8yr old crying all the time!

[Wigeon]

DD (year 4) bursts into tears at the slightest thing, and has done for quite a while. Some recent examples:

She realised at breakfast that she will miss 30 mins of the school's STEM-themed cross-curricular week for her instrumental lesson.

We said she either had to have A or B for dinner and no, she couldn't have C.

She was frustrated while practicing her instrument.

Her sister did something mildly annoying.

It's probably at least once a day, and often more frequently. Full on tears and bawling! Obviously if she's genuinely hurt herself, or something genuinely bad has happened we comfort her, but tbh it's happening so often and over frequently trivial things, that we often end up telling her off for crying (again)! We also try ignoring her but she often is right there (eg at the dinner table) and she then starts complaining that we're ignoring her (on top of whatever started the crying off in the first place).

Her school has done some good PSHE on resilience, getting things in perspective, managing emotions etc etc, so we try to remind her of that and the techniques they've talked to the children about, but in the moment when she's wailing she's not exactly in the mindset to listen.

Any one else got a bawler? Any tips?

No help but I could've written your post.

Yesterday it was because I said she'd need a bath in the morning rather than at night as we had a busy day planned.

Or because she can't have 2 treats

Or because I've asked her to stop annoying her sister.

Mostly silly, trivial things.

I think ours is mostly a jealousy/attention seeking behaviour due to the big age gap and no longer being centre of attention.
It just winds me up though.

That was me age 8. I was a perfectionist and couldn't handle feeling that I hadn't quite got everything right. I'll be honest it possibly was routed from being somewhat precocious so used to get praise left right and centre for reading early, playing instrument etc. Once it was just expected I missed the attention. Might not be that of course but I'd just remind her she's loved, don't take the mickey out of her (like my mum did )and just keep the boundaries in place. Im tough as old boots now also might be growth spurt and she may just be getting overtired like toddlers do. Make sure extra curricular stuff isn't too overwhelming and she has lots of downtime.

Could be.

Have you tried ignoring her? I agree that at her age it is definitely attention seeking and manipulative behaviour as I presume she doesn’t do this at school. Just ignore her and if it’s before school remind her once to get into the car or let her get late and tell the teacher what she’s doing.

It's definitely worse when she's tired, but it still happens a lot when she is perfectly rested! Eg she had a quiet Sunday yesterday, went to bed on time, slept for I think 11 hours, and still cried this morning! I don't think it's hormones as it's been going on years probably. It might be attention-seeking (yes, she doesn't do it at school), particularly competing with her articulate and annoying older sister (almost 3 year age gap).

We do try ignoring her where possible, but when she does it with her sister around it makes her sister annoyed, then the big sister winds her up more, or starts wingeing at her to stop crying, which obviously makes it worse and it just escalates (then the little one sometimes hits the bigger one because she's intentionally winding her up, at which point we obviously can't ignore it!).

I'm also torn between thinking I shouldn't ignore it - that all behaviour is communication and at that moment in time she is annoying / upset / frustrated to the point of tears, so I should emphathise and she would calm down - versus thinking it's attention-seeking and I should ignore it! I think "How to talk so kids will listen" advocates the emphathising point on the basis that she is feeling that emotion at that time and dismissing her genuine emotion won't help. But when it's sometimes several times a day, over properly trivial (to me!) things, it's hard to emphathise!

But when it's sometimes several times a day, over properly trivial (to me!) things, it's hard to emphathise

Exactly this.
It's like the boy who cried wolf. I find myself rolling my eyes thinking here we go again.

I actually think you shouldn’t emphasise and be really honest with her and remind her that every time she cries when she could use her words, means when she actually does cry over something big nobody will want to help her.