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you're not doing anything wrong. i think this is pretty normal behavior at this age. my older son didn't have a huge tantrum phase at that age, but my second one is. i think he is so close to talking, but can't, and gets frustrated. i also think he is developing a clearer sense of agency and independence, and he can't always get what he wants or do what he wants to do or say what he wants to say, so it becomes frustrating. plus you've got the whole nap change issue which may be affecting him.

with our younger one, when he reaches the red zone point, we've learned that the best thing is to leave him alone. distraction, talking and soothing don't always work. no doubt you will figure out what works best for your son to help him get past the tantrum.

good luck!

Yeah it's normal at that age. It gets better the more verbal they become. They have all these opinions and feelings but can't convey them and you can't read their minds so they just flip out. My husband's way of dealing with it was to move my son to a safe open space on the floor so he could flip out without hurting himself and leave him alone. Once he'd calmed down we would ask if he wanted a hug, give empathy, and move on. Hitting started at this age too so we had to work on a lot of "gentle, gentle" and softly stroking faces and teaching him to give high fives (gives them the slapping sensation but it's positive).

@MrsBrewer: yeah so when DS would hit we would grab his hand and say "NO. We don't hit. We are gentle, gentle." And stroke our cheek softly while we said "gentle." Then we would say "YAY GOOD JOB!!! High five!!!" And high five. Then we used high fives as the positive reinforcement to everything. "YAY YOU ATE YOUR WHOLE LUNCH HIGH FIVE!" We also used high fives to greet new people if DS was shy and didn't want to say hi. We'd ask if he wanted to say hello and if not we would ask if he wanted to give a high five. 99% of the time he would give the high five because it was fun and it was still a greeting to the new person.