Help! I Have a Biter! - Vancouver,WA

My son is the same age and occasionally bites people too. It usually happens when he's all wound up and being tickled and playing a bit rough. I think for him it's reactionary. We don't play around with the biting. He gets the angry "no" voice and a prompt time out. He know's it's wrong and is sorry. Honestly, with my son, I don't think he was even thinking about biting...it just happened in the heat of play. He's doing it less and less, so I think he'll grow out of it. Hope this helps a little.

My son is now 14 and he too used to bite...he would bite when he got mad. I tried the "bite him back" tactic and it back-fired, he would get even more mad and try to bite me again. I tried putting him in time-out, I tried to flick his mouth of course I would tell him no, but nothing seemed to work. So, I did what my mom did if she heard us curse....soap! The next time he bit me I got a bar of soap and made him bite that. After that, when he would get mad and make like he was going to bite all I had to say was, "soap". He would instantly close his mouth.
Hope you find something that works for your child....All children are different and as far as discipline, no one thing works for all children except for consistancy and love.

Hello K.,
I am totally against biting your child back. It doesn't make sense to me. How will your child learn not to bite if the person he loves and trusts the most is biting him? My advice is to give all your attention to the victim of the bite. I have been an early childhood educator for many years and I can tell you that in my experience biting is usually about the reaction and attention gathered after the fact. So, you can sternly tell your child that biting is not okay, and then totally over do it for the victim. That can be hard if you don't catch them in the act, but usually it's obvious who was the biter and who wasn't. Biting is a very common developmental stage, so don't panic. Your son will learn quickly and he won't bite forever! Good luck!
L

K.,

When kiddos are little, they really do not have any empathy. Some children are more oral and like to bite just becasue it feels good to their mouths. I have a son who would happily sink his teeth into people, not to be mean, but just becasue he liked things in his mouth. All of our furiture looks like a puppy chewed it from when he was a toddler. Anyway, when he would bite me, I would scream like he had really hurt me (and sometimes he did). This would startle him and clued him in that actually caused me pain, even though biting me didn't hurt him. Someone I know had a new baby and a 2 year old. The two year old was not at all mean, but he would bite the baby, just to get a reaction, I think. This mama knew that her two-year-old had no idea that it hurt the baby when he did that, so she lightly bit the two-year-old's finger. He fussed a little, taken aback at what his mama had done. Then she told him, "That is what you did to baby. That is what it felt like to baby." Her two-year-old went into hysterics when he heard that. He was so sad that he had made his baby hurt like that. He really had no idea before, but his mother helped him to gain some empathy, and he NEVER bit his baby again.

my son was the biter.. and there was always someone who knew how to get him going and then he bit! every time!

He somehow became facinated with sharks and began making a "arh, arh, arh" sound like he was a shark and about to bite when kids were taking his toys or antagonizing him. so they'd all run and say Ahh he's a shark!!

When he actually did bite I sternly told him NO and I think he was bitten back a few times before he stopped. However the shark threat didn't stop for some time.
It was a good way for him to feel in control of a situation.

I'm not so sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing. he Kind of got a sense of control over all the kids but it was a phase and it did end. we are now dealing with other things!! :) I kind of miss his little, "arh, arh, arh"

good luck.

This may sound harsh, but as soon as he does it, bite him back on the arm - don't do it too hard, but enough to catch his attention. My pediatrician had me do this to my son when he was 2 (now 6) & it worked - he never bit again.

Hi

I work at a daycare and almost all of the 2 to 3 year olds bite. we are only aloud to put them in time out which dosn't work. When my daughter and niece where that age my niece bit my daughter 5 time on the same arm my sister bit my niece hard and she never bit again i know that seems harsh but it worked. that was 32 years ago.

Mailyn

My daughter has been bit SEVERAL times by the same boy at her day care. It was horrible because her providers had tried SO hard to keep him away from her. He was 2 when it started and she was little (6 months), she was in the exersaucer and he was playing near her and he just scooted over to her and bit her foot. He continued to stealthily gain proximity to her to bite her on other occasions, once while she was one of the women's lap, another when she was in the high chair! He got time outs, but it didn't address the problem. I hated to confront his parents about it (because I knew the provider had), but I did. They were upset, but didn't know what to do. He still has this issue, but my daughter can walk and talk now and has clobbered him once when he got near her to bite--so now he's moved on to another littler one. Seems disturbing to me, like he targets the ones who can't defend themselves because it's easier and he gets some sort of satisfaction out of it. Does it seem like your son is targeting his playmate? What is the context of the biting?

Monitor him closely. Figure out the situations that seem to trigger it. If it's frustration or anger--you might actually have an easier time than the parents of the boy at daycare! Also, ask your peditrician about it and what he/she recommends you can do.

On a funny note, my brother (14 months younger) bit me a couple times when we were toddlers and once left teeth marks in my arm. My mom, a FEISTY Spaniard who grew up in Mexico, grabbed him, dragged him to the kitchen and put a jalapeno pepper in his mouth and told him to bite it. He never bit me--or anyone again! He's not scarred for life, and started eating salsa with jalapenos when he was about 10 (well past the biting phase!).

Good luck to you and your little boy.

Hello,
I am not fond of 'biting them back' strategy. My 4 year old started biting when she was around 9 months old, right after another day care child bit her. I definitely was not going to bit her back. For the next year, I gave all of the attentionto the 'victim' and none to her. Unfortunately this did not work, she continued to bite. My next tactic was to give the victim attention and give my daughter a time out. This did not work either. Frustrated because now she was over two and biting was her first response to being frustrated or not get her way. I googled biting and in the results was an article on using 'hot sauce' to stop biting. The next time she bit I got the hot sauce bottle, showed it to her, and put the smallest drop on her tongue. I told her that biting hurt and was mean (as I always did) and that everytime she bit she would be 'hot sauce'. She hasn't bit since then.
It was not a painful experience, she got so little hot sauce that she just made a face and said it was yucky.
A family firend had suggested vinegar.

Good luck!

I was a biter too, until my aunt bit me back. I don't remember it, was not tramatized by it. My daughter has bit, pinched and hit me as well. For us we have a few cats that have accidently scratched or bit her when she was too rough so I tell her that is how it feels when she does it to me, or ask her if she wants me to do it back to her. So far I have been able to rationalize with her but she is not super agressive and often she is doing it as a play or love thing (but it is not a good thing to allow for whatever reason). Try to figure out what leads up to it if you can, maybe even ask him (calmly). Good luck!

Do you know why he is biting? does he gets upset with the other boy and responds by biting him?

This is going to sound harsh, but many moms have testified that it works, and works fast: Bite him back. It should only take once or twice til he figures out that he doesn't like it!

my daughter did the same thing and all I can say is you will have to wait it out.He will stop just keep a close eye on him when he plays.

K.,

What worked/is working for me (I have a 4 1/2 year old son and a 14 month old daughter) is to flick them in the cheek when they bite, not hard just hard enough to get their attention, and tell them No Bite in the Mommy Voice. Neither of my children bit me or dad more than twice, and not other children.

Hope this helps,
Melissa