Help me with my cranky 3 year old...

[*Robin*]

Every morning he wakes up just fine. We co-sleep and he's happy in bed. Then we slowly make our way out of bed and he goes a little nuts. He starts screaming and crying and basically has a melt down for no reason. We thought maybe it was a blood sugar thing, cause he has issues with refined sugars, so we are completely off of them. But the last two nights he's had incredibly high protein bedtime snacks, immediately before bed, and we make sure we get breakfast ready fast in the morning to avoid blood sugar problems, and sometime he even nurses before he gets out of bed, but then he'll still just throw a hysterical fit. I know I probably should handle it with a little more empathy, but 6:30am is just not the best time of day for me, especially when I also have a 6 month old. Any thoughts or suggestions for help? I need some actual gentle discipline type quotes of things to say, as at 6:30am, or even earlier sometimes, my brain is not functioning.

Thanks for the help and ideas!

[jenfl]

This reminds me of my 2.5 year old! She sleeps in her own bed and comes out into the living room on her own in the morning. DH and I used to jump out of bed as soon as we heard her door open to meet her. We'd sit on the couch and try to snuggle, rub her back, whatever, but she would just cry and melt down.

One morning, I just... didn't get up. I'm pregnant, I was sick and tired, I couldn't get out of bed right away. She came out, climbed onto the couch, and just... sat there. When I finally did come out, 5-10 minutes later, she was pleasant as could be.

We've since discovered that she just needs space in the morning. Our current routine is to give her a few minutes on her own in the living room before we get up. She usually brings the last night's bed friends out and sits on the couch to talk to them. When we get up, 5-10 minutes later, we say hi and give her a good morning hug, then get her breakfast. While she eats, we go into the kitchen and unload the dishwasher. After another 5-10 minutes, she'll come toddling in and give us a leg hug and be her usual self.

It's an amazing turn-around. I never would have expected it to work. We have thoughts of getting a dorm fridge so that she can get her own breakfast out in the morning, but that's not in the budget right now. But I think she would love that!