How to stop biting & hair pulling

Cottontail

My son is 19 months. He's a great little man most of the time but the one thing that's really upsetting me is that he's always biting me and pulling my hair. He does it to my husband as well, but to a lesser extent. He seems to do it mainly for two reasons, either he's teething (as he is at the moment), or if you don't give him what he wants. We normally deal with this by putting him down if we are holding him, telling him 'no biting, that hurts', then leave him there for a couple of minutes before making him apologise by giving us a hug and maybe even kissing the bite better. However, that just deals with that particular incident, and doesn't actually stop him doing it again.

he's been pulling my hair since he was very young (I remember him doing it at 5 months although it may have started before then). We deal with this in the same way as the biting, but as he gets bigger and stronger the hair pulling is starting to hurt more every time he does it.

I'm just getting to my wits end on this now because it's getting to a stage where I don't know if he's going to hug me, bite me, or pull my hair when he comes near me. It's really upsetting and I don't know how to stop it happening. I asked one of the girls in the creche about it this morning, she wasn't particularly helpful but at least he doesn't seem to do it there. I just don't know how to get him to stop. Can anyone give me any advice?

xzanti

I feel your pain, my 7.5 month old is going through a hair pulling and face clawing/scratching phase.. it's very frustrating.. I have to keep filing his nails every day as any little bit of growth seems to do harm.. He doesn't scratch himself at all just others..

I don't think he does it in a bold way, he's just fascinated by peoples faces and makes a grab for them.. he made my Aunt's face bleed last week I was mortified..

Will be interested to see if anyone has any good advice on this thread.

Moonbeam

My little one went through a stage of biting me but no one else, I bit her back with out hurting her but she did not like it at all so never bit anyone again.

Cottontail

biting him back actually has been suggested to us, but I just couldn't bring myself to do that to him also, how can I teach him it's wrong to bite other people and then go and do it to him, it's a bit hypocritical, even if he wouldn't understand the concept!

Frank Black

Our little fella (just gone 2) is the same, particularly to his big sister (4), whenever he get’s frustrated or they get into an altercation he’ll grab her hair or scratch or bite her.
As per OP, he’s so nice and friendly 99% of the time but when the mood takes him he becomes a terror. He has literally ripped out clumps of his sister’s hair, he’s drawn blood once when he scraped her face and he’s left teeth marks on her arm that were visible for a couple of days.
We’ve tried putting him on the naughty step, ignoring him while making a fuss of his sister when he does this, we’ve even pulled his hair a few times to try to show him that what he’s doing is very sore – none of this seems to be working.
At the moment we’re just hoping he grows out of it (it does seem to becoming a bit less frequent) and we obviously try to intervene quickly if a conflict develops – not much help, but I’d be interested to hear if someone has successfully solved this issue.
Our biggest worry is that he's do this to some other kid in a playground or something - thankfully hasn't happened yet anyway.

Lola92

My 8 month old girl is exactly the same. Scratching, biting, hair pulling, headbutting etc. Usually she is fine and has only done it to my OH and myself thank god but it really does hurt when she does it.

At the moment she is too small to really understand we just say no and try to distract her so as not to do it again but I don't know how I'll handle it when she's a bit bigger.

Will be watching out here for good suggestions

wmpdd3

Same with my one, she's being doing it since she could grab anything. She's now 10 1/2 months. I squeeze her hand (lightly) and put her down when she does it.

But the next day she'll do it again.

I've seen her with loads of kids her own age and she's the only one who does exactly as described above, its so embarrassing.

All advice appreciated.

rubberdiddies

Cottontail wrote: »

My son is 19 months. He's a great little man most of the time but the one thing that's really upsetting me is that he's always biting me and pulling my hair. He does it to my husband as well, but to a lesser extent. He seems to do it mainly for two reasons, either he's teething (as he is at the moment), or if you don't give him what he wants. We normally deal with this by putting him down if we are holding him, telling him 'no biting, that hurts', then leave him there for a couple of minutes before making him apologise by giving us a hug and maybe even kissing the bite better. However, that just deals with that particular incident, and doesn't actually stop him doing it again.

I found with out 22 month old who started to bite that when we took away her dolly that she sleeps with at night every time she bit, shestopped the biting after a couple of nights without dolly coupled with the naughty step

Cottontail

rubberdiddies wrote: »

I found with out 22 month old who started to bite that when we took away her dolly that she sleeps with at night every time she bit, shestopped the biting after a couple of nights without dolly coupled with the naughty step

He does have a tigger soft toy that he brings to bed with him every night, might be worth a try! I spoke to one of the girls in the creche again this morning, she said that with kids who are a bit older (about 3) the taking away toys and naughty step works but with children of my son's age it's more difficult to resolve but they usually grow out of it... and i'll be black and blue while i'm waiting for that time to come!

Lola92

Hopefully that might work for you cottontail.

I was thinking about this thread this morning as my daughter grabbed a fistfull of my hair pulled my head down to her mouth level and proceeded to bite my nose..... *sigh*
Really hoping she grows out of this soon...

Cottontail

That's what happens to me too. He'll grab my hair and pull me towards him, then i'll see the teeth coming towards my face! It's good to know though that it happens with a lot of kids that age, that it's not just mine that does it! The girl in the creche did say to me that a lot of kids that age do things, like hair pulling, biting, headbutting, that kind of thing.

namurt

Another suggestion for the biting is to put clove oil on their gums when they bite. Not sure if you're going to want to go near their mouth after just getting bitten though.

taldar

The tips i got at the time were. Zero Tolerance. If they bite/kick/slap/pull hair they are put on the bold chair/corner for time corresponding to their age. 1 = 1 min 2 = 2mins. Mam & Dad have to know this and stick with it and they soon realise that if they do it they will have no-one to cuddle/play with for a time.

it is all fairly normal and it comes from frustration of understanding more things but not being able to communicate them.

My little lad is 2 and a half now and sometimes I can see he wants to give me a good whack but has second thoughts because he knows where he will end up! Its so funny!

Zero Tolerance is the key

Anyway hope this helps some of you.