Say No to Pants

Yesterday I did a training for teachers about dealing with nonverbal kids who get out of control- verbally or physically in their classrooms.

This morning I got to enjoy several Andrew tantrums and attempted to use the strategies I taught the teachers. Fortunately, most of them also apply to nonverbal toddlers. :) Here was one of my favorite segments of Andrew's tantrum. I am sad I didn't get him throwing himself on the floor over and over again and writhing as if in pain because he was SO MAD... he is definitely dramatic.

The tantrum was all about putting on pants. He loved his shirt (we had another tantrum when he had to take it off for bed), but did NOT want to wear any pants. This clip is mid-tantrum.

I am a mean mom because I think the tantrums are mostly funny (except the ones at the grocery store). Tantrums can obviously be exhausting at the end of a long day, but it is fascinating to me to try and interpret the behavior and try to reteach better behavior... or figure out what I'm doing to make him mad/sad (which is sometimes a lot of the problem).

Andrew eventually happily said "jeans" and let me put on his pants.

I'm sure something new will cause a similar reaction tomorrow. This is an entertaining age. :)