Toddler Has Picked up a Bad Word

When my son was that age he picked up the "S" word from my friends and a few other words I wish he hadn't. The way I broke him of saying those words was with a little time out. Everytime he used the "S" word or any word he shouldn't be saying he would have to sit in a chair for 2 mins. For a 19 month old that is a long long time. About 2 weeks of that he realized that if he said a word he shouldn't he would have to stop what he was doing and go to time out. Maybe this will help you too.

Ignore it completely. She does it because she gets a reaction, whether it's a good one (laughter) or a bad one (no!). If there is absolutely no reaction whatsoever, the behavior will eventually get dropped. Next time she says it, just act like nothing happened. It'll take a little time, but eventually it'll do the trick.

At 19 months, she is definitely old enough to understand that her actions have consequences but on a very simple level. I would try the good old fashion wash her mouth out with soap approach. Don’t go too overboard with it though, just a little of her No More Tears on a wash cloth to get the bad taste in her mouth and she’ll start to equate bad words with a bad taste. The same thing goes for daddy if he says something in front of her! If you're luck you can break both of this nasty habit. Good luck.

Try timeouts...my son is very stubborn and was in a very similair situation. He is 22 months and also shows signs of liking the attention and the correction. You might have to block her to keep her in, but it will get easier. Just started to do it this week and he is understanding. Make sure you explain to her in a real stern, soft, even tone and dont keep her too long. Thier little thoguht process is short. Stay with her and in between the crys and screams, tell her what she did wrong. Ignoring is something you can try, but if she is a "actress" she will keep saying it...good luck and have no fear.

Yep, draw attention and she'll keep it going. Pick a fun expression and just go with it. Be silly and intentionally drop something, or trip, or whatever she likes, and overdramatize your reaction phrase so she'll possibly pick it up. You know, phrases like, holy cow! or ahhh, man! or jeepers! or whoopsie daisy!, whatever works for you. In the mean time show no reaction to her cursing and she'll lose interest.

I actually had my 3 yr old son say 'Damn it' when his blocks fell over in the CHURCH NURSERY! I was so embarrassed. That's about the only 'bad' word that will come flying out of my mouth if I've had some kind of accident around the house. Since that moment, I'll say "AAAHHHHHH MAN!!!!"...really long and drawn out and snap my fingers like darn the luck! Sometimes I would do it purposely...like when it was taking too long to find my keys. I always end it with what a better situation would be...like, Ah man, I should've put my keys where they are supposed to go so I could've found them sooner. The kids think it's hilarious and they've picked up on doing it too. It gives them a little bit of an outlet and at the same time..it puts a funny spin on dropping items, writing our letters backward, stubbing our toes, etc. Good Luck!

Have you tried time-out? Whenever our kids do something we do not want them to do; they have to sit in time-out. The length of time they have to be in time-out depends on their age. Your daughter is close to being 2 years old. So anywhere from 1 to 2 minutes in time-out should be sufficient. We usually just place one of our kid's toddler chairs in a location where we can keep and eye on them, but they are still away from all the activity going on around them. My daughter is 3, so we set her timer for 3 minutes. When the timer beeps, she has to apologize for what she did and then she's off to play again.

Before you start the time-out process, it's a good idea to explain the consequences of saying the bad word. This way, your daughter will know exactly what is going to happen to her when she says the word. And you must be consistent! She'll get the hint that you are not going to put up with it any longer. For example, tell your daughter that everytime she says this bad word, she has to sit in time-out for 2 minutes. Also tell her that sitting in time-out her her choice. If she does not say the bad word then she is choosing not to go to the time-out chair. However, if she chooses to say the bad word, then she is choosing to sit in the time-out chair.

Now, getting your child to stay in time-out is another thing. When we started this with our daughter, she's fall or slide out of her chair and plop herself down on the floor. You just have to keep putting her back in. Everytime she'd do this, we'd stop her timer. We told her that we could not start her timer and she could not get out of time out until she was ready to stay in her seat until her timer beeped. Sometimes it helps if the little ones can watch their timer count down to zero. As our kids got older though, we had to stop this b/c they figured out how to work the timer and make it beep faster.

Consistency is really the key here. Getting her to go to time-out and finish her time-out without any disruptions will take a few times, but stick with if and if you are consistent, then your daughter will get the hint that mommy is not going to let me get away with saying the bad word any more.

First of all, congratulations on your anniversary; hope the two of you have many more to come.

About your toddler saying the 'S' and 'F' words: My 3 year old grandson does the same thing. As a group (parents/grandparents) we talked about this and decided to first try ignoring it. All of us take particular care with our language. Shoot is a good alternative for the 'S' word. We're still working on the other one.

