18 month old tantrums

bubs seems to be throwing tanties at the drop of a hat these days. i think he has just learnt the full power of a tanty and is really going to town with them. of course i am doing the walking away trick which kind of works. after leaving him to scream for 10 minutes he will just get completely out of sorts and then come to me and melt in my arms (opposed to fighting me if i try to pick him up or console him before hand). but still.... how can you curb these before they get to this stage?


he is not talking yet. not even one word. but yes i agree that he can probably understand a lot more than we think.


is this going to get better or worse????

He could overstimulated or overtired. How old is your little one? It could be handy to keep a diary for a week and track when he is having the trantrums. You may find it's a pattern if he has been up too long, etc. Then you can start to maybe have quiet time a little earlier.


Also as joshmomm said, they can't communicate properly and it frustrates teh hell out of them. So the best way is to throw the tantrum and any sort of attention is good attention to them at this age.


Definitely stick with the not reacting though. That is the best thing I did when our started the tantrums, make sure they are okay, then ignore it as much as possible. Once they have calmed down, then go to them.


It will get better and if you stick to your guns, it wont' last as long. Good Luck

eh, the thing that I did with my oldest [who is now 2] was try to figure out what her triggers were and avoid the situations as much as I could. She was beginning to be verbal at the time, though, and we were really really encouraging any efforts on her part to communicate, so i'd start by asking her to "use your words" and hunker down to really try to understand what she was trying to say. She went through a short phase about 18 months, and then another short phase just now after her brother was born. From what I've read, they tend to be most intense starting at around 18 months, and they either ramp up or ramp down, depending on which gives the kid more satisfaction.


Basically what I did to avoid the situations where she was throwing them was to first identify them and then as they approached, before she had a chance to go into tantrum mode, give her two choices: the grown up thing that I hoped she wanted to do or the baby thing that she had been throwing the tantrum because I wasn't letting her do. Of course, I made the grown up thing sound much more appealing, but didn't argue or complain if she chose the baby thing. She started to choose the grown up thing almost all the time [yay!] pretty soon -- I'd say within a week of me identifying it as a tantrum trigger in most cases.


She's a pretty easy kid, and we have found that in most cases straight "discipline" is less effective than giving her a way around the stumbling block. But she's one of those really wants to please kids, not one of those really wants to push your buttons kids...

well i think things will be much different when he can talk i'm sure, but it's going to be a few months more as his dad and all the boys in his family were late talkers! starting at the age of 24 months only...


when he had that tanty the other morning i had asked dad to go in a get him when he woke up. sometimes he is okay with that and sometimes he is not. that morning he was absolutely not!!! and was quite angry and took a while to calm down. but as we have baby #2 on the way i am trying to get him to be more flexible as he wants me to do everything!!! put him to bed, night time care, feeding, carrying him, watching tv with him!!! as soon as i get home from work he clings to me like crazy. what will happen when baby #2 comes along???


and sometimes he just gets angry at me. like this morning he kept wanting to hit me at the same time as wanting me to carry him and be with him. he wanted to tell me he was angry at me but because he can't talk i just don't know what i had done wrong! i go to talk to him and cuddle him and he hits me.... :(

Hi Sashimi Girl, your last post made me smile, as I too have been on the receiving end of Mr Angry with the confused demands to be held and then slapped around at the same time. It started some months ago, my boy is now 23 months and the tantrums seem to be slowly improving. Our son is also very much a Mummy's boy, honestly you'd think his father was actively murdering him if it is me he wants instead eg getting him up in the morning, putting him to bed at night, changing of a nappy etc. Again the ability to get him to accept daddy to do these tasks is improving with age.


We are working out his tantrums fall into two categories generally, either those that are driven by hunger / tiredness, or those that are driven by an inability to communicate effectively with us, or should I say when his emotions get the better of him and the only effective way he communicates is by shouting / crying / lashing out. For the first ones the cure is relatevely (ahem) simple, i.e provide an immediate snack / tell him its time to go to bed and do so immediately, the key is to remain calm, the more ruffled I get the more he plays up.


For the second type of tantrum what works with us is essentially rejection i.e no cuddles until he is calm, first I try telling him I'm sorry I don't understand you, please tell me in words or show me, I get down to his level and look him in the eye and stay calm. If that doesn't work I say to him I really don't understand you, you need to calm down, if you keep shouting at me / hit me you I will put you in your room (that's our time out spot ...for now) I give him a couple of warnings, if he continues to ignore me and continues in his tantrum then off he goes to his room. Generally I leave him for 1 to 2 minutes (the rule of thumb for time out I understand is 1 minute for each year old they are). I then go in and say to him are you calm now do you want to come to Mummy, if he continues to shout at me I go out again and wait another 1-2mins before going back. Repeated as necessary until he has calmed down enough to want a cuddle and then try and communicate with you what he wants, more times than not he has forgotten what he was having a tantrum about anyway. The key to getting this to work is meaning what you say, it works far more effectively for me than our helper as she does not always carry out her threats (but she is improving too on this! which helps). Initially when we started this route it took several attempts of going in and out of his room before he calmed down, now generally we get to the " Do you want to go to your room?" stage followed by "I mean it you will go there now" stage before he says "No" and calms down. When you are outside the house and there is no time out spot I still try and do a similar routine, although it is harder, on occasion we have had to say ok that's it we're going home and then head home just so he does know we also mean what we say when we are in public. You will get lots of disbelieving looks at what a terrible parent you are for not comforting an obviously distraught child, when he is throwing himself down on the pavement and yelling and shouting, but I stick with the no cuddles rule as much as possible until he has calmed down as long as he is not in danger of harming himself


All sounds easy? Like you I'm a working Mum and to be honest his beahviour really started improving after we spent 10 days together by ourselves, I took him to the UK to see my family while hubby stayed behind for work here. I started to understand him better and could work out which type of tantrum he was having. and I guess he started understanding me better. It might be worth taking a few days off now and really working on your communication together (banish the helper and hubby) just you and him, before # 2 comes along.


Good luck!

Another thing that may work for you -- pepper little 5 minute intense fun times together into your normal daily schedule when he is not mid-tantrum. Not only you, but from his Papa as well. Little sacred celebrations where neither hell nor high water can come between the two of you and the fun you are having together. Choose times when he is between tasks or sit down next to him and ask if you can join in on something he is playing independently.


Kids can be sensitive to the most minute shift in the daily routine [mine once threw a fit over the fact that our Ayi had given me a pair of red chopsticks instead of the green ones that I had had every other day that week]. If you're prego, things have shifted in some way and he may be responding to that. In that case, get him used to what the new reality is going to be starting now.


Something that is not clear from this thread is how close a relationship he and his Papa have. Most kids right around 24 months have a big attention shift from Mums to Pops, which can work in your favor re #2.