My daughter is at that age around 18 months where she knows what she wants but she can’t always communicate it to me. She used to point to the refridgerator and whine when she wanted a drink or cry at the bottom of the stairs when she was tired and wanted to go up to bed. Since I have little patience for whining and screaming, I decided that an intervention needed to happen! I knew that she wasn’t just whining to annoy me– she was frustrated because she thought she wasn’t able to communicate effectively to me. All I needed to do was make her feel confident that I knew what she needed or wanted. That’s step one!

When she went to the refridgerator whining for a drink, I repeated to her what she wanted using words she knew. “Do you want your baba?” She would immediately stop whining and smile that I knew she wanted her sippy cup! When she cried at the bottom of the stairs, I would say, “Are you ready to go night night?”

Now that she was confident that she could communicate to me, she started using her words more and more. But now she was crying next to the fridge screaming “BABA! BABA!” Uh-oh… Did I make it worse?

Many times, if a toddler wants something and doesn’t get it RIGHT THEN, he/she become emotional… and since they don’t know how to regulate their emotions, it spirals into a FIT. Now she knew that I knew what she wanted… she was even using words to tell me what she wanted. But she wasn’t doing it in an appropriate way. When she would do this, I would kneel down beside her and say, “Look at Mommy. I don’t understand when you fuss— whisper. Baba.” She would whisper, “Baba.” An amazing thing happens to a toddler when he/she whispers… I have never seen a toddler that can simultaneously whisper and pitch a fit! It is a way that you can teach them to regulate their emotions, even if you can’t explain to them that that is what they are doing.

So then, anytime my daughter started whining for something, I would say, “Mommy doesn’t understand fussing!” And she would whisper and naturally calm herself down. A LOT of the whining disappeared as a result. She now knows how to regulate herself. I will notice her whine, stop, then say what she wants calmly. The whispering has turned into a calm, confident voice. When we’re at the supper table and she wants “more,” she doesn’t whine or shout. She simply says, “More?”