Parents – how you discipline your childs complete public meltdown?
My daughter who is almost 4 (2 months shy) had a complete meltdown this weekend in Target. I told her I would buy her a barbie doll that she wanted. She started not listening when I asked her to do something or said we had to move on from the toy section. I gaver her several chances to listen or I would put her barbie back. I ended up putting it back and she wouldnt follow when we moved on, she ran away from me (I seriously lost her for a minute) and I had to run my hardest to catch up with her once I found her. She was hitting me and screaming at the top of her lungs. I ended up carrying her out of the store screaming. In the car I used force to restrain her to get her into her car seat and then she kept taking her arms out of the seat belt while we were driving. she cried most of the way home, but once we got home, she was back to her normal self.
How do you discipline of handle this type of situation?
When she started acting up the first time, I would have said gently “If you don’t act like a big girl, we are leaving the store right now and you are not getting the Barbie, do you understand?” …. Then follow through with that. Giving her ‘several chances’ is just teaching her that you aren’t serious and you don’t mean what you say when you say it. One warning is more than enough, and only one warning shows that mom means business. When you continue to repeat yourself over and over again and give ‘chances’, it will make the meltdown even worse.
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