Really struggling with 3 year old

[Lafi123]

I'm hoping this stage will end eventually, I have a 3 1/2 year old DS and since he turned 2 & 9 months till now it’s just been so difficult to manage his tantrums/behaviour most times. He has had a lot of changes in the last 9 months with new baby, moving nursery etc, so I know those can have an affect. But I’m really struggling with the day to day where the smallest almost non existent thing set him off, and then he gets into a strop turning into a tantrum and these are so frequent. Example he threw a tantrum today because he wanted his 9 month baby brother to ride his small bike which obvs he can’t. I have a 5 DD but can’t remember if it was this bad. Please let me know when things got better for you?

Bump

My 4 year old still has a few tantrums. However I can now get through to him most of the time. He'll understand that I'm holding his hands and take a deep breath. I can usually get him down from them quicker, DH still struggles.

I feel like my DS is really sensitive and almost anything can trigger him, otherwise he is really sweet, likes to be involved in day to day activities and very curious. I’m just struggling with the tantrums over anything and trying to keep the boundaries without getting worked up

I swear it must just be personality with some kids OP. My nearly 4 year old has never tantrummed and if he has a moan and a cry about something daft he gets over it quickly. I swear some kids just have the energy for throwing themselves about and screaming whereas my son can’t be bothered.

A friend of ours has a child the same age (almost to the day) and he’s forever throwing himself about and screaming the place down over the oddest things. My son looks at him like he’s grown a second head. His parents seem to broadly do the same things as us. It must be a mix of development and personality. You can see that comparison with your older child. I think you have to just dig deep to appear completely unbothered, and don’t pander to the tantrums. Let him have his emotional moment and get it out. When they’re in that crazy place that some kids go to you can’t reason with them anyway. Best to ride it out and speak to him after the fact about the behaviour.

Don’t let him get what he wants behaving like that but maybe think of ways to give him what he wants in a different way- could you hold baby brother on the bike for a couple of seconds and be all “hooray! Look he’s doing it! He loves your bike. Thank you bike brother!” And then say “that’s fun let’s get teddy/batman/whatever to ride your bike.” He’s only little and just has mad ideas that he wants to try out. Usually there’s a way to let them try things safely and then distract on to something else while explaining “baby brother can’t ride it properly like big brother, but he loved having a turn of your bike.” Sometimes you have to sort of channel their madness and not always go to “no” and “you can’t do that.”

It can definitely be a personality thing. My DD6 has be very on edge and the slightest thing puts her in tears. Whereas DS4 gets angry rather than emotional things like crying.

I was going to say that they eventually grow out of it but I think some adults still strop like pre schoolers 😂

My DD tantrummed from maybe 21 months and has only recently calmed down now she's 3.5 years.

Didn't stop her having a massive strop last week when she wanted to stand in dog poo...