to play whilst I potter in the garden/garage where they can see me. So long as they CAN see me, they just play themselves and barely acknowledge my presence.

Then, I think, "aha, I'll just go in the kitchen" (the kitchen door opens onto the decking, it's like three feet away from where they are playing) and do the ironing. I rarely even get the ironing board out before, "mummy.. mummy... mummy.....". So I go back out again and.... they don't need me, they're "busy"!!!

I curse inwardly and think, "only a few hours until they're in bed". Once they go to bed, it's MY TIME. I am currently catching up on all the series I've missed since they were born - Dexter, Game Of Thrones, Breaking Bad, Mad Men etc.... and I just look forward to that every evening as my "treat" for managing to not go insane all day!!!

I do have days where I think, "All I've done all day is shout at you..." but without fail, they cuddle up for bedtime stories, tell me they love me and ask if we can do the same things tomorrow as we did today so... try to remember that kids live in the moment and forget easily those moments when you DO have a bit of a yell after the millionth, "muuuummmyyyy!".

The time for doing things together is fast approaching (I get the feeling your son is at the younger end of 4 rather than almost 5 like mine?) - mine will sit and paint clay things or make money boxes/televisions/aquariums out of cereal boxes for a good hour or so now before wandering off (and leaving all the clearing up to me!!) and that's good enough for me.

It's as important that they learn to amuse themselves and be self-sufficient as it is that they do things with a parent/adult, IMO.

Remember, you're NOT a bad mother. Bad mothers wouldn't care or worry about things like this. You do. That says everything.

No, he's 5 in October. We occasionally get some projects to do together - we're making a papier mache minion out of a McDonald's cup currently and he got the latest Octonauts magazine which has instructions to make a gup out of a cardboard box which we're also planning to do. And he enjoys cutting and sticking (much trauma whenever I throw anything away as "I was going to cut that!!"). I have found that banning him from TV is an effective sanction and the promise of a star (after 5 stars he can buy a magazine, or 10 stars for a DS game) is a good motivator.

I sometimes think it would be easier with 2! Because he's an only child I am the only person he has to play with/tell jokes to/show everything/etc etc. I realise he would still want to show and tell me things if he had a sibling, but I think it would lessen the constant demands to play...

No it doesn't Yoni, it just means that there are two people demanding your attention, and the added bonus of sorting out squabbles.