Time Outs

Elizabeth has started to hit her siblings. A lot. She whacks them on their head with her hand, musical instruments, spoons, other toys, and just about anything else. After she hits Parker, Parker says, "I don't like that Elizabeth. Don't hit me." But she keeps on hitting. No amount of redirecting or even yelling at her scarily to stop has helped. So, I tried a time out.

After she hit him today, I told her, It's not ok to hit your brother and moved her away. The second time, I said, It's not okay to hit your brother and if you do it again, you are getting a time out. After her third attack, I said, It's not okay to hit your brother and you are getting a one minute time out. I picked her up and put her in the corner facing us, but not near any toys or doors or anything. I said, crouching down to her, You are in a one minute time out for hitting your brother. And then I walked away.

Amazingly, she stayed there. After about 30 seconds, she tentatively took one step forward. I said, Go Back. She step slowly backward to the wall again. When it was over, I told her her timeout was over and she could come play again. She ran over to me with a big hug. Then I told her to tell Parker that she was sorry and give him a hug. She didn't do the sorry part, but she did the hug.

Who's knows what kind of damage I did to her doing all that, but she absolutely understood what was going on. Ab. Sol. utely.

And as a sidebar...Parker said, Elizabeth gets a one minute time out. Parker gets a 3 minute time out and Daddy gets a 40 minute time out.