Back to school: three tips to prevent temper tantrums in your child

Juliette Moreau Alvarez 8:00 p.m., August 31, 2022

Crocodile tears or big whims at the supermarket: situations that are very difficult to manage for parents and children alike.

Constantly stimulated by screens, increasingly large and crowded places or increasingly sweet foods, our little ones can quickly become little monsters today.

Isabelle Filliozat, psychotherapist, explains on the antenna of Europe 1 in

how to prevent and especially reduce the crises of our children.

A less sugary diet

To avoid crises, Isabelle advises preparing her children for the morning meal.

"There is never an ideal breakfast for everyone, everyone has different intestines and therefore will react differently," she warns.

All the same, in general, “we will avoid causing a spike in blood sugar”.

It is better to turn to "fibers, therefore vegetables", she says with a knowing smile, knowing the aversion of children for these.

"It's not easy at breakfast", admits Isabelle at the microphone of Europe 1, "so we will start with nuts, almonds, cheese, proteins or eggs".

Foods that will help regulate the mood of children "for the whole day".

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Another piece of advice is to identify your child's crisis times and try to see a regularity in them.

“Just to check if it would not be a blood sugar problem”.

Hyper or hypoglycemia can make a child very upset.

When blood sugar rises too high, "we are excited, awake", but when it falls too low, "we are exhausted".

“But when a child is exhausted, he will not necessarily rest, he will rather be overexcited to fight” this phenomenon.

Help the child move more

As a parent, you have to help the child manage his nervous breakdown, when he is stressed or overstimulated.

One of the ways is to hold him, "with tenderness, to provide him with all the love" he needs.

The child will experience stress but with sufficient security.

The other path is that of "freedom", of "movement".

You have to make him move, dance, throw him into a sporting activity.

The expert specifies, "it works better when he has been taught to do it at home".

One of the reasons for the amount of crisis is also the lack of movement in the day of our children.

"Unfortunately at school in France, children sit for a large part of the day, which tires the body".

"There is less and less movement today", compared to previous generations, underlines the psychotherapist on Europe 1. Between car journeys and school desks, children do not move enough.

“Today's children have less physical capacity, their cardiac capacity has decreased”.

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Anticipate and prepare for crises

For the new school year that is coming, some parents may face a lot of anger.

"We all struggle with transitions."

We react in different ways: either we are "excited by the novelty", or "we anticipate" and we ask ourselves many questions.

For the start of the school year, as for any other difficult transition, "we must talk about it in advance" and also "provide the child with resources".

On Europe 1, Isabelle Filliozat surprisingly recommends "playing 'what if?'".

What if it goes wrong?

What if we were alone?

"We let the child imagine all the worst scenarios".

Instead of trying to reassure him, we ask him what he will do in this type of situation.

"Suddenly, the child will have explored all the possibilities and he will feel equipped".

His parents will thus have offered him a range of possibilities.

Anticipation also works for moments of fateful crisis, like the famous anger at the supermarket.

Great trick: "We give a mission to the child".

He can take care of the oranges or the toilet paper.

Everything to ensure that the races no longer become a "test" to undergo.