help with tantrums please!

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-30-2003
help with tantrums please!
3
Wed, 04-05-2006 - 11:08am
DS (18 months) has been having HUGE tantrums lately. When he doesn't get what he wants he cries, falls to the ground, kicks and bangs his head. I usually just ignore him until he is done. He has also started hitting or squeezing me when he is mad. For ex. , last night DH said to Jacob, Do you want to go outside. Well, Jacob LOVES to be outside. When he didn't get to go out immediately he started crying(loudly) and then came over and hit me. I told him no, he hit again. I am not sure what to do with him. His reactions to not getting his way are so much more intense than what my DD would do. I could at least reason with her. I think part of the problem is that Jacob only has about 20 words. Any suggestions on how to deal with this? I need help and some sanity.
Thanks
Sonya
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Registered: 03-31-2003
Wed, 04-05-2006 - 7:29pm

Hi Sonya,

I know you've been worried about Jacob for a while. I don't really have any advise about the tantrums, but as far I understand, that kind of thing is real common in little kids who don't have a whole lot of words yet.

But also, I remember when my oldest son was 17 months old, I was taking a child language-acquisition class in college (part of Anthropology degree), and I remember specifically that we learned that at the age of 18 months, children typically have between 3 and 20 words in their vocabulary. That doesn't mean the words are necessarily pronounced right, but they are used as words, to communicate. So, if the kid just utters, "bababab" at random times, that's not a word, but if he uses it to mean "bottle" or "baby" or "belly button", then it's a word. I remember that it was "between 3 and 20" at 18 months, because David had 300 words that he used, only one at a time, and they were all weird things like, "Michelin Man" (pronounced in a baby way), and "statue", and "porthole".

So, if Jacob has "only 20 words" at 18 months, that's actually pretty good. I've known a few moms with kids who didn't talk at all until they were two, and then the floodgates opened and the words just came. I remember each time, the moms started getting real worried towards the 2nd birthday, and each kid seemed to have worse tantrums than the earlier talkers. I realize you have other concerns about him, and I don't mean to suggest there's no problem. Obviously, I wouldn't know. But I'm pretty confident that tantrums AND having 20-words at 18 months are both pretty typical and age-appropriate. I think when little kids have something they want to say, and don't know how to say it, that's when a lot of tantrums happen.

Now, how to deal with the tantrums, which was your question--Well, hopefully someone else can help. David didn't have a tantrum at all until he was about 4 and suddenly began to FREAK out on me. One thing I've learned, though, is to take every bit of advice with a grain of salt. What works for one kid, or even a thousand kids, might not be what works for yours.

Good luck!

Evelyn

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Registered: 08-26-2005
Wed, 04-05-2006 - 9:27pm
Sonya,
Evelyn is right, 20 words at 18 months is very good. Ella is going through a horrible stage of laying, screaming and tantrum behavior too. She's almost 22 months old and pretty difficult to deal with. I think she is getting a little frustrated because of her speech, it's not that she has no speech it's just a lot of the time I don't get what she's saying unless she says it a couple of times and you know how much small kids like to wait for things(LOL). I wouldn't worry to much because it sounds like typical stuff for his age.
Teresa
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-25-2003
Wed, 04-05-2006 - 10:31pm

There is one thing which works with tantrums: Analysis.

Look at what happened before during and after the tantrum. Try and figure out what his triggers are. If you can work on the triggers, you are almost halfway there, because you can prevent a lot of tantrums. He probably blew up about the 'outside' incident, because an expectation was disappointed. A way to help is to set the expectation appropriately: "We are going to finish ...whatever, put on our coats and go outside" It may take awhile, because his language may not be there yet, but it will help.

Dealing with tantrums while they are going on may take some trial and error. See if he has different kinds of tantrums, and how he behaves during each kind, You may deal with different kinds differently. With Peter I would walk away and leave him during his 'attention' tantrums. For those, any other action would have reinforced the behavior.

However, he also had these complete and total meltdowns, where he just became completely overwhelmed. In those cases, it was inappropriate to walk away. He needed love and understanding. In fact, he often couldn't stop the meltdown on his own. He needed help to 'come back'. For those, I would sit with him, rub his back and talk in a hypnotic voice, soothing him and giving him cues to stop "All done now. Allll done"

It is a bit of an acquired skill. Listen to your instinct and keep your boundaries intact. Things like Hitting are not OK, no matter how upset one may be.

You will get there and it will get easier as he gets older.

-Paula

-Paula

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