Biting at daycare

[jellybean88]

As if I don't feel bad enough dropping him off at daycare and him crying

I dropped him off this morning and as I was leaving he was happily playing and a kid came up to him and pushed him over and now I've just got a call that he's been bitten (this is the second time) by another child at daycare and has needed a plaster and Ice pack and apparently they've filled an incident report

I feel so bad and just want to wrap him up and cuddle him he's only 19 months old , do I need to get him tested from the bite? My poor baby he's such a quiet gentle boy he just gets pushed around

[Cass72]

Unless the skin is broken, I wouldn't worry about testing for anything.

It sucks when your child is bitten at childcare. I know, because DS2 was bitten regularly for his first 6 months or so at childcare. I'm talking every second day he would come home with a bite mark - sometimes noted by the centre, most times noted by me when I was bathing him.

The thing is, children bite. I also know this because my sweet little bitee became the horrid little biter (who was then victimised by a fellow parent who tried to get the anti-DS2 committee happening).

They bite for all manner of things:

• excited
• tired
• lack of language skills
• overwhelmed
• teething
• mad
• experimental
• under stress
• frustration
• powerlessness

Just to name a few reasons...

DS2 was shadowed at childcare. It did put more pressure on the carers but intervention is a much more effective tool than acting after the event. It worked too. The incidents became further apart once they worked out his triggers.

With regards to your poor little one, the best tool you can give him is to teach him to stop the other child (whoever it may be) from hurting him. At most centres, they will teach the children to say, "stop, Sparky I don't like it" and to reinforce with putting their hand up as stop sign. The younger ones would just say "no, Sparky". The child who is bitten is usually given lots of attention by the carer and the child who did the biting is asked to help (by holding a coldpack for example).

It's hard but there's also not much you can really do. As long as the centre has an action plan in place for addressing biting and I agreed with that plan I would be happy.

We can't shelter them forever hun, trust me, DS1 is 18 and every now and then when he's been so disappointed or hurt I still want to just wrap him up and give him a cuddle too. That feeling never goes away.

[Beautiful Disaster]

My DS was constantly bitten for weeks by we think the same child. I got head office of our centre involved as the teachers weren't doing anything. Seems to have stopped now.

Your poor DS. Hope he is ok

[peanutter]

Yes, sadly biting is normal and common and awful.

At one stage, DS1 was getting bitten basically every day. Just awful.

We didn't get him tested, but we did keep an eye on the bites to make sure bruises were being monitored, and nothing could get infected.

[Floweryfields]

I can guarantee we feel just as awful when it happens! Biting is awful and yes sometimes it can be prevented, but often it can't, unless you totally isolate the biter that is. I can also guarantee that the parent of the biter feels terrible when their child is biting others too (well not always but most often).

I once had a parent say 'what sort of parent raises a biter' to me when his child was bitten, um, the parenting has nothing to do with it.

[FabFiona]

What sort of parent raises a biter? Me! My eldest was a biter. We had one or two incidents a week for around 6 months then occasionally for the next six months. It started when his brother was born when he was 18 months. Consistent reinforcement that his behaviour was not ok including time outs when a bit older was the answer for us. We worked in partnership with his teachers at child care to stop it.

Your son will be fine. It's not nice when they are bitten but you don't need to get him tested for anything.

[Ginger]

What do you get them tested for?

[peanutter]

What do you get them tested for?

Vampirism.

[jellybean88]

I know it is a normal child response and there is not much that can be done and they are learning to communicate etc..
I'm not upset towards the child or his parents it just upset me that my son was hurt and I didn't have to work he wouldn't have been hurt I wish I could afford to be a SAHM

[Doing my best]

I'm not upset towards the child or his parents it just upset me that my son was hurt

I had this same response when my almost 4 yr old was injured a few weeks back, not biting this time, but have been there as well when he was younger..

[surprised]

My DS got bitten the second day of daycare. I wanted to wrap him up in cotton wool and never let him out of the house again.

BUT... I realised that I can make these events into positive learning experiences. I can talk about why biting isn't cool (as he now has experienced first hand), and I can talk about how you deal with people being unkind. I teach him to say "stop that, I don't like it" and "let's be friends" (provided the other child stops the behaviour!). I can't spend the rest of his life creating controlled environments for him, so I might as well start teaching him the skills he'll need to deal with all kinds of people, and to create positive relationships out of potentially difficult ones.

They are in different rooms now, but for a while there he used to name the biter as his best friend.

And I try to go easy on the parents, because I know next time it could be my child doing the biting!

[jellybean88]

I think that might be adding to my anxiety he doesn't talk so can't say stop he is pretty much in the same boat as other kid in that he only has basic physical responses to communicate his upset or frustrated and he doesn't understand if I try to explain things to him