The tantrums have arrived!

[idigchaitea]

My son is almost 23 months old, and has recently begun throwing major tantrums! He gets on the floor and kicks and screams and wants "up" but then won't let me hold him. Any advice on how to deal with the tantrums would be great!

[Mom2*Lauryn*Jacob*]

I think a lot depends on the childs temperment. My DD started the BIG tantrums @ abou 16m. They were just like you discribe. For my DD only 2 things worked. The first was redirecting, trying to show her something to do and praising the good behavior. The other was ignoring her tantrum, she would carry on for a few minutes then get ahold of herself and then I would play with her again. After a bit, I could tell the difference between the attention getting tantrum or the frustrated tantrum. The flustered tantrum was due to her lack of verbal skills, so I tried to help her find a way to tell me what she needed by redirecting her.

Good luck, I hope it passes quickly for you, it isn't easy for sure!

[greek4]

Wow, you are lucky, we got hit with big tantrums at about 16 months. We just make sure DS is not in a traffic path, near something he could get hurt on, or physically hurting himself. Then we proceed to ignore the behavior and go play nicely with his toys. He usually picks himself up after a minute or two and comes over and plays with us.

Occassionally, he does not fall for it and will come over and hit or throw something, then he gets put in timeout which usually distracts from the original tantrum and he is sorry and happy to be out of time out.

Tantrums are stressful and it's hard not to just give the child what they want to quiet them down.

[mbsr76]

My son recently turned 2 and apparently someone sent him a memo reminding him that as a 2-year old he is duty-bound to throw some good ones every now and again.

He flops down to the floor, kicking, screaming, and wriggling around, several times a day. I just make sure he's not going to hurt himself and then I ignore it. It doesn't last long and I'm hopeful that he won't still be tantruming by the time he heads off to college.