He hit me, so I had to hit him back.

Question:

I have a 2-year-old boy and he is very stubborn. When he is in trouble… I do punish him to sit down but he refuses to sit down. He keeps coming up to me and says sorry, but he is not finished with his punishment. Im confused about spanking my kid. When he tried to touch my typing board and I said No!! He hit me, so I had to hit him back to tell him that hurts me, he continued hitting me. What should I do?? Please send me more information about this situation. Thank you.

Answer:

My name is Jody McVittie, I am a family physician and a parent of three children 15,13, and 10. I help answer some of the questions for the web page.

You sound really challenged by your two year old. As children grow up they can be a challenge! It sounds like your youngster is just getting to the age where he wants to do things that HE wants to do. That is an important developmental step (and it is his JOB to do that now). It does make life a little harder for parents…because you now have a young human being in the house with a mind of his own and he WON’T always agree with you or want to do things exactly your way. Some parents get a little scared by this. They think “If I cannot control my 2 year old, I’ll never be able to control him” They sometimes think that it means that they are not a good parent because they were taught that good parents “control” their children.