13 month old tantrums

[OctopusLimbs]

My 13 month started throwing tantrums a few weeks ago. If I can catch them in time and distract her they aren't so bad, but sometimes (the last few days probably once per day) they just turn into these epic tantrums where she screams and screams and won't stop. They are triggered by tiny things. If it is near nap time she ends up screaming herself to sleep, otherwise the only way to stop is to take her out of the house to the shop or something, which I can't always do. If I don't take her out she honestly just doesn't stop no matter what I try. She is fine the rest of the time, and so far doesn't do it at nursery and doesn't do it when we are out and about. She doesn't do it as much with her dad either.

Is this normal? And how should I respond? She has always been very strong willed, but this is something else entirely! If she is like this now, I dress to think what the terrible twos will be like.

It all sounds very normal and I wouldn’t bother trying to distract or take her out. In fact I’d ignore her completely and go and make a cuppa.

How’s her speech? I found that once they could get themselves understood better the tantrums subsided.

She is very vocal but the only recognisable word she says is "hello" so that might be partly it.

I did actually try leaving her to it earlier and she did seem to calm a bit better. I felt so guilty though, I guess because through the smaller baby stage I never would have left her to it if she was crying. But I guess this is different, and picking her up doesn't calm her anyway.

I always found with mine the more I tried to calm them, the bigger the tantrum would get. I would smile sometimes and say “has that ever got you what you wanted” but at 13 months she may not understand that anyway.

Have you thought of using a few small signs with her? So say when yiu ask her if she wants a drink yiu just sign drink? She may start using them back and it should ease her present quandary of not being able to echoes herself adequately 🙂

God mine did this. Still does but nowhere near as bad at 20 months. He used to bang his head off the floor or wall or whatever he could find that was hard (he liked our reaction I think hope!) there isn’t much you can do other than ignore / reassure it’s hard going but does get easier once they are able to make themselves understood. Now I’m waiting for the threenage years to appear 😀

Thank you! I definitely also find the more I try and calm the worse it gets! So will try ignoring. The signing idea is good - I will try it! At the moment she does a lot of pointing, but often I can't work out what she is pointing at. Or I do know what she is pointing at, but there is a very good reason I have put it out of reach!

I think that's pretty normal. Nothing to worry about as it should just wain as they age. Been there before :)

The best way is to ignore for some of the days and pay attention on other days. Feed the tantrum on lets say 2 days a week and ignore the rest of the days in the week but not two consecutive days.

So long as she’s not going to hurt herself just walk away

Totally know how you are feeling my daughter was exactly the same a few months ago. It was really worrying me!!! She's now 16 months and in addition to pointing is now also nodding and shaking her head and has quite a few words which makes a massive difference. Words like yay, down, go, door etc are making things easier. She also points to her mouth when she wants food and says mmmmmm when she wants milk or drinks. It's just frustration before they can communicate as they must just think we don't listen to them.

I am taking more time to explain what we are doing now as well as I'm conscious she is nodding or shaking eg I will say right let's go upstairs now and get you dressed, are you ready etc I think this helps as I am not taking her by surprise. Can't remember now if I did as much of this before she could nod or shake her head so may be worth doing that.

We still get tantrums but they are more focused now - they are more likely when I don't let her do what she wants because she's not allowed if that makes sense or if I take something off her.

Don't despair as it's perfectly normal even if it is very trying and at times embarrassing!

IF she has a dummy then give it to her. Too young to reason/bribe/talk down if distraction has failed. Both of mine were like this at that age to the point they forgot why they were crying. Dummy/boob would calm them down instantly and we would go about our day. As they get older and have more understanding you can reason/bribe/talk down a bit more.