The No-Reason Tantrum

Tantrums: the unbelievable, ever-frustrating, silly emotional fits that small children (and some teens and adults) throw.  My daughter will be two years old in two months.  She is really beginning to come into her own with the tantrums she throws.  My four and half year old son still has tantrums, and his can become crazy, although they are less frequent than my daughters'.

Tantrums happen for several reasons.  They happen more frequently when the child is tired or hungry.  Kids have tantrums when they want something, don't want something, or things don't go their way. In the blog,  Reasons why my son is crying it details some of the crazy reasons just one child has tantrums.

My daughter has what my husband and I call the No-Reason Tantrum, or the NRT.  These happen daily.  Usually, it's after she wakes up and is a little cranky, or doesn't get the beverage of her choice.  For example, my daughter was rolling on the floor, and my husband asked why she was crying.  I told him that it was because I offered her juice.

The NRT is my favorite tantrum really.  It comes out of no where and is for no reason.

The above picture was taken we toured a fort in St. Augustine, Florida. She was tired of walking around and didn't want to get in her stroller.  There was no pleasing her.  So, like a good mom, I got out my camera.  

This picture is my favorite.  Here, we were on the beach.  The beach.  Who gets upset at the beach?  She wasn't eaten by a shark.  She wasn't hungry or thirsty.  She just felt like crying.  She spent the entire morning alternating between playing or rolling around in the sand and crying.  

When an NRT crops up with my daughter nothing helps.  With my son, we could hug him and say "take a breath" or "it's going to be okay" over and over until he calmed.  My daughter doesn't want a mantra.  She doesn't want to be held.  She is past fixing the problem.  She just wants to cry.  We look like horrible parents when it happens in public, but there is really nothing to do for the five, ten, or fifteen minutes this nonsense lasts.

I know she is just beginning the tantrum phase.  When she turns three they will become ridiculous, leave-the-cart-at-the-store level tantrums.  Right now, we try to help, but there really isn't anything we can do for her.

In fact, as I wrote this, she threw her empty sippy cup at me.  I filled it up, and she threw it and cried some more.