re: Need a little encouragement. I have a difficult young son.

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That type of behavior definitely merits a good butt whooping in my book.

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agree.

A good occupational therapist can help a lot. They can help establish some routines and structure for him. Therapists like speech, behavior specialists, OT, etc. can help a lot. I’d probably talk to a medical professional at some point to see if you can figure out a diagnosis or get some answers.

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His physical size makes him tough to control

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Hit the weight room

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Whipping him isn't the answer

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My oldest son used to pitch fits. It’s like he’d lose control when he was told to do something he didn’t want to do. I spanked him early on and now regret it as he really wasn’t in control. It was tough and unless you’ve dealt with it you don’t understand.

So my only advice is don’t spank once you realize it isn’t a quick and rare correction. You won’t break his will through punishment, logic or yelling. Best thing we did was to just walk out when he’d lose it and wait for him to regain control before engaging again. He eventually grew out of it and learned to control his anger. There’s plenty of resources for dealing with kids with control issues.

Now he’s a perfectly fine 17 yr old that played 5 yrs of football, is a leader in his church and is graduating and headed to college. I think sports helped him have release. He’s still independent as hell though which I hope he can channel into something positive.

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My bad I had you confused with another poster Beating the kid ain’t the answer though

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No worries. A whipping doesn’t have to be a beating tho, there’s a big difference between the two. You can discipline with a whipping without beating him.

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We basically have this linen closet with a small space at the bottom. I’d put his arse in there Abu Ghraib style for as long as we wanted as often as we wanted.

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I don’t have anything specific but hang in there and love on him.

Stay unified on strategery with your wife.

Good luck. He’s a little boy who needs to learn how to assimilate into society but also needs to know he’s safe & loved.

My kid was like this around the same age. Completely impossible to talk off the ledge when the meltdowns would start. I never resorted to a third party but came close. Quick question—how much screen time does he get? We have never done iPads or tablets or anything, but we do watch TV, and I found that lowering the screen time somehow helped with limiting outbursts. I’m not sure if it’s the fixation type of brain that gets overstimulated with too much TV, but I found that it helped. We also severely restrict what our kids are exposed to on TV compared to other kids. Mostly we watch old cartoons

Now at age 4 almost 5 with a wide vocabulary most of these issues are fixed. I think the hardest thing for them to deal with is not expressing how they feel, and they feel out of control and like nobody understands. Try teaching more words to describe how he feels (for example not just anger but frustration, disappointment, etc) and hold firm to rules. Structure and consistency is so important for this personality type. So if I say no to something and there’s frustration, I’ll get down on their level and say “I understand that you feel frustrated that you can’t have this. I would feel frustrated too! But this isn’t the time for that. Or it’s not safe for you to have that and I’m supposed to keep you safe. But your feelings are understandable.” Note that the answer is still “no” but the feelings are validated. Using language to help them figure out how they’re feeling is proven to help. Just some quick tips from a non professional with a very smart, determined, emotional kid.

ETA: found this on google. It seems silly but I’ve seen it work.

I’m glad I have daughters and not sons, because I’d beat the shite out of my sons if they acted like that