Is this level of aggression and impulsivity normal for a two-year-old?

[Karma1387]

Looking for a bit of advice and reassurance. We have been having increasing difficulty with my 2 year old at home. Lack of concentration, impulsivity (literally launching himself over the side of furniture), increased tantrums over nothing at all, no desire to actual play with anything just destroy, getting physical towards himself when angry (pulling his mouth with his fingers or biting his hands)

The biggest behaviour that seems to be shifting on is his interaction with other children. He was so so lovely to everyone constantly hugging other children (a bit too much to he honest). This is starting to turn and has become more aggressive. We had a few instances at soft play where we had to redirect or remove him but now he has had an incident at nursery where he purposefully walked up to another child and shoved them in the stomach into a fiece of furniture.

We did have another baby in March but besides lack of impulse control (will rock the cot super rough or will lay next to his brother lovely and then suddenly stomp on him). He has actually been lovely with him and asked to see him and hold him and brings him his favorite teddys etc so unsure if the baby is the reason for the behaviour getting worse.

Is all of this normal 2 year old behaviour? We are going to ask GP to do allergy testing as I read food allergies can cause issues with behaviour but I could use reasurrace that all his behaviour is fairly normal for a 2 year old.

Any advice or experience appreciated.

What do you have in the garden for him? My son was very high energy (still is) and the best thing we got was a water table. I never put sand in as too much mess for me but he was delighted by splashing about for ages. Do you have something to climb on? Maybe those balance rock things?

I have a water table, ship sand pit, slide, scuttle bugs, rocking horse, balance rocks, football goal and ball but he doesn't use some of these properly even have a climbing frame thing but he has no interest in it.. He just tips over the water table or stacks to balance rocks together.

Tried to take peoples advice for burning energy and tried to get him to walk to the park and then nursery. Well he refused just screamed and screamed and when I ignored the tantrum he just curled up on the path as if going to sleep!!!

Also you sound scared of him and not in charge. He will pick up on that and exploit it for all it's worth....

I am not scared of him in the slightest. I ignore his tantrums until he calms, i dont feed them with any attention. He isn't generally physically agressive towards us he is just destructive. He is 2 years old what is there to be scared of?

What I am scared of is the behaviour continuing and it becoming a problem.

But please I would love some suggestions on how to show him i'm 'in charge'

I'm picking up on you not taking him places because you're worried about his behaviour - suggests to me that he's in control. Just a suggestion that maybe he would appreciate a stricter approach. Also letting him have a huge nap because hes grumpy if you wake him.... Just let him be grumpy!

90% of the day ! I think youve answered your own question there .
Could you do some bottle feeds and spend time with him exclusively.

I let him sleep because hes grumpy so clearly needs to sleep. Hes only awake 5 hours at a time as he gets so tired.

What would your stricter approach be? We take him to soft play if he hits or hurts anyone we leave whether he likes it or not. I don't take him to toddler groups because no i'm noy paying like £7.50 a time to go there and leave within 5 minutes because hes throwing stuff around. I try to get him to walk to the park to burn energy and he lays on the floor to sleep because he want to go in the pram what would your suggestion be?

I am very open to suggestions on how I can be stricter and improve the behaviour which is why I posted. He is my first so it is all a learning curve

I think the baby on you all the time is simply too much. What does your HV think? There’s 2 dc in the house and you cannot expect a 2 year old to respect or love a baby as you do!

Currently wont accept a bottle or dummy. And I would still have to bottle feed him and hold him as he wont be put down currently without screaming but I am hoping it will get better once he is a bit older.

My toddler is about to turn two and has a death wish (climbs as high as my head at the park, wants to go on the big kid stuff). We periodically have hitting behaviour and found the most effective thing was to get up and walk off. That leads to crying, but the hitting stops and we get better behaviour. I honestly feel like we've been in the terrible twos since 18 months. And that's with good language and no siblings to compete with!

HV didn't say anything about it. Baby unfortunately wont sleep in his own bed and breastfeeds constantly partly for food as he spits up constantly and partly for comfort as he refuses a dummy. It isnt helped by the rare time the baby is calm and I attempt to put him in his cot in the living room the toddler shakes it or shouts at the cot wanting to hold him! So then the baby gets distressed and wants to he on me again.

