tantrum advice needed

[johno]

my 14 month ds has just started to have tantrums when he cant get his own way, today he wanted a biscuit just as i was preparing his dinner, i told him no and he started to pinch my leg, i told him he was naughty and pointed my finger at him and he head butted me and bit me, tonight i was running his bath and because i wouldnt let him get in as i had only just started to put water in he head butted the bath, hes ok and i kept him awake for extra hour, how can i over come this head butting and biting, help

can anyone help

I believe its part of growing up..I always made my dd say sorry after she had been horrible...Try and give him something to snack on,carrotts etc while you are cooking or put him in his high chair and ask him to help you....Same thing with the bath,it is such a awkward time for them,does he say many words yet?

no not really, just da deee, gan gan, he used to say mama, but wont pronounce his m anymore im a ba bee and his mamaa is a ba baa, he tells the dogs to get down which is funny and if he sees anything on floor he will point and say ditty

It sounds like an early start to the terrible two's. I find that when they start hitting and biting you the best thing to do is completely ignore it. Half of the fun for them is getting a reaction. If you don't react they lose interest. Another option is just to say in a calm quiet voice, "No we don't hit people." This helps to reinforce the message that hitting/biting etc is wrong but doesn't give them the reaction they are looking for. Speaking in a very quiet calm voice means that if they want to hear what you are saying then they need to stop what they are doing to be able to listen. Obviously if they are attacking another child then you would need to remove them from the situation.

thats a very early start lol, i just dont want him to hurt himself with the head butting on hard surfaces, when he was little he used to throw himself backwards alot from a sitting positon, but thats stopped and were headbutting whats in front of him, he hits his head on the back of his high chair if hes in that for to long, or if in his low chair he rocks it backwards and forwards laughing, im scared of this toppling over

hi johno - it's so difficult when they're preverbal isn't it - we're going through this kind of stuff at the mo with ds - now 16 months, he started at 14 months too. I think it's the beginning of them starting to try and find out where the boundaries are. They are all 'id' at this age. I'm no expert but I try to use distraction to try and avoid the flashpoints in the first place - e.g. give him soemthing novel to play with while you run his bath (bunch of keys works for us). Also try to be consistent in your response to behaviour you don't want - I say 'No phatcat ds' in a stern voice and put him away from me for 30-60 seconds, then pick him up or speak to him and carry on as before. It takes a number of repetitions to work but over the course of a couple of months ds has now stopped hitting our faces when he's pissed off.

Someone posted some very wise advice on here recently (I can't recall who) which I'm trying to heed as it makes a lot of sense to me - it's basically to pick your battles - so for example don't make an issue out of wanting a biscuit, in the grand scheme of things that's not important (perhaps you could've given him a bit of bread?), stuff to do with hurting others and personal safety is, so save the confrontation for those situations. HTH

have you tried putting him in his buggy and ignoring him for a minute? Don't know if I sound harsh though as he's very young.

My ds2 (18 months) is a headbanger too. He doesn't seem to care how hard the surface is either. If he's headbutting something that may hurt him I tend to lift him up out of the way and put him somewhere a little safer (we even have a big cushion on the floor especially for this! ). Ds2 seems to do it more often when he's tired - so of course when they fall asleep soon after you end up worrying if they've injured themselves.

thanks for all ur advice u have been really helpfull, i cant leave him alone in his buggy as he can undo the straps and stands up, if he lent forward hed tip it up