When Your Child Hits (Stop Doing This)

We're currently running a special limited time five week Q&A series exclusively for our Bratbusters boot camp members. Throughout April, I'm featuring selected member questions alongside the most common implementation hurdles in an exclusive episode each week for five weeks. If you're not already a member, it's not too late to be part of this series. You'll get an instant access to the episodes already released and the final episode question submission deadline is April 23 at 3pm Pacific Time. Go to bratbusters.com or check out the podcast description to learn more and join the Bratbusters boot camp today. Your daughter does not feel good about herself when she's screaming and whining and carrying on. She feels like crap. Okay. You're not doing her any favors by trying to please her. That's that pleaser parent style. You're probably trying to avoid all the fit scenes meltdowns and tantrums. Those are the lessons. If you're going through this as a parent, this is stressful, but you talk about how these kids are often the athletes of tomorrow. Well, when they're really physical and they use their body a lot. Like I said, they're not evil. They're just physical, right? I feel like some days are okay and others. I'm purely walking on eggshells where I don't love being around them. A leader brings out the best in them, making them feel the best. And when you feel good, you do good. And that's all we're doing here. Welcome to the Bratbusters Parenting Podcast. My name is Lisa Bunnage. I'm a parenting coach. I'm a mom. I'm also a grandmother. And I'm Amy Bunnage. Lisa's daughter and I handle the marketing and planning here at Bratbusters. While I don't have kids, each episode will dive into parenting topics and Lisa will answer your questions. Let's get started. Okay, sweetie. What are we talking about today? Today's topic is all about children hitting. Children. Oh, okay. Gee, that never happens. Now, wait a minute. You said children. You mean three to three to 12 or is it toddlers too? We're including toddlers here too. Now, hitting is something, especially with toddlers. This is something that they can learn to do later on if you spank them or if you are rough with them or you wrestle with them. You can teach them how to hit as they get older, which you don't want to do. It's all this negative stuff that, you know, like wrestling too rough with them or whatever. So they can become hitters later in life, like when they're five, six, seven, but toddlers only hit if it's in their DNA. It's just something in them. There's four things that they're born to do or they're never going to do. One is aggressive behavior hitting. Another one is running, like running away from you because they have no fear of danger or anything. The other one is climbing same thing, but they don't not all climbers are runners and vice versa. And then the other one is tantrums. So those are four things that they're born to do or they're never going to do. Okay. But tantrums, I don't think they, you can never really teach them how to have a tantrum, but they can learn that if they're bullied and they've got a sibling who hits them all the time. They can start hitting back, but generally it starts in toddler hood. And I can imagine as well, especially if you're a first time parent going out, like this would be a behavior that would feel a little jarring. And especially if you're navigating it with other kids, like you don't want other kids getting hurt. I would say it's probably one of the most embarrassing things for parents. Because your kid is hurting other children. And what you want to do is you want to intervene right away and just prevent future hits. You know, parents don't tend to do that. They tend to have the big discussion around, don't hurt other people, gentle hands. You remember all that garbage stuff. So yeah, you've got to pull them away for a few minutes and then you're right there intervening and preventing future hits. That's what most parents don't do. They do the little mini therapy session, which does absolute squat. And then they don't, they're not right there hovering to prevent future hits. So you don't have to take them away forever, like for the whole rest of the outing or whatever, but you just take them away for a few minutes. And then you can reenter with the play with the other kids, but you got to be right there preventing future hits. It is by far one of the most embarrassing things for parents by far worse than tantrums, I would say. Because tantrums aren't hurting other people, aside from their ears, but hitting is actually they're often really hurting other kids. Like can be quite dangerous at times. If they take like a car or something, like a little, you know, little metal car or something and hit another kid in the eye, it can really do some damage. Now, do you find that kids are doing this? Are they being provoked or do some children just do this unprovoked as well? Unprovoked. They think it's fun. They just, because they get a big reaction. Remember kids will go for toddlers will go for a big reaction, good or bad. So they get the big reaction. That's why they do it. That's why you always want to