19 month old and discipline

Hi everyone...been a while since I've posted. I started a new job and have been trying to keep up with my almost 2 year old. Who does NOT listen. I can tell him no over and over again, take something away, put him in time out, nothing works. Even at daycare they told me he's "not a good listener" and maybe I need to talk to the pediatrician . He will take thecable box card out 5 times after I clearly and firmly tell him no. That's just one example. So am I dealing with normal 2 yr old boy behavior? He' s very good otherwise. It's basically more like if hrs doing something bad and we tell him no he thinks it's funny. HELP!!

Re: 19 month old and discipline

No advice, but I definitely sympathize! 2 year old here, and he is the SAME way!

I try to tell him "First do xyz, then we will have *insert reward*" and it works sometimes, maybe 1/2 the time...

eta: Good luck with the new job!!!

Message edited 3/26/2011 10:34:49 PM.

Re: 19 month old and discipline

DS is generally a good listener, but I've heard great things about 1-2-3 Magic. I'm not sure if it's more effective for slightly older toddlers, but it might be worth checking out.

Do you think he's doing it for attention? Does re-directing him work at all? I find it hard to do sometimes, but consistency is key. Hang in there!

Re: 19 month old and discipline

This is DD#1 It took much longer to train her with time out discipline vs. her sister. I do have concerns that she has a short attention span and wonder if that is why it took her longer to 'get" disciplining. She is much better now (3.5) versus a year ago. I would make eye contact with her to let her know what she was doing was wrong and give her a time out warning. Kind of hard to do when she closes her eyes and turns her head each and every time. It was frustrating and maddening. Now I can tell her I will count to 3 and she listens (almost) every time.

Re: 19 month old and discipline

I'm not an expert, but DS is very disciplined at 12m, and we had a lot of issues around 8m... He thought no was funny, we warned him not to do it and he'd do it just to test us. He tested everything even things he wasn't even that interested in otherwise.

So now, we follow a script, something like this.

He does something we don't want him to do.
I say "I don't want you to xyz, hands off please/sit down please/back off please"

If he doesn't I say "If you need help to stop, I can help you, or you can stay away from it yourself"

"Okay, I see you need my help, I'm coming to pick you up and move you"

If he screams/cries/tantrums
"I know your really want xyz, you like xyz!" - for some reason telling him what he wants always calms him down.
Then I say
" I can't let you have it, instead can you play with abc or 123 instead?"

He'll whine or whatever and I'll repeat "I know you want xyz, but for now, can you play with abc or 123?

If he's really upset he'll throw abc or 123. Fine I affirm how he feels "you are really upset, I see that" "you want xyz, but I will not let you have it"

let him go and

Repeat repeat repeat as many times as he needs to test you. He's learning boundaries, you need to draw them.

It gets easier as time goes on and he develops an understanding of boundaries, that some things are not meant for him and he has to just learn to live with that. Its healthy and gives him security.

Re: 19 month old and discipline

I notice the more I say no...the more she does it...dd will even smile at me while doing it. She takes the cable card out, I have taped it to the box lol two weeks later she forgot about it. She won't go near it andbthe tape is off. Dd is a super climber. I say no she climbs higher....I just remove it from the room and tell her it's dangerous. She throws food. I will remove her from the table. I feel like this works best for me.. I don't get stressed out as much

Re: 19 month old and discipline

I count and for some reason it works...I rarely get to 5. I also give them a choice we cannot touch the TV. We can do a or b..etc

Re: 19 month old and discipline

its so hard at that age.. i have a DD that is almost 19 months and she is a handful to say the least. however i have started putting her in the PNP for 1-2 minutes for not listening..lately she has been standing on the couch.. i would say it took maybe 7-8 times but shes understands now when i tell her shes going in PNP if she doesnt sit...she then sits. if u follow through they get it..

Re: 19 month old and discipline

With Cailen, we told him no one time. If he did it again after one no, he got a time out in the high chair with it facing the wall. That way there was no escape, no looking at us to see if he is getting attention - just screaming at the wall as an immediate consequence. We started this at 15 mts old. But I already started with time outs at 10 mts old, so he was already aware of what a time out was.

Re: 19 month old and discipline

This is JJ....There are times where he will react to No & listens but 9/10 times, he laughs & continues on. My parents bought us a timeout bench & now once he does it past a warning, he is put in timeout for 1 minute. When he comes out, if he continues to do it, he goes in the PNP for 1 minute. Usually that helps but there are still times he just refuses to listen

Re: 19 month old and discipline

DD is 18M & sometimes she also laughs when we tell her no. We make sure when we tell her no we explain to her why she can't do what she is doing..etc...sometimes we use time-out for 1 min....I think consistency is the key so that they learn that each time we will react the same etc.....I also think some of it is age related & testing.