Hitting, Punching, Gnashing of Teethies

Lately Jack has taken to violence to express his emotions to Branden and I. I have been quite concerned about it because smacking seems to be his method of choice for dealing with any emotion. If he's excited he'll smack you, if he's sad he'll smack, if he's Angry OH HOW HE WILL SMACK YOU! We've been going over methods of getting him to stop and they do seem to be curbing this habit atleast a little. He gets time outs, or if we are holding him or playing with him he gets put down. He does not enjoy either of these things to he usually stops. But sometimes when he's really in a mood, it will do nothing to stop him. One night last week he was angry for no reason in particular and smacked me on my face. So I put him in time out in his crib for one minute. He cried and screamed and tried to climb out and after a minute I picked him up told him hitting was unacceptable and that I loved him. He promptly smacked me in the face again. So back in the crib he went. This repeated no less than a dozen times. The kid is stubborn. But since then he's gotten better. The hitting is less and less frequent.

I spoke with his daycare ladies last week and then said he has never once hit another kid there or them. So thats good (or maybe not) but he seems to be saving his very worst behaviour for home. As I was discussing it with them and expressing my extreme relief that he wasn't "that kid" the one that hit the others (especially since he is currently the oldest and in a room with several rather small babies) he smacked me in the face. They were shocked, I was unimpressed.


I am glad this behaviour is only happening with Branden and I and he isn't really a problem child at daycare or in the nursery. And our consistent responses of no, time outs and we love yous seem to be working. He is hitting less and less and when he does hit the last few days you can see him trying to resist. But those impulses can be hard to control for babies sometimes and he isn't always perfect. Its quite funny actually a few times in the last few days I have watched him fight the urge to hit me or Branden when he's upset he fights it so hard and you can see he's just not able to fight it so he will come over and hit all the while saying 'no no no no no:" because he knows its a no no. Its almost too cute to get him in trouble!

He is a wonderful child who I adore though and I just hope the hitting ends soon. Because quite frankly sometimes it hurts! and I hope its a normal stage of development. It seems to be from what I've read. More common for boys than girls, which makes sense since boys are so very, very rough and tumble!