Epic

That is the only word that I can use for the tantrum that we faced last night, It has to be the worst we have seen in the 3 years that the smalls have been with us.

The frustrating thing is that it could have come from a number of things or nothing at all.

It seemed to start when we declared time on Wii games because he was getting really frustrated but there was a minor paddy when he did his spellings and he got 7 out of 8 (still a great score as they were hard spellings). It continued because he couldn't decide what story he wanted and escalated because he didn't get the CD story he wanted either. The screaming (full on proper screaming) started. No tears but stamping, shouting, growling, running up and down the stairs, door slamming and throwing himself about went with it. We decided to approach this calmly and returned him to his bedroom each time saying we will talk to you when you calm down. This ended up with him pinching, slapping, pushing and trying to bite us. We were told to 'go away'. 'leave me alone'. At one point he even tried to push us down the stairs. It took him a full hour to dissolve into floods of tears and then calm down enough to listen to us, to accept a cuddle and them to settle down in his bed for sleep.

In the cold light of day I can add things to the list of things that might have unsettled him enough for last nights tantrum - his sister is having her friend for tea tomorrow, he started Beavers last week and he started play therapy on Monday. It could be too much all at once, But it could have been something at school or nothing at all except being tired. At the end of the day we have to set down boundaries that include tantrums are not the way to get what you want. We are trying to let the little things go, to give him choices and allowing him to make decisions but I am starting to question whether we are doing the right thing.

In other news we are returning to our house move plan - we are getting back on the market and hoping for a buyer so we can find a bigger property with 2 essential additions - another bedroom so that the smalls can both have a big room and there is no jealous because one has a bigger room than the other and a second bathroom so I can have a shower in peace. Fingers crossed.