[Xero]

I think you're right about a lot of that. I don't see anything WRONG with tapping a hand or butt, but I personally plan to never use hitting as a punishment on my son. Hitting kids teaches them to hit. Basically they learn that hitting is used as a punishment when something doesn't go your way or you don't like something or something makes you mad. So that's how they use it!! Monkey see monkey do, you know? I don't think there's anything wrong with it, but I don't want to hear complaints when your little one doesn't understand that hitting isn't ok. You know what I mean?

I agree with taking him out of the situation. If he can't be nice, then he can't play. If he throws a tantrum, watch him to make sure he doesn't hurt himself or break anything lol. Oh and he probably doesn't hit the little girl when mom isn't around because the little girl's mom probably doesn't let him. She probably uses some kind of unwanted and yet harmless kind of punishment, so he knows he can't get away with it. When mom is around, he can get away with it because she's the boss and the neighbor isn't at that time.

Oh and when I was talking to my mom about trying to keep Eli out of things he shouldn't get, or anything else bad, she suggested I tap him on the hand or whatever. I said "well I don't really want to hit him, what about time out?" and she said "Well I think he's too young for time out". Am I the only one that thinks that's the most retarded thing ever said? Like that doesn't make any sense to me. "He's old enough to be smacked, but not old enough to be sat aside in a playpen harmlessly when he gets in trouble". OOOOKAY.

No way, I obviously can't let him run amok, and I refuse to hurt my child physically, so when I think I need to do something about his behavior, I have a playpen in the livingroom that I pick him up and set him in for MAYBE one minute. He cries, but it doesn't hurt him. I pick him right back up, tell him no to whatever thing, calm him down, and put him back down to play. And it works!! The other day he opened up the cupboard under the kitchen sink three times in a row and each time I told him no, and the last time I even moved him over to play with something else, and next thing I looked and he had it open and a couple cleaners out and I put him in time out for not even a minute and he didn't go NEAR it ONCE for the rest of the day, and every time he goes for it since then I tell him no and he listens to me.

They obviously wont sit in a chair, but they get the point when they're in a playpen. Especially for me, since I don't use the playpen for any other reason. Basically I just think the idea of a kid being too young for timeout, but old enough for hitting, is stupid.

If they don't feel bad about hitting their baby, they shouldn't have a problem plopping his butt in a playpen for a minute and watching him throw a tantrum so he at least gets the point. (That if he can't act appropriately while moving around, he'll lose his priveledges to move around!! haha)