stay calm. So they will get the big reaction from the kid, but they won't get it from you. But yeah, it's just in their DNA. It's your job to train them out of it slowly, but surely it's not going to happen overnight because it's something that they're kind of born to want to do. Right. Doesn't mean that they're evil. It just means they're physical. Right. Now I'm thinking we could go over how to approach this, but we do have a lot of questions here and I'm sure that you will approach it for toddlers and for three to 12. So do you want to get right into the questions? If we've got a lot of questions, that's a good idea. We do. Okay. So the first one here is Charlotte from England. How do you tell, show or teach a 17 month old daughter not to hit? They suddenly started hitting me and my wife around the face. Then when told no, she has hit herself in the head too. There's absolutely no violence in our household. It seems particularly prevalent when she's tired or overly excited. We don't know what the best way is to help her to not hit. Okay. I would physically restrain her. What I mean by that is just hold her hitting hand, just hold it and then maybe read a book or something. Do something really calming because you said it happens most when she's over tired or over excited. So you want to bring that stimulation down, right? The tiredness also brings out this, you know, emotional stimulation because they get all worked up. So yeah, you might want to just say no and then whole restrain that hand. Just hold on to it and then maybe just sit and read a book with her or something. So you can try that. She's only 17 months old. She's coming out of baby hood. She's not quite like two or like a toddler yet. Toddlers to me are 16 to 35 months, but that 16 month is sort of a gray area. 16 to 18 months. Okay. Should we get into the next question? Yes. One of my five year old twin boys has an issue with being rough or hitting, which we managed to fix for the most part aside from the odd times which we address. Now he's struggling in school. He is only in pre primary, which is basically daycare. He has troubles with transitions according to teachers going outdoors, leaving their play space. I've had good communication with the teacher, but it's getting exhausting hearing all of the issues. He can be defied at home, but it seems to be less frequent. I give consequences, but since it's been so frequent, I made one of the rules always listen to the teacher and I skip the consequence and go right to the negative deprivation. So media blackout. I'm not sure if this is the way to go. I play with him board games, freeze, tag, dance, et cetera. I try not to yell and usually succeed. I'm at a loss and don't know what to do. Yeah. Well, the first thing I'm going to say, I won't go on about it, but don't go to the second consequence. If they do something bad, you want to replace it with something good. That's why we have two consequences. The first one's a positive action. Don't go right to the big one. Not right now. Sometimes I will, but not with this. Okay. So and also what it, what's it like at home? I would push the envelope a bit more at home, have more systems and routines at home because you want to get him upset with you at home. I'm assuming you kind of cater to his moods. You kind of don't want the fit scenes meltdowns and tantrums. So I would get systems in place that you know, he doesn't like a school has systems and routines and habits, right? So you're sort of preparing him more for school at home. Have your system just sort of buff up or beef up your systems, routines and habits at home so that you're pushing him a little bit more at home and then you can deal with the behavior at home so that it doesn't happen at school as much because usually what happens if they're acting out at school and then you say, it's not as bad at home. It's a tell for me. It means that he's not being challenged at home. Okay. That's what that says to me where school is challenging him. He's having to do things he doesn't want to do more often. That's why he's worse at school. So yeah, you want to push him a little bit over the edge. Okay. Remember those fit scenes meltdowns and tantrums. Those are the lessons on the other side of that is the lesson without those fits. There is no lesson with a kid who's who's prone to have fits. Okay. I can envision though it may even be subconscious that you're doing it like that would be tempting to just try and make things a little bit more well, especially with multiple kids. Yeah. And you got twins and what you're doing is you're going for the short term gain for long term pain. I go the other way. I absolutely I push the envelope 100% with any kid I've ever worked with. If I think like if a kid didn't like doing something and I know it had to be done, I wouldn't put it off. It'd be the first thing I do. I was working with kids absolute first thing I do. No, he hates doing science. You might want to work on that last. Okay. Let's start with science. Guaranteed 100%. That's what I do because I'm going to get respect right up front. Right. You don't get respect with the easy stuff. You get it with the stuff that's hard and that's what