Hitting

My LOs are 19.5 months old and DS has turned into a nightmare. We suspect he may be jealous and is attention-seeking. He´s become hard to feed (I´ve posted separately about this already) but has also taken to pulling his sister´s and my hair and hitting us with objects - his sister more than me. Also when DD is playing with something, he has to go and take it from her ony to discard it moments later. DD is a little angel and just gets on with things but DS is the opposite.

Today he threw a toy and it hit me in the eye (it still aches). He didnt throw it intentionally to hit me, obviously, but Im always telling him not to throw things as he can hurt people (he hurt his siter yesterday doing this). We also have the tantrums. I put him in his soft sofa (he´s safe there) and walk away. I´ve had 2 horrible days with him (he was at my ILs´ previously) and found myself in tears (after the eye incident). He used to be such a sweet boy and I dont know where he has gone.

When does this phase end? How do you handle behaviour like this?

TIA

 

I walked away from tantrums myself, I felt like if I gave the attention, I fed the tantrum. Hitting and throwing was always a TO worthy offense in our house, I would remove the child from the situation, place them in my lap (not facing me), would not speak for a minute. It took a few months but I did find the hitting/biting behavior went down and at 24 months, they hardly do those things.

 

Yup us too...I feel like Ryan is getting alot of attention on this message board today!!
He has been hitting for about a month or so, and it seems to be gettting a bit better. I really can't offer you too much other than to let you know I understand how frustrating it is.

If Ryan hits me with a toy, I take the toy away and say "No hit, Ryan is all done with the toy" Ryan is always looking for a reaction, he's a smart little boy. I also find he acts up when he's bored.

If he hits me without a toy, I get up and leave the area and say "No hit, Ryan is all done playing with mommy"

So now the tough part is he hits his brother. It has gotten better, when it was at its worse we picked up Christopher and hugged and loved all over him, ignorning Ryan...for what ever reason that seemed to work better than scolding him.

I'm sure we are going to be in for it with him... I just love him to pieces though!

GL! and (((hugs)))!!

rebecca

 

Man, this is a tough phase. My guys have started throwing toys at me (mostly Jack, but Nate hit my BF in the face with a MegaBlock the other day :blush: ). I have been taking the offending toy and putting it in time out. And if he continues with other toys, I remove myself from the situation. I'm not sure he "gets it" 100% but he is upset when I leave for a few minutes, so I think it's getting through. Some days I just want to replace all of their toys with plush ones so it's not so painful.

Luckily they don't hit each other too much (yet).

Good luck and I hope for you and for me that this phase ends quickly!