Two year old is spitting in faces and slapping... Please Help!!
My name is Jessica and I have a wonderful two year old little boy who I love with all my heart. The problem is...
Lately, with Joshua, he is slapping people in the face, running up to them and punching them, spitting in our faces when we tell him no, kicking, and throwing tantrums constantly. And, by constantly, I mean he is throwing tantrums in the amount of 15-20 per day.
I know, you can't really give me a lot of advice without some background information...
So here's Joshua's routene. Normally, we try to have him in bed by 10PM at the latest; however for the past two months, he has refused to lay down or go to sleep until 4AM-6AM, and believe me, we are TRYING. We have tried the bathing/story routeine and so much more.
Joshua has always been a really good baby, suprisingly to me because his dad has ADHD and it is likely that Josh may have it as well. But lately, Josh is biting, kicking, screaming at the top of his lungs for like 20-30 minutes at a time, beating on us, literally.. he smacks us in the face, punches us, grabs our eyes and pinches and other things.
Josh is by no means exposed to violence and we monitor what is shown on our televisions. Apart from Barney, Calliou, Dora, and things like Pawn Stars and Storage Wars, there isn't much else played on our televisions.
Josh is given adequate play time daily. We even take him to McDonalds sometimes when it is empty so that he can run and play freely. (Our parks aren't the best in the world.)
But I'm at a end here, I don't know if this is normal or what to do, so I am turning here. I have changed his doctors multiple times because they brush his behavior off as normal and I do not believe it is completely normal and they tell me there's nothing they can do to see that he has ADHD until he is at least 5. Please help me, please!
That really doesn't sound like normal behavior, and I'm wondering if you might ask for a referral to a pediatric specialist so that he could be evaluated. I would start with a Pediatrician and a pediatric psychaitrist. Not that he is mentally ill or anything, but a psychaitrist would diagnose ADD and other child impulse disorder, but is also a medical doctor and could work with the pediatrician could look at possible medical components. The fact that he won't go to sleep until 4 to 6 am makes me wonder what might be agitating him or if he might have some physiological problem that he can't articulate that may be prompting him to act out in frustration. Also the fact that you said Lately, this has been happening, as if the problem has developed more suddenly and has not been characteristic of your son as a baby. This is more than terrible twos, and if your son is hurting in some way, you would definitely want to know.
Fortunately, we listen to country music, so there is no heavy metal music played around him. I may have overstated, but Josh has always showed signs of hyperactivity. When he was born they had to rush him to the Children's Hospital for meconium aspiration. They had to give him morphine and put a chest tube in and he was heavily sedated for a few days. As he has grown he has become more and more hyper. I mean this child can literally go for about 17 hours wildly until he crashes. But there was a drastic change lately. We have given up our netflix subscription lately and he was used to going to bed with Barney playing. I have some slightly loud neighbors so we always played Barney to soothe him and calm him down for nighttime. We purchased a Barney DVD though and are trying it tonight, but that doesn't mean it's definitely going to work, but he was whining and kicking and screaming just a few minutes ago and I turned one of the episodes of Barney on Youtube and he suddenly calmed down and was watching. I'm not big on tv, but I believe it's okay to let him go to sleep to a show. He only watches maybe two or three tv shows daily himself, and that is while I am cooking or cleaning. Otherwise, we are playing or he is playing in his room. Could this sudden change have made things worse? Now that I think hard about the whole Barney issue, the not going to bed until after 12PM has been since we gave up the Netflix subscription. Before that, we would lay him down around 10PM, and he was asleep almost every night between 10PM and 12PM. He's actually laying in his bed right now and not fighting us to not go to sleep.
Perhaps he needs to be evaluated, to see if there is something else going on.
Two Year olds go through their troublesome phase but he sounds like there is more than just being 2.
I'm sorry you're dealing with all of this, it sounds awful. My 2 year old has been pretty bad lately and his older brothers have been equally as bad. :-(
I hope you get some good advice!
I would try to establish a routine. My 20 month old has been on one since he was 9 months old. It helps him to know what is going on. And if your son does have ADHD it would be the best thing for him. We eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner around the same time everyday. He takes his naps at the same time each day and we lay him down at the same time each night for bed. Other than that the activites that we do during the day differ.
Josh is 25 months old, almost 26 months. It seems that the Barney that we inquisited last night has provided a relief today as well.. He has been amazingly calm, we have only had to fuss at him one time, and it feels like a whole new atmosphere! Thank you all for the responses, we are still going to have him checked out by the pediatrician, but I believe we may have found part of the problem!
he sounds like my 19 month old...except for the spitting...i do believe its adhd and i do believe both my kids have it..(dh has adhd and i have add)..before bed i let my kids run...i mean run around the house like crazy animals(as long as it doesnt get to carried away)..this way it lets them get that last burst of energy out..then its quite time for 30 mins then bed....works really good for my 4 yr old but my 19 month old needs just alittle more attention..try cutting out anything with red dye(food..drinks ect)..it makes a world of difference...google it and it will give you more info...good luck
i have never heard of this before...some of the calmest kids i know have parents who listen to that kind of music
Quoting DarlaHood:I have also heard heavy metal exposure can cause problems. Maybe he could be tested.
I'm hoping that your response is sarcasm, and meant to be funny. If so, LOL! But just in case... I'm talking about heavy metals as in lead, or mercury that could be in the environment!
Quoting Audreesmommy757:i have never heard of this before...some of the calmest kids i know have parents who listen to that kind of music
Quoting DarlaHood:I have also heard heavy metal exposure can cause problems. Maybe he could be tested.
its meant to be funny...LOL im not good at jokes but i can try right
Quoting DarlaHood:I'm hoping that your response is sarcasm, and meant to be funny. If so, LOL! But just in case... I'm talking about heavy metals as in lead, or mercury that could be in the environment!
Quoting Audreesmommy757:i have never heard of this before...some of the calmest kids i know have parents who listen to that kind of music
Quoting DarlaHood:I have also heard heavy metal exposure can cause problems. Maybe he could be tested.
Colossians 2:1-5
- mommy2johnwayne
on Jun. 20, 2012 at 2:06 AM