Bite Me!

Before getting to my originally planned post I want to give a big Congratulations to my friends David and Sunny on their new baby girl, and of course to big sister Gabby too!



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This last week Lillian did something she has never done before, she bit me!  Well that's not completely true, she did bite me once while nursing, but I think my shriek in pain scarred her enough to never do it again.  Anyway when I went to pick her up at the sitter's she was using the BIG potty.  So I sat on the floor to chit chat with her while she went.  She leaned towards me to give me hug so obviously I leaned in for the hug.  Well, all of a sudden, she bit my shoulder!  My instant reaction was to pull back and smack her hiney.  You know, that quick, but firm one?  She looked at me with the widest eyes I've ever seen on her.

As if she had no idea what she did wrong. 

Now, I know she knows what she did wrong cause the sitter's son that in only 4 months older than her has a biting problem.  Lillian has been the victim of his biting several times, but not recently.  I asked why she bit me and she just looked like she was going to cry, I don't think she actually knew why and she felt horrible for doing it.  I did tell her though, "You will not be punished this time, but if you bite again, I'm going to bite you back, do you understand?"  She said "yes, I'm sorry mommy." and we moved on and she hasn't done it since.

So you see, the biting problem is not that of my child, it is of my sitter's child.  He's had a biting problem for quite some time now although we all thought it was a phase and over with.  It had probably been almost a year since the last time he bit her until the last couple of weeks where she has come home with bite marks a few times. 

Now the sitter always tells me this happens, she doesn't try to hide it and I know he is being punished because Lillian tells me he is.  "R had to go up to his room today, he bit me." and so on.  The sitter and I have discussed it a few times and we think his biting problem is due to his older brother.  His brother is 18 months older than him and likes to play rough, like boys do, including R.  But L (older brother) doesn't always realize that R still isn't as big as him and when R has enough he bites his brother cause he knows it's the only thing that will bother him.  I know the sitter tries to stop it all, the rough play, the getting to the point of biting, all of it, but you can't always do that.  I get it.

So here's my question, how do you/will you/would you handle the biting?  Any tips or tricks on deterring it?

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