My whining toddler - I need some serious help please!

[Nomad248]

Hello everyone,
I have a daughter who is 3.3. My problem is all she does all day is whine and fake cry. I have really really had enough. She has been like this since about 18 months. I feel I try my hardest for her. We keep her very active, go outdoors lots, I really do connect with her. In fact, I have a no tech rule for myself when I’m with her. I play with her, she goes to preschool 3 days a week and we are very routine. She has a clear routine and she does like to stuck to a routine. If we was to forget anything, she’d tell us! I do feel like a failure though, I know it’s normal for toddlers to whine and it’s a way to get attention, they need to connect and have power. We always try our best to give her options throughout the day so she feels she has some autonomy over her day. I just feel like I feel I’m doing everything. I cannot think if anything else to try. What am I doing wrong?.. as soon as I get up I there here we go again and despite this I make a really big effort to have a good day, play lots. We aren’t overly strict but obviously we have boundaries and are always clear and consistent with these. Please help with any suggestions!

How do you usually react to her whining?

I hated the whining! Like nails on a blackboard.
My solution was to never reward a whiny request until it was expressed better. Each and every whiny request was met with ' say that again in a nice voice and I shall say yes'. Took a while but it helped.

I have a whiner too and it's really hard. I am also going down the "I'm sorry I can't understand you when you talk like that" route, and specific praise when she talks nicely,"that was a lovely voice you used."

I may be completely wrong but reading your post my first thought was 'are you giving her too much attention/is she 'spoilt'? Maybe she needs to learn to entertain herself for 5 minutes whilst you sit on your phone. As I say I might be completely wrong. Agree with PP saying 'I can't understand you when you use that voice.

Agree @thistimelastweek

Sometimes because the whining is so unbearable we end up giving them what they are whining about in the moment, in an attempt to stop the whining... but by doing so we inadvertently end up rewarding the whining, and perpetuating it!

My DD is a tiny bit older at 3 yes 7 months, and we have definitely been through this!!

So I tried to stay upbeat in my tone of voice, and calm, and quietly say something like ‘ mummy can’t really understand you if you ask like that’ or ‘mummy loves it when you ask nicely, can you say “please can I watch tv mummy” in your kind voice?’

Patience, repetition, try and always model the behaviour you want her to show you, and the tone of voice you prefer her to use

For us, in the last month things have really improved as her emotional intelligence has improved

Like everything it should be a phase, hang on in there!

I think it’s great that you make sure she gets lots of attention, maybe she does need some time where she doesn’t have your full attention though? I know you mentioned no tech- but a bit of tv can give you both a chance to have a bit of chill time.

I’m with you though, absolutely can’t stand whining. When my 2.5 DD gets whiney we just say ‘use your words’, and get her to tell us what’s wrong. We make sure she has lots of healthy(ish) snacks and isn’t tired as that makes things 100 times worse.

Thanks everyone for your advice. Going forward I’m going to be really firm with not giving into the whining and I have explained she needs to use her big voice, fingers crossed it’s soooo irritating!