Stubborn 5 year old!!

[Lisamarie1181]

Hi sorry if this is in the wrong place but I really need advice about my niece.
Me and my sister have just started talking again after falling out 3 and a half years ago and she’s finally let me start seeing my niece again. I’m finally babysitting overnight this weekend for 2 nights and am really looking forward to it and so is my niece. The problem I have is that she has been very spoilt and is prone to tantrums if she doesn’t get her own way, such as throwing herself on the floor and wailing and no matter what I try, nothing can console her unless I give in to whatever it is she wants. Whenever I have encountered this I just wait it out until she cry’s herself to exhaustion but I’m worried what my neighbours will think. Am I doing the right thing? My dd is 18 now and I can’t remember her ever being this bad even at 2/3 years old. Also my niece will only eat chips and chicken nuggets for dinner or the occasional sausage. That’s it. No veg or fruit passes her lips as she flat out refuses to eat them or even try. Any ideas as to how I can entice her with anything healthy? She is quite overweight for her age and we can only just pick her up and I worry about her health. She also still uses a dummy at home and drinks juice out of a baby’s bottle to get to sleep.I know my sister would be very happy if I can get her out of these habits, she says she’s tried but nothing works. Any advice would be much appreciated thanks.

You only have her for two nights so maybe need to make a decision if you want to try and change anything as whatever you do there is likely to be a battle.

Are you sure your sister would be happy if you trained your niece to be a perfect child? I think the chances are she would resent you big time, but that is probably not going to happen in two nights so don’t worry.

Since you are only going to have your niece for a night or two and you don’t know her very well then I think you need to bite the bullet and accept the chicken nuggets , the dummy and the bottle. (Though I think my house might have run out of juice at night). I think I would find it harder to deal with the tantrums, I think ignoring them is the right thing to do, but bear in mind that she could be upset at the new babysitting arrangement so I think you need to ignore the tantrum while being sympathetic to the upset if you see what I mean.

I think your 18 year old could be your secret weapon if she can bear it. Most five year olds love the attention of an older cousin and will emulate their behaviour so seeing your dd for example eating healthy food, behaving calmly, brushing her teeth before bedtime etc could eventually show your niece other ways to behave.

It's lovely that you want to try and help your sister and niece but it's not really your job to sort out these problems, and even if you did try, if you only have her for the occasional overnight stay, it's not going to make much difference. She needs consistent boundaries and encouragment to try different foods from her main caregiver.
As far as food is concerned, my nieces love an indoor picnic whilst watching a film when they come for a sleepover. You could put her familiar nuggets and chips out but also a few other tempting bits and pieces and just let her serve herself with whatever she fancies. Even if it's just the nuggets and chips it's still a start, as she's seen different foods, seen someone else enjoying them and maybe next time she might be tempted to try a tiny bit of something.

Thankyou for your comments and your advice. I think I worded my OP wrong, of course I don’t expect this to happen over two nights nor do I expect her to be a ‘perfect child’. My sister knows I have posted this and is hoping I can give her some tips. She’s hoping my niece will maybe be abit more experimental with me and my daughter in regards to her eating. As for the tantrums who knows when they will stop but I was just making sure I was doing the right thing. My dd is by far and never has been perfect and I don’t even know what a perfect child could be, mine still has mini tantrums at 18!! I’m just asking for advice not just for me it is for my sister too. She has asked me to help her as she says she’s at her wits end particularly with the tantrums and the eating problem that she has. Her GP has expressed concerns over my niece’s weight and eating habits. She sometimes refuses to eat anything but crisps and will cry and cry if she doesn’t have 3 packets in one go. My sister is quite ill at the at the moment and isn’t able to take her out so I try to take her to parks, etc for exercise but she says her legs hurt. I’m honestly not trying to change her as a child, she is who she is, my sister has asked me for help and I thought I’d come here for advice like I have before.

Honestly, your sister just needs to remember that she is the parent and put her foot down. Ideally, she'd have done that from the beginning, because it will be much harder now.

Is sounds like she may have some additional needs, SPD, ASD and ADHD come to mind - it’s easy to say to ‘be more strict’ but it’s not as straight forward as that.