My little girl has started biting me and it hurts! I know this behavior is fairly typical of a one year old. When she does, i move her away and say no very firmly. I've tried giving her other things to chew on but she seems to prefer me. How did you all handle it? How long does this very painful phase last?
GrammaRocks is right. Her advice is exactly what we did with our boy when he went through the biting phase. We would IMMEDIATELY separate ourselves from him physically by going to another room. He figured it out really fast then. About 6 weeks. I know that sounds long, but right away the number of times he tried to bite went way down. Then stopped!
Good luck.
It might sound harsh but my son used to bite me. He bit me really hard when he did too, leaving bite marks on my neck, or arm. The last time he bit me, he drew a little blood, out of instinct I popped his little butt and put him on the ground, and said "No, no!"
He never bit me again, and that was months ago.
There's no way to tell. Some children stop right away and some keep doing it for weeks or even months.
You need to immediately run her to her bed, shut the door and leave her alone for awhile. Eventually she'll make the association of being left alone after hurting you.
I wish people would just STOP with the ...."Oh they don't understand" That's ignorant nonsense. They only get a pass once or twice. They DO understand.
Continue to say, "No" firmly, it's OK to startle her because you want her to know the seriousness of what she's doing. Then, isolate her a couple of minutes, her crib is fine, so she associates being separated from you with her biting. And, be consistent each and every time. Hopefully she'll get the message soon and stop : )
If children have an oral fedish, it is because they have not developed in other areas of their well being in order to overcome this situation. I would strongly suggest that yuou start your child on reading, (Glen Doman (author) How to Teach our Baby to Read.) I hope that his helps. Otherwise, I would hug her with a coat on, tell her I love her, and no matter what she is afraid of, she does not need to bite in order to show her frustration or insecurity.
I do not remember any of my children biting, if but once. Get her to speak to you. Try to get her to speak in complete sentences. She must be frustrated. Hold on!!!!!
I agree that you should tell the child "NO!" or "NO BITE!", put her down immediately, and ignore her for a few minutes or until she seems contrite. If you notice a pattern to the biting, sometimes you can catch it just before it occurs, though a bite tends to be very quick. (I did this with a semi-feral cat that wanted my love and feeding, but tended to scratch. After I yelled OW! and walked away and ignored her a couple dozen times, she finally began catching herself just before striking out. Hopefully it will be faster with a child.)
Sometimes it works to put them in their room or crib, but be aware that once they begin to associate those places with punishment or isolation, many children will NOT want to be in their beds alone in the future. You don't want a child to think she's being punished every bedtime.
But putting her down in a safe place, across the room from you, and getting busy with something else should do the trick. Be as consistent as possible. Every case I've heard of that was handled firmly diminished over a few weeks at most. Another part of the "repair" for a sensitive child can include hugging and making up, and asking the child to gently kiss the owie she caused.
