Frequent intense tantrums in my 7-year-old, struggling to manage at home

[Newgardenspring]

I’m looking for some help. I am really struggling with my 7-year-old’s behaviour at the moment, particularly over the last few weeks and I’m looking for some help.

She has always had a temperament, but since turning seven her behaviour and tantrums have become much more frequent. It feels like we are living with an unexploded bomb, constantly worrying that saying the wrong thing (which can be anything!) will set her off.

Her tantrums are so intense. She can go from 0–60 in seconds, screaming and shouting at us. In the past these outbursts were fairly rare, but recently they’ve been happening almost daily. Once she’s in that state it’s really difficult to calm her down. We’ve tried comforting her, but she will scream and run away from us. If we give her space she will shout that she needs help to calm down, but when we go to help she screams at us to go away again. Recently the only thing that seems to work is ignoring it and waiting for her to burn herself out, but that can take quite a while. The triggers can be anything.

We’re generally a very close and loving household, but it’s been really hard lately.
It also seems to happen a bit at school, albeit nowhere near as bad as at home. She has good friends, but if something annoys her she can overreact and end up getting told off.

I am really worried that people won’t want to be around her if this continues as generally she is such a caring, funny, lovely little girl.

We’ve tried everything! consequences for bad behaviour, taking things away, praising good behaviour, everything ‘by the book’. At this point I am desperate and like we’ve run out of things to try. If she’s been great for a few days, for example before this morning, we treat her eg. take her out for breakfast but then she blows up straight after so it’s like we are fighting a losing battle. I’ve spoken to her a lot about how this isn’t an appropriate way to respond when she’s upset, and that we need to find better ways for her to calm down rather than exploding. But this has been going on for years and nothing seems to change. I have also made it clear that if she speaks to us in certain ways (sassy rude etc) we will not be responding and there will be consequences to her actions.

Has anyone been through something similar, or found something that helped?

How is she at school? Do you think she has any ND traits? This seems extreme to me and if you’ve tried all the obvious things I wonder if there is something else going on?

If we give her space she will shout that she needs help to calm down, but when we go to help she screams at us to go away again.
is she an only child? It all sounds very much she needs to be the one in control and in charge of everything?

I think you’ve realised that the usual discipline techniques aren’t working and it can be frustrating.

Can I ask if she also has tummy aches? My DD was very similar at age 7 and complained of stomach aches.

Two books you might find helpful are 10 Days to a Less Defiant Child and The Explosive Child. It doesn’t really matter which order you read them in, but the first one does have more strategies.

Try to remember that all of this big emotion is her telling you she’s not coping and some support might need to be put in place.

I’d start by doing this simple progress checker. Let us know if it says that she needs some support, let us know and we can advise you what to do next

Sounds identical to my almost 7 year old who is on the pathway for ADHD and ASD diagnosis

You could be describing my son who was diagnosed with ADHD at 9 but we saw these traits at around s 7/8. Especially that you can’t calm her down. I always say it’s like being strapped into a rollercoaster - once you’re on, you’re on until the end. It’s worth considering to see if any other elements fit - may not but some of the techniques for supporting ADHD kids might be helpful anyway.

Hungry? Tired? Overstimulated??