How do I handle this- extreme toddler tantrums

[jellyfrogsandcustard]

Dd is 2.5 and has always been a handful, very lively and wilful. When she gets really wound up she bites, sometimes drawing blood and headbangs/slaps her face. Had meeting at nursery as they flagged it up and once meeting took place nursery pretty much said they've got it under control their end (despite her still biting/attempting to bite other children ) I've been referred to family support which is embarrassing as I wouldn't say I'm a bad parent. There are so many people I see who put much less effort in but don't struggle half as much as me.

Today I went to the park with dm and kids. We all planned to go back to dm but dd kept hitting baby sister in the pushchair. I told her if she continued that I would take her toys away. She continued so toys were taken. She continued still so when we got to dms I stayed outside with her whilst everyone went in and explained that we weren't going in as she was hurting and it's not acceptable. Waited a bit and said we could go in if she was gentle. When we did go in there were several instances of throwing/hitting so after the usual removal of toys, time away from people I said the next time she was rough that we would be leaving. Upshot is that we ended up leaving but not even that seemed to bother her. Dm said she didn't feel it was an appropriate consequence but I just don't know what else to try and she isn't forthcoming with advice herself! Quite often dd offers up her toys in favour of playing up. Time out increases the aggression to the point I have been bleeding and had hair pulled out.

Has anyone got advice as to what I can do. I feel so frustrated and worn down by it. I so want to be a good parent but feel I'm getting it all wrong.

Have you tried reward/ distraction rather than punishment/ removal? So get in the pram and you can have this, if she starts kicking off with sibling 'stop that- here have this' gets bored with it, 'Look what I found, look what it does!' Etc. Once some kids get in the 'zone' removing something or trying to fight it just pisses them off further and then they kick back against it. I had an endless supply of random items and little packets/ frozen drinks/ sticks/ giant leaves we'd found previously about my person at one point for when we were out.

Try speaking to a HV, they might be able to offer you some support. My DD was playing up after DD2 was born and they arranged for a nursery nurse to come visit. I felt utterly crap as I'm a teacher, can handle 30 eight year olds but not my own two year old. The best advise they offered was rewarding every bit of positive behaviour- I made her a chart with 9 squares and every time she's been good/kind, had a good day, listened well etc I gave her a sticker (made them reusable so I just blutac them on). When the chart is full she gets a treat from the treat box - I raided pound shops for the kind of tat that she loves 😂 It's worked, she's so much better. It's hard trying to be positive about the smallest thing but I've become much better at it.

Tried distraction, sometimes it works but when she is angry she is focussed. It's like she changes, I can tell whether it'll work by the sounds she makes!

To be honest I haven't tried a reward chart as I'm not sure how to implement it. She's not bothered about stickers. Her one maim interest is a particular cartoon and she pretty much exclusively plays with those toys which would become quite expensive! The only other thing that may work would be chocolate/sweets but I'm sure I read that you shouldn't use food as reward/punishment. I might try a sticker chart relating to her favourite characters and see if it works. So how does it work? Earn them for particular things then lose them for bad behaviour? What about when out for the day do they make the connection easily enough when they can't physically see that they've lost a sticker?

I made DD a Trolls one as she loves them. If we're out I tell her when she's earned one and then we put them up when she gets home. As I teacher we're told never to take a reward away but I have taken the odd one off for really bad behaviour and told her. Like your DD she doesn't care about time out or if I take a toy away so it's the only sanction that actually works. I've only done it a few times though.
You could always get treat size sweets? I know rewarding with food isn't the done thing but if you're not really against it then it could work short term? I think the first couple of days I tried to make sure DD got the chart filled up in a day so that it got her attention but now I make it take 2-3 days!

If you make an A5 chart you could always take it with you if you're out? Or alternatively could you thread fancy beads on a string? Easier to take with you maybe?

IMO she might be a little young for the kind of delayed positive rewards being discussed here, although, the beads on a bracelet idea is a good one. We used a clear plastic container and those sparkly pom poms with DS. We carried them around with us and any good behaviour earned a pom pom which he put in the little box. When it was full he got a treat. He was well over 3yo when this worked best, though.

As she's so little I would simply go OTT with positive comments when she's been good "that was SO KIND! what a LOVELY GIRL you are being today" (with applause, hugs and kisses, high-5s etc.). This is working well with ds2 who isn't yet 2.

Reward the good, the sticker chart is a mark of her achievements not her failures. It should be getting fuller.
Have a target - x stickers in a day = slightly bigger sticker
x slightly bigger stickers = special treat/dessert/toy

If she's earned a sticker, and then you take it away it becomes negative.

If you build them up, it helps you and her to focus on the good bits. You get a reminder for yourself of her being good as more and stickers are earned.