They will do it to get attention if you make an issue out of it. Since we have thrown an alternate word to him and kept going, he has seemed to quit. Be patient.

Not only do kids pick up their vocabulary from home. Anyplace or anything is a source of information: TV, radio, daycare, stores, etc. . .

Good luck!

I think the 'replacement words' are the best thing in the world but I'll add that the sillier the better so it becomes a game of how to be as creative as possible! This may be hard when she's so tiny but it works GREAT as they get older and even BETTER for hubbie!

"Oh my stars", "Holy Cannoli", "For the love of spaghetti" are all great alternatives (the more creative the better) and not only have you avoided passing along less-desirable vocabulary, you'll find you have diffused your own negative feelings a great deal too! I'm not sure if it's the pride you can take in having mastered your own worst self in a moment of weakness or if it's just the pure silliness factor...I guarantee you'll feel better!

In my opinion (and I'm sure I'll get slammed for this) but I truly NEVER use profanity because I feel it shows a complete lack of creativity and class...it's a sad day when you have to resort to using words from the gutter to think of something to say. Those words aren't "Adult Words"...or "Grown Up" words because if someone was truly behaving as an adult they would have the brain capacity to think of something better!

Maybe try to get her to say a new word, like uh oh. My daughter is 14 mos and we trained her to say this over time when she falls or drops something to keep her from crying. It has worked... I would give her tons of praise for switching to a more appropriate word. Hope this helps.
J.

I hear you on that one. My lovely little girl all of 14 months has decided that her favorite word is "shut up" And she'll say it for anything, if you look at her wrong, tell her something she doesn't want to hear, when the dogs bark, anything. Just the other day we were walking around the store and she would say hi to people to get their attention and as soon as they spoke to her she would yell"shut up" talk about embarassing. So I try to ignore it, meanwhile getting death looks from people cause my kid just told them off, and hope that it will pass soon.

I had this problem with my 3 year old and we just ignored it completely. Didn't even acknowledge that she said it. I don't know the last time i've heard her say something inapproprite. YOu are right, the more attention they get from it, or anything, the more they'll do it, postive, or negative. I'd suggest just letting her ramble for a week or two with out any acknowledgement that she's doing anything wrong, and since it won't get a rise out of mom, and may have to include granparents ect.. in on this if they see her frequently, and she will soon get bored with it and (hopefully) stop on her own. :)

Good luck!

When my daughter started doing this we decided to come up with a fun word that would still show that she was frustrated. Ours was SHAFOOWEE! But I have also heard moms and kids steal expletives from TV shows like sponge bob "Aw tarter sauce", or Hannah Montana "Sweet Niblets!" Try not to give too much attention to the bad word. If she is getting attention for using that language it may be part of the fun.

Hi Amny -

Ouch! I know how hard that is to deal with... we want through the exact same thing. First, it is VERY IMPORTANT that everyone (you, your husband, both in-laws, child care providers, etc.) to handle the situation the same. First, do not laugh. That is very hard, even though it sounds so easy. Next, when she uses it now she expects attention. Don't give it to her. Just try (which is so difficult!) to ignor it, and have everyone else do the same. Truly this tactic worked with our son. He is now 3 1/2 and he does not drop the F work or S work anymore.

GOOD LUCK!

My mom did the soap on us as kids, it didnt work on me really i was just really hard headed and rebelious. Im not sure about using it on kids that young though. However, (and many people might think im wrong, but this is my thinking) my son is 3 1/2 and has started to cuss, now everyone he is around does including me and his father, i feel that i can not punish him for something that he is seeing us do, they learn what the see and taught. Therefore we are just trying to teach him when and where it is and isnt appropriate to say these things. (Although he has been getting in trouble for it lately because his latest thing is to tell me if he gets upset with me that he will beat my A**.) People may say im wrong again but after tellin him several times that he cannot tell me that i pop him in his mouth (not hard just hard enough that he understands that it isnt right to talk to people like that.) I hope this helps you. Good Luck, its a battle i think we are going to deal with forever.

It's hard to stop saying words just around your child, so hubby might try to stop saying the words at all. And you should ask the grandparents to not laugh but make a sad face and be disappointed about it. (I am all about letting grandparents be playmates and have fun and not making them raise my child, but this is a serious issue that needs their cooperation.) She needs immediate punishment whenever she says the word- she has to associate negative reactions to it and not positive. My suggestion is an immediate time out when she says the word. If time out doesn't work for you in other instances, then I'd try whatever works for her- whatever makes her upset. Whether it's taking a toy, or standing in the corner or whatever. Don't let it be a game to her. But hubby needs the most help- it's not right to say those words in front of his child. He needs to understand how serious this is and change his behavior. Maybe he needs a swear jar- has to pay everytime he slips up. He needs to let her know he's wrong and tell her he'll correct his behavior as well. Good luck!

