Why is my one year old throwing tantrums?

Question

I have a 12 month old daughter who had brain surgery at 9 months for infantile spasms, complex partial seizures. She had a large portion of her left brain removed a hemispherectomy. It has been almost 4 months since the surgery no seizures but has hemiplegia on her right side. She is showing a bad temper at times ,like.. she throws her self back when I try to dress her. I love on her all the time. Sometimes she pushes me away I thought signs of autism, but she has the a better attention span than I do. She will most of the time only drink milk, no food. I'm concerned because of the tantrums she is already throwing. Can anyone help?

Answer 1

i dont know much about her brain condition, but she sounds like a typical 1 yr old.

my daughter started doing similar misbehavior at 10mos, and only now at 15, i can calm her down long enough to dress her.  the thing that works for me everytime is singing. i sing her a lullaby song or some kind of other repetitve song, and she completely stops wiggling and throwing around. Try that!

about the bad temper.... this is the time when these attitudes develop. our pediatrician told us to ignore our daughter, if she starts out with one of these, and instead either leave the room (just make sure she cant hurt herself) or distract her with a toy, if neither works, sometime you just gotta let the child cry it out.

also, her low food consumption could be from teething..... Check with your pediatrcian first about administering Oragel or similar gum-numbing medicine. The teething process can be extremely painful for some children.

More importantly, you need to bring this up at your next meeting with the doctors, because drastic changes in behaviour in anyone with medical brain problems could be cause for a more serious problem.

good luck!

Answer 2

That's normal behavior.  Most 1 year olds have times when they express that they are NOT happy with whatever.  I've had similar issues at that age with all four of my children.

First, it's important not to give in to tantrums.  Don't give her what she's throwing a fit for.  Even if it's something that would be okay at certain times, she shouldn't get it if she's just thrown a fit about it.  If she throws a fit about being dressed, don't say in a lovey-dovey apologetic voice "I'm so sorry.  I know you don't want to get dressed, but you need to.  Mommy's so sorry." or anything like that.  She's the one in the wrong, not you, and I speak firmly and matter-of-factly, not with overt sympathy while they are throwing a fit.  Afterwards, I may explain that I understand, but not during.

Secondly, when my children around that age have thrown themselves back or similar things when getting them dressed, I say "No" firmly, swat them once on the leg, and then continue dressing them.  Repeat as necessary.  Eventually, they learn it's not worth throwing a fit about and to do what you say without fussing.  This can be applied to any other area of defiance or fussiness as well.

Answer 3

Well, if not for the drastic surgery, I'd say you've got a normal toddler on your hands. Has she just started walking? Once a kid is up and running, they don't want anyone or anything to slow them down!!  The temper is because she's learning how to express anger--you can teach her better ways to handle it when she's a bit older, for now, just showing her that hitting and screaming aren't acceptable are the most you can hope for.