Does your 4.5/5 yr old cry often?

JCS2007

DS is making me crazy. He will be 5 next month, and seems to loose it at the drop of a hat when he doesn't get what he wants.  It seems to only be with me/mh, and is typicallly little things, like refusing to try to strap himself into his booster seat or put on his socks/shoes (he has to try first, if he has trouble, I then help. He has proven to be capable of doing it all).  He tends to get over it quickly, but sometimes it happens 3-4 times in a day.  I typically just tell him when he is ready to talk to let me know and ignore him until then. He will take a few minutes, and then tell me 'I'm done crying now' and we move on. We have discussed how crying doesn't ususally get him what he wants.  Is this typical?

I can't decide if it is him playing me (which hasn't gotten him far- he loses what he wants (such as the movie he was asking for last night) when he does it but keeps doing it, exhaustion or just part of being a preschooler.  Anyone else dealing with this? Any suggestions besides ignoring the behavior until he calms down and not giving into his demand? He will ususally try to do what he was doing after he calms down (like still put his socks on himself, ect).  I think he cries more than my 2 year old.

Jinsy80

Yes, she's very dramatic. She cries more than the baby does...no advice though, I just ignore.

L D

Only when she doesn't get her way, someone takes something of hers, she gets hurt, if ds or dd hit/kick/pinch/trips her, has to do something she doesn't want to, when she doesn't like her clothes, how we fixbher hair, what's for dinner, her snack.  Then she cries louder/harder when I send her to room.  

Oh and this goes for both the girls.  5 is a VERY dramatic age.  

omurray

In general, no. My DS has never been much of a crier.  However, he did go through a short phase right after his 5th birthday where he would get extremely upset over the tiniest things and have  a full blown meltdown.  I'd say it lasted about 2 weeks where it was really bad, then it tapered off and he was back to normal after about a month or so.

surprise3rd

Yes, DD will be 5 in March, and already we had two episodes of tears today.  The first was literally first thing this morning when I told her she couldn't put blue sparkly frosting on her blueberry muffin, and then when I told her she could not get the princess ugg boots she saw a payless two days ago.  Totally trying to play me and I ignore it.

Sxia

It's gotten better with school. Now, she just gets upset or angry, but doesn't cry.

She did, at age 4 tell me (when I asked her if she preferred being happy or crying) that she liked crying because people gave her stuff when she did.

That snapped me out of any rewarding behavior for that. (I even had to stop people at stores, etc, from giving her a sticker, etc, when she had a tantrum.)

Angela814

My 5.5 yo cries all the time. She's started throwing screaming/crying fits when she doesn't get what she wants. (Not all the time... mostly when I think she's overtired.) She's kind of clutzy and is constantly bumping into things. Yesterday she fell on our garbage can while taking off her snowpants and bumped her eye. She cried for a good 5 minutes. (On the other hand, my 18 mo bumped her head later that evening and cried for less than a minute.) I think 5 is just a very dramatic age.

brightning

My DD is 4.5 and probably cries twice a day. I really don't think she's doing it for attention because she's just as likely to do it when she's by herself. If she's really frustrated that she can't do something by herself, she'll cry when asking for help. She definitely cries more when she's tired, and she also has days where she'll cry at the drop of a hat.