ETA (Edited to Add):
Let me just clarify that I DO have empathy for the parents of the biter. This is a just a phase kids go through, and it's hard to stop the biting. No one wants their kid to be the biter. So I don't actually want to beat up the parents or child, and I do feel bad for them too. My main concern right now is with the daycare and how they are handling the situation. I have given them two options: A) relocate the biter or Wyatt to another room until the biting has subsided, or B) have an additional staff member or the trainer in the room shadowing the biter until the biting has subsided. I should know more today and will post an update when I do!
Original Post:
I might as well send Wyatt to school with that sign around his neck. Because he keeps getting bit.
He's gotten bitten 3 times in 2 weeks. 3 out of the last 9 times he has been there. That's 1/3 of the time! I have no idea if it's the same kid or not because they won't tell me, as per their "policy," but I suspect it is. Sweet. You want to know MY policy? Three bites, you're out. You bite my kid three times, I take your mom out to the playground and we settle it there. Because I'm not taking my kid somewhere he gets bitten all the time!!!
I understand biting happens. Most kids, at some point, are either the biter or the bite-ee. When Wyatt started biting Tommy and I (this was like a year ago), we bit him back. End of problem. I know some of you out there are GASPING at the thought of this. But my 65-year old pediatrician and his nurse both recommended it. And it worked.
The daycare staff is having a "meeting" about the issue today. As if it's MY issue, because I am the one addressing the problem. Okay - maybe I am overreacting to the meeting. But seriously - why does it take me complaining about it for them to address the problem? What I need is for my kid to stop coming home with bite marks on his arm, telling me "Bite," "ouch," and "not nice." How would THEY like to come to work every day and have ME bite them when I get there???
I don't care if they have to relocate the biter (or Wyatt) to another room for awhile. I don't care if they have to hire another person or keep the trainer in the room to personally shadow the biter all day. And I don't care if they have to tape the kid's mouth shut. Just make him stop biting my kid.
That's all. Momma Bear is signing off now.
5 comments:
Well Megan- I think were all for you taking th emom outback. I would love to see that happen, haha! You'd whoop on her butt... I do not think it is right that they may not let you know who it is. "Policy" come on. Are you fricken kidding me, I owuld demand to know so you could talk to the parent. And if I was the other parent I would want to know what my kid was doing and to who... Are they not worried about rabies? ha ha! Well I am sure something will be figured out or you slap um with a lawsuit! Fixes everything else right?! Take care friend!
Megan-
I do remember the biting issue last year and I remember telling you to bite him and I thouht that YOU were mortified by that idea. It's what we did with both of our kids and it worked like a charm. That has been the policy at every daycare too...for just that reason. I remember being livid (and had other co-workers that went thru the same thing and felt the same way) but I soon found out that was goes around comes around. My kids were bitten first but they soon became the bitees...and unfortunatley they didn't bite the kids back that started it. Oh no...they had to start a whole new string of biter/bitee. So, there was a mom out there looking for me too. Just hang in there - this too shall pass. I know it's hard...I really do. But it happens to almost everyone. Kim
Kim -
Oh I ABSOLUTELY remember being mortified when people told me to bite Wyatt back. I thought they were nutso. Pediatrician included. But Tommy bit him back, and he stopped biting Tommy - but KEPT biting me! So one day I bit him back. Problem solved. And now, I'm an advocate!
I don't want to tell Wyatt to bite back though. I don't think he'd understand what I'm telling him, plus I think he is too young to know the difference between why it is ok to bite back (i.e. in defense) but not ok to initiate biting. Then I'd have a whole other problem on my hands.
The whole thing is just very tough - but I agree with "this too shall pass" - that has always been my motto!
Megan
That's how my mom taught me not to bite...sometimes you have to "speak" in a language that kids understand :)
the policy at the daycare i worked at was not to let them know who the biter was either...or who the bitee was...
but, what was interesting to me, was that it was typically the kids who couldn't yet verbalize "no" or "stop" that bit, because they didn't know how else to make the other kid stop doing something to them that they didn't like.
i'll have to remember the bite back thing if i have kids and they start biting me...
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