She’s starting to look like a cancer patient

Seen comics that look like this?

 

 

Well this is my life.  Faith really does this.  All of the time.  (Ryan’s cousin pointed out the other day, when I was whining about it, that you see it in comic strips and as a euphemism for frustration.  No one thinks it’s real!)

In case you haven’t noticed…Faith is a little bit of a challenge.  I’ve had 4 other toddlers and I know about tantrums, and I KNOW that this girl does not have normal tantrum issues.  I cannot figure out how to work with her.  We’ve tried EVERYTHING (and trust me when I say that I am awesomely consistent at stuff like ignoring, removing, not giving in). 

She is extremely willful.  I’ve kind of figured out that she’s a “strong-willed” or “explosive” child.  When things don’t go her way she does any combination of the following:

• screams
• falls on the floor and kicks her legs
• begins to gag and barf
• pulls out handfuls of hair (so upsetting)
• goes on for hours
• writhes and kicks and makes it very difficult for us to physically control her
• tries to bite us and, if that fails, herself

 

She is very hard to calm down, distract, reason with (obviously).  Sometimes when another person gets involved (Emma, Ryan), she will settle down…I think because she doesn’t want to “give in” to the person issuing the directive to buckle in her car seat, eat only on the wood floor, get dressed, not steal her siblings’ stuff, stop reading a book, etc. etc.   She is the WORST when we leave the house, because she knows she can get way more leverage when we are in Target and nowhere near her bedroom.  I think it’s mostly about control and she’s VERY smart about figuring out what buttons to push (hair pulling for Vain Me, barfing on the floor for Clean Ryan).

We’ve prayed and I felt directed to become an “expert” on this type of child, so I checked out a million books and searched the web and I found TONS on Strong-Willed Explosive Children, but nothing for kids under 2-3 years of age. 

Can you help?  Any websites, therapists (in the Spokane area), books, articles, ideas would be so greatly appreciated.  This girl RUNS this house with her moods and tantrums and I literally dread when she wakes up in the morning and I have a big knot in my stomach when I have to go anywhere with her.  I kind of wanted to enjoy my last kid, you know?