It’s bad enough that you’re running 100 miles an hour, juggling a task, and running late against your schedule, but on top of all that, your child becomes uncooperative and decides to throw a tantrum. Your initial reaction to feelings of anger and resentment causes your blood pressure to climb, so you muster up the strength to calm yourself and try other methods. Some of those methods include pleading, begging, and bribing, but even those don’t seem to work well. Finally, you pick up your screaming child (assuming she’s not too big for you) and try to contain your patience as you carry her to the car.
I bet your feeling exhausted just reading the previous paragraph. I also bet you can’t remember giving your parents this much trouble. And even if you did, it probably resulted in a spanking and being sent to bed, teaching you that this behavior didn’t pay. If you’ve read my past columns or my book, you may have read about what causes this kind of behavior in young children. Let me offer you 8 ways of stopping toddlers tantrums that work more effectively with love and logic toddler tantrums. They won’t all work in every situation, nor will they all work with every child. Be ready to try one until you find what works best for you and your child.
EASE THE CHILD’S FRUSTRATION
3-5 year old tantrums are a child’s way of expressing frustration toward you, a lack of power, or your boundaries. If you can, comfort your child in the moment and do it without giving in. Remain with him silently and hold him, rub his back or just be there close to him. If he hits you, leave his space without words.
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DON’T GIVE IN
If your child is screaming for a toy in the department store, it is too tempting to buy him the toy to get him to stop the fit. If you purchase it, you have averted some embarrassment and hassle at the moment, but worse, you’ve taught him to do it in other situations.
KNOW YOUR CHILD
Many tantrums are triggered by fatigue or hunger. You know your child better than others, so look for patterns that lead to him being hungry or tired and planning for it. Yes, this means you have to change your schedule to NOT be in a store at a certain time or feeding him off schedule before leaving the house. The point is that you have the power to alter the sequence of events if you plan.
USE VISUAL TIMERS OR VISUAL SCHEDULES
Two modern-day parenting products now on the market make avoiding tantrums much easier. Visual timers allow a child to see visually how much time she has for an activity, and visible schedules introduce her to the fact that her day is broken down into individual segments of time and tasks. These two visual cues change your child’s perspective on what to do and how long to spend time doing it.
REDIRECTION
Mild tantrums can be stopped or avoided altogether by getting a child interested in something else. If your toddler is fascinated with the knob on the stove and you know that coaxing him out of the kitchen might set him off, instead, exhibit excitement about something in another room or out the window.
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WAIT IT OUT OR MOVE FORWARD
There will still be times when nothing seems to work. If this is the case, ask yourself this question; “Can I wait this out with minimal impact to my schedule or anyone else’s?” If you can, “pull up a chair” and wait it out. The storm will eventually blow over. If you can’t wait it out, conjure up loving thoughts of your child and pick him up as gently as possible. Don’t speak and move forward with what you have to do.
One day my granddaughter was having a tantrum in her car seat in the back seat. My own fatigue and weariness had me on the verge of getting angry so I pulled off the road into a parking lot, shut off the car, and got out to sit on the hood of the car. After just a few minutes the screaming died down and I felt calm enough to get back into the driver’s seat. The tantrum went on for just a few minutes, but at a much lower decibel and I felt much more calm on the ride to our destination