Testing toddler

[LiamsMum]

Do any of you have toddlers who try to smack you?? My 22 month old has recently developed this annoying habit... he will come up to me for no reason and smack me (not hard at all - more like a tap) - he'll actually hold his hand up to smack me and look me in the eye at the same time, to see what my reaction will be. He also tries to give a little smack to dh or his grandparents if he doesn't get his own way. When I say a firm 'NO' to him for doing this, he sometimes tries to hug me afterwards. Either he's confused about his feelings at the moment or he is just testing, testing, testing!!!! I must admit some of his behaviour is very trying at the moment and my dh's parents are coming to stay with us from the UK for 5 weeks in August - all I can think of is how stressful it's going to be!

Completely normal behaviour and they do grow out of it! I had a 'smacker' and I think he was just testing how far he could push things. I used to stop him mid smack and explain that it hurt and made me feel sad and cross - fortunately as I don't use smacking as a form of discipline, I was able to say 'do I smack you?' which he couldn't argue with. I also used to say to him 'do you see mummy smacking daddy, or daddy smacking mummy?', which again he couldn't argue with.

When he did smack me I would pick him up and put him in a chair, or on the sofa and walk away from him telling him that I wasn't going to play with him because he had hurt me. After a while I would come back and we talk about hitting in general and that it wasn't nice and people wouldn't want to play with him if he hit them.

Anyway, the smacking finally stopped - I can't remember when - it just sort of tailed off gradually. I'm sure this smacking phase happened about 2 years old - he's 3 now and happily doesn't wallop us, or his friends deliberately now!

I was advised by healthvisitors to, on the initial hit/kick, say not to do it as it is naughty to hit/kick and hurt me, you dont want to hurt me do you? If you do it again I will take you to your room. When they do it again, as they always will to push you, you take them to their room even if only for a few minutes. Sometimes by 9am my little boy had been in his room 3 times. You mustnt tell them they are naughty it is what they are doing that is naughty. Eventually it sinks in and they stop. You have to be consistant although its hard when you are out of the home. Even now, 1year latter little lapses occur with my son hitting, the room works though.

I think it's mostly testing. My son does it too (he's 18 mo.) The problem is that if I say something like "you don't want to hurt me do you?" He says "yes", giggles and hits me again. In fact he is quite enjoying being "naughty" at the moment. If he thinks I haven't noticed him doing something he's not supposed to, he'll come over get my attention, say "naughty, naughty" and go back and do the naughty thing again. I just try to distract him and hope that he'll grow out of it before he's 40.