Exhibit C: Hitting
Originally published four or five blogs ago (the blogs having been set on cyberfire). Republished for this post.
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A few months ago, Sariah went through a phase of hitting Jane. She wasn’t doing it out of anger, and it was never hard. I figured out that she was doing it for me. She only ever did it when I was in the room, and the one time she thought I saw, but I didn’t, so I didn’t react to her (I just comforted the baby), she told me she hit her.
I was really concerned about this, of course, but I didn’t know what to do.
Everyone I know and all the popular parenting books and magazines would probably suggest some version of time-out for every offense. But I knew that would be a disaster and would only escalate the problem. After all, it would be a punishment, and for Sariah at least, that just makes thing worse. Way, way worse.
My initial response was to rush over and make a big deal about how it hurt the baby, “Oh no, Jane is hurting! Look at her Sariah, she is so sad! She doesn’t like being hit, Sariah, that hurts her,” and then firmly, “We cannot hit.”
I knew I wanted to direct her attention mainly to the effect her action had on her sister–not to an arbitrary effect it would have on her (time-out, or whatever other consequence I might have come up with)–because leading kids to think mainly about consequences for themselves just encourages self-interest.
But it kept happening (once or twice a day, for about four or five days) and I realized that she was perceiving my exaggerated reaction and emotional response as a punishment, even though I wasn’t intending for it to be so.
So I had to reframe the scenario in my mind. Instead of thinking of her as being mean, or trying to get to me, I decided to see the behavior as a sign that she needed something. Food, sleep, attention, love–something.
The next time she did it, I changed my reaction.
I just quickly comforted the baby (she only required being picked up; she wasn’t really hurt. Like I said, she never hit very hard,) and then reached out to Sariah and said, “What do you need, honey? Come here, do you need a hug?” And then I held her for a bit.
And it never happened again.
Crazy, eh? Just like with potty training, she knew she wasn’t supposed to hit. She knew hitting hurt and baby didn’t like it and I didn’t like it, and all the other things I kept telling her when she did it. She didn’t need me to keep telling her. She perceived my reaction as a punishment, and since she reacts to punishment by continuing to do whatever she was punished for, the hitting (and trying to get me to notice) kept getting worse.
I’m certain that if I hadn’t changed my reaction, or if I’d try to invoke some other sort of ‘logical consequence’ for the hitting, she would still be hitting, and possibly getting even more aggressive, as she would come to view herself as mean or bad. I’m so glad it didn’t take me as long to figure this out as the potty thing did!
Filed in: parenting | January 27, 2007
Jenna
I have been thinking about your post and thought that your solution was excellent. Showing love is most definitely more far reaching than any punishment you could possibly inflict. But what about when you show love and the child does something anyway. Do you try punishment or leave them to their own devices?
Simply Mother
Well, I just don’t believe punishment is an effective teaching tool (and for Sariah, at least, it is absolutely counter-productive). I don’t think kids learn values by being made to feel bad. They may learn that they’ll be punished if they do something, and so they don’t do it, but it’s not because they’ve really internalized the value or developed self-discipline. They’re just avoiding punishment.
So, if “just talking” and showing love doesn’t help the situation, I assume she’s either needing something (food, sleep, attention, stimulation, lack of stimulation, etc.) or she is just not developmentally ready to learn the value or stop herself. Or she’s trying to assert her autonomy.
So I take the steps to keep her and others safe, try to get her what she needs, or remove her from the situation to cool off or talk—but I always stay with her (as long as she wants me) so she doesn’t feel like I’m isolating her or pushing her away from me because she did something I didn’t like.
I honestly wasn’t expecting my new approach to “work” so quickly. I was expecting to do it over and over again for a couple of weeks, and in the mean time, just keep a constant eye on her, keep her within arms reach so I could stop any impulsive hitting before it happened, and wait for her to outgrow it.
That’s the thing: I’m starting to realize that most of the negative behaviors we spend so much time (and often heartache) trying to stamp out are things that they will naturally just outgrow, if they are shown better alternatives, and modeled correct, compassionate ways of interacting with people. While they are little and learning, we just have to be responsible for keeping them safe, and keeping them from hurting or making others unhappy. And give them ways to solve their problems. It’s easy to forget that they’ve only been in this world for a couple of years, and they’re not born knowing these things!
When Kids Go Through An Aggressive Phase : Simply Mother
[...] Exhibit C: Hitting (This is the one relevant today.) [...]