My nemphew, now 3 almost 4, used to use the S word all the time in the same situations. It took everyone ignoring him and not bringing attention to the negative words for him to finally stop.

My son, on the other hand, used nasty words when prompted to and now, age 6, will correct others that say bad words and ensure they are aware they said a bad word.

Every child is different in how they react. Try ignoring it and see if that makes a difference. Best of luck.

This exact thing happened to me with both of my children. If you give it attention, it feeds the problem. Either positive or negative, the child is gaining your attention. Address the problem with "we don't say those words", then let it go. Ignore the behavior. I know it's hard, but it's what worked for my children. And, it's what the pediatrician suggested. Hope this helps!

B.
A employed full-time, college student part-time, mother of two very beautiful children. (daughter-11 years and son-9 years)

I tell my two-year-old (who communicates at a level a bit above average) that those are "grown-up words" and "ugly words". I even include the word 'stupid' in that category. I usually just say-without making too big of a deal-and in an even tone, "that's a grown-up word, lets not talk like that" instead of saying the "no". Usually when "no" is involved, it makes it much more of a tempting tabu. (I found that out when little hands were tempted by the electric outlets)
My husband tells a story that He and our little guy were going somewhere in the car together and from the backseat he says, "I'm getting bigger and bigger. When I'm a grown up I can say words like gosh-dammit." I do agree w/ other moms that you should avoid laughing at these situations, although my husband can't help it.
Good Luck.

My kids when they were little picked up on the cuss words as well. It was embaressing when they would say them at church or when we were out and got attention from every one. I just started removeing them from the room. If at home I would put them in there room by them selves for a bit. If kids think they cant get attention from what is wrong then they keep doing it.At church I would just have the people in the nursery/class bring them to me so they wouldn't get attention from other kids and other kids didn't learn the words any sooner then they needed to. My 16 year old son is Autistic and he still uses them. It is like when he gets up set. I am trying to get every one to ignore him and not make a big deal of it.Ack as if they didn't hear him.My theroy I am trying with him is that maybe if he dosen't get a rise from every one and dosen't have me yelling at him to stop that maybe he will learn to just not say it. But with Autistic kids you just don't know.I guess my sugestion to you is try some time out.or removeing you child from the room so she dosen't get every ones attention.

S**T was my son's choice word for about a month. He even knew when to use it--when he fell, dropped something, or was irritated. He YELLED it in JcPenny at the lovley age of 22 months. I just said, "that's my boy." It is embarassing. It makes you look bad, or at least, you feel that way.

There's good news, though. He just stopped. He's 2 now, and I haven't heard that word for about 2 months. It was only about 1 months time, so I anticipate your child dropping that word as new ones are introduced to her vocabulary. My son now says UH OH.-----Much better than s***t huh?

my advice is to totally ignore it because the attention she gets will just encourage her.

Just ignore it when she says it. Once she sees that there is no responce when she does use that word then she won't find it as funny to say. You may get stairs when your daughter will say it, but at that age you really can't tell with 100% certainty what they are saying anyway. My son said Rocking Chair like "F@#%#&%! chair". I was the only one that knew what he was actually saying and if I didn't react then noone else would either.

my name is J. im 35 and I have a child named conor he's 7 years old and says cus words if he doesent get what he wants AND LITERALY SLAPS ME IN THE FACE! I TRIED MY HARDEST SPANKS HE NEVER LEARNS what should I do?...

I've been through the same thing. Whenever my son said F*** I would respnd saying Truck? Where's the truck? or any other rhyming word and pt things in that direction and when he siad S*** by saying Sit? Sit down? or what or no your not sitting silly your standing. etc. whatever comes to mind. I just would try to turn the conversation/situation focused and something else. After responding I just kept the conversation "moving" so it passed getting his attention and mind and someting else. Almost making it like the "bad word" was part of "normal" conversation. Then whenever my son started understanding he still would try me. (of coarse) Then I would just tell him u no better and that it is ugly. Hope this helps....GOOD LUCK!!