we're after here. You want to set yourself up as a leader and another thing that parents often forget is they're so busy focusing on the bad behavior, but you have to mix it with a lot of fun. I would say I only maybe focus on discipline, maybe 5% of the time. If you've got a really challenging kid, the rest of the time I am taking those opportunities to be fun and connect with them, especially when you're when you're setting up your leadership, becoming a leader is a lot of work. Okay. It just is. It's very time consuming, but it's worth it. You want to make the future years easy. This is how you do it. You put in the hard work now. He's very pliable at five years old. Not so much at 15. You want to get this sorted out now. By the way, when I'm hired to work with teenagers who are, you know, out of sorts, let's put it that way with boys. It's almost always just turned 15. It's a me just turned 15 is a real point with boys. Hormones are kicking in all that stuff. Girls are anywhere from 12 to 16, whatever. But with teenage boys, it's just turned 15. You do not want to hire me when he's 15. If you don't get this sorted out now. Okay. The next one is Taylor from Canada struggling with a four year old and two year old also have a baby. Sometimes the behavior is so overwhelming with the four year old though. I don't know where to start. He will wind them through a tantrums for every little thing. So for example, he doesn't want what we have for dinner to be clear at times. He's very good at these things, but most of the time it's pulling teeth. I find myself often threatening way to get to take away TV to get him to do it. Then he can be very mean to a sister hits her and hurts her. I know I'm not a leader and don't have respect. I'm just struggling on how to get there. We haven't really implemented the behavior board because I just don't know what to put on there first. With the two year old, she's very clean. Once we carried around all the time with the baby and we just can't do it anymore. If we lift her up, she'll start throwing a tantrum. We try our best to ignore the tantrum. She can be mean to her brother and they will fight over toys, hitting each other, pulling hair, etc. I just want them to be able to sort things out on their own as well. Well, I already know what you're doing wrong just by what you just said. You're not consistent. You're probably good one moment and then the next minute you just can't handle it and you give in. I'm pretty sure that's what's going on here. Okay. So I would put down on the behavior board. Now you've got a four and a two year old in a baby. Okay. You can only put the one on the behavior board, but he's obviously the one you're targeting anyway. I always say to families and I'm working with them. Who's our target? Like there's usually one kid that's a little bit and often it changes too. But there's always one that I want to focus on because we want to get the difficult kid first, right? So what I would do is on the behavior board, I would put no aggressive behavior, which means no hitting, no kicking, whatever. So it because you always want to address that first. It's going to be a hard one to address. Okay. And then follow through. I'm also guessing that you don't always say what you mean and mean what you say and the way to follow through with that 100% is just be real careful what you say. Okay. So you don't and parents will say, yeah, but I said this, how do I follow through? I say, well, just don't say that then. If you're not ready to follow through, be very careful what you say. So your lack of consistency, which is making them not respect you. I'm pretty sure about that. Okay. So just think about that. Start with the behavior board. It's completely free on my website. You might want to look into the courses in the bootcamp courses. I would go with the three to 12 year old one because you're focusing on the four year old and that just has a lot more information on it because you got a lot of kids like three kids and you said that you're struggling with two of them. You're going to end up struggling with the baby too. If you don't get the sorted out right now with the four year old. So and you don't want to go there. And you don't need to go there. Okay. Just set yourself up as a leader. It might take three to six months before it's really cemented, but you should start to see results within three to six weeks. If you're consistent and sorry, did you mention what rule to start with for the no hitting, no aggressive behavior? I did say that. Okay. No aggressive behavior and that includes hitting, kicking, whatever aggressive, whatever you decide is aggressive behavior, whatever he does, that's aggressive. How do you balance that then? If you have the toddler hitting back and they're hitting each other, well, then the toddler is different. And if on the free behavior board, there's also a toddler section. Okay. And it explains how you discipline toddlers. But if they're hitting back and retaliation, you still go after the initial hitter. So yeah, but then the toddler might have grabbed something off the four year old, which is what made him mad in the first place. You got to be on top of this. You