Yesterday, late afternoon I made a run to the happiest place on earth – Sonic Happy Hour. When I returned home with my Diet Coke in hand I noticed Nick was playing outside with Jackson and Chase and Tyler was crying in his room, while the counter on the microwave ticked down. 10 seconds later the timer went off and I told Nick I’d grab Tyler for him. I walked down the hall, opened the door, took one look at Tyler, turned around, headed to the back deck and had the following conversation with Nick….
Me: Did you by chance put Tyler in his crib without clothes on?
Nick: No!
Me: Well he’s naked now. Completely. No shirt, no shorts and no diaper.
Nick: He definitely had clothes on when I put him in there.
Seems our little tantrum thrower is now a pro at removing his clothes in under 2 minutes. That’s right, I called him a tantrum thrower. What’s that? You thought the afternoon tantrum was supposed to stop now that we stopped potty training him? Yeah, we thought that too. Apparently this horrible afternoon tantrum is something different.
So let me break this down for you and share a theory my sister in law has and see if you all have similar or different theories.
- The afternoon tantrum is hugely different from the normal tantrums he throws for not getting his way.
- The afternoon tantrum always happens sometime between 2 and 4.
- Sometimes he starts the tantrum as soon as he gets up from his nap and sometimes it’s 30-60 minutes after he wakes up.
- He gets plenty of sleep so I do not believe this is sleep related (11-12 hours at night and 2-3 hours during the day).
- The tantrum is between 30-60 minutes long, often times on the longer end of that range.
- During the tantrum there is no consoling him: he does not want to bed held, he does not want a drink, he does not want to eat.
- He is often violent towards me (or Nick) during the tantrum, trying to bite, kick or hit us.
- He has adjusted just fine to being back in diapers, so I don’t believe he’s “holding it” anymore.
Ok, so my SIL’s theory is that it’s blood sugar related. Her nephew went through a similar thing until they figured out his blood sugar was crashing (which was when he’d have the tantrum). Now that his blood sugar is regulated by regular snacks and meals he’s better. She could be right about this being Tyler’s problem, except that we do offer regular meals and snacks (7:30, 10, 11:30, 3 or 3:30 and 5:30). However, lately the boys (Ty included) have been eating less at meal times. For example, yesterday Tyler wolfed down his grapes at lunch time but hardly touched his quesadilla.
So what do you all think? Could SIL be right? Any other theories? If these continue through the weekend I will strongly consider a call to our doctor early next week to hear her thoughts.
