My daughter is nearly 5 and has got a fierce temper. She changes from being totally normal happy child into child from hell. She screams and lashes out and won't listen to anyone. She refuses to speak to anyone who tries to calm her down. She just repeats the same phrase over and over again at screaming volume. I tried holding her today to calm her down but she got even more angry but I was worried she would hurt herslf. Any ideas would be greatly received. Tried discussing it with her when she was calm and she says she doesn't know what made her lose it either.

'She refuses to speak to anyone who tries to calm her down.'

Don't even try, not while she's in that state. for two reasons, one that you've already found, she's not in the mood to co-operatate at that time and it probably just fuels her more, and the second is that if you always intervene she will never get the opportunity to learn to calm herself down and you'll end up with a child who will still be having tantrums when she's an adult because she's not learnt to cope with frustrations.

Put her somewhere safe or just walk away, doesn't matter which but do the same each time, and when she's calmed down give her a big hug and say well done for calming down and carry on talking about it with her as you have been, it doesn't matter that she doesn't have any answers for you, its the talking and letting her know your interested in how she's feeling that counts.

Thanks. How long do you think it should take someone her age to calm down. It seems forever but is probably about 40 minutes at the worst at the moment.

My 2.5 year old daughter can go on for 40 minutes as well. It is amazing. The exact same behaviors.