Wednesday, February 13, 2008

First REAL temper tantrum on film

Well on Sunday Nicky had his first real, out of control tantrum. And me being the great mom I am I let him work through it and filmed most of it. What a lucky kid! ;)

Tom had left for church a few minutes after Nicky woke up from his nap. We went outside together so Nicky could wave bye-bye, but instead he started crying. He was probably still a little tired and I also thought he had a poopy diaper so I took him in his room for a diaper change, but he would NOT let me change him. Rather than fight with him I tried working with him.

I tried turning on the radio so that he wouldn't think I was putting him to bed.
I tried giving him a binky to help him calm down.
I tried getting Tom's phone to distract him.

But he was working himself up into a fine frenzy and so I started filming him while I spoke calmly and was available to help him calm down. Of course my first instinct was to hold him to comfort him, but he wouldn't let me hold him.

So I have two movies up of his tantrum. Part one is here and then part two is here. After flinging himself around a little bit he found a few more binkies to hold and then he ran into the livingroom and eventually at the end he said he was ok.

It probably took only about 5 minutes for him to work through it, which really is probably pretty good. He was having genuine upset feelings and had to figure out how to deal with them. He wasn't having a hissy fit on purpose to manipulate anyone, just dealing with his own temper. And I think he did a pretty good job of it.

But the best part was showing the movies to daddy when he got home. :) It took a while for me to figure out how to upload the movies online since the file type is different on a phone, but they're up now!

And if we're lucky we'll find that darn power cord for the real camera sometime soon. Argh.

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good job!!! both Mom and Nicky did well with that tantrum episode. Poor Angie though, I know that it is hard to watch your sweet good natured son have such strong feelings.
Hope you all are having a wonderful Valentine's Day---I love you all bunches and bunches today and everyday!!!
xxxoooMom/Grandmomma :)