Moms of biters....post here

[cagirlintexas]

My name is Melissa and I am the mom of a 2 1/2 year old biter. He has been a biter since he was 10 months old.

We have a game plan and we follow it but he still bites. WHen he bites he goes to time out while I back up stuff. I tell him firmly no biting. Then he says he is sorry and we leave.

But he still bites.

[Lula's Mom]

I'm sorry. It's hard to be the parent of a biter.

[Red Pajama]

One of my twins started biting at about 2 and a half. He only bit his brother. I acted shocked, and said "oh, no. We never put our teeth on a person! (I didn't even use the word "bite"). I tried telling him that when he bit he must be tired, so he needed to go to his bed to rest. It got better, it got worse. And then he quit. I don't know if my actions or his maturity helped him stop, but it eventually stopped, sometime after his third birthday.

So I'm here to offer hope.

[Alyantavid]

My youngest was a biter. Nothing we did would stop him (and we tried everything, except biting him, because that just wasn't going to happen). He did quit and it's been a good year and a half since he's bitten.

[dachshundqueen]

For some reason, my kids only bite one another and me. While it is terribly distressing to see bite marks on the kids and the horribly painful bite marks on the back of my thighs (up under my butt @ toddler height), I am glad that it is at least contained in the home.

Both children bite when they are overwrought and have exceeded their ability to verbally communicate. Mine are 4+ and 22 mos.

Liz

[Asparagus78]

My son was also a biter - it started when he was about 8 months old, and lasted for about 2 years. Scolding didn't work; what finally did the trick was praising him just as he was about to bite. (He did it out of excitement 99% of the time, never out of anger). So when we noticed (or felt!) his mouth closing in on skin, we'd say "good kissing - that's so nice... awesome kissing...". He would look a little shocked, then we'd ask for another kiss, and he would oblige, never biting. We did that for a few weeks, starting at about 21/2, and eventually he would even catch himself and say "I'm not going to bite, I'm going to kiss..." and then proceed to kiss.

Now, at 3, when he sees a playmate biting, he'll go over and tell them to kiss, and that kissing is better than biting. Perhaps this approach worked because he wasn't doing it to be mean, but rather to express excitement?

[betsyj]

My 15 mo old bites at daycare. Last week he bit three separate times in one day. It is SO embarrassing. Each bite means I get an incident report.

For him I think it is a combination of frustration (he had a stroke in utero so can't walk or crawl so he tends to get bowled over or have toys taken from him) and for the reaction it gets him. The DCP's really try to anticipate his biting and it has gotten better. They really try to ensure the other kids treat him fairly as well. He still tries daily they just know the scenarios that cause him to bite so for now the problem is being managed and not cured.

He also bites when he is really excited about something.

Thankfully the DCP's are extremely non-judgemental and understand it is a phase some kids go through.