again with the hitting

[famousmockngbrd]

Mamas, I am at a loss. DS just turned 4. We have had problems with hitting since he was at least 2. Some of you may remember some of my previous posts about this. It just keeps going on, and I am out of ideas.

It does seem to come and go, to get better then worse. The problem is I can not for the life of me figure out why he does it. The only thing that seems to have any impression on him is sending him to his room. He hates it and I don't like to do it, but he flies into these rages and that's the only thing that calms him down.

He is a lot better around other kids now. He rarely hits in social situations. Now his hitting is mainly directed at family members. I don't know what to do. I just want him to stop doing it. I am at the point where I almost don't care why he stops, I just want to end the behavior.

[Twocoolboys]

The cool thing about him being 4 is that you can ask him why he does it. Talk to him in a non-heated moment and ask him how he feels when he gets mad. Ask him what he could do besides hit the people he is mad at. This is the best parenting thing that I have ever done with my oldest son. Whenever there is any kind of an issue, I ask him to tell me what we can do to make it better. He is so much more likely to follow through on a solution that he came up with on his own. As a matter of fact, he has never not followed through on something he came up with. (I have vetoed some of his ideas for various things. It needs to be a mutually agreed upon solution.) I am just waiting until my 2 year old is old enough for this kind of dialogue.

[boobjuice]

I think its ok to send him for a little quiet time if he is out of control. My ds hit me several times before, he has speech delay and I could tell he was so mad that he wanted to tell me something, but couldn't get it out. It was very sad. I think also at these ages hitting can be a form of communication. Like pp said, ask him when he is calm. good luck.

[famousmockngbrd]

Sigh. I have tried this. I feel like I have tried everything, to be honest. It has been a long two years.

He usually says something like, "Because M. knocked over my tower, and that was mean of her. She's a mean girl." So I try to validate his feelings by saying something like, "I know you were really angry when M. knocked over your tower, but it is not Ok to hit people. You can yell or stomp your feet (etc.) but hitting is not allowed." When I ask for his input on other things he can do besides hit, he says "Not hit" or else he runs through the suggestions I have given him. He never has an idea of his own. He has had some success with using some phrases I have given him, such as "I don't like it when you do that" or "I'm using this right now, you can have a turn when I'm done" etc. but a lot of the time he says it in a really loud, aggressive way. Still, it's an improvement.

He also says things like "I just needed to hit him," or "I had to". I have stopped asking him why he did it because I often get into a debate with him about why his little sister is not being deliberately mean when she knocks over his block tower, or why so-and-so did not *need* to be hit. Now I stick to more generic acknowledgements, like "It's ok to feel frustrated but it's not ok to hit", etc.

This is part of my frustration. I've read the books, I've done the stuff. It isn't working.

[mamalita]

I wish I had some words of wisdom, but on-and-off we have the same challenge (DS is also 4). So I'm here with support . . .