What To Do When Your Child Hits

It’s that time. The hitting has started. Fun. Fun. Fun. I know she’s just testing the boundaries, figuring out how to express herself and in general fascinated with what she can cause to happen. But it’s really annoying, isn’t it, when your child is the one hitting?

I’ve tried a couple of things to stop this behavior: ignoring it, calmly holding her hands by her sides and telling her “no hit,” and getting angry. She’s really interested in the attention she gets when I get angry so I’ve stopped that (well, as much as possible).

The ignoring works (kind of) but it seems to be a slow route. And when I hold her hands at her sides and speak to her directly, she is nonplussed. Just stands there, staring. Oh, and time outs are completely lost on her right now – she has way too much fun with that “game.”

I have thought about hitting her back, oh yes indeedy, but since I’m a firm believer in modeling the behavior I want to teach my child, this just seems counter-productive. And confusing – “Sophie, no hit”…whack. The only thing that gets her attention and disturbs her is when, after she hits me, I say “we don’t hit” and walk away from her immediately.

I don’t give her another chance, or three tries or explain anything. I just remove myself from her and she seems to get the idea that she caused the leaving, and she doesn’t like it. Unfortunately, this causes lots of crying that then has to be either ignored or dealt with. And, it won’t work in all situations.

I did read a good article on iVillage about hitting that had lots of good information on dealing with hitting. My guess is that every child will respond differently, them being individual little snowflakes and all…

Here’s the thing – I honestly think the hitting is caused by a number of factors…she’s been hit by other children, so she’s testing out that form of communication; her emotions (either good or bad) well up in her so fast and strong that her hands get involved before she knows what she’s doing; she’s simply testing the world around her. How can I get mad at that? It’s all perfectly natural and, dare I admit it, something that she has to go through.

Let’s just hope she gets to the other side of this soon. Real soon.

photo credit: Tammra McCauley