Am I Asking Too Much of a 27 Mth Old

wow no offense but does every question have to lead to someone saying you should have your kid evaluated for this or that disorder? it's literally every question on here. i feel like 99% of these issues are just discipline problems.

one thing you don't mention - do you not do time outs? if he has been raised with timeouts (or maybe it's time to start them), part of it is, you STAY where mom puts you. if you can get him to do that then you should be able to keep him from wallowing all over the baby. tell him if he doesn't stay off the baby he will have a time out. separate them (put him in his timeout spot) and keep doing it as long as it takes. do the same thing for pets. there is appropriate "loving" and inappropriate, and he's not being safe. tell him it's not safe to lay on the baby and he could hurt him. i could be wrong, i just feel like you need to be firm and insist he stop this behavior. it's not okay. you will have to stick to your guns and be consistent.

just me, but i would forget about the eye contact for the moment and pick the more important battle of keeping your little one safe. my son is extremely shy and i have a really hard time getting him to look me in the eye, except for the briefest of flutters here and there. focus more on the behavior you can control. you can't force him to look at you. use a calm voice and state matter-of-factly what the results are for his chosen behavior - don't give him reason to be afraid of you or fear judgement. the eye contact will come later.

During baby's tummy time, give your toddler his own activities to distract him so the baby can be left alone for a while. Let him color, play with play dough, read a book, build with blocks, have a small snack at the table... create that separation between them.

Sometimes, you have to let the older brother have quiet play time in his room too so that the baby can explore and enjoy his bouncy seat without being smothered for once.

If that means putting a baby in a pack n play, then do it. It sounds like he may be able to explore more in there than out of it anyways, so long as the older brother doesn't climb in with him.

This is totally normal. My 24 month old tries to sit on the cat. She will be nice but then hits her. Trying to get her to listen and look at me when I am telling her she did something wrong..yeah. However, she does understand a bit that when I take somethiing away or remove her from somehting, she should not do whatever it is she did. Even though she will still do it. : ) The funny thing is she will reprimand the older kids or even me sometimes. It is very funny when she does it. Just keep repeating. If necessary, put him in another spot if at all possible when baby is on the floor. Easier said than done of course.

My son was doing that to the cats from about 20 months. Then, when a baby that didn't walk yet, was brought into his daycare class, he was usually not doing it to the cats at home, but started doing it to the baby! We learned about gentle touches with the cats and would immediately get him off the cats at home, sometimes with time outs, or at least he wasn't allowed to play with the cats for 5 minutes. He stopped doing it to the baby after about a week or two and is really quite good with the cats now at 24 months. I think that consistency and immediate consequences helped.

Amy,

I have a hunch that maybe your son needs to be evaluated by an OT. If he were just giving his baby brother the full body treatment, then you could think it was behavioral, but that he does this to pets it seems to me that he is exploring the world with his whole body, especially live things, and since what you describe seems like a sensory seeking, driven, frequent issue, I would rule out vestibular issues while he is still little. The OT can help you determine if the eye contact issue is anything to be concerned about.

If you end up in therapy with him, be very alert and do some reserch on all of his developmetal milestones. Consut a Developmental Pediatrician if you suspect anything more.

M.

I have soooo been there girl! The eye contact thing...Oh my gosh! It's like I know you know so why are you doing this!!! AAAAHHHH! The good news is there is a way to make it work for you! My son has always done this! What we finally told him was I will not talk to you when you do not look at my eyes and be respectful, we actually call it "respectful eyes.. We explained to him what we were expecting before we did it and then the next time that he wouldn't look at me I would calmly say I will not talk to you when you wont look at me and then stand up and walk away. Now he was usually in his room or timeout chair so he would continue to sit there. I would come back in a min or two depending on the situatin and ask him "are you ready to give my respectful eye?" If he look away again stop talking and wait a second to see if he will look at you. If he does not, repeat the process. If you are able to get through the conversation then thank him for his "respectful eyes" and tell him how much you love that and how great he did!

Oh and be on his level. It's hard for kids to give eye contact when you are stand up. And it show respect to them.

I know how frustrating it can be but he will learn that what he is doing only makes it worse for him. Also make sure to follow thru with this with other people too. Simple saying "respectful eyes" or "honey they aren't going to talk to you if you wont show them respectful eyes" he'll know what you mean.

Making sure to not let yourself be pulled in, stay calm because you are the one with the "power" here. he wont get what he after unless he gives you the eye contact he needs to.

Good luck, he's smart enough to know what he's doing so he can def learn not to!

Lisha

I'm going to deal with your second question first. I totally understand your desire to have him look at you when you are talking to him, but if that isn't working you might try something my husband has used when we are taking care of the grandchildren. He will take the child to a place away from other people (the front porch step is a favorite place if the weather allows) and simply tell that child they need to sit together and have a talk. Then they sit side by side, and he puts his arm around the child and quietly talks about whatever they did that was wrong, how they can do better next time, if they need to apologize to someone for what they did, etc. Most of the time, the child will want to get up and have this talk over with before he is finished, but he gently pulls them back down and tells them "no, we aren't finished talking yet". Once he feels that he has made progress and the child is ready to go back to apologize (if needed) and get back to playing, then they get up. After having done that consistently for a while (I think it has taken about six months for each child) all he needs to do most time is ask the child "do we need to have a talk?" and their answer is usually "no, Poppa, no talk" and they straighten out right away. The nice thing about his way is that it works for the very young ones like your boy and continues to work as they get older.
As far as the smothering love is concerned, I know part of your concern has to be that he may inadvertantly injure the younger child. For that reason I think you need to be right with the children any time they are together playing. You also need to provide some time when the baby can be on the floor to play when big brother isn't around to bother him. Perhaps during older brother's naptime would be a good opportunity for the baby to have floor time. Or, as someone else has suggested, have a special activity that you can do with older brother, but be near enough to keep a good eye on the six month old. You might also try having floor time in the evening for the baby, and maybe daddy and big brother can go out for a walk or do something special together.