It does sound like he needs a bit more structure and attention rather than being left to watch films multiple time a week when he’s home from nursery. It’s hard with a young baby, but you have quite a good split of days if your toddler is at nursery 3 days a week. What I did in the same situation was have days when my eldest was at nursery dedicated to baby, so when baby was a little older we do baby groups and all my attention on baby. On the days my eldest was home, those days were dedicated to her. So we went out and did what she wanted, and baby just came along too, right from birth really. Intended to babies needs obviously but the days were tailored to my toddler, so play dates with her friends, trips out, toddler classes, parks, and at home playing with her. Days my DH was home (weekends for us), we split our time with one each so they both got individual attention from a parent, then also some family trips.

I am trying to do things my toddler wants to do I am just struggling with it. We go to the forest and he just wants to sit in the pram. Softplay he wont go around on his own and now with his aggression I can't now trust him to go in alone. He just doesn't have things he wants to do or play with and that makes it really hard. Him staring at the back of the babys bassinet as we walk around places doesn't really seem like a good way to entertain him 😪

And suggestions on things we can do that dont cost a lot but don't involve him sitting in a pram?

Are you getting support for the baby’s reflux? Keeping them upright as much as possible might help so a good sling so you are hands free? And no stop feeding just to throw up most of it is worth exploring too. Have you tried any meds for this yet?

I honestly think you need to work on baby steps with the toddler. I’d cut down the telly immediately - particularly if it’s the fast paced stuff - and maybe just aim for a half hour of something calming (my kids both liked octonauts and it’s a very soothing pace). Then try to parallel play with him for 5 mins at a time, building up slowly. Some kids need to learn how to play. Try a game maybe? Something physical like how many steps can you do, how far can you jump, maybe something involving beanbags? My daughter needed to be prodded to walk when she was younger (particularly once we had her brother and she remembered that prams existed!) so we did a lot of games. Hop three time, spin in a circle, etc.

We were giving it some time after his tongue tie got cut to see if it would improve but as it hasnt I have an appointment next week to discuss trying the medication. So far he hates the sling but I am looking to get a second hand carrier to try to see if he prefers that.

He cant jump yet unfortunately otherwise I would get him a trampoline. I brought a whole garden set with bean bags and cones and hoops to try and play games with him... he just moves anything I try to set up or walks off with the beanbags.

He cant follow instructions like you suggested with getting him to walk so he cant jump and doesn't copy if we stomp and stuff. I assume he should be doing these things by now?

Not necessarily. I’m no expert and every kid is different. But just re trampolines the wee toddler ones with the handles can just be kind of stood on and walk about, you don’t need to jump.

Firstly I have 2 ND kids so my understanding of development is a little bit outside the norm. Take my post as you like.

He is very good at copying words and he will say lots of words like bike, food, car but very little of his speech helps him to actually communicate with us.

This is very normal for just 2. I think a lot of parents assume that they should be able to be more reliant on verbal communication by 2 and IME this isn't really a realistic expectation until more like 3.5 - 4. Obviously yes talk to them very much. But you need to keep actual communication/instruction much more action based (e.g. moving/blocking him or showing him what you want him to do instead) and controlling the environment rather than expecting him to follow verbal directions.

In addition, understand that whatever he is saying to you is only an extremely rough approximation of what he actually means. I think a lot of toddler frustration could be avoided if more people were aware of this. Language development is incredibly complex and he will make mistakes both in what he thinks words mean and in how he uses them. Obviously yes do encourage and respond to what he says because it helps him learn what words mean, but with the idea in mind that he might not be able to use words very accurately yet.

There are some things in your posts which do sound like they are at the more intense end of things. For example, yes 2 year olds have barely any attention span of course - they're barely even out of the baby stage. But usually they will find SOMETHING which holds their attention, usually something which is the exact thing you don't want them to explore, like taking everything out of your handbag or all the books off the bookshelf or examining all the gravel in a pot plant for example. For him to be constantly restless, sensory seeking and irritable with everything is unusual, IME.