Look for her being good, even minor stuff and focus on the positives, praising her, giving her lots of good attention.
Distracting her from the bad and removing her to calm down in a safe place, then once she's calm find something good (no matter how small) to focus on the positive.

At 2 she's old enough to have worked out that a dramatic tantrum is probably the best way to take attention from the baby and get it on her. She needs more positive attention and the minimum negative attention possible.

I work with children with special needs and we exclusively do positive reinforcement to manage challenging behaviour. Our pupils choose an item to work towards and then receive tokens on their little token board when they behave well or get their work right. They then receive their item of choice when they fill up their board. This item may be one crisp, or one chocolate button, but they have many opportunities a day to earn items of their choice. We use Velcro so we can take the tokens off and start again. If they do have challenging behaviour, we don’t remove tokens or punish in any way. If they are hurting others, then we block the behaviour using our body but don’t provide any attention (so avoid eye contact and don’t speak). It sounds like her behaviour might be to get your attention, so providing attention for positive behaviour, even if it has to be something really tiny initially may work wonders. Once she is behaving better, you can reduce the praise you give, but initially you’ll end up annoying yourself by praising every little thing.

Positive reinforcement was the route I had gone down but perhaps I'm not doing enough. I do the usual 'good sharing', 'nice and gentle' etc but maybe I need to really lay it on thick. I have always blocked hitting and say "I won't let you hit" or something to that effect. I didn't like the idea of taking away the earned stickers do I'm pleased that's not really how it works. I've struggled with the fact that all the positive praise didn't seem to have any effect on the negative behaviour. We could be having a lovely time and outt of the blue it can start and it has neen a problem since before baby. I think some of it is attention but other times she will be in another room and come in with a mark on her or stop mid play and run to the opposite end of the room to hit me which I just don't understand why. Nursery have commented on her unpredictability and that they can't take their eyes off of her in case she bites.

I'll have a look into making a chart and be more conscious of praise, hopefully it will work.

Hopefully she will realise mummy and the rest of the family really pay me lots of attention when I am playing nicely but completely ignore me when I do X or Y, so it is boring cos nobody talks to me when I do X or Y

It will take lots of effort from the family especially when she is sitting nicely quietly playing or looking at a book or doing a puzzle but if she realises that doing that makes others happy and get a sticker/star/smiley face on the chart etc

Also, try not to talk about her behaviour while she is in the house in earshot

Have you any other concerns about her development? How's her speech and understanding? Does the behaviour you describe tend to happen more in some situations/environments than others?

Read this

www.handinhandparenting.org/article/when-your-toddler-hits-you/

I know this is a Mumsnet cliche but my DS was like that and turned out to be Autistic.
You said something about sounds she makes. Is she talking? What is she
Like with food?

I was also going to suggest Autism, based on her obsession with one particular cartoon and no other toys. If she’s delayed with speech, the lashing out may be a sign of frustration that she can’t make herself understood.

I've been referred to family support which is embarrassing as I wouldn't say I'm a bad parent. There are so many people I see who put much less effort in but don't struggle half as much as me.

You don't have to be a 'bad parent' to get a referral to get support for your child. You wouldn't say that if your child got referred to a SaLT or an OT or an audiologist or a physio, etc. Take any support offered. Even if it is a course - Promoting Positive Parenting or suchlike. Sometimes just chatting to other parents and sharing ideas really helps. Please don't feel it is some sort of punishment for you.

I'm going through exactly the same thing OP, my DD is making me
So upset she's only 2 and she is always hitting me and having tantrums and when I tell her off she finds it funny, honestly don't know what to do anymore feel so sad and I'm always in tears when she has tantrums, hope your little girl gets better for you

Thank you all.

She didn't really speak until around 2 but now nursery comment on how good she is with language (using more advanced sentence structures/word endings) They have said they think some could be jealousy and that the rest is because she's so smart and getting frustrated with not being challenged enough (She knows all shapes, letters, colours, numbers up to 40 etc)

I'm definitely going to praise her more for general good behaviour that I probably take for granted. And I have been guilty in the past of discussing her behaviour, I may think I'm being quiet but perhaps not enough.

As for the autism comments and the sound she makes; She makes this strange high pitched kind of shrieking noise usually when she gets bad, we always joke it's her war cry! It usually gives me time to move out of the way! I was worried at one point but less so now. I raised a concern to nursery as she struggled in busy environments and intermittently walks on her toes but we recently went to a fayre and had no real trouble and SEN worker at nursery has no concerns at all. The older she gets the less frequent the violent meltdowns seems to be. It now seems more like lots of lower level toddler type hittung biting tantrums rather than the daily blood drawing type. At one point I was covered in bruises weekly but it is much less frequent now.

Lots of food for thought, can definitely see where I could improve. I'm thinking of trying to get some regular time just the two of us to see whether that helps.