Toddlers, biting, and a nanny share!
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Anonymous
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My 20 month old is going through a biting stage. It's awful, embarrassing, and it has become a major issue- particularly for the other mother.
It happened several times in 1 week about a month ago and a big issue ensued. Our nanny immediately told me and the other mother about it and sent us pictures of the bite. I went over what she did, what was going on, and what we need to do from here on out. The first time it happened, I immediately bought the book, "Teeth are not for biting" and we talked about appropriate techniques for redirection, and what phrases to use "You may not bite. Biting hurts." and trying to talk with him about using his words and taking turns but let's be honest...he was 19 months so he didn't really get it! I apologized to the other Mom and told her what we are doing to address it and told her that it is developmentally normal and we are going to work on it using all the tools available. The other Mom told me that her child never bit before my child came around and her child has been around many, many different kids (never for 10 hours a day, 5 days a week though). She became upset and I asked if she felt like there was more I could do and if so, to please let me know as I am a first time mom and I'm learning. She did not respond. There have been maybe 2 more incidents since that one including one early this morning. The last incident before this, my son bit her daughter who is 2 months younger and while the nanny was tending to the little girl, the 3.5 year old bit my child on the arm and left a big bruise. After apologizing each time to the other Mom, and her demanding to know what we were doing....she didn't apologize at all to me or say what she would be doing to address it with her child who is more than twice my child's age. The kids are temporarily all at my home and my child is learning about taking turns (he's never had to do this as he has no siblings, no cousins, and we don't have a lot of time to have other friends over). He also has been sleeping badly due to cutting 4 teeth at once. The biting seems to happen when 1) My child is teething or is sick and not feeling great and 2) When another child takes his toy. I feel like I am doing everything in my power to handle this situation appropriately and I've been communicating with the nanny that we need to be on the same page and just going over it and making sure we are all aware that it is being addressed and there is a plan but I get the impression that the other mom wants MORE to be done and she expects that her child will NEVER EVER be bitten again. That's not a guarantee anyone can make with any child, especially under 3! Any suggestions on what I could do differently? I feel like I'm stressing way more about this than I should and I do not want to put pressure on my child to be perfect because he's a toddler with big emotions and limited communication skills. |
Anonymous
| Is your child new to a nanny share? |
Anonymous
Not really. We've been in the nanny-share for 6 months but it is the first nanny share for both families. My son has bitten probably 5 times over the past 3 months but 2 or 3 of those were in 1 week when everyone was really sick including the nanny (my little had a very mild version of the flu with a bad cough while the other kids and the nanny had pneumonia). He's left probably 3 marks so 3 of those times there weren't any marks and only once was it a bad bite. |
Anonymous
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Your child should be used to the other children by now. Make sure to "take turns" with him at home and reinforce the teeth are not for biting by talking about it a lot.
As for your share situation- I don't think it is going to work out for you. You don't seem to be on the same page as the other mother. And three kids might be too much for the nanny to supervise properly. |
Anonymous
| Btw, expecting him to not bite is not expecting him to be perfect. No one wants their child bitten. |
Anonymous
| The other child needs to bite the hell out on your kid. Once he learns that biting really hurt s, he will stop biting. |
Anonymous
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This is tough, OP. I always worried that I would end up with "the biter."
One reason people choose nanny care is that they think they'll avoid a situation where their kid might be regularly hit or bitten by another child. Yes, it is developmentally normal, but no one wants to tell their own child that they just have to get used to being bitten, either. I have to agree that this has got to be on the nanny if it's going to be resolved. She needs to tell the other mom that there's no more she can do, and then other mom needs to decide what to do about the share. |
Anonymous
| I understand you're frustrated with the other mom, but if your kid bit mine 5 times and then one of mine bit yours once, I don't think I'd send you my home lesson plan on training my kid not to bite either. Just keep working with your son and know that 1) this will pass, and 2) until then other people will be bothered and potentially ungracious when your kid bites their kid. |
Anonymous
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natural consequences: When your child bites, he goes in a playpen for 1-2 minutes before coming out, while nanny starts reading teeth are not for biting. Same result for the other toddler. 3.5 year old gets 3-4 minutes. It's not time out, because nanny is still interacting with all of the kids, but it removes the biter from the other kids for just long enough to resolve the situation (hopefully).
If part of the issue is children taking toys away from each other, nanny needs to be more proactive. Timer gets set for 3 minutes, EVERYBODY switches toys when the timer goes off. She can gradually increase the time to 5 or 10 minutes. It'll teach taking turns in a concrete rather than abstract way |
Anonymous
| Biting may be from the teething. Freeze the gel tethers or freeze baby washcloths when they are damp (twist them so kid can hold them). Also, give some medication to relieve the pain. |
Anonymous
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Longtime nanny here. In my last position with twins, they went through a biting stage between 16-18 months. We also read that book but it didn't really help much. We tried the playpen method of "modified" time out but that didn't work because the child outside of the playpen would often go over to the playpen and end up getting bitten again, plus by 17 months they knew how to climb out of the playpen anyway. We started using the high chair for time outs because it was successful in actually keeping them contained for the 90 seconds of time out. At the end of time out I would give one more quick "talk" about why we don't bite. It's hard to know if the methods we used were very successful or if they just grew out of it, but the first couple weeks there were several bites (and several more attempted bites), the next few weeks there was on average one bite per week, and in the last few weeks I saw the attempts taper down considerably until they stopped completely.
Things that helped the twins: 1. Teaching them to sign for "hungry" ( I noticed biting happened more frequently when I was preparing lunch or snack; I think hunger and lack of direct attention, even just for a couple minutes, contributed to the biting, but once they could sign "hungry" I could pop them right in the high chair with a few bites of food while I finished making the quesadilla or pasta, etc for lunch) 2. If you catch them about to bite (but are able to intervene before it happens), you can remind them "ouch biting hurts, we don't bite" and hand them a frozen washcloth (put it in the freezer damp) to chew on. 3. Watch them like a hawk. That helps a lot. I have to agree I'm disappointed that your nanny isn't doing more to be proactive about this. Does she have experience with taking care of multiple toddlers at once? How many children is she watching at a time? |
Anonymous
That is NOT a natural consequence!!! What does biting have to do with the playpen?! |
Anonymous
Its fine to put a kid in a playpen for biting. There is no natural consequence for a toddler. Its silly. The natural consequence would be for the nanny share to split up as the other parents got tired of the biting. |
Anonymous
It is a natural consequence, the child who was bit doesn't want to play with the biter... |
Anonymous
So the child who was bitten sends the biter to the playpen?! Come on... |