Whats your stay calm, don't lose it technique!?

Somedays when the whining and crying and fighting doesn't stop I am literally growling and yelling at my kids! I hate it, even when I'm doing it my brain is telling me to stop but I can't help it! It's like I finally explode! What do you do to take the edge off? When I walk away and ignore they get louder and I'm gritting my teeth before I eventually yell! HELP!

 

drink


ETA: Actually, my thing is to get away from them for a while. So I'll tell my husband that he's on his own with them while I go for a walk, or I'll take them to the park and let them play while I read.

 

2nd vote for the drinking.

But if that doesn't work or isn't practical, I just take a break. Put a 1/2 hour show on for them to watch and decompress for a few minutes.

 

I'm trying to counter the whining because for the most part, I think in Jacob's case, there is a reason for it. So, lately, when he gets all a fluster, I've been picking him up and attaching him to me until his attitude changes. For jacob, you can actually see a spiral effect that starts with whining and ends with laying on the floor upset. For him and maybe I am projecting, I think it is a bit of insecurity due to changes in the house so I've been trying to help him. For the bickering that occurs between the two of them, I walk away or find an activity that occupies the two of them (water table, moon bounce, tv) until I am ready to be nice again.

 

I make sure they're in the playroom with gates shut and hide in the bathroom with my iphone and twitter "Mommy has to go potty" always buys me a few minutes!

 

I put myself in time out. And I tell them. Mommy needs a time out. I then go sit in the living room on a chair. One of mine will even say now when I come back "are you feeling better mommy?". It gives me a chance to take some deep breaths and remember they are just being 3 year olds.

My other stratagy is to take them outside. Everyone feels better outside including myself. We go to the backyard or for a walk.

 

This. I tell them I'm getting angry & that I'm going for a time out till I calm down. Then I literally lock myself in my bedroom for a few minutes until I feel under control again.

 

I swear theses days if I drank every time this happened I would be an alcoholic! My big issues at home are with my teenagers so thankfully they can be left alone at home. My OMGosh problems with my little ones almost always happen in public. I simply excuse us from whatever we are doing if I can, we go home and we talk about it all the way home and then they sit one on my bed one on their bed for as long as it takes for me to regain my sanity. If they are just being whiney and driving me crazy at home I try to redirect the whine and energy into something they like - for example last night they "planted" an entire package of flower seeds in the yard. It took them an hour. Then they took their watering cans and watered their seeds - another 30 minutes! it gets them out of my hair plus they are happy to work together.

 

I sing. It sounds silly, but it works for me. It started with my oldest. She was so whiny and it drove me crazy. I was yelling all the time and I hated that about myself. And I hated the look on her face when I did it. I started praying for help, because I just felt sort of at my wit's end. One day on a trip to my grandmother's, I had to stop to use the bathroom. Sage was tired and grouchy and started whining about getting out of the van. I literally opened my mouth to yell at her and a Sunday School song came out of my mouth, instead. I can't explain it other than as an answer to my prayers. I sat at the side of the van and held her on my lap for a minute or two while I finished singing and then she was fine... and so was I. It was a pretty special teaching moment for myself and I worked very hard to continue to do that when I was upset. They say music soothes the savage beast, and I guess that was me (though I wasn't really savage, I didn't hit her or anything).

I admit I don't always do it and I do occasionally still yell. But now it's rare... and mostly about messy bedrooms, not whining.

 

Getting out of the house regularly really helps overall....quite honestly, on particular days that are really bad, my kids end up watching extra TV. I know that's not great for them, but I figure an extra 30 or 45 minutes of TV is better than me losing it and yelling at them.

 

I third drinking or timeout. Or both.

When Paul's home and it's a team effort I'll tell him it's "his turn" and go busy myself with housework or Twinstuff until I'm more mellow. When I'm home alone (like today) I tell the girls to play nicely, mommy has to do [whatever] and I get that task done. Usually I feel so much better for having cleaned the counters/thrown in laundry/made that phone call that I'm ready for the next hour or so.

 

What an awesome way to handle the moment. I am going to try to remember this for my whiner.

 

I whine back. It usually stops them in their tracks and I say, "do you hear how silly you sound to me?" I also tell them to use their big girl/big boy voice. If it's especially grating, I go to the bathroom and hide out for a few minutes and calm down. Or I will send them to their rooms, so all 3 of us can calm down and then I have enough time to handle the situation in a calm, rational manner rather then losing my mind.

 

I thought I'd add that sometimes I tell them I don't understand that voice but if they want to use a normal, pleasant voice I'd be happy to listen to whatever their problem is.

 

Dielle, I do something similar. I will sing or say, "Faalaalaalaalaa" and they look at me and laugh. Or I scoop them up, give them a kiss or a tickle, and try to break the mood.

I'm not an easily frustrated person, it is hard for me to lose my patience - which helps! For that, I'm thankful.

 

Oooohhh, don't we all have these days!! Some days I hear myself reprimanding them or even yelling sometimes and I hate it.

