please help! Moody and whingy 4 yr old girl

[jazzcait]

Any tips would be very helpful! My DD1 is 4 years old and there is hardly a time at the moment when she is happy and smiling. Lately she is always moody and whingy, If she wants something she won't ask for it using words, she will whinge.

How do I deal with this. It's doing my head in!

[OurLittleBlessing]

My 3.5 yr old daughter is going through a similar thing, and it is exhausting!

I have no magic solution, but here's what I am trying:

- Being fairly 'matter of fact' about things. ie, 'that's no good darling, now lets put our shoes on'. then just refuse to get into it with her.

- having a short cuddle if she has one of her many hurts (lol) and then saying 'let's choose our happy hearts now'

- sometimes I resort to opening the back door and having her throw her 'grumpies' far far away. This actually works pretty well. It usually makes her laugh, and I can remind her when she is whinging next.

It's hard because I don't want to supress her feelings, but I also don't want her do dwell on every. little. thing.!

What have you been trying? I wouldn't mind some new ideas myself!

[jazzcait]

sorry to hear your 3.5yr old is going through a similar thing, as mine.

We haven't been trying anything as yet, as it's only just started. I do try really really hard to remain calm when she is like this as it will only make it worse I think. that's all I've been doing.l

[hopefully2]

We refuse to give ours anything unless she uses her nice voice. When she refuses we just walk away and leave her. It might escalate initially but we have noticed it has worn off. It is worse when she is tired.

We also use timeout if she doesn't stop.

We use a lot of humor and laughter in between and really praise the happy times.

[cherrymummy]

Hi there!

Is it possible she could be unwell? I find my 4 year old son gets clingy and whingy when he's sick.

Just a thought. :)

[Ffrenchknickers]

She could be coming down with something, my now 5 year old gets like that if she is getting sick. She did go through a whingy stage when she was 4, had a new baby sister and had just started kindy. I ended up taking her on her own to a cafe every Saturday to spend some one on one time (we have 5 kids) and she came right within a couple of weeks:)

[allforthem]

Our 4 year old girl is like this too!! Maybe its the age?? She seems better when we have some one on one time with her, especially when we spend that time stimulating her mentally. I put her surliness down to her being physically tired from kindy, but mentally bored because she is SO ready for school.

Goodluck, i know how you feel! :)