Baby Place

Nikki · Joined: 30 Mar 2004 Posts: 407 Location: Toronto

Hi,

The problem I am having is not with my son, it's with other kids hitting and
pushing my son.
My son is 19 months, soon to be 20 months on May 8th. He is an only child and is not a "hitter". Though, I would be lying to you if I said he has never raised his hand. Occasionally, and mostly in the past during a tantrum he has tried raising his hand usually to my husband but was told "NO!" right away and has had timeouts.
My son also since the time he could crawl at 7 months was told to "touch nice" when he was around our cat. This is something that I find has to be reinforced continually and at around 17 months we started with timeouts for about 30 seconds to curb anyone abusive behaviour of the cat. In the long run, the timeouts have seemed to work but we still have to keep an eye on him when he's playing with the cat.

Today I took my son to McDonald's playland and there was another little boy there (I later found out he was 18 mos.) This boy was quite a bit smaller than my son but hit my son several times on the head. With the first hit, the father just sat there and did not say anything (I think his mother was ordering food). My son started crying and I went over to discipline the boy and comfort my son. I told the boy that that wasn't nice and not to hit.
Soon after that the boy's mother came in and I didn't say anything, thinking that this was a onetime incident. Within a few minutes, the boy hit my son again and again my son started crying. At this point, the mother went over and scolded him and even hit her son several times in the face and said "how do you like it"?
Personally, I don't believe in using violence in disciplining children if at all possible. Well, her boy continued to pick on my son and my son would not hit this boy back even though his mother insisted that my son hit back.
My son has been pushed off of toys before at different playcentres. He never pushes back or hits back.
My question is what do I tell and teach my son to do in a situation where he is being bullied??
My husband was taught by his father and also believes that if someone hits you first, you hit back. I'm not to sure how I feel about this but at the same time I don't want my son to be a target for bullies.
My son is a good-hearted little boy and even will offer and share toys with other kids. He is also a big boy for his age but will never fight back.
What should I do?? Confused

rycheymac · Joined: 02 Apr 2004 Posts: 12 Location: Ontario

So far it sounds as though you have been handling it great, so, I guess if your son is being bullied on the swing(for example) then take him out of the situation and move to the slide . I just tell my girls to walk away. When my oldest DD was younger we had a next door neighbor who's little boy would hit Rylie, his Mom would talk to him and sort of punish him and of course he kept hitting her and although I liked his Mom, I stopped letting them come over. So one day he and his Mom knocked on the door and he asked if he could play with Rylie and I told him " Sorry,Rylie doesnt want to play with kids who hit her" and it took a couple more times of saying that and then I let him play over and he stopped hitting( although he raised his hand a couple times, I sent him home each time) I wish I could help more, I know it breaks my when I think of my child being hurt like that.

Nikki · Joined: 30 Mar 2004 Posts: 407 Location: Toronto

Thanks for the advice.
The boy would actually follow my son everywhere, to the point where I had to be right beside my son and stop the boy with my hand from coming any closer (while his parents talked amongst themselves).
Makes me wonder if this little boy was acting out for attention.
Just from observation at different playgroups/playcentres it seems sometimes and is not always the case that some of these children are
really just starving for some attention, positive or negative.

mamaof3 · Joined: 31 May 2004 Posts: 6 Location: Indy

The little boy hits because he think sit's ok to hit. I say just keep telling your son it's not nice. He will have to understand that some people do things that are not nice. It will develop into having to talk to them about someone you know who smokes cigarettes or anything else. It's not nice. Doesn't mean that they're not nice, they're just not being nice!
I can't believe she hit him in the face in the middle of McDonald's!!!

pavemylow · Guest

Well, not sure, but it seems like the two of you are moms, and very good ones at that. I just wanna help out in the father department with a male reply and why. I kinda have the same problem, everynow and then myself with my 2 year old getting shoved around. Ill share a story. We were at good ole Chucky Cheeses one day, very crouded, but having fun. My son was standing in front of me playing with a computerized screen, not really understanding what he was doing, but was having fun. He was about 3-4 feet from me. 2 girls ran up, probably 3 and 4 ish, and shoved him out of the way, pushing him to the ground and knocking his head off of an object. It hurt, and I know it did. (Read my post "just a few questions" for more elaboration on my relationship with my son) He did not cry, he did not faulter one bit with emotion. He got up, rubbed his head, and looked at me, with his big ole blue eyes that were screaming DADDY, WTF??? DO SOMETHING!!! I squated down, and he looked at me in disgust, like "why dont you do something, they hurt me". I got inbetween the two girl and said, "girls, you just pushed my son down and that hurt him really bad, he was playin with that toy" They looked at me, up and down, looked at each other, hit me, and ran to daddy. Daddy, was a BIG loser. He was getting drunk at chucky cheeses....c'mon...watch and play with your children! Oh well. After that, I explained to him, that there are people in the world, even as little kids that act bad and do bad things, but you are better than them because you do what is right and share and so on. He understood completely and later on, the 2 girls were playin on a jungle gym of some sort and the older one fell, a few feet, and was hurt, but not bad...she did cry though. Call me a bad person, but I smiled inside for a second after she got up. But even more astounding, I looked at my son who saw the whole thing, and he looked at me, walked over, smiled, and hugged my leg so tight. He saw that she got hers, without him having to do anthing, but give it time.
When my son is in school and the "bully" situation comes up, I will not tell my son to not hit back, I just wont. In my opinion, at this age, they dont have the discression to understand a child knowing better or not. However, in Jr High, when a kid messes with him and smacks him around, he will be told to give a verbal warning, and if hit hard enough before supervision gets involved, he will retalliate. I dont believe in and eye for and eye, but I do believe in defending yourself. If he does not learn to do it, he will get walked all over in life, until a life changing experience happens. I know this, because this happened to myself. Mom told me to never hit, you will get in trouble, just get away from it....so I did. I got walked all over in the real world till I got cheated on by my wife...then I lost it. I was a MEAN person for a long time after that, because the defenses were up so hardcore. If he is allowed to stand up for himself a time or 2 and run the possiblity of getting suspended for a few days, so be it. Its better than putting his friends and family through what I did to them. Not sure, kinda ramlin now, but hope that made sense. A man, never wants to see his son picked on, it reflects badly upon the father (sorry, its just a natural instinct). I understand not to have your kid fighting at the drop of a hat, but only in dire situations in what im saying. Well, thanks for your time Smile