got to make it a real chore, like a real job, a real project for the next three to six weeks. It's worth it. Then you can kind of just relax and enjoy your kids, right? Once you get yourself set up as a leader, they will eventually follow. Children, children want a leader. They want need and crave a leader. The way they ask for it is by acting out. That's a perfect example of that is that eat your little boy. I know I say this all the time, but I just met him and he was a handful. I was asked to work with him and I said, hi, I'm Lisa and he said to me, if you don't give me what I want, I'm going to have a fit. And I leaned back in my chair and I just said, bring it on. And he never did. He was good as gold. You could see him. He actually looked relaxed. He looked like, oh, thank God, finally a leader. Somebody knows what she's saying. That's what he looked like. He was great with me. Right? So you want to get there. That makes your life so much easier when you can come in with that calm leadership. They will follow. By the way, the reason it was easy for me is I'm level 10 with this because I invented it. Plus I had no history with him that I had to erase. It is harder because you're learning how to do this while you're also having to sort of erase the history that you did. You know, when you weren't a leader, so it is a lot harder for you. I can get respect right away pretty much, but yeah, it's going to be hard and it's, but it's worth it. All my clients who get there, like once they're there, they go, I just get it. I turned the corner. I just get it's different for everyone. By the way, it could be session three, could be session 33. It's different for everybody. Okay. Um, but when they get there, they all say the same thing. Oh, it's so easy. Once you get it and I go, yeah, fake it till you make it. I can envision as well, especially as he said, it's worth it in the moment. It's like there, it must feel in the moment like it's going to be like that forever, but it doesn't have to be. But it will be. It'll get worse by the way. If you don't, if you don't address this now, it'll just get worse. Okay. If he's like this at four, it, yeah. It's just going to keep getting worse and worse and worse. If you don't address this now, it's worth it. Put in the work now. It is worth it though. Everyone wants the short term game, you know, but they don't realize they're setting themselves up for short term or for long term pain. I want the other way around. I want to go all in. I want to sort this out as soon as possible and then you can just relax and enjoy your kids. Are your kids driving you nuts? They don't have to check out bratbusters.com for my bootcamp courses. If you want to learn how to become a leader. Okay. The next one is Beth from the United States. My 18 month old is going through a new phase where every time we say, no, she throws a fit, gets angry and will throw anything in sight. Her water bottle, food, pillow, etc. And then oftentimes if we're trying to ignore it and calm and be calm next to her, she will come and try and hit us. I stop her hand and say no, but the anger and fit continues. Is this anger normal part of a tantrum? How can I ignore it while trying to stop her from throwing her hitting? Yeah, I've got tons and tons of videos of that. If you want to Google that for more information, but I'll just make it quick here. A lot of them will hit and get aggressive and hit themselves, bang them hit, bang their head on the wall, whatever. When they get angry because they lose their mind and they don't understand pain and all that. They're just not there yet. So yeah, you just say no. So they're having a fit. You just say no and you grab their hand so that they can't hurt anyone, including themselves. And you only hold it for maybe 30 seconds. Watch them, but you're not looking at them and you're not talking to them. Okay. You're still ignoring them. You're still, you're still looking like you're waiting for a bus, but you just happen to be restraining them from hurting you or hurting someone else. Okay. Or throwing anything. So if they're hurting themselves, hurting someone else or damaging property, you physically restrain them. Just hold them for maybe 30 seconds. Let go if they start, you know, the physical stuff again. Just hold them again. Keep doing that off and on 30 seconds at a time. And they'll eventually learn by the way, they're going to get worse and worse and worse before they get better because they're sensing that. Wait a minute. I don't have as much control as I did. You're starting to take control. They are, it's all, it will for sure get worse before it gets better. And just if this is someone's first time, you're not a medical professional and not a therapist and you're talking about this gently in that sense. When you're restraining them. Yeah. You just hold onto them so they can't hurt themselves, hurt someone else who damaged property. You're not, you're not twisting them or twisting the arm or anything. You're just holding them so they can't get hurt or you, or they can't hurt you. Okay. The next one is Julia from Canada. My 13 month old. By the way, can I just say this? This is weird, but I don't like it