Dh and I are at our wits end with Kingston. He is difficult almost the entire time he is awake everyday. I don't even think I can put it into words what we are going through. He's ALWAYS throwing fits and screaming about EVERYTHING. This is nothing new either. Its not like he hit a toddler stage and changed. We used to think that maybe colic or teething or his lactose sensitivity was causing this. We are coming to the conclusion that this is apparently just who he is. When Dh graduated the police academy last month he suddenly became a daddy's boy. It was all great and nice at first for me because I was getting a break, but not anymore. Dh is totally about lose it. He wants his undivided attention at ALL times. He can't go to the bathroom or anything. He won't let us sit down, if we do he comes running to you and grabs your hand to get up. If you don't he will scream non stop. You can't do anything at all while he's awake. I was just trying to iron Dh's shirt and he came up screaming pulling me away from the counter. If I try to do dishes he comes up screaming pulling me away, same thing with cleaning bathroom counters, folding laundry, etc.... If you go with him to see what he wants, it doesn't help. It seems that he doesn't really want anything except for you stop what you are doing.

I just don't know what to do. Layden didn't act like this. Apparently he was the perfect baby and toddler. We have no idea how to handle this. Right now its just taking all of our extra energy to keep our patience with him. By the time he goes to bed at night we feel ass whipped. Just flat out exhausted!!!!!

If anyone has ANY suggestions, I would so love to hear them. Words of wisdom, encouragement, anything... LOL

I am so sorry he is having such a hard time.

Have you talked to your regular peidatrician about this to rule out any sort of medical problem? I think you should have him evaluated by a developmental pediatrician or Help Me Grow to see if he would qualify for some sort of services. He probably feels miserable being miserable too. My middle son is very high energy, and can be very "high maintenance" too. Although he is extremely bright, he qualified for speech, o/t and p/t. I bet your son might qualify for Early Intervention for Adaptive behavior, and maybe speech or o/t. In my experience, they usually "help" them qualify if it's close. Good luck!

Wow, I don't know. I second the medical approach too.

Is his doing this just with you guys or also with babysitters/other family members?

The only other thing I can think of is to stop caving in to his demands. Set some very clear boundries and reinforce who is the boss in the relationship, because right now it seems like he gets his way and he knows what to do get it.

Definitely get him checked out. I would start with your regular pediatrician and see if s/he feels you should have a developmental pediatrician look at him.

Edited to add: My Lukas started throwing regular intense tantrums around 18 months. He also qualifies for speech, developmental and occupational therapy.

I just wanted to say--- I dont mean to sound like something is "wrong" with your son. I just thought that if you could rule out everything else, then you could deal with it as a behavior issue, whereas now, it's hard to really tell.