Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
How to handle a violent 4 year old? Her outbursts come on suddenly, often without warning or any opportunity to de-escalate. They may be triggered by a request to brush her hair in the morning, or by the fact that she learned there will be salad at dinner, the car is too hot, or some other seemingly mundane detail. When she gets out-of-control upset, there is some combination of screaming, hitting, kicking, scratching, throwing things at her parents, etc.
I feel like there is a disconnect somewhere. When she’s calm, and when asked, she will recite any number of healthy ways to express her anger and frustration. Options include hitting her pillow, stomping, “being a turtle” (calming technique a therapist taught her), drawing her feelings, asking for her “calm jar” (a bottle with glitter that can be shaken), etc. But she goes SOO quickly from calm, to out-of-control angry and irrational. When she’s calm, sure, she’s an expert on healthy coping techniques. But when she gets out of control angry, she can’t control herself, much less think rationally about a healthier way to cope with her emotions.
Therapist recommended putting her in time out for 4 minutes (1 minute per year of age). Once the 4 minutes are up, if she is calm and ready to apologize, she may come out, apologize, and is given a small task she can do to make it all better. If she’s not calmed down after 4 minutes, she gets another 4 minutes of time out, until she is calm. We’ve taken anything out of her room that can be used as a weapon or used for destruction. When she is in her room, she’ll kick the door over and over, and/or open the door and slam it against the wall hard enough to break a hole in the wall. This happened twice in the past couple months. What to do?
She struggles much more with transitions than the average kid.
We’ve just started therapy a couple weeks ago, but I welcome any advice or ideas anyone here has.
Read this book, tomorrow! https://www.amazon.com/This-Your-Chi...his+your+child I had a friend whose daughter (now 21) was similar to your daughter. She tried a variety of things including hitting her. The teachers were struggling and it was almost to the point of her being booted from the school in 1st or 2nd grade. She had all kinds of medical test and therapy visits. This book was recommended to her by someone that swore by it and told her to read it. It changed her daughter’s life. Like most, she fed her daughter the SAD, which is crap. She followed whatever this book said and did a complete elimination diet. Within days, her daughter was a different person. She explained to her daughter was was wrong and got her involved in proactively watching her diet. A few times she became enraged at school having a complete meltdown and each time they were able to backtrack and realize she’d eaten something she wasn’t supposed to have. Her big triggers were red #40, yellow, and blue. If she had a cookie or cupcake with color, or Blues Clues yogurt, she could count on her going bonkers in short order. There were other things that trigger as well. To this day, her daughter is still very mindful of how she eats. And when she was a little girl, she’d tell people she didn’t want certain things because it made her “turn into the Hulk.” My friend was always struggling with the grandparents who poo-pooed the idea that chemicals and preservatives in food were making her sick.
I had this epiphany when baby #2 was three months old. We had a family outing at the park, and as we were pulling out of the parking lot to drive home, my oldest was screaming at the top of her lungs and doing everything she could to create a scene and make everyone miserable. My three month old was just sitting there in her car seat, calm, just chilling. My husband and I had a good laugh, because I joked how the oldest hasn't changed at all since she was a baby - still crying away in her car seat just like she did at three months. But the actual three month old was calm and content. Always has been, unless there is a good reason not to be.
Over the next couple days, I realized, Oh my god, my older kid is always going to be like this. She is always going to have a rough time of it in life. That scene leaving the park really drove home the point that no, this is not just a stage.
Not meaning to scare you at ALL, but as she ages into a teenager keep an eye out for drug and alcohol abuse. They often self-medicate to cover their problems and be more "mellow", which doesn't work of course.
Our oldest (who I mentioned earlier as having been a difficult baby/child) is a full blown alcoholic. He's a great person, but how I wish he'd stop drinking. Drug dependency is every parent's worry as they grow up.
Environment is everything; nurture (or lack of it) is the key. But not any more.
Now, one of the country’s top psychologists and behavioural geneticists, Professor Robert Plomin, of King’s College London, offers an emphatic conclusion.
It is drawn from 45 years of research and hundreds of studies. He says the single most important factor in each and every one of us — the very essence of our individuality — is our genetic make-up, our DNA.
The basic building blocks of life that we inherit from our parents are what determine who we are — not how much they loved us, read us books or which school they sent us to.
I've been trying to say this on almost every thread on CD that discusses raising difficult children.
I'm reading this thread with a lot of interest as I too have a 4 year old that is exactly as you described your daughter. He had outbursts that have absolutely floored me with their intensity. At one point he was waking up angry, going to bed angry, and was miserable and mean all day in between. His teachers however called him an angel. Which told me that he was able to control those impulses at least somewhat. The meltdowns started as soon as I picked up from school (the walk to the car was unbelievably awful) and continued all night until bed. These were not just tantrums, but full on meltdowns (screaming, kicking the walls, kicking us, scratching us, lashing out, sometimes for an hour or more at a time). For us, even going out to the store was out of the question as he would meltdown every time. We took him to OT and were told that he has sensory processing disorder. Basically he is extra sensitive to sounds, smells, and other sensory experiences and becomes overstimulated through the day. He "holds" it together all day but then has sensory meltdowns at night when he is home safely with us. I can see this as being accurate but I still feel like there is a piece missing. We have ruled out all sorts of physical issues. Most recently we had an MRI to ensure his brain structure was fine. Thankfully it is. So now we continue to go the route of looking at neurological conditions. DMDD is something I have never heard of and I will be doing some research on this. Luckily his behavioral has somewhat improved as he gets older and can better express himself verbally and get better control of his emotions. He realizes the consequences of his behavior. Basically we ignore the bad and sometimes lock ourselves away in our room so there is no one there to "witness" his behavior. It takes a lot of the wind out of his sails.
