Tips for parenting a highly sensitive 4 year old

[sensitivesoulchild]

Looking for tips on how to parent my Highly Sensitive 4 year old please. They're bright and brilliant, hitting all milestones, but are A Lot of Work. Caps intentional.

Once they get an idea in their mind, they are stubbornly set on it. A specific outfit, activity, food item, or rules to a game - they want it to be exactly the way they've dreamed it up. We pre-warn about transitions / expectations as much as possible, but the meltdowns are epic when things don't go their way. It's not malicious bad behaviour, they literally vibrate with disappointment and can't handle it. The meltdowns can last up to an hour or more.

We've tried co-regulation, distraction, time-outs if it's particularly bad behaviour (limited as negative consequences makes it 100 times worse). We keep responses simple and to the point "we're not having ice-cream for dinner. I hear you're disappointed, and I'm here". But the only thing that really works is throwing them up in the air or spinning around for 5-10 minutes to reset their nervous system. They're a very athletic, physical child and respond well to movement.

Screentime and sugar are limited to weekends, they can't cope with it during the week.

They're quite shy, and take a while to warm up in social settings. For sports classes, we get there a few min early to let them get used to the surroundings first. They did get bullied by another child in nursery this year, which we and nursery took seriously, but I worry this will happen again until they get better with social skills.

We have other children with far different temperaments, so the contrast is very notable. They get on extremely well with siblings, mostly because they're the eldest I think, and get their way the most. All children have regular dedicated 1:1 time too.

My questions - did your highly sensitive DC outgrow it? Is there anything that helps grow resilience or regulation we can try? How can I stay patient through it? Increasingly frustrated with the behaviour, when it feels like we've tried everything, even when I know it's not their fault.

Some similarities with my DD now 10.
The Aha parenting website helped me. Like you found, the default of being stern didn’t work with her like it did my other dd. She really needed help with regulating her emotions. One thing I remember from the website was saying calmly over the yelling 😊 Eg you want this. Yes I know. And mum said no. (Repeat). Acknowledge it’s hard but the no is still there (I’m not explaining it too well but hope you get the idea). Also if well into meltdown- sitting nearish and saying calmly DD is crying, DD is very sad, DD is kicking- that seemed to slow her down a bit so she could move on.
Lots of time in her imaginary world, she still loves writing stories. More down time maybe.
She found social things more difficult than my other DD at school. ASD was floated in y4 but school felt she didn’t have all the traits. Year 5 turned a corner! Much more confident in herself and socially and able to talk things through, have down time when needed. Still needs a little help with transitions but overall well rounded with some good friends.
you’ve got a special kid there and my feedback is it does get easier 🙂 xx

@Katelinda It's been really interesting how often this has come up on the thread, and I am for sure going to keep monitoring it as he grows. Interestingly my DH and I were chatting through some of the things we're going to try last night and pointers from this, and he pointed out dyslexia is a form of ND. I knew that in the back of my mind but hadn't really thought on it - DH is dyslexic as is my DB, and there's a high inheritance rate, 50%. I've only just started looking in to it but a quick Google shows distinct ND traits and often an overlap with other ND.

Which also makes sense as there's a huge rate of ASD in my DH's family, and lots of ADHD in mine. My DS seems to have more in common with my family than his, in terms of sensitivity, but I will obviously continue to keep an eye on it.

@Daisychain700 thank you for sharing your experiences and tips, it's heartening to hear positive outcomes.

I'm going to step away from the thread for a few weeks to try implement some of the tactics, routine changes and parenting updates. I think if I keep gathering more I'll be too tempted to try them all at once - which seems counter intuitive!

It's been incredibly useful hearing different experiences, things to try, and other perspectives. Has sparked a lot of thoughts and helped me shape what exactly I'm trying to achieve for my little one. Also been a little challenging, as it feels very vulnerable to open up about your parenting on the internet! Thankfully most have been kind. 💐

Nearly two weeks since I posted and I wanted to give an update before abandoning thread. (I don't want it to get identifying of my DC.)

When I originally posted, it was about coping mechanisms for sensitive children, but after reading a lot of diverse (mostly kind) views I realised I should probably be asking how to help a more introverted child cope in an extroverted, full-time working family. I had been taking it for granted this was most families normal, and considering my DC as the outlier tbh.

Since then we've prioritised more 'pottering' time, and restructured our morning routine to support that. We're early risers so it's nearly two hours uninterrupted play. Also cut down on the after childcare activities during the week, with more time at home. Where we can, my DH & I are taking turns starting work early / leaving early to cut down in their childcare time. It's only 30mim or so but we see a big difference in the evenings.

We've been working on negotiating instead of flat no's, which my DS has taken too with a frightening flare. It's going to take some time to teach the right balance but I can see that being helpful in the long run.

For tired evenings we've gotten a set of timers to help transitions. Bit of a learning curve not to let the DC see the full set of different colours - or let them play with them outside of transition times - but giving control of the timer to them has helped.

Still some work to go but I'm really surprised (and delighted) how quickly these tweaks to our routine have helped. I thought it would take weeks of trialling to be effective. They might seem blatantly obvious when you write them down, but I think when you're in the thick of parenting, working and balancing it all it can be hard to step back enough to see things differently. The big feeling outbursts are much less frequent in the last week. We're getting closer to normal 4 year old tantrums, rather than overwhelming devastation taking hold of him.

Thank you to everyone. 💐

Very glad you’re seeing an improvement OP. Wishing you both all the very best.

I found this book helpful:
https://amzn.eu/d/09F4S6Ta

And this one (very good despite the title):
https://amzn.eu/d/0g00bGnb

Mine grew out of it. But it was haaaard work while it lasted. Now she’s a delightful adult.

Love to hear this ❤️

My almost 7 yo was like this at 3/4/5, she has mostly outgrown it but can still have her moments occasionally, she still finds it difficult to leave places but I usually tell her that If she leaves nicely when I ask then we get to come back, if she doesn't and kicks off about it then we don't return, you have to be prepared to stick with that but it has honestly worked wonders.
id say pick your battles, when it comes to picking clothes, food etc then go with it where you can it will save you and them a lot of stress.
i found that choices worked a lot of the time too at that age, it was massively a control thing, she couldn't cope with not being in control of the situation, but at times she would explode regardless of what I said or what choice I gave her. so long as she and everyone else was safe I'd let her know I was there when she needed me but just let her get on with the meltdown and go about my day (very difficult to just block it out but I did find she got over it much quicker when she noticed it actually wasn't getting her anywhere)
theyll get there and the social skills will come, I think we forget at 4 they are so clever but still so little, it's completely normal for them not to have those skills yet. It sounds like your doing a great job op