Hi everyone,
I'm hoping to get some advice on how to deal with a VERY INTENSE toddler. My daughter (now almost 13) was maybe a little more intense as a toddler than most kids, but son is a whole different story and we're running out of sanity around here.
He's almost 2. He can speak in sentences, but generally chooses not to talk. Not sure if there are perfectionist issues going on there or not. When he does talk his pronunciation is starting to get somewhat more understandable, so I think his hearing is okay.
99% of his communication is done through pointing and grunting and then a lot of high-pitched screaming if he can't get what he wants.
He's started hyperventilating when he doesn't get what he wants now. We don't give in (often because it's something dangerous, so we couldn't if we wanted to), but he just keeps escalating his reactions anyway. We try not to pay too much attention to a temper tantrum, but at the point of hyperventilating, it's more that he's extremely upset than being manipulative (I think), so we do try to comfort him.
We have a very open house - he can play with almost anything in it except for things like knives and items on a hot stove, so it's not like we say "no" a lot. However, there are situations where we'll say "no" all day -- for instance if he keeps asking to make a smoothie (he loves helping with the blender). He might ask 20 times a day to make one. I've tried to do pretend smoothies with him and he'll do that once, but it won't work again for the rest of the day. We eventually close the kitchen door which leads to hyperventilating. It's not always smoothies that lead to the meltdowns, obviously, though that's been a particular issue for the past few days.
We try distracting, but he is completely focused on the one item that he has to have and can't be distracted.
I've also tried the "I wish you could," thing - which doesn't seem to work much. I've tried giving him a specific timeframe ("we can <do this item> after we eat dinner <or some other timeframe>.") ... That doesn't seem to work. We've tried removing the item from his view, that only works sometimes and it's working less and less now.
Any other suggestions?
I'm open to reading some books about this, but finding time between dealing with him and my work pretty much takes me to bedtime as it is, so I'm not sure when I'll fit that in. Feel free to make suggestions on those though anyway. I already have intentions on getting "Transforming the Difficult Child."
