The article that I wrote is on page 15 of the magazine.
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Monday, March 26, 2012
Tips to understanding a toddler’s tantrum so that you don’t start to have tantrums of your own.
Tips to understanding a toddler’s tantrum so that you don’t start to have tantrums of your own.
Tip # 1: Your toddler is not a little adult. Even if your toddler is considered to have a high superior Intelligence Quotient (which you would only know if you’ve for some reason had him tested), that quotient (IQ) is age-specific. It is based solely upon how much your child knows in comparison with his same aged peer (same aged to the day).
Tip # 2: Your toddler simply is not capable of doing much more than imitating the rationale that you (and other important people in her life) model. This is not to say your toddler is not intelligent or cannot figure out simple reasoning tasks. It’s more to say that “reasoning” with a toddler, especially in the midst of a tantrum, will eventually become unfruitful… and often times make the tantrum(s) worsen over time. Why? Because your toddler does not understand what a want is versus what a need is. To her, everything is a need. (Refer to Tip #3).
Tip # 3: As adults, we clearly can see that the dirty red cup in the top rack of the dishwasher is not a need. It’s a want. And to us, a gross want that we simply do not want our child to have. To your toddler, that red cup is a necessity. “I need the red cup! I need it now! Mommy, get me that red cup! It’s right there!! Don’t you see it?! Don’t close that! I can’t open it! Mommy, open it! I need that cup! Mommy took away my red cup! Mommy took away my NEED! Mommy’s not protecting me! (insert tantrum behavior here).” Your toddler’s first several months of life have revolved around you taking care of his needs. He’s hungry, you feed him. He’s got a dirty diaper, you change him. He’s cold, you bundle him. He’s sick, you care for him. And you do all of those things when he whimpers and cries… immediately. And after you do those things, he feels better. So when you won’t give him that red cup, he interprets that as you not taking care of a need (and for him it feels exactly the same as a survival need). How scary.
Tip # 4: As evolved as we are, we are still built like cavemen. For instance, if we starve ourselves, eventually our bodies will begin storing fat in an attempt to prepare for a famine. Similarly, when an infant or toddler is denied a need of “survival”, his brain and body (and hormones and all the other fun things we learn about in biology) go into survival mode… and with that come literal and figurative screams for help… specifically, screams for mom and dad to help. But these helps are cries out for ANYONE to help him get his needs met.
Tip #5: Crying and screaming are not only a natural physical response to fear and danger (and anything negative), but are also the only coping skills the child has had to use for the first year’ish of her life. New coping skills have to be taught. The fact of the matter is, if your child is clearly not in danger (i.e. the red cup incident), allow the tantrum to play out (i.e. allow her to express her frustration and use the coping skills she has gained so far). Be there to help her after she calms down from the tantrum (contrary to popular belief, this is not rewarding the behavior but rather it is soothing her). You’ll probably notice that there are times that even when you negotiate her wants (or give in all together), her cries and sobs might continue… she throws the cup, pushes you away, throws her hands in the air, and runs to the nearest chair to bang her hands on. When this happens, parents are often left confused… bewildered. But when thought of like this, it might make more sense. And it might encourage parents to wait to soothe her until after the tantrum has played out. Your child’s tantrum continues because she’s now feeling scared and bad and she doesn’t know how to make that bad and scared feeling go away. She’s frustrated and everything that she doesn’t want to feel is surging through her body. At this point, she doesn’t care about that stupid red cup. She cares about mommy making her feel better. Give her a hug, remind her that you’re there and that she’ll be okay and just offer her the opportunity to calm down. Depending on her age (1 vs. 3 is an incredible difference), take the time to make this a learning experience. For a 1 year old the lesson in this is the beginnings of wants vs. needs and that mommy and daddy will protect her. For a 3 year old, the lesson is that the red cup was dirty and we can only use clean cups. “Use your words” is also a good lesson to incorporate (or whichever lesson you so choose). Lessons to avoid are “mommy yells at me for expressing frustration” or “my feelings don’t matter.” Help your child to understand that though you care very deeply for her and her feelings, sometimes we have to do things that we don’t want to do and this time is one of them.
Again, I must stress that these are simply tips (and layman’s terms explanations of development) to help understand the innate reasoning behind tantrums (because as we know, reason helps us adults to survive and function… when things make sense, they become less frustrating and stressful).
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)