Hitting and Pushing....i need some help here!

[tinyblackdot]

My daughter has started hitting and pushing whenever she is getting frustrated! If i tell her no, she will hit me, or pushes me away. We give her time out for it, but i feel like the time out is only making her more frustrated and angry and fueling the anger. I have tried addressing it with telling her to use her words not her hands, and when she settles down it seems to work, but when she get initially angry she doesn't seem to know how to handle it. I dont want her first reaction to be to hit! She is doing it to her friends too, not hitting but whining and pushing them away. We need a serious attitude adjustment and im just not sure how to handle it. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

[simplycrunchy]

We're going through the same thing with dd and it's tough! We don't do time out, so we have struggled with really not knowing what to do. I really think it's just a stage so I'm trying to focus on each instance not on long term worrying about it. Normally we just move out of her reach and keep repeating "I love you but I can't let you hit me." If she chases or keeps moving towards us hitting, we stop, kneel down, and just deflect her hands with our hands/arms, repeating the same thing. Eventually she stops and we just remind her that our house rule is to be kind and that hitting isn't kind because it hurts. I'm trying to talk about being kind at times when she isn't upset because in the moment, there is no reasoning with her. I think it's really hard for us to not take it too seriously/personally because she's always been super sweet and loving and all of a sudden it feels like she's turned into this mean, hurtful girl when she's angry, but I think it's important to not make a big deal out of it and just remember it's a phase that will pass. As long as we don't make it okay for her to hit, eventually she'll grow out of it.

[ASusan]

Oh, we're in the same place, yet DH and I don't exactly agree on how to address it. DS is 27 mos. When we tell him something he doesn't like, he "bams" us. He'll strike us while saying, "Bam!"

DH and I do want it to stop. I prefer to ignore it (not reinforce it) and turn away, OR I affirm that he isn't happy with the situation but he still has to go along with the plan ("You don't want to change your diaper, but it's dinner time and you're stinky. First we change diaper, then we eat.") I sometimes a "no bamming" to the front end of that.

Time out doens't work for us, because DS is pretty blase about it. He just sits on the chair until his 2 minutes are up. No biggie. (I think this is because they overuse timeout at daycare, but that's another thread.) I've done timeout only once or twice at home.