Look out, he bites.

Very cute 22 month old; loves balls, dogs, blueberries, and his mummy and daddy; can take every book off his shelves in 6.2 seconds; tries to dress himself; and he bites.
Every parent's nightmare, being told their child bit someone at daycare that day.  Even worse, being told that your child was bit at daycare that day.  I am one of those who has heard the second choice.  Max spent a year in daycare when I went back to teaching.  He was bit twice, once on the arm(by a repeat offender), and once on the back of his head(by a first timer).  I was so angry. But in a very small degree of compassion, I also understood the other child's parent's pain.  How they must have felt?  What were they going to do?  My child will not have friends because he will be known as the one on the playground that bites.  Rumors will fly, he will be an outcast, therapy bills will mount up ... Ok, so I am getting ahead of myself.  My child was bit, not the biter.
My husband had an absolute conniption.  Why are we paying all this money and he is being bit?  I had no answer, but caused a bit of a stink at daycare.  All they could do was apologize and guarantee me the child would be monitored and shadowed from now on.


Then yesterday as I tried to stop my very cute 22 month old; loves balls, dogs, blueberries, etc. from throwing my neatly folded laundry, he bit me.  It hurt.  I yelped.  I got on his level and I told him it was not nice and tried a time out(how do you make a 22 month old sit still when he thinks it is fun and playtime ... stay tuned).  I hoped this was a one-time occurrence.  Of course not.
Today as I nursed his little brother, he thrust books at my face narrowly missing the baby.  As I reached my arm out to protect us, he bit my arm.
MAX.  You are not a biter.  You are my very cute 22 month old who loves balls, dogs, blueberries, etc.  So now the adventures of time outs begin, while I have an 8 week old.  This should be fun.


So what did I do?  I called my sister, nanny extraordinaire, and my mum, because who wouldn't call their mum.  Mum said for me to supply him with distractions in a room, make it something we must do so he understands,  keep those toys just for those times, etc.  So we went to his bedroom with a block building train and I sat in the rocking chair ... not bad.  My sister explained the ins and outs of         time-outs; how to, what not to do, theories, suggestions.  Tomorrow we will start again.


Take every day in turn, plan for anything and everything to happen, do not assume you will have the ability to get anything done, pray, drink wine at the end of the day.


July 20th, 2011