Hoping someone has some miracle advice for me as I’m tearing my head out now…
My little boy is 3 next month and has been going through a pushing ‘phase’ since his little brother arrived 5 months ago. We did everything we could think of to prepare him for baby’s arrival - read all the books, got him a baby of his own to play with, have him big brother ‘jobs’ to help him feel important etc but inevitably he’s had a hard time adjusting. He’s lovely with baby and has never shown signs of jealousy, but quite often the pushes happen when I’m feeding baby (maybe because I’m not there to police him so he thinks he can get away with it?).
It’s hard because no one thing seems to trigger it - sometimes it’s when another kid snatches a toy (which I understand the reaction but obviously it’s still not ok), sometimes it’s when someone is too ‘in his space’, other times it’s if I’m distracted and he wants my attention, and sometimes it is completely out of the blue - he’ll just get up and go and push someone for seemingly no reason.
What makes it worse is he’s big and strong for his age so the other kid always goes flying, and if anyone ever tries to push him he always wins, so he doesn’t understand how it feels.
I feel like we’ve tried everything:
Time out
Calmly explaining things
Taking toys away
Giving attention
Not giving attention
Good old telling off
Positive language - “Kind hands” etc that’s been recommended by nursery
Books about feelings and being kind
We’ve stuck with various techniques so that we are consistent with our approach and not just reacted differently on different days, and only changed tact when things clearly aren’t working. We make sure nursery and grandparents etc are on board and doing the same. Nothing seems to work though and I’m just at my wits end. I can’t take him anywhere without having to hover over him ready to grab him. We’ve been asked not to go back to a play group after he pushed a little girl off a climbing frame, and nursery have had me in to discuss it. I hate that my kid is the ‘naughty kid’. He’s so lovely in every other way, which is why I just don’t understand this side of him