My baby bit her friend - over reaction?

Hello!

My baby girl is 16 months & she has bitten one of her little friends on three seperate occasions. It upsets me of course because no one wants a bitey baby but Im more upset with the mothers reaction.

Each time they are playing & her friend gets pushy & in my babys face & yells & screams & smacks & takes the toys & shoves & then my baby reacts by biting her. Its not like my baby just happily walks up & bites - there is always some kind of fight first.

Then I take my baby away, tell her "Dont bite! It hurts your friend" and I put her in the corner for a minute & then make her say sorry & kiss it better. I dont think me smacking her or biting her is fair punishment & in all honesty I think she is only biting to get the other baby to stop pushing at her.

So I apolgise to the mother & I get pretty upset about. I always text later to make sure the baby is ok. But - my problem is that the mother always makes me feel really really really bad about it. She says things in a joking manner but its not funny to me. For example she says - My baby is wearing her bite mark with pride - or My baby points at her mark & says Ouch - etc etc - they arent the best examples but she makes reference to it & brings it up over & over & then emails me articles about babys who bite.

Sorry for the vent but is it just me or I am over reacting?

My baby bites when her baby smacks & she gives me crap about it?

Its not like I dont do anything about it but honestly - I kinda feel like her baby isnt doing the right thing either.

I would suggest that next time it starts to escalate into a situation when your LO will probably bite, then turn to your 'friend' and say something along the lines of 'geez, your baby is so aggressive. No wonder my baby bites, she is probably afraid of being hurt."

Acknowledge your baby bites but let her know that there is a reason. Hopefully she will do something, even something simple like removing her baby from the situation until her baby calms down and they can play happily again.

I don't think you are overreacting - I would hate it if she kept bringing it up!

I agree with chocoholic - you have identified the situations where your baby is likely to bite so at least you can do something proactively about it. If you don't feel comfortable saying something to the other mum, maybe get down on the floor next to where the babies are playing and if the other baby just give some positive play directions to both of them followed up by lots of prasie for good behaviour choices.

If the other baby starts yelling in your baby's face you can say 'we need to use quiet inside voices' or taking her toys 'we need to share the toys' etc ... just point out the behaviour that you want them to do. Make sure you follow it up with lots of praise 'What a lovely quiet voice, I really like the way you are talking to each other!'

It might be an idea to sit and play with them from before problems arise so you have plenty of opportunity to give positives to both of them before you have to start positive re-direction.

Sounds to me like your are handling your baby's biting just fine. That is exactly what I do with my kids. Most kids go through a biting stage. My DD2 is 2 and a half and has only started biting in the last couple of weeks - NOT FUN! I thought I was lucky and had escaped dealing with that issue but apparently not. Her biting has in turn brought out the biting stage in DS and they have bruises in the shape of each others teeth marks on their bodies. It is terrible! They are SLOWLY getting the point though. Everything takes time for them to learn at this age, but I am being consistent and vigilent and it is starting to get through.

Good luck with everything.

They are just babies there is no tit for tat, there is no need for blame. And there is no need to get nasty between each other because of that. If she's sensitive about it maybe talk to her about it and tell her how bad you feel about it. Ask her if there's a way you can both work together so that the situation is avoidable.

My daughter had a thing with biting toes!

However, it might be a good idea to intervene before it gets to the biting point. In fact the other mother should consider stopping her daughters behaviour don't you think? If you don't think she will I think you should step in and separate the both of them and calm down the situation yourself.

I don't think making catty remarks back to the other mum will help, just try stop the situation from escalating xoxoxo

Sounds like you know the triggers and I would be inclined to seperate them before it escalates to the point that your DD is biting; that way she knows that the other child's behaviour isn't approriate either. At this age they are just reacting and we need to teach them to share and to be gentle etc... If the other mother isn't willing to step in then I would just gently try and distract your DD with another activity or the other child.

Children bite, lucky for me DS mainly bit me :rolleyes: and eventually the phase passed