Hi L.,

I have two daughters (aged 10 and 4 now) and we had this experience with both of them. The only way to stop it is to stop the attention that your daughter is getting because of it. When each of my daughter's tried their "new" word out on us - I ignored it at first and responded to the rest of the content of their sentences. The second time, I casually mentioned that that was an adult word and only to be used by adults. You will need to be persistent. Talk to the grandparents so they can be on the same page -either ignoring or repeating it's an adult word. If she continues to use it, even after you've calmly insisted she doesn't - remove her from the situation and put her in her room or another safe place - so she isn't getting any attention and tell her that she'll be removed from you every time she does this. Be consistent and it will pass. All kids try something like this out and it's short lived, I promise!

We had the same problem. We make up another(silly) word and used it in the same scenerio. Children respond to the reaction the word causes, not the word itself. If you react the same to the replacement word they will pick that one up instead. Our word was pickle.:)

Hi L.,

My sugestion is to accidentally on purpose start droping things and find a funny good word, say it in front of her. Or
The way we stoppped my toddler from saying the F word (I have TEENS) is to make the word STUPID a very bad word. She picked up on that so even though it ws a ugly word, it wasn't so bad.
With the teens as toddlers they were not allowed to say the word hate (I think it's way over used.)
I guess my point is find an acceptable word, and kind of make it her key word.

My theory on parenting is
"As parents it is our job to manipulate our childrens characters to be healthy, productive, self sufficient people in society."

I agree with most of the other ladies, focus on replacement words. The next time you drop something say "oopsie" or "shoot". Say it loud and clear, maybe she will begin to mimic you instead.

If she says the "S" word look at her and say one of the replacement words over and over, and with a smile. Don't say no, it will just encourage the word. Have your Husband use the replacement words frequently.

Praise her when she uses one of the other words. "Say, yeah baby that's right oopsie."

Keeping those words out of the house is far more important than anything else. Have your husband put a dollar in the jar for each time he uses it. That money is yours to spend or to put in your babies account. You have to have it nixed completely.

I have a special needs son, and when he picked up words that we didn't want him to use, we would remember one thing: "Any attention given to a negative behavior is reinforcing of that behavior." In other words, even when you're correcting her, she is getting some satisfaction out of the whole thing. What I would do is reward her for a certain time period when she doesn't say the bad word. Start out with 5-10 minutes and lengthen the time until she goes a whole day without saying it. This is a tedious process, but it absolutely works! You might want to have this goal as part of a behavior chart that includes things like "pick up toys", "finish dinner", "take nap", etc. That way, it wouldn't be the center of attention. You could even let her pick a reward for a certain number of stars or stickers for tasks accomplished! Let me know how it goes!

You can try to ignore it and get her grandparents to do it as well, so that she'll see it isn't getting her anymore attention. And then she'll starts saying it less.

My daughter picked up gd it and now she thinks god is a bad word because we told her that gd it is a bad word...she started a new daycare and when i went to pick her up...that was the first thing she said to me...thanks to dh..finally we used soap...every kind until we stumbled across the soft soap foam kind..I felt so bad...she through a big fit and got some in her nose (a little in her mouth)...but has not muttered a bad word since. We say butt she says hiney booty...we say damn she says thats a bad word...lol...we dont practice cussing around her nor do we beat our children. So don't get the wrong idea.

My son is 18 months and a few months ago he said the S word a few times. We didn't say or do anything to him. I haven't heard him say it in awhile now. It could be coincindence or it could be that ignoring it does the trick.

As a SAHM to a 27mo old daughter, I have just run into the same problem with the bad words. My hubby has become much better after one experience with her when we were in our truck. After he said something (I think it was what the f), she began repeating it in a sing-song voice, and said it several times. We had discovered the same thing you did - replacement words simply did not work. We've dealt with this for awhile, but fortunately for us the extended family isn't close enough to make it more difficult. What worked for our little girl was to completely ignore what she was saying. With no reaction, she quickly gets very bored with it and no longer says it. The night my husband used that phrase, neither one of us corrected her and by the time we arrived at our destination she had stopped saying it - and I think we were about five minutes from the store. It will work - IF you can get the extended family to do the same, rather than laugh or react in any fashion. Kids this age love attention and will do anything to get it, especially a laugh. They don't understand right from wrong yet. I hope the ignoring trick will work for your kids!

I had this idea you could try. When she's watching, try to make it look like you stubbed your toe "on accident", or drop something when you know she's looking and then say a word that you would much rather her saying like "oops" and have your husband make a point to do that as well. Kids at that age are just copying what you do. That is just what I would do if my daughter picked up a bad word. The word I started using when my daughter was little whenever she would fall down or something, is "BONK", and I'd say it in a silly way and now she says it all the time. Oh and I agree with the others, Good luck!

