Please help me!

[becoming]

My 21-month-old will NOT listen to me sometimes, and I don't know what to do. Today he was hitting my parents' 17-year-old poodle with a hard plastic car in the head, face, etc., and making her yelp with pain. I told him very firmly not to do that anymore, explained that the dog is old and it hurts her when he hits her, and tried to distract him by leading him to another part of the house. That worked for about one minute, then he was back at the dog's chair hitting her again. This went on for about thirty minutes. It became a power struggle, and I eventually SCREAMED at him to stop, which upset him horribly of course, and I felt terrible.

What I have been doing in these situations is to give him what I call a "time-out", which is holding him in my lap and not letting him up for a minute or two. He screams and cries real tears while this is going on, and I'm afraid it's going to make him think that me holding him is a punishment, although it hasn't seemed to affect him in that way so far. But this is the only thing I've found that gets it through his head not to go back and do the same thing over and over again. I do have to use threats ("You're going to get another time-out if you do that again") after the "time-outs", though, or he will do it again. And I hate using threats, because I think it's placing myself in the position of dictator over him, and I hate that idea.

Is there anything else I can do about this behavior? I have started to consider it deliberate defiance, although it's probably more about impulse control at this age. It's hard not to think of my child as having a bad attitude when he does these things, though.

Help! What would you do?

[spinach]

becoming, i hear ya. My dd, who is 2, has just gotten to the point where she is almost always kind to our cat. Dd hurting our cat was a major hot button issue for me. Our dd is such a sweetheart in every other way except with our cat. I couldn't understand how she could be so "mean." I tried time-outs (before I gave them up all together because I don't think they work), I tried saying no, I tried ignoring the behavior, etc. Nothing changed the behavior. In the end, it seems not giving a REACTION ("No!!!!!") helped. In addition, I would separate dd from the cat, get down to her eye level, and explain to her that the cat is hissing to express that he doesn't like being hurt, etc. At this age, I don't think they can control impulses like that. It's just a phase that they have to move through.

BTW, when dd is being kind to the cat I have said things like "I like the way you're petting the cat" or "can you here how he's purring? He's telling you he likes your petting."

[Embee]

I've found that with certain undesirable behaviors, DS will just latch on and won't let go for awhile. I don't know if it's my initial reaction (maybe it was particularly colorful, caught off guard, whatever), but the impulse is too repeat is just too hard for him to resist. Totally normal behavior by the way...

I don't use time-outs. For this type of behavior (we have a cat who's taken a hit a time or two) I gently, but firmly stop his arm and tell him that he "may touch the cat gently" while taking his hand and showing him how. Then I say, "if you feel like hitting something, you can hit some pots and pans, your drums, the floor, etc." I usually leave it at that and so does he (runs off to drums or continues petting the cat nicely). If he goes for the cat again, I change the scene and separate him from the irresistable urge (either leave the house, the room or have the cat do so) and then physically show him to something he can hit...