What is Reddit's opinion of Parenting the Strong-Willed Child: The Clinically Proven Five-Week Program for Parents of Two- to Six-Year-Olds, Third Edition?

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>Tough to do positive reinforcement if they never act good.

I ready a whole book on this. The author argued that there are always ways that a kid can be "less bad," and the trick is to reward those.

He gave an example of a kid in class who would get up out of his seat, stand on the desk of another kid, and stomp his feet. One time he didn't stomp his feet, and the author praised him for that even though he was still out of his own seat and standing on somebody else's desk.

The goal is to give the kid the feeling of being praised for doing something right. Kids crave attention, and if the only way they can get it is by being bad and getting punished, then that's what they'll do. But they are even happier being praised for good things, which is why you want to find an excuse to do that and get them started on this healthier path.

I'm not saying it's easy, but I found that this style of thinking was helpful in raising my daughter.

I found this book to be really helpful.

One of my favorite ways of dealing with an unhappy child is to try restating their comment in a way that is accurate, but less inflammatory. If they say, “I’m getting a new mommy,” you might say, “You are really unhappy with me right now, aren’t you?” It doesn’t always work, but sometimes agreeing can turn a fight into a conversation.

Find a therapist that specializes in early childhood. We had one for our youngest when he was around that age. She used play therapy and helped him learn strategies for regulating his temper, like visual signals of red, yellow, green to think about how he's feeling, and what he can do when he's in the yellow zone, before going red.

She also recommended parenting strategies for us, many of which are preventative. She recommended this book, which was a helpful resource.

It's also helpful to give the child options of what they CAN do when they feel angry. Punch a pillow. Jump up and down and scream. Go outside and run laps around the house (or in the backyard or whatever safe space for the age). Have a private place where he can yell all the mad things he would LIKE to do to his sister (not yelling at the sister, and she shouldn't hear it... but he's too young to write/journal it so, let him verbalize it).

Also, something like ADD could potentially be a factor (Add has three basic types, one type is just Impulse control, even if their attention capabilities are fine.)

I really liked this book. I never faced anything like what you’re describing, so I can’t promise that it works, but I did find that it had lots of interesting advice about different ways of thinking and different ways of interacting with my daughter.

One trick that I found with stressed out children is to simply agree with them, but in slightly different words. If he says, “I hate you,“ try responding, “You’re very unhappy with me right now aren’t you.” Sometimes no other communication is required beyond them feeling heard.

My friend’s daughter was very unhappy because her mommy was gone. Her father (my friend) tried lots of stuff, but she just kept crying and asking for mommy. I tried the agree thing, and it seemed to help. “You want your mommy. You miss your mommy. You wish she was here. I wish she was here too.” My friend has been wanting to explain why mommy was gone. Why his daughter couldn’t see mommy. That definitely didn’t help at all.

I’m so sorry you are struggling with this. It sounds awful.

I would look into an assessment for them, as it sounds like impulse control is more difficult than the average kid of that age. Even without an assessment, getting the help of a play-based, young-childhood therapist if possible can be really helpful for both parenting strategies and for kids to learn coping mechanisms.

My youngest (of 4) was more like this than the others, while they all drew on a wall or floor or something occasionally when quite young, he was the one who spray painted a chair (my husband left it out in our basement, and was away when this happened... I was LIVID), and managed to take a kitchen knife to kindergarten--which his teacher very discretely handed back to us at the end of the day, thankfully (we locked the knives in a supposedly child-proof cupboard, but he was a miniature Houdini). We took him to an early childhood therapist, who helped him work on strategies for impulse control when he was angry (the things that happened more out of curiosity were a little harder to prevent), and helped us with discipline strategies. This is the book she suggested that helped us. It is meant for young children, ages 2-6, but your 7 year old is behaving in a younger fashion, so I expect the strategies could still be helpful.

It's important to get to the reasons for the behavior. Does it happen when they're angry? Is it curiosity? Is it impulse control issues? Are they seeking negative attention because they don't get enough positive attention? Is there a lot of stress in the household? With my kid, it was impulse control problems along with a hugely active brain/body. This kid is scary smart, but also needs to MOVE A LOT, and needed an outlet for that. He also had a very strong desire for autonomy and did NOT like to be told what to do. I've found that he would do very well when given some freedom, with boundaries. If he violated the boundary, he lost the privilege for awhile until he could show me he could handle it (you can ride around the block out of sight, remember the rules to wear a helmet and check in after 3 times around).

But in the moment, you have to be very consistent, and firm routines and boundaries really need to be established with strong-willed kids. There really just isn't room to let down your guard like there are with most other kids. It's exhausting. He was the only one who had major screaming, run-away, kicking and screaming fits in public.

It's also really important to use empathy and calm talking after an incident to help them see the other point of view of how destroying things affects others, makes them sad, etc. and talk about how they can make reparations. My kiddo had a really hard time saying sorry when I know he felt it, so we also had to work through that.

