Gentle Parenting?!

Question

Hi all,
My 18 month old just tried to headbutt me twice out of anger and she tried to smack me in the face for trying to help her hold a crayon correctly. I almost cried. Those who engage in gentle parenting, how would you handle this? This is my first baby and all I could think of in the moment was to say, "we don't hit when we are mad, we use our words" but she says like 6 words so looking back i see how stupid I must have sounded lol. Any tips for a kiddo as young as 18months who hasn't had her word explosion yet? Greatly appreciated. Gentle parenting is our preferred method.

Answer

I gently grab my daughters hands and say firmly “you will not hit mommy” and redirect her to take her anger out in a different way. We have a corner in our house for our daughter that has colors, coloring books, a little library and some toys. I’ll take her other there and say “once you’re done you can come find mommy”. Once she’s calmed down I acknowledge her feelings “I understand you’re *whatever emotion* but that does not mean you can hit”. I’m also teaching her to breathe when she’s getting frustrated so I’ll say “big breath” and we breathe together. Sometimes she just needs to cry so that usually when I’ll put her in her corner and let her know I’m her when she needs me. But, we do not allow the hitting she knows not to hit now, sometimes does it cause she’s a toddler but she hesitates before doing so, does it the once, realize what she’s done and doesn’t do it again.

Answer

It’s still useful to explain it to her. She can understand a lot more than she can say. We always tried something like “Ow! That hurt me. Use gentle hands.” Then you can demonstrate how to use “gentle hands”.
If she keeps doing it, we say “That’s too rough. I’m not playing when you’re too rough.” and we walk away or move her away from us depending on the situation.  
Now that she’s older (3yo) we also pull from things like Daniel Tiger and say “It’s okay to feel angry. It’s not okay to hurt someone.” And we talk about how she was feeling (angry, sad, frustrated), but there is no hitting allowed. Occasionally she ends up in timeout, but that’s the highest form of punishment for her so it’s pretty rare. It mostly just takes a warning these days and she’s started to tell us “I was frustrated” or “ooops. Gentle hands” and then gives us a pet 😆.

Answer

To repeat other posters, firmly state “no, we do not hit” (use a deep resonant voice— teacher trick for classroom management. People obey deeper cadences more), create an immediate discipline (5-10 minute time out), follow up with reflection after cool down “explain to mommy why we dont hit.”

Answer

We explained, disengaged, did all the recommendations but the hitting didn’t stop until we finally did a time out. That finally got the point across. It was such a difficult concept for my girl to understand.

Answer

Explain, disengage and redirect. If it continues id end the activity, move rooms, changing the environment can help.

Answer

You are really upset, state the reason why she is upset. I can’t let you hit me, hands are not for hitting, hitting hurts, etc. If she won’t stop tell her that you need to put her down/walk away so that she can’t hit you.

Gentle Parenting?!

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