[gaymama]

My 18 month old son has started pushing and occasionally hitting other toddlers. He doesn't do it to older kids, and rarely to adults, but mostly to his gang of 'mates', when they have something he wants, or are somewhere he doesn't want them to be, etc. He's very large and strong for his age, and sometimes he hurts them.

I know it's just a developmental stage, and will pass, but how do I deal with it in the meantime? (It's hard to remember that my child isn't 'aggressive' when there's a smaller baby crying, and then I also feel defensive about other's labelling him.) My friends and I are all into gentle parenting, but they obviously don't want their babes getting hurt, and I can tell one or two are getting pretty upset. Constant vigilance is wearing, and I don't want to stop hanging out with them - I'm pretty isolated as it is. At the moment I'm trying stopping stuff as fast as I can, but this isn't always in time to stop someone being hurt. I'm pointing out when someone has been hurt 'Look, X is sad because you hit him and it hurt him' which I expect to be successful long-term, but I could do with something successful short-term too, before we lose all our friends!

 

[boigrrrlwonder]

How verbal is he? He sounds a lot like my kid was and still is: someone who just doesn't have the words to ask someone to move or communicate that she would like something that someone else has in any way except using her body. So one thing I have tried to help her do is give her language so that she can ask for space or for an object or whatever. Generally her peers don't understand what she's asking but I do and I can help facilitate what she wants. Of course, that does require a certain level of shadowing, which even though it sounds like you don't want to do that, it's the *only* way I've seen to deal with the issue.