It is fairly normal for them not to pay much attention to danger but if he's constantly flinging himself off everything to the point he's always injuring himself, that is extreme. Does he ever hesitate or stop himself or e.g. try to balance himself at all? Does he remember previous times he has hurt himself? (It's normal if he remembers but doesn't anticipate similar dangers or change his behaviour to prevent the same accident again.) Is he scared of things like loud noises or large dogs or an older child rushing around fast? TBH you will probably just be told he is accident prone and some children are.

He does sound very intense, more intense than most 2 year olds. Whether it's a phase he will grow out of, or indication of something deeper is probably yet to be seen. Everyone is obsessed with screen time right now but I don't think that screen time used as a tool is a problem. It can become a problem if you slip into a habit of using it constantly all the time. Your description does not sound like this to me. Please don't feel guilty for doing what you need to do. With a reflux baby as well it's a hugely challenging situation for you and I do hope that it will get easier in time.

Sounds as if he has lots of toys, both indoors and outside. I would be tempted to make less available at any time. Even tipping stuff out, or stacking things up is 'playing'. Throwing things can be OK in certain circumstances. If you start to play with something, maybe with the baby, is he interested? Something as simple as bubbles could get him into fresh air and running around.

Your DS doesn't sound too far away from the norm for his age but he does sound very frustrated. Have you considered teaching yourselves Makaton, as a tool for improving communication? There are lessons available online, Nursery might use it too.
In your position, I would ask the GP to explore allergies for both children, babies don't normally need to spend so much time feeding, or cry the moment they are put down.
Tbh, it sounds as if there is too much available for DS to play with, no wonder he flits from one thing to another so quickly. Have you tried showing him how to play with natural materials such as pine-cones, wooden spoons, different sized wicker baskets etc? What about popping him into a playpen when you need to move him away from the baby?

He does sound as if he would really benefit from a strong routine which I understand is difficult with your baby as well. He definitely needs more 1-1 time, hard as that is for you to give him currently. Can you pop baby into the pram and play with DS, ignoring the crying for a while, as you can see that baby is perfectly safe?

DS truly needs to have it demonstrated that baby isn't more important than he is. At the moment, he must feel exactly the opposite. Did he go to Nursery before baby was born or is that a new thing, too?

I really think you are going down the wrong path with food allergies. GPs only tend to refer for hospital testing if children have gastrointestinal issues as well as other skin symptoms etc.

the behaviour does sound neuro spicy

I have him on a toy rotation as that was suggested to me to make things more interesting plus limit my clean up but it hasnt helped much.

He used to build towers with blocks and knock it down or ask us to build it but he lost interest in that a long time ago. I haven't tried playing with stuff myself with baby so will give that a try to see if it makes him want to play with stuff.

I think frustration is very much his issue but its not knowing why he is frustrated. Nursery don't use makaton or anything but I could try learning it and attempt to teach him.

Reflux is I suspect a mixture of both poor latch (which we are working on) and the fact he eats constantly. Doctoe says no way it is allergies as despite the reflux he is gaining weight well. My toddler however has an appointment next week to discuss with doctor allergy testing as he has a rash around his mouth constantly which I am hoping will be enough to warrant the referral!

He has lots of toys but not available at once (with the exception of outside as they all just live out there) his indoor toys are on a toy rotation. We dont have room for a playpen in our house unfotunatley and he can tip over the small fabric ones (hes a big boy).

I can put baby in the pram although the screaming is hard to listen to and my toddler then gets overwhelmed and starts to shake the pram violently or asks for the baby to come out. So he doesn't help the situation.

Hes been at nursery for just over a year. The only change was he moved from the baby room to the toddler room in January.

He does have inteemittent bad bellys he will go from 1 day being solid to huge and loose and he does have a constant rash around his mouth so I am hoping that will be enough for them to be willing to do the referral. He also has an inhaler for suspected asthma so i'm not sure if that will help the referral too!

Frankly its just a attempt to find a fixable cause for his behaviour 🙈

I’d definitely try to increase one to one time, he may be lashing out at you more than baby because it’s you he might be “annoyed with” since baby arrived but he can’t articulate that