The good news is, my kid improved so much as he got older and more impulse control took over. He is 12 now, and the most amazing, helpful, kind kid. He channels his energy into sports and his intellect into his creative interests. We did make mistakes with him, getting too frustrated, yelling, etc. and I know he has internalized some of that shame, and I see it internalized as negative self-talk, being too hard on himself, etc. (although we always tried to repair the relationship). So, now we're working on that... parenting is hard and nobody does it perfectly.

Overall, I have tried to follow positive parenting (or gentle parenting or whatever new, trendy term you want to apply to it), but most of those parenting resources ABSOLUTELY fail when you have an explosive child.

When trauma is removed as a culprit, there's usually some other kind of issue going on, like some kind of nuerodivergence that makes it much more difficult for a child to regulate themselves. Add nuerodivergence to a naturally strong-willed, "don't tell me what to do" type of temperament, and you get an explosive child who needs different parenting tactics. It doesn't mean they're "bad" kids... but it also shouldn't mean that they're allowed to attack the people around them, either.

I have put tantruming/running away/hitting/kicking 3-5 year olds on their tummies, over my
shoulder to remove them from a situation as they kick and scream, as it was the best way I found to keep from getting kicked (while they still might pound on my back with little fists). I have shut a kid into a safe room and stood outside the door until they calm down... I have resorted to using the small half bathroom as this room, so rooms /items don't get destroyed. I have also physically removed an (older) child from the house, and told them to jump up and down/run whatever their mad out, but they're not allowed to knock over furniture, hurt people or destroy things. (At the age I did this, my kids were NOT going to hurt themselves by running into traffic--- but they found it very difficult to disengage the "fight" response, and I had to physically disengage them until they could calm down--after which there was always a reconciliation/reassessment). Yes, I mostly tried to work on prevention, but when there are 4 kids running around antagonizing one another, you can't always prevent a kid from getting to that "fight" response emotional overload where rational thinking and impulse control completely disappears.

I just thank God every day that my two explosive children are 7 years apart, with 2 more easy going temperaments between them, because I do not know how I would have survived if they'd been next to one another in age.

I found the strategies in this book helpful in those early childhood ages. We also took our youngest to an early childhood therapist who helped with emotional regulation techniques through play, as well as helping us with parenting tips (didn't need a diagnosis to go this route). Probably should have done so with our oldest, but he was more verbal outbursts than physical, and it really didn't even occur to me.

My kid's natural consequence in this case is to get put over my shoulder (so he causes me the least damage with kicking and punching), carried to the car and physically put into the carseat and buckled in. He doesn't want to go, he has to go anyway. That's the consequence. A young child won't associate this instance with loss of privileges later.

My youngest did this. I tried everything with timers, choices (do you want to run to the car or skip to the car?), etc. It didn't matter where were going to or from, whether I was dropping off or picking up. He mostly only did this with me, and sometimes with his Dad. He was an angel at pre-school (after I physically deposited him inside and left) or with grandparents.

It was SO frustrating. Those were some of my worst parenting moments/times. And I did react punitively out of frustration because I just NEEDED him to get in the carseat at that moment (other kids/commitments). And I feel so bad in retrospect, and I see that he has internalized some negative self talk (he's 11 and a kind, conscientious kid, still very active and feels things deeply), and we're working on that, but I still don't know what else I could/should have done instead. I also think some of that comes from observing his Dad and older brother's negative self-talk, too, so I don't take all the blame on this one.

He was my fourth kid, and I thought I knew what I was doing, but I was at my wits' end. I ended up taking him to an early childhood therapist, who did play-based emotional regulation with him and helped me with some tips. She recommended this book, and I used some of those tips, particularly preventative stuff for going to stores (SHORT trips), etc. It helped some, but really he just seemed to get a lot better around age 5.

Things I have learned: he has high needs for physical activity, outdoor time, and autonomy. He really doesn't like being told what to do, but likes to be helpful/useful/capable on his own initiative. This became a lot easier to manage when his brain developed some reasoning capabilities.

I ended up taking my explosive 3-4 year old to an early childhood therapist, and we worked on some emotional regulation stuff. She also recommended this book . I didn't follow the "program" exactly, but did get some helpful preventative tips from it. (That kid is now 11, so it's been a long time since I actually read it, so if it doesn't seem gentle/AP enough, there are probably other resources out now, but I remember it being super helpful for my youngest, when the other parenting advice I'd used on my older three didn't seem to apply/work/help.)

Honestly, I never figured out the perfect approach, and got frustrated too much. I did not know anything about ADD at the time (Now I recognize that I have 3 kids with ADHD, and each could be a poster child for one of the three types). Even following preventative tools and tips, I often had to end up carrying him out of places over my shoulder, kicking and screaming so he wouldn't hurt himself or anyone else.

The truth is we won't be able to soothe all our kids hurts. We just have to try not to pile more on their shoulders through shaming, taking out our own frustrations, etc. (though no parent is perfect at this either--at least I'm not. But I do apologize and try to set things right when I mess up). Use all the tips to try and make transitions easier, but if it's still really hard for her (like it was for my son, even while working with a therapist), it will be okay. Even when you're the one "inflicting" the discomfort because you really just need to get her in the carseat so your older child can't be late for school/activity AGAIN.

Things got better when he got older and his brain matured enough to regulate a little more.