OP, I sincerely hope things get better for you and you get some answers. I know how frustrating this could be. And how helpless it feels to not be able to figure things out.
Read this book, tomorrow! https://www.amazon.com/This-Your-Chi...his+your+child I had a friend whose daughter (now 21) was similar to your daughter. She tried a variety of things including hitting her. The teachers were struggling and it was almost to the point of her being booted from the school in 1st or 2nd grade. She had all kinds of medical test and therapy visits. This book was recommended to her by someone that swore by it and told her to read it. It changed her daughter’s life. Like most, she fed her daughter the SAD, which is crap. She followed whatever this book said and did a complete elimination diet. Within days, her daughter was a different person. She explained to her daughter was was wrong and got her involved in proactively watching her diet. A few times she became enraged at school having a complete meltdown and each time they were able to backtrack and realize she’d eaten something she wasn’t supposed to have. Her big triggers were red #40, yellow, and blue. If she had a cookie or cupcake with color, or Blues Clues yogurt, she could count on her going bonkers in short order. There were other things that trigger as well. To this day, her daughter is still very mindful of how she eats. And when she was a little girl, she’d tell people she didn’t want certain things because it made her “turn into the Hulk.” My friend was always struggling with the grandparents who poo-pooed the idea that chemicals and preservatives in food were making her sick.
Thanks for sharing. I'm glad your friend found a resolution! And yes, absolutely, the SAD is pretty terrible.
Not meaning to scare you at ALL, but as she ages into a teenager keep an eye out for drug and alcohol abuse. They often self-medicate to cover their problems and be more "mellow", which doesn't work of course.
Our oldest (who I mentioned earlier as having been a difficult baby/child) is a full blown alcoholic. He's a great person, but how I wish he'd stop drinking. Drug dependency is every parent's worry as they grow up.
Absolutely. I knew so many people who struggled, especially during the teenage years. Some eventually got their lives turned around. But some never recovered. Some died. I do feel kind of helpless, because I'm not sure how much we'll be able to prevent that path from happening. Goodness knows we're going to try.
I'm reading this thread with a lot of interest as I too have a 4 year old that is exactly as you described your daughter. He had outbursts that have absolutely floored me with their intensity. At one point he was waking up angry, going to bed angry, and was miserable and mean all day in between. His teachers however called him an angel. Which told me that he was able to control those impulses at least somewhat. The meltdowns started as soon as I picked up from school (the walk to the car was unbelievably awful) and continued all night until bed. These were not just tantrums, but full on meltdowns (screaming, kicking the walls, kicking us, scratching us, lashing out, sometimes for an hour or more at a time). For us, even going out to the store was out of the question as he would meltdown every time. We took him to OT and were told that he has sensory processing disorder. Basically he is extra sensitive to sounds, smells, and other sensory experiences and becomes overstimulated through the day. He "holds" it together all day but then has sensory meltdowns at night when he is home safely with us. I can see this as being accurate but I still feel like there is a piece missing. We have ruled out all sorts of physical issues. Most recently we had an MRI to ensure his brain structure was fine. Thankfully it is. So now we continue to go the route of looking at neurological conditions. DMDD is something I have never heard of and I will be doing some research on this. Luckily his behavioral has somewhat improved as he gets older and can better express himself verbally and get better control of his emotions. He realizes the consequences of his behavior. Basically we ignore the bad and sometimes lock ourselves away in our room so there is no one there to "witness" his behavior. It takes a lot of the wind out of his sails.
OP, I sincerely hope things get better for you and you get some answers. I know how frustrating this could be. And how helpless it feels to not be able to figure things out.
Thanks for sharing, deeni. And for your kind words. My understanding from our therapist is that sensory processing issues do commonly occur along with other disorders, so you may be onto something if you feel like there is still a piece missing. If he is getting overstimulated throughout the day, I wonder if scheduling a few minutes for him to be someplace with low stimulation to "process" periodically throughout the day would help?
Children increasingly resemble their parents in cognitive abilities from infancy through adolescence Results obtained from a 20-year longitudinal adoption study of 245 adopted children and their biological and adoptive parents, as well as 245 matched nonadoptive (control) parents and offspring, show that this increasing resemblance is due to genetic factors Adopted children resemble their adoptive parents slightly in early childhood but not at all in middle childhood or adolescence In contrast, during childhood and adolescence, adopted children become more like their biological parents, and to the same degree as children and parents in control families Although these results were strongest for general cognitive ability and verbal ability similar results were found for other specific cognitive abilities—spatial ability, speed of processing, and recognition memory These findings indicate that within this population, genes that stably affect cognitive abilities in adulthood do not all come into play until adolescence and that environmental factors that contribute to cognitive development are not correlated with parents' cognitive ability
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
