Major serious help needed!Hitting,whining,yelling,U NAME IT!

[JaynaF]

OK!! So we've had it.... DS, 2yrs old: Hitting, not listening, hitting back, ASKING for time out when I go to get him away from who he is hitting or hurting. Doesn't nap, or else he wont sleep until 1030, and fools around banging on the walls in his room. So we dont let him nap. That way he goes to sleep 5 minutes after we tuck him in! But this hitting, and what not.... HELP!!! DD, 4yrs old: Pushing, hitting back, WHINE WHINE WHINE about everything!!! Its getting really bad, the whining. All of a sudden she doesn't know how to feed herself, she needs help to put a fork full of food in her mouth.. COME ON! Geeze... She gets tired during the day too, but refuses to nap, and will only have quiet time for so long. May I add that I have 2 daycare children as well (yes, I can see now that the one on one time with each of my kids is lacking, so we are going to be doing some major time spending with them!! From now on). I didn't realize that the daycare would have such an impact on my kids. How can I help them? And what sort of things can I do with the hitting and whining and fighting and yelling etc...?? Thanks! Jayna

[murf1511]

my thought for you would be to have a quiet time with them. A nice long story time with special books maybe laying in mommy's bed? and then they can look at stories on their own or a show if they are being especially quiet and good? or if you have the energy, they could help you bake cookies or make playdough?

In regards to the hitting, whining, being nice to the DC children, maybe charts with stickers would help? A sticker for using words and not hitting, stickers for not whining when brother hits her, stickers for eating like a big girl, stickers for helping the DC kids....you get the idea. Make them simple and make the stickers great. You could even get a chart at the teachers store downtown. You could remove a favourite toy from the 2 year old if that would be effective...it is difficult when the hitter is your own, not fun to explain to DC parents:-) I have also found that it is just a stage and thankfully my ds is getting out of it at 4 1/2. He still will call names (fake words that he makes up like "clogger") and we reenforce that its not ok. but you can only do what you can do to turn them into little civilized people and also to have a stress free day. Good luck.

[Hope1]

I can hear the frustration in your "voice" (I would feel the exact same - with all that going on). I have a 4 1/2 yr old and a 20 month old, so I hear ya!
The one thing that came to mind when I was reading your post....kids feed off your emotions. They know when they're getting you fired up. You need to calm yourself before you deal with them. I have a friend that says "OH 'Johnny' stop it! THAT"S IT! TIME OUT!" A better way might be....calmly...(and this is the hard part)...."We are not allowed to hurt people, sit here for 3 min."
I don't know, sometimes it's hard to stay calm but I found it really helped, My DS fed off my emotions soooo much. (we just went through a 3 week stint of him pulling DD hair (till it fell out!) CALM time outs nipped it in the bud.
Hope this helps a bit....??

[JaynaF]

Thanks guys... I think the time alone thing is what we need to do. And of course the calm cool talking.... LOL I need to be more consistent on what we do. Keep it coming though, would love to hear more ideas! Jayna

[suesue]

(i know my comment will annoy many)....
Can you stop taking in DC kids? Your children come first and this behavior can only get worse without real solutions. The first few years of life are really the template for how your kids will react,
learn, and cope....
I think they need some focus. Just you, and not just when you can fit in an hour or so of alone time.
OK i know this may be unreasonable for many reasons...but maybe even having only DC kids max 3 times a week.