Biting eleven-month-old

[captain optimism]

I think it's time to bring this to you gentle discipline mavens.

My son is 11 months old! It's wonderful! He can do so many things now!

One of the things he can do is bite.

Yes, he bites my nipples when we are nursing. At first he just did it kind of by accident. Now he'll nip me playfully in a number of situations. It doesn't bother me much if he bites me because I'm not paying attention to him, or because he's slipping off--well, it's not a problem because I figured out that I have to pay attention to him and support the breast so he doesn't slip off!

But he still does this (I must say quite rotten) trick of nursing most of the way to sleep, unlatching, rolling away for a minute, and then relatching just to bite me :eek When he does it, I generally say, as evenly as I can, "Okay, I see you don't want to nurse, because people who want to nurse, nurse." (Okay, many times I say that only after I have yelled something like "Ouch!" or "Oy vey!") Sometimes I'll look him firmly in the face and say, "Stop biting me." :firedevil When I do that he makes happy little singing sounds and tries not to make eye contact! Doesn't that sound like the behavior of a much older child, evading a lecture? I think he's a pretty smart little dude. :love

He also bites me and his daddy when we are holding him. He'll bite us on the shoulder and on the arm. His dad has started to say "No biting, sweetie."

I'm not sure, but I think the arm biting might be a way of saying that he wants to nurse, and maybe I can get him to learn the sign for nursing instead? I hadn't done that but maybe my dh and I can cooperate on that. Has that worked for you?

Any tips for me about how to stop reacting to his biting? Any other ideas about why he is doing it? My mom suggested giving him a teething toy whenever he bites me. But that biting the nipple thing is NOT about teething. I don't think. I find the boobie-biting really upsetting because I'm starting to get blebs and blocked ducts again, and I hadn't had them in a long while.

[seraph]

Here is what I do, but I started doing this when Kaia first got teeth and bit me, which was around 7 months. She would bite down as an experiment. I say "ouch!" and I put her down and walk away for a minute. Usually I need a time out anyway because it makes me really mad to be bitten. After maybe 20 seconds - half a minute, I come back and pick her up and explain to her that biting hurts me and I don't like it. It took about a week (maybe 1-2 times a day) for her to stop biting me at all and now when she takes an experimental nip (maybe 3-4 times since that time) I still put her down and walk away. It seems to work well for us so far. I think at this age they are learning still that what they do can get a reaction from us, so if they get a reaction they don't like (like being put down and walked away from), they stop doing it.
I haven't read many GD books so I don't know if what we do is a recommended method, but I do know that the advice I was getting to "flick her on the nose" felt totally wrong to me. I would never hit my baby, so why would I want to inflict pain on her in some other way?
One thing we are struggling with right now is PINCHING. She started out rolling the slack skin on my breasts between her fingers, and it escalated into full handed pinching. I can see that it's a comfort thing for her now, but it's so painful. I gently prevent her hands from grabbing me but it makes her so frustrated! I'm trying to work with her on transferring the comforting to rubbing my belly while nursing instead (she already does this sometimes) but there's something about the pinching that fills some need in her. I've also gotten some suggestions to hand her a small object to hold while nursing and I made some felt balls that fit perfectly in her hand, I just have to remember to grab them when we're sitting down to nurse.

[chapulina]

We went through this phase too! It simply drove me nuts!! To be honest, I don't really know what helped, but I stopped nursing her when she did the biting ( I didn't actually leave her, just disconnected her from my breast), and saying, "No biting; biting hurts" very seriously to her.

She also bit my dh and I on the shoulder - so shocking when those sharp little teeth pierce your skin!

she's now 22 mon. and it hasn't been a problem for a very long time (after about ?13mon.)