The Girl Who Cried "hurt"

Bea has become The Girl Who Cried "Hurt". She says "hurt" at least 20 times a day, and it's getting to where I don't really know if something hurt her or not. I think she's figured out that "hurt" gets attention, and she's really upped it since the last check up when she had a shot. She screamed bloody murder and did not cope with the doctor's visit well, and we kind of made a fuss over her trying to make her feel better. We were out today and she said "hurt" for no reason, and I said "oh, you are not hurt" and got one of those looks from someone, and I had to explain that she says hurt all the time. I didn't want this random person to think I'm neglegent.
Anyone else's kid do this? I'm sure this is just a phase, but it's getting old and I am afraid I will miss a real injury or something because of her fake "hurts".

 

My DD does the same thing. I've found that if she's faking hurt, she can be easily distracted with a drink or a book or something. I'm hoping she grows out of this quickly - it's exhausting.

 

Your post reminded me of a suernanny episode I saw once. The little girl was around 3 or 4 and had twin siblings. Anytime she wanted attention she would scream "foot cramp" and start crying. Her parents had taken her to the doctor and determined nothing was wrong and yet the foot cramps persisted. Well her parents gave her all sorts of attention when that happened and would stop everything to rub her feet. Supernanny figured it was an attention ploy and told her when she wanted mommy or daddy she should say she wanted cuddles or something.

I have no real advice as your girls are much younger and explaining would be difficult. Hopefully something Miss Bea will outgrow soon.

Reagan

 

Casey sort of does this. It's most like every little bump into something (no matter how slight) becomes an episode worthy of whining and tears and, of course, kisses to the affected area. I can't tell you how many times today I've had to soothe her "hurt". Sometimes I can say, "Are you ok?" and she'll nod yes. Then I'll tell her to "brush it off" and she takes her hands and brushes them down her chest/tummy. Then she's fine to go on about her business.

 

Both of my boys say, "He hit me" to get attention (course, it sounds more like, "Ee imee". Nine times out of ten they're in different rooms when they claim this. They figured out really quick that Mommy makes a fuss if someone's been hit...

 

kelly, i swear our kids do all the same things - must be something about being born in august of 2005

cameron the past couple of weeks is forever saying (and signing) hurt and he'll also say cry and do the sign for cry. generally, if i'm pretty sure he's not really hurt (he's a drama queen, so if he was really hurt there would be dramatics involved) i just jokingly say oooh, poor cameron, he got hurt, mama must kiss it better and make a game out of kissing the hurt place. or if i'm busy with something i'll say silly cameron, where are you hurt? so i do give him attention, but don't make a big fuss over him and make it clear that i know it's not real - i treat him very differently when he really does get hurt. not sure if this is a good strategy or not, but it seems to work - i think he's just trying to figure out cause and effect.

 

I have one that does that. Every little bump is like a major issue. I thought we had been great about just having them brush it off and praising them for quick recoveries. And she usually does still recover quickly if I give her a kiss to the hurt spot. But gets pretty tweaky when she just nicks on something a little.

Jade one the other hand appears to be made of rubber and just bounces off everything.

 

Ben does this, and he milks it! He loves the attention. For him, he says "owie" and then demands a kiss to make it all better. And it works every time. But today, when he bit his tongue and wanted me to kiss it, I had to draw the line!

 

QUOTE(ruthjulia @ Apr 9 2007, 10:23 PM) [snapback]212536[/snapback]
kelly, i swear our kids do all the same things - must be something about being born in august of 2005

cameron the past couple of weeks is forever saying (and signing) hurt and he'll also say cry and do the sign for cry. generally, if i'm pretty sure he's not really hurt (he's a drama queen, so if he was really hurt there would be dramatics involved) i just jokingly say oooh, poor cameron, he got hurt, mama must kiss it better and make a game out of kissing the hurt place. or if i'm busy with something i'll say silly cameron, where are you hurt? so i do give him attention, but don't make a big fuss over him and make it clear that i know it's not real - i treat him very differently when he really does get hurt. not sure if this is a good strategy or not, but it seems to work - i think he's just trying to figure out cause and effect.


Oh yeah, Bea actually started by signing "Hurt" and then progressed to saying it along with signing. Sometimes I make a little joke and say silly things like "Does your hair hurt?" "Do you toenails hurt?" and it will make her laugh and she forgets about it. I need to teach her somehow the difference between "hurt" and "mild discomfort". She's also a big drama queen about every little bump. I'll try the brush it off thing.