This is really beginning to get me down. He doesn't hit at nursery (three days per week) but when he is at home he hits me (and to a lesser extent his dad) ALL THE TIME.
It has been going on for about five months now, so encompassing the last few months of a very difficult pregnancy and the two months since his brother arrived.
It is really sending me crazy now. I feel that nothing I can do is enough. He hits me when he is angry, bored, tired. Sometimes we will be cuddling or he will just walk up to me and hit me. He also headbutts.
When he hits me, I put him in time out. If I dodge the hit I give him a warning. We do the whole eye level explaining thing "Immputting you in time out because you hit mummy. We don't hit each other" blah blah blah. After time out he says sorry, not particularly sincerely, then two minutes later he'll hit me again.
I'm getting to the stage where I am losing my temper. I can keep it together nine times out of ten, the tenth time I end up bellowing at him.
I know he is only little. I know he has a lot to cope with at the moment. But it is making my life a misery.
Since time out is obviously not working, what other approaches have you tried? Several people now have suggested I smack him but I really don't want to. But on the other hand a controlled smack to show him it hurts might be better than what I'm really scared of, that one day I will just lash out and hit him back in anger. I'm getting about three/four hours sleep a night at the moment and that is what I am really scared of.