I have to admit, my first thought was VODKA!! Haha. Only half kidding, though. There have been days when all I think about is the glass of wine I'll have when they go to bed.

But, really, I try hard to give myself little pep talks. Even just in my head. I remind myself that they're 2. They're not trying to drive me crazy. They're not trying to break things. They're not trying to destroy the house.
I also always flashback to watching my itsy bitsy tiny babies fight for their lives in the NICU and that truly is about all it takes to calm me down and make me thankful that they are even here to drive me crazy ;-)!
I also do a lot of redirection and I will often times start singing a song which seems to grab their attention (probably because I sound so bad ;-)!
My husband does a lot of ear-whispering, diffusing-type pep talks which work well.

 

red wine become my friend awhile ago It calms me down and according to doctors it is beneficial to health (in moderation of course!)

 

Thank you! I do need to watch more closely to their cues if they are ready to meltdown, sometimes it so subtle and with all 3 can be hard! I will add one more glass of wine a week

 

Awwww Kim I wish I would have gotten on here 2 days ago. ;-) Sounds just like my house. It's gotten so loud here lately that I just give up talking because I can't even yell loud enough to be heard over the 3 of them and the dang dog. Literally days I want to crawl in a hole and cry. LOL BUT saying that - I too admit to greatly looking forward to my glass of wine after bedtime. If I make it that long. ;-) This seems to be a common theme here. ;-) We've been trying to encourage inside and outside voices (which they apparently really don't get yet) but when they start to wind up and get loud I'll try to corral them and try to get them to pay attention to me and say are we inside or outside. They'll of course say inside. SO then I remind them we need to use our inside voices. So far it's only working for a few minutes at a time. LOL But I'm hoping I'm planting seeds that will grow and I can use that as they get older. LOL As far as whining and throwing tantrums. I usually forget in the heat of the moment because my ears are ringing and my head is spinning and I feel like I'm going to lose it BUT if I can turn around and look out the window and take a few deep breaths I will take whoever is throwing a tantrum (and sometimes it is all of them) and put them in their room (physically carrying them usually) and tell them that they are hurting my ears so they will need to stay in their room until they can quiet down. Amazingly when I remember to do that the whining or tantrum stops within 3-5 minutes and they come out happy and like nothing happened. It's the oddest thing but it works. I just need to remember to do it all the time. LOL We go out in the back yard and we even ventured to the park in the neighborhood last week (I'm still deathly afraid to take all 3 out with me when I'm alone...I don't know why I think it just freaks me out they'll run in 3 different directions and get hurt). Going out just seems so incredibly stressful when I'm on my own. My husband has been gone for almost 3 weeks straight and I am out of bread. That is no good. LOL He has another week till he gets home for a few days. SO we're going to have to make an outing tomorrow. Yikes! When Nick and I take them out they're always good and they hold our hands but I'm still scared to death. LOL So I'm putting their little backpack leash things on when we go to the store tomorrow. It's hard when you have more little ones than hands!!! LOL Big hugs to you and I'm really sorry you are going through this too but thanks for making me feel like I'm not the only one whose house is ridiculously loud and feel like I yell too much and lose my mind. LOL

 

I second the singing - you have to breathe properly in order to sing and it helps me refocus even if the kids do not initially respond, but mostly they join me pretty quickly because they love music.

I also try to get everyone outside or I do mommy time out (for me this means mommy's special chair and a cup of tea, which the children have learnt to respect - as long as I do not take too long).

 

Toy Story. The girls cannot help but smile and repeat "to infinity and beyond!" when that movie is on. It gives me time to relax and they settle.

Drinking works too.

As does leaving the house.

 

I tried the singing with the boys the other night. They were both fighting and just not listening. They both stopped and stared at me. Then came over and sat on my lap and sang with me. I couldn't believe it really worked. I've tried it a couple additional times and it worked. Unfortunately I have a bad cold and have lost my voice so the singing is on hold for a moment.

 

I need a big like button! Instead I gave you a point

I love that it really worked, and I love that you tried it even though you weren't sure!

I remembered one more thing I do/did. It's my OK to Cry About List. It's really more for a little bit older kids. I made it up when Sage was maybe 5. She was really upset about something completely stupid. I told her I had made a list (yeah, it still only exists in my brain) of things that it was ok to cry about. If you have a fork sticking out of your eyeball, it's ok to cry. If you fell down the stairs and your head popped off, that head is allowed to cry. LOL! I made it all completely absurd and she started to laugh. On the NOT Ok to Cry About List are things like... your brother is playing with your toy, your sister looked at you funny, Mommy said you couldn't have a 4th glass of milk, etc. Sometimes they would come whining and I'd just say, "Sorry, that's definitely on the NOT ok to cry about list!" Or I'd tell them I couldn't see the fork. I've used this "list" with all my kids, but I hadn't thought about it for a little while. This week, I babysat two brothers for a couple days while their mom had a baby. The 5 year old is a total whiner! I told him I had a very strict no-whining rule in our house and Adam popped up with the OK to Cry About List. I love it when they listen!!!