Parenting Blog

"Distress tantrums happen because essential brain pathways between a child's higher brain and his lower brain haven't developed yet. These brain pathways are necessary to enable a child to manage his big feelings. As a parent, your role is to soothe your child while he experiences the huge hormonal storms in his brain and body. If you get angry with a child for having a distress tantrum, he may stop crying, but this may also mean that the fear system in his brain has triggered, over-riding his separation system. Or he may simply have shifted into silent crying, which means his level of the stress chemical cortisol will remain sky-high. As we have seen throughout brain research, uncomforted distress can leave a child with toxic levels of stress hormones washing over the brain." ~ Neuroscientist Margot Sunderland
 

NPR ran a story on tantrums recently that's gotten a lot of play, with a video of a little girl having a tantrum.  I think it went viral because the sound of a tantrum pushes all our buttons and makes us as parents feel so helpless, as the story pointed out.  Tantrums are terrifying and traumatic--and I'm not just talking about for kids!

The researchers pointed out that behind the tantrumming child's anger there is always sadness, and gave parents the solid advice that even if a child is too angry to interact during the angry phase of the tantrum, she needs comforting when she moves into the sadness phase.  Refreshingly, the researchers didn't imply that young children manipulate parents during tantrums, only that they're genuinely distressed. 

Unfortunately, the article's advice that "The quickest way past the anger, the scientists said, was to do nothing"  was interpreted by many of the commenters as a reinforcement of the frequent advice that tantrums should be ignored. This may have been reinforced by the fact that in the video, the dad leaves the child on her own to wail. When she looks up, ready for some comfort, there is no parent in sight.  (I have to add that these were the more compassionate commenters.  There were many who recommended giving the child something to cry about.) 

So just for the record, we can reduce both the frequency and the severity of tantrums by staying close and seeing ourselves as a compassionate witness to the depths of our child's despair.  If we can remember how overwhelmed he is, we won't try to explain or ask questions. (It was curious to me that the Dad in the video seemed to be asking the child to choose a chair.) And many toddlers get more hysterical if we try to soothe or touch them while they're angry. (I would probably feel the same way -- as if my anger were not being heard.) But even when kids can't interact, they do want to be heard, and they want the safety of knowing we're present.  If you think about it, this makes sense. She's tantrumming because she has such big feelings and no other way to express them. If you ignore her, she becomes doubly upset because not only is she frustrated; now she has also lost her connection with you. If she felt that you understood what she was feeling, she might not need to act her emotions out so graphically.

What kids need during tantrums is a parent who's listening and empathizing, ready with hugs as soon as the child is ready.  Does that reward the tantrum?  No, as long as you aren't giving your child the lollipop or whatever provoked the tantrum.  You're offering your little one comfort after he's been knocked off his feet by torrents of out-of-control rage, frustration, helplessness and misery. You're reassuring him that those feelings are just part of being human, that he's still loved, that the sun will come out tomorrow.  Just what you'd want to have your spouse tell you after your worst meltdown.

Tantrums are simply part of life for some children, nature's way of helping them discharge overwhelm, so they can't be completely prevented.  But some styles of parenting do minimize tantrums. I'll let one of my readers speak to this:

My son was banging his head on the ground or against my husband or me during tantrums. We followed exactly what you outlined in your article on an 18-month-old boy doing the same things. Following your advice has meant our son rarely has tantrums anymore, and when he does, we always react with compassion and love and give him words for his feelings while we hold him. The tantrum quickly dissipates. He neither hits his head nor us during tantrums anymore.

If your child is past the tantrum stage, take a moment to be grateful. If not, you have the sympathy of parents everywhere. 

And if you're still working on getting yourself past the tantrum stage, here's where the advice from the NPR story that  "The quickest way past the anger, the scientists said, was to do nothing" will come in handy.  Just remember to offer yourself compassion.