My kids all picked it up womewhere along the line. My current 2 yr old sayed it too. We ignored her for a couple o mounths and she quit. I mean EVERYONE had to comply. NO ATTENTIONS AT ALL - NOT EVEN A HALF SMIRK! That was esp. hard at my house since the other kids thought it was so funny. LOL Good luck.

we have that problem, my husband cusses like a sailor if no one is around. of course, little ears pick it up, because we are not always on our best behavior when they are present. so, we have to make up new words for a troublesome moment arizes. our favorite is "freaky deaky" instead of the f word! and shucks instead of the s word, and so on. it helps, because when you come down to it, no one wants to hear bad language.

WE also did the soap. We gave her one warning then did it the next time. We told her that her mouth was dirty and needed to be cleaned. It has worked. We don't curse, but she has picked up things from others or overheard the TV (we don't watch stuff with her). One warning and soap, one pump. It is AWFUL to do, but it really does work. I told my cousin and it has worked for her too. Good luck.

Chances are she likes the reaction she gets when she says the word. Especially if her grandparents laugh. Try downplaying it and keeping the reactions low key. Maybe even ignore her when she says it. You may have to very tactfully explain to the grandparents that their reaction is not helping. When she realizes that it doesn't get the reaction she wants, she'll lose interest. It worked for my daughter. Of course, they learn best by example, so if your husband can refrain from cussing it would help tremendously. We didn't think we cussed all that much. Then our 2 year old started using the S word correctly. We then changed our own habits.

We ignored the bad words because we figured out really quick that she was only doing it to get a reaction out of us. When she saw that it didn't upset us she quit saying bad words. We have also worked really hard to fix our language.

At 19 months, your daughter is still too young to understand that she's using bad words - she's simply mimicking what she's heard in her environment. No judgements here, it happens in our house too! Definitely try replacing the "bad" word with a word that is maybe a little silly or funny sounding. Our two boys (8 and 4) watch Spongebob, where they picked up the phrase "Tartar Sauce."

When my 8 y.o. was about 5 or 6, this statement pretty much took care of the problem for me: "That word isn't a nice word, and I know that sometimes you will hear grown-ups say it, but you should know that grown-ups don't like to hear kids talk like that."

Good luck - believe me, it's a universal problem. We can all relate!

Hey there. We have had and are still having the same problem with our 2 year old soon to be 3. He seems to have picked up the same 2 bad words as well as the word stupid. Its been really hard trying to break him of this. Its been going on for about 5 months now. I've come to notice that here recently when he decides on saying the words i act as if i cant hear him when he is talking to me or if he is alone saying the words it never fails that he looks up to see if i am going to say anything to him like not to say that or thats not nice. So, i decided that when he says the words to ignore him and act like i never heard so and come to find out its working lil by lil. He has cut back a great deal on saying the words and now when they slip out of his mouth he comes and tells me i said that ugly word and i am sorry.

My older son started saying those 2 words right about the same age.. I just simply ignored him and made a very strong effort not to swear anymore... I am sure he picked it up from me, I used to swear a lot before I had kids, and that was my wake up call. If she doesn't hear you all saying it, she will give up on it.

good luck! J

What my mom did, and now I do, is this: Don't forbid the words. However...take the child to the bathroom and let them say the word(s) all they want to. My mom told us that we could say the word(s) but she didn't want to hear them so we could go to the bathroom and say them all we wanted to. That wasn't fun. She said she didn't want to hear ugly words coming from such beautiful faces. It works!

This is going to take a team effort, and the first step will be to get the grandparents on your team. Everything they laugh, it undoes weeks worth of you ignoring the behavior. I'm sure they'll understand, but if not, tell them you'll just have to limit their access to your daughter until you've managed to get her to stop swearing.

The trick to a replacement word is that is also has to be something interesting and fun to say that will also get a reaction. Frankly, "ship" is no fun! :-) Suggest words like "snickerdoodles!" instead--something that makes her giggle when she says it will likely make others laugh, and she'll have the attention she craves without the profanity. If you have to, encourage others to laugh! You may also need to model the behavior for her--having you and your husband say the replacement word when you'd normally swear--since that's how she learned it in the first place.

And for a little emotional support, to remind you that you're not the only one who's had this happen--and that your daughter is learning GOOD things from you too!--listen to Rodney Atkins' "Watching You." :-)

I agree with B.P. My daughter climbed up on a stool at the library and said "F*^#! it". I was mortified. I took her to the car and washed out her mouth with some dish soap I had in the car. She was so upset. She had no idea what she had just said. She had heard her dad say it before. She didn't say it again. However as they have gotten older they have picked up words here and there. I have ignored when they were younger. Disaplined when they were old enough to know better.