Not exactly sure what I'm asking here, but my 4 year old seems to suddenly be going through a 'difficult' phase. She has always been an 'easy' child - and I mean, very easy. Goes to bed and doesn't get back up/out, has slept through the night for years, you would usually count to 3 and she would come on 1 - the 'compliant' child.
Over the past couple of weeks it is sometimes like that, she is lovely, and sometimes like I have a different child. Examples..
1 - took her to a department store to get school uniform, she refused to get out of the car and said she wanted to go home / once in the store she started racing around like a nutter, being really silly hiding under racks of clothes, running off any time we wanted to hold clothes up to her, spinning round so we couldn't do it properly / she then out of nowhere ran up, kicked me hard in the shin and ran off - at that point I yelled in front of the whole shop, did a '123' and made her sit on a spot on the floor, I was so embarrassed
2 - my mother came round to help her try on the school uniform to check what fits - she knew this was coming as I gave her advance notice all morning. It meant she had to stop her game for 20 minutes and she would get a treat (ice cream) later in the day if she co-operated - she would not cooperate, not even with my mum and she is usually good with her. Tried to run off, jump up on furniture, flailing around / when we tried to get clothes onto her made her arms stiff so we couldn't bend them at the elbows, sat down or stood up when she should do the opposite.. it was a nightmare. My mother was suprised, has never seen her like that. I told her would lose the ice cream.. after at least 3 warnings she lost the ice cream.. and kept going.
These are just 2 examples, but it's like this rebellious hyperactivity. Even when we are giving her advance notice, explaining what we need and how much time it will take, and what reward she will get for good behaviour, and trying to be encouraging and kind. I end up using my strict voice, then a stronger one, then shouting, then yelling. In the case of [2] when she was flailing around she hit my mum in the face (by accident). I grabbed her and slapped her on the forearm - and that was such a shock she stopped - and cried, and I felt horrible.
I should say that DD is due to start school this year, so just over 4.5. The only change in our circumstances recently is that she was on holiday and with me non-stop for 2 weeks, then went back to nursery for 1 week. She has been going to nursery since she was a baby so I can't see how that should make a difference.
Has anyone experienced this with their DC around the same age, especially a DD and what is your 'method' for managing behaviour? I am a LP and very little contact/support from any family and work full time, so it is really going to be down to me to figure it out.
We have tried star charts once or twice before but she doesn't seem to care about them.
DD does get quite a lot of what I call treats e.g. ice cream, trip to park, little toy, bit of chocolate or whatever. I am wondering whether she should have to work harder to 'earn' these - but where I'm really struggling is when she is in the middle of the bad behaviour and the threat of their removal doesn't seem to make any difference to her.
Thanks x