Restaining Techniques

It's time to get some family counseling or play therapy or a physician's evaluation for this child. You don't have to do this alone.

At that age, they don't express themselves well and with the inability, they tend to throw tantrums. It is okay, because they are also learning so much during this time. Find out what they want or need. Is he/she tired, hungry, thirsty, upset? If he/she is hungry, teach them to ask for something to eat.

If you don't work on it now, the fits will continue to replace communication later in life.

Some additional info would be helpful - can you provide some examples of what types of aggressive behavior?

Also does the 3yo have a diagnosis? how you would restrain a child with severe autism, for example, would be quite different than how you would restrain a 3yo who is misbehaving due to trauma or one who is out of control because there is inconsistency or issues in the home.

If you have having issues that are quite outside the norm, I would suggest talking to your pediatrician or get a child counselor to work with you on behavior modification techniques.

You definitely need to give more information, but for now I'm going to go with the burning building example. Your child is the burning building when their behavior is out of control. What do you do when there's a burning building? Do you run into it? Do you run towards it? No, you run away from it. Let it burn itself out.

Physical aggression met with physical aggression usually escalates situations aka is grease poured on the fire and more people get hurt.

Mom to a child with Autism

I recommend parenting classes.

Please give some examples of the behavior so we can offer helpful suggestions. We need to know if this is aggressive tantrum level, where we could offer some help, or if this is dangerously aggressive in which case we are not qualified.

If your child is dangerously aggressive where they are a true danger to themselves or others, you need to talk to your pediatrician about this. Get counseling if you need it. Honestly, it's completely unsafe to ask a bunch of random mothers who have no training at all and no idea of what is going on with your child to recommend ways to restrain. Your child could be severely hurt if they are truly out of control and you try to hold them down without knowing what you are doing. And if you are trying to restrain a child for being a normal bratty child instead of working to cut off the behavior before it gets out of control, that isn't a good idea either.

Please talk to a professional and get the help you need from them if it has truly gotten out of control. If the child isn't dangerous, then put them in their room, making sure that it is safe for them, and let them burn themselves out tantrum wise. A better Idea would be to work out why the child gets to that point and figure out how to diffuse it before it gets out of control.

Need information. How I restrain my Autistic Son, how I restrain my bi-polar Nephew, and how I restrain my brother when he has a seizure are very different examples.

So if you could give us more information, we might be able to help.

In my experience, physically restraining a child is not very helpful during a tantrum. What seems to work in our home is distraction. Sometimes my oldest will see his little brother melting down and will start doing silly things to make him laugh. Sometimes I'll start dancing around like a nutcase, and that might snap him out of the tantrum. Sometimes I'll just open the backdoor and announce, "Ok, let's go out and play!"

Of course, it isn't going to work every time, but the majority of our tantrums can be handled this way. Other times just having "quiet time" in their bedroom will help them chill out.

If you are asking us this question, I think you may have a bigger issue. Consult your pediatrician so that he may be able to point you in the right direction.

Depends on your goal. We never used restraint, because we chose not to allow the aggressive fits. We stood back, gave a warning, and if the child did not stop THEMSELVES from the fit, we disciplined them. Yes, physically, but it was only necessary a couple of times before they quickly learned to stop THEMSELVES form the behavior at a warning, which is a very valuable skill for kids. It has kept me sane to have three non-tantrummers including one born with an extremely difficult and rageful personality. She needed more repetition than her sibs, but has wonderful behavior now at three.

To me "restraining" is just a wrestling match that tires kids out. It doesn't really teach them NOT TO ACT THAT WAY. It's also sort of a rewarding hug for the behavior. I've been present when friends restrain their kids and I find it really bizarre and ineffective-as in, the kids keep up the behavior knowing the parents will wrastle them. Those kids all tantrummed and acted aggressively to very mature ages and mine didn't. I recommend the book Back to Basics Discipline by Janet Campbell Matson for tantrums.

If my parents would have restrained me as a kid, I feel like it would have left bad memories. I'm glad I wasn't allowed to act that way and that no one physically restrained me while I acted that way. I can't remember the one or two times I was disciplined for fits or aggression-just the fact that I wasn't allowed to do that and didn't.

I took a non-violent crisis intervention class to learn techniques for restraining children and adults who demonstrate aggressive behaviour.

I agree with CoMoMom....we need more info to be able to give you proper advice for your actual situation.

For example, holding hands which have just hit.....vs.....a child totally out of control. Very different situations!

Every child is so different in how they react to different types of disciplines (NOT punishments – see http://pubs.ext.vt.edu/350/350-111/350-111_pdf.pdf ). Just as Je§§!¢aWe§§!¢a put it I would NEVER recommend meeting physical aggression with physical aggression. If you do so you are showing your child that it is okay to be physically aggressive.
If we back up some - are there any signs of 'aggression' prior to it? (e.g. escalation in voice, growling, screaming, etc). Is there a trigger to the aggression (e.g. not getting his way?).