So, the battle of wills started at 1.30 (when I say battle of wills, I mean the one where your toddler wakes SCREAMING like he's being murdered, banging his door, head butting and yelling and as soon as you go to him is smiling and happy) so after an hour of this OH has just taken him downstairs.

Every waking hour of the day he seems to be screaming or moaning. Nothing sets him off, it's like his sheer purpose to be put on the earth is to cry. I've absolutely had enough..

His tantrums are epic, and border on complete rage, and I feel so alone as none of my friends toddlers seem to be on the same scale or even close

All my HVs suggest is that I need to go to parenting classes - so they basically think the problem lies with me and not my hysterical toddler!

Wow! You poor thing! It definitely sounds like you are at the end of your rope.

Ignorant question, but has been checked for a possible ear infection? When my son gets like this (whiny, crying at night, just miserable), he usually has an ear infection.

You're not a bad parent. It's normal to feel frustrated. Recruit the help of family members and friends if you can.

Get him evaluated, and make sure you're getting time to yourself!

Hugs!

Hi moomoo,

Please don't feel alone. I am sitting with exactly the same situation. Just this morning I discussed it with a friend of mine, to get an outside view on it all. She did not have the answer as to why he's behaving that way, but just that one has to stop it in it's tracks. Can you imagine if you let it slide, by the time they are 16 years old, it will be near impossible to handle.

I lost it this morning , and shouted at my 2.5 year old, because he just refuses to accept anything I tell him to do. He'll just fall on the floor, scream like crazy, kick his feet, try and hit me etc . That's when I screamed at him to stop it and I grabbed hold of him and gave him a slap on his bottom. He then just started screaming at me even more. I continued slapping his bottom, one slap at a time, telling him to stop with the screaming, hitting and kicking. (I don't hit hard to hurt, just enough to make him understand that I mean business). Quite a few slaps down the line he realised that he's not going to win this one and stopped. I then told him to never do it again, because it will just be a repeat of what happened now. He said 'OK'. I told him that I still love him very much and hugged him .

Not even 5 minutes later , we were on our way out of the house (for him to go to day-care). Just outside the door, he stopped, fell on the floor started crying again and telling me he's not going, he's staying at home.

I walked right past him to the car, put his bag etc in the car and told him he's got 10 seconds to get up and get in the car or there's going to be trouble. I started counting, when I got to 4 he jumped up, rushed to the car and without any issues got in and we left.

Usually he does not want to let go when I drop him at day-care, but today he gave me a hug and a kiss and said that he's going to play with his friends and not misbehave.

Now this friend of mine said that little one's learn and un-learn behaviour over a period of 3 days. So I will try this and stick my guns for the next 3 days and then see how it goes.

Good luck to you too!!!!

Did you try to give him relaxing time during the day? Omar is so active & always on the run, but he gets overwhelmed easily & he starts to scream or whine. I found that giving him a relax time with his dummy & give him his pillow & pillow for lie ins on the sofa for a break really helps in getting him back into a better mood. We also lie down on the bed to talk & make up stories.

we're also going out less those days, he can't cope well with going out everyday.

I can't ignore him as it distress him & a whine or a scream might end up with a major tantrum.

Hi OmarsMum,

Yip I agree that really works wonders too. But for some reason these last few days nothing seems to be working. If he does not get his way 24/7 he screams.

I try my best to spend some alone time with him every day, where he has my full attention, this does seem to make the tantrums less.

Hi Hun,

Omar is with me all day, so I spend almost all day finding something new to keep him busy. He doesn't even go to a nursery. I try to be creative. He started recently to enjoy playing alone. We have good days &. Bad days. When we go out it's more challenging (refusing to go in to the carseat/ buggy, screaming for no reason, asking to leave classes to go home, etc)

I also spend lots of time giving him full attention, & I ask him to get involved in house work & cooking.

I also talk to him a lot, when we go out, I tell him clearly if he's going to cry we will go back home. I also whisper in his ear if I sense that he's going to start screaming.

I dread going out with him those days, 2 days back he screamed non stop in the car for over 1 hour for no reason. We were stuck in traffic & we had to pull over at the nearest shopping mall to calm him down as it was too stressful to continue driving with him screaming

Yesterday we skipped his dancing class as I didn't have any energy & today we will not go to the open day at the centre where we go to classes.

He was a grump when he woke up today, I even asked him if he wanted to go swimming down stairs but he said no, I want to sleep

He's eating non stop since morning, so maybe he's going through a growth spurt

He's highly sensitive. I bought a book "the highly sensitive child" By Elaine N. Aron. I've just started reading it, i really hope I can find some useful tips in the book to help with controlling his ongoing changing behaviour xx

Hi OmarsMum,

I can soooo relate to everything you mentioned!

I have just bought PARENTING COLLECTION: DR JAMES DOBSON. Inside Parenting Collection you'll find The New Dare to Discipline, The New Strong-Willed Child, and Parenting Isn't for Cowards, all offering biblically based parenting wisdom.

This man is a genius when it comes to raising children with fantastic values. It's just a pity that the book is currently on back order and I have to wait now.....It could really have helped me get through this.

You should consider reading them, he has very interesting ideas on how to get through certain problems with little ones right through to teenagers.

Thanks Hun, I will take a look at this collection xx

Thanks ladies

I've been to work today so have had a "day off" and all day at the Childminder he has been fine until I turn up. I swear he just hates me! He pulls my hair and hits at me and I just feel powerless when what I really want to do is just drop him on the floor and walk! Maybe I should next time.

I'm just so exhausted from it, sick to the back teeth in fact

He doesn't hate you I promise, he's saving it all for you because its safe to push the boundaries with you because you will still love him and be there for him. He behaves for other people because he's less sure of them and how they will react to him. Its really normal for kids to be the worse behaved for their parents.

If he's hitting, kicking etc I would put him down on the floor straight away and remove all your attention (if possible) or walk a small distance away. I went through a stage of doing this with Tom alot up till about a month ago and if definately had an impact on the way he was treating me. It just made it really clear to him that it was not ok to do that and that I would not put up with it.

Also how is his talking? Could he be getting frustrated because his thoughts are way ahead of his speech?