Is this normal 4 Yr old behaviour or am I failing?

[JerryGarcia]

Found a small bottle of cuticle oil and poured half of it out

Scribbled on the carpet in crayon/paint stick

Drew on walls a few minutes after being told not to

Smothered her and her sisters (DD2) faces in lipstick for the 3rd time despite being told not to

She's just turned 4 this month. She's constantly destroying things through her play and I'm getting so fed up of it. Is it normal for this age or am I doing something wrong? Feel I'm at the end of my tether and have jad a few days where I just want to walk out of the house. Am trying really hard not to be a scary/shouty/cross mum but I have to walk away when she does this stuff as I am constantly undoing things she has done.

I follow Dr Becky too. My child is five and it really works for us. She’s got a podcast too ‘Good Inside’.

Some of the replies about 'consequences' i.e. punishments (incl time outs) made me sad for the kids. So many young people are suffering from mental health issues due to not having adequate parent connection, after just having to be ‘good' out of fear for their own grown-ups. And of course a child who has to restrain themselves all the time at home will likely go and express all their big feelings outside of the home, often in a negative way.

Lots of helpful parenting books out there, written by people who research the latest and know well their subject. I’ve read these two recently:

The Book You Wish Your Parents Read
Disciple Without Damage

It's at the livelier end of normal, imho. How much is

() attention seeking
() willful mischief, understanding she shouldn't
() genuinely doesn't understand why she shouldn't
() no impulse control
?

You tell us.

I did time out for a little bit with older DD - wasn't working for me. Putting my DD on the stairs/in a chair, on her own, walking away from her and ignoring her, for having a meltdown didn't sit right with me. For this behaviour I would simply remove the items until she's old enough to learn about what his hers and what is yours although tbh my DD14 still seems to think all my belongings also belong to her 🤣

For meltdowns etc try staying with her, but not engaging, when she is quiet or not screaming/hitting, then engage. Basically reward for what is right and not punish for what is wrong at this age. I changed my approach as DD's got older and understood more obvs.

For things that you've mentioned the consequence would be helping me to clear it up, making it a reasonably long and boring task

I think there's a big difference between an actual consequence and a punishment. DD is 3 and I use the former but not the latter.

So, when she drew on the wall I want going to punish her by stopping her having pudding later or not going to go on a nice day out tomorrow. She's too little too connect those things, so it's just a punishment and not that effective.

But as a consequence, she had to stop what she was doing and clean it off. (With supervision and some help.)

It was boring because it took a fair amount of time and she wanted to do something else, so she didn't like it. She soon learned not to do it again.

I only use time outs if she's basically losing control. I take her to her room and I sit with her but we don't play. Again she doesn't like it (normally cries at first) but I just explain that she needs help calming down and that's what's happening now. I'm staying with her because it's my job to help her.

My 4yr old and 3yr old do not behave like this. Sorry

This is really helpful, thank you

My dd is the same age. She recently got the bathroom floor soaking wet (I was feeding the baby), so the consequence was she had to dry the floor with a towel. So in your daughter's case, consequence in my view would be washing paint off/lipstick off and no access to lipstick or paint unless supervised by you.
We don't do time outs. We try to go with natural consequences. 4 year olds are still going to push boundaries at times though.

My two would never do this sort of thing. We kept certain things out of reach including pens and paper. They have to ask if they want to do drawing etc.

We also said every time we got craft things out that walls are not for drawing on etc.

Finally, I do timeouts with my youngest. My eldest just isn't one to do naughty things.

For a time out to work you need to use sparingly. You need to give a warning first and be specific so it would go;

Child does specific action
Parent; please don't do specific action again
Child does specific action again
Parent: name, I've asked you not to do specific action. If you do specific action again you will be in a time out

Child does specific action again

Parent: ok - time out. Take them to their time out place and leave them for the same number of mins as their age. I tend to stay just out of sight so they know I'm close but not interacting with them. If they move, they go back to the spot and the clock resets.

When the time is complete I go in and sit next to her and ask her if she knows why she's in time out. She will tell me and I'll explain why that action isn't allowed. Then I ask for an apology and we kiss and cuddle and it's all over.