2yo hitting me and DH in face

[CrimeaRiver]

What can we do to stop this?

Honestly, she only ever does it when (a) she doesn't have our undivided attention, or (b) when she's tired and looking for a rise. Otherwise she is a truly delightful little toddler (like every MNetter seems to have ).

DH and I both have a zero tolerance approach to this, so far we have been making her sit in the little passageway outside our bedroom (only a small flat, so I can see and hear every little movement). Nothing. Afraid I flipped this afternoon when she did it for the second time (first time having got her a stern talking to through many snotty and gulping tears (on her part)), and put her down for her nap without lunch. (She had just had a fairly substantial pre-lunch in the supermarket trolley so wasn't massively hungry, plus she dropped right off which kind of ruins the whole thing anyway!).

My view is that she will grow out of this and we just need to continue showing her this behaviour is unacceptable. It's all because she isn't in control of herself and certainly not her emotions. But equally, we can't have her doing this in nursery come September (starting for the first time).

Any thoughts gratefully received!

Bumping!

I think 2 year olds aren't mature enough to understand the naughty step/time out etc, so not sure that strategy is the most effective.

Repeat the same phrase each time it happens: 'no we don't hit, hitting hurts people'. It may well be a phase but explaining something is probably going to get a better result than leaving her to sulk

My almost-two-year old does this sometimes, but it's only ever when she's really tired or not well and we're doing/requiring her to do something she doesn't want to. I just hold her hand still and say a firm "no". Usually she'll cry a bit more or shout "aaah" at me but she gets the message and doesn't tend to repeat. If she does I'll try and distract her with some toys and walk away from her for a minute or so. I just think she's very little still and not quite in control of her emotions yet. I don't let it lie obviously but I don't want to make a huge deal out of it when really she's just tired or upset.

That's just my experience anyway

P.s my daughter is also going to nursery for the first time in September. I'm working on the assumption that no child is perfect and unless her behaviour is totally out of control then nursery will most likely have dealt with hitting many times over!

My dd did this at the same age, if i was at home,
I'd put her in her room to calm down, in her cot if she's still in it. It's tricky when out, id say no and put her in the pushchair, basically withdrawing attention. I don't think they really understand why it's wrong, but my dd at least doesn't like having attention taken away. They do grow out of it, when they are 3 and up you can start explaining it hurts and taking toys or treats away for hitting. Sympathies, used to make me feel awful.

Tell her "no, we don't hit" and put her down on the floor, if she is on your lap. "Busy" yourself elsewhere if she's not.

When she approaches more appropriately, acknowledge that, acknowledge that she's obviously tired, fed up or whatever and reward her for it, as appropriate (cuddle, play, look at what she's wanting to show you etc)

By the way nurseries are adept at dealing with this so don't worry about that, many dc go through hitting/biting stages, one of the disappointing aspects of parenting.

I'd go for a - giving the child no attention when they hit - approach too. Put them down or move away etc. Reward any behaviour you want to see with attention as well.

Thanks so much for these replies, it's so good to know I'm not raising a devil-child!

Instinctively, I think that your approach MoreSnowPlease might be the right one with my DD. I think she wants us to pay attention to her, but doesn't know how to get good attention vs bad attention. Gen35 and ouryve, this is what we have been doing to date, seems to make no difference. She never hits repeatedly, when you say 'no' she stops. But that's because she has our attention at that point!

Thank you also for the comfort/reassurance re nursery being adept at dealing with this sort of thing. I think I was getting pre-embarrassed at sending off a child who goes about hitting her carers! She may be my first but I can tell that she's just too little to understand cause and effect, or at least understand it to the extent of applying it to her behaviour. But I do think that she needs to learn that in this world, this sort of stuff is Not On.

Thank you all again!