tantrums, "transforming the difficult child" - Page 2

[chapulina]

:

fascinating discussion and information here. sorry I can't really contribute much. right now, dd is 3 y.o., sensitive and intense.

I believe I was (am?) one like your dd; I remember *frightful*, very scary rages when I was a child definately past the 4 year-old age, breaking a glass window on a garage door, terrible forceful door-slamming that would send reverberations through the house, blood-curdling screams, breaking things, etc. Yes, I remember feeling so ashamed of myself after an episode; in the moment, I seem to remember feeling incredibly overwhelmed by strong emotions, like nothing I could *do* would be quite strong enough to get them out of me..

I fear that I still have a strong temper/reaction to things, and am always trying to manage my anger more effectively. Never physically violent, but verbally scathing. Yellling is a problem for me. Becoming a mother and acting on good advice (much from this forum) has helped my own personal growth.

sorry for the interruption! thanks for an interesting thread!

[darlindeliasmom]

This is an interesting discussion; I might look at that book and see if it resonates...what I'm not hearing is a sense like the one chapulina describes, how it feels inside the tantrum.

I don't think my dd is addicted to outrageous negative behavior, I just think that her emotions are like a storm inside her, sometimes a happy storm, sometimes a hurricane of anger. It never feels like she's trying to GET anything by her tantrums except relief from the feelings.

And yes, it has affected her self-esteem, because the other children in her class, especially the ones who have been taught to squash their real feelings, mock her for it. I don't mean the tantrums, i mean the exuberance, even the methods she has tried to come up with to handle the storm. For example, she goes and runs or bounces on a trampoline or swings from a rope when it all gets to be too much. But people laugh at her when she runs in circles to blow off steam...so she has worked on 1-3-10 (1=stop and think, 3=3deep breaths, 10=count to 10 before speaking). In the middle of the deep breaths, the mockery starts...sounds like the problem is NOT with my kid, who is so trying to get on top of this, but with other people.

How could a reward system help her? I have always done emotion coaching with her, have always noted when she has found a solution to a problem for herself...I think that she is just, as she gets older, really internally motivated to find an answer that works for her. Would she be working as hard as she is if I had used external rewards??
I don't know. It hasn't been an easy road, not when she was a walking volcano at 4, a weepy mess at 7...but we're growing. If only I could parent all those others too

[Piglet68]

thanks again, kesmith. I hope you'll indulge me in some more questions because I feel I'm learning something here and would like to persue it more.

I can see now, how patterns of negative behaviour could rob a child of self esteem. Especially when you point out that she gets so focussed on those times that she doesn't see the good things she is/does. I can also understand what the next poster said about not being able to control oneself in the moment and having regrets/guilt etc afterwards. Heck, I have parenting days like that where I say things I don't want to say b/c I am too tired and out of resources to stop and it feels like crap.

You say that in the review section you go over the "good things" and this helps build her confidence. Couldn't this be done in the absence of a credit system? Just a "review of your day" thing with the child?

Also, you said it makes expectations clearer and more concrete.... Question: do you guys decide ahead of time on what is worth a credit, or losing a credit, and how much a particular thing is worth? Does she have any say in what things are "credit-worthy" or will lose her credit, and for how much? Because when you say it makes things clearer I'm assuming that all given situations where she could gain or lose credit are known ahead of time. But then if she is an active part of deciding on what gets/loses credit and how much then I'd say this is one aspect I can really get behind.

Originally Posted by kesmith

I think the credit system helps me parent more calmy because, my dd fully accepts the penalty...

You mean she never argues about something not being worth a deduction, or something being worth more credits than you said?

Another question: when she blew the raspberry at the neighbour, what did you say at the time? Did you say "that will cost you 5 points", or do you say nothing until the end of the day?

previously, any of my attempts to teach her that this is unacceptable behavior tended to spiral into a worse and worse situation.

This sounds like the reasoning behind getting kids involved in problem solving, where you ask them for suggestions on how to improve or make reparations for some incident or behaviour...in other words, they tend to follow better when it was their idea, or they had a say in imposing the "rule". Which again makes me wonder if this could be done without a credit system, and simply following the whole "get them involved" system of Faber and Mazlish ("How to Talk...") or Gordon ("P.E.T.").

It's obvious this system is making you and your DD feel good, and my intention is not to slam it apart. My "inner hypothesis" is that the credit part is not required, and that it's other aspects of this technique that are the really important part (meeting calmly to review behaviours, getting her involved in solutions, etc)... I'm just trying to wrap my mind around how this works....Now I'm reversing my goal of getting you to ask questions (because it's obvious you have!), and hoping you'll answer them for me instead.