when I see parents pick a. Child up. I want arm. I'm not a doctor. I'm not a medical professional. I've literally seen an arm being pulled out of a joint once. Yeah, I wouldn't like that either. No. So I'm just throwing that out there. So when you're physically restraining them, be gentle. Don't do anything that's going to throw their body in a position. It shouldn't be, but I, I saw someone once pick up a child who was having a tantrum and they pick them up by one arm. Yeah. You heard what happened. It was so loud. I think from your approach, what you're discussing is just keeping everyone safe. That's all it is. You're not picking them up. You're just holding onto their hand or the hitter, the hand that was hitting or the, both of them so that they can't hurt themselves hurt someone else or damage property. Yep. The next one is Julia from Canada. My 13 month old hit simple hair of mom and dad. How do we respond appropriately to curb this behavior? How old? 13 months. 13, I still a baby. Just face them away from you. Don't pick them up when they're facing you when they're doing that. Just hold them so they can't get that. And then you look like you're just going about your business. Don't talk to them about it though. Do not discuss it with them. That, that's part of feeding it by the way. So yeah, just pretend you didn't even notice. So if they start doing that, just hold their hand and sort of, and then hold them facing away from you and just go on about your business while you're holding them. You might be, you know, washing some dishes or cleaning off a counter or something. So look like you're distracted. Like it's not a big deal because you know what you're doing, right? You're just preventing them from hitting you and pulling their hair. They're going to try stuff. Okay. It's just the way it is. But you just have to intervene and not let them continue. It's not these mini therapy sessions discussing it. That's absolutely ridiculous. Okay. It's a 13 month old, it's still just a baby. So yeah, just face them away from you so they can't continue doing it. They get muscle memory. They get used to doing it. So every time they do it, they get turned around. They don't like that. Every single time they go to grab your hair, say, Nope, and just turn them around and then just go about your business while you're holding them. So you're not focused on it. You have also talked about the idea like obviously if you're going through this as a parent, this is stressful. This can be very a lot to handle, but you talk about how these kids are often the athletes of tomorrow. Well, when they're really physical and they use their body a lot, like I said, they're not evil. They're just physical, right? They're the kids who do hit, they do run, they do climb. They're often the athletes of tomorrow because they use their bodies in a more aggressive way, right? So yeah, I was never aggressive. I've never hit or anything, but I was also lousy at sports. So there you go. I am also following your footsteps with that. And none of us actually, neither of my kids are really into sports. We're into fitness, but not sports, but none of us ever hit or anything. So yeah, those are often the kids who I've actually asked parents who have a really athletic kid and they said, oh, they were climbing. They were running. They were hitting. So they just use their body in a different way. So it can turn out to be a positive down the road. Yeah, they're the lacrosse star. That's right. The lacrosse star, the boxing star. Yeah. So they think about it. Doesn't it make sense, doesn't it? I don't like getting hit. I don't like hitting. I don't like anything aggressive. Neither did my kids. We never wanted to do a sport where we might get tripped and kicked and all that stuff because we were never physical. Like we didn't use our bodies that way. So it makes perfect sense, doesn't it? I remember in eighth grade, I remember the basketball coach being like, he me, you need to be more aggressive. And I was like, not the sport for me. Yeah. No, thank you. Yeah. No, thank you. That would have been me too. Okay. The next one is Tanya from the United States. My five year olds giving me a hard time. She was a pretty chill as a toddler with a few intense tantrums, but they were always related to hunger or tiredness. Now at five, she has severe tantrums whenever things don't go her way. She yells, hits us, throw things and says mean things. Tears are coming down her face like it's the end of the world. Do we treat these tantrums like we would a toddler's tantrums? This all started three months after we moved to a new state. So I'm not sure if it's related in daycare. They say that she's too sensitive and cries often. And by her own admission, she's quote unquote behaving very well at daycare and is very cooperative, which teachers confirmed. But at home is very naughty and she tries to be good. I reassure her by saying she's always good. Only the behavior is sometimes wrong, which is okay because we all make mistakes and are learning. She's insecure about learning and being accepted by new friends, but we made a lot of progress there. And teachers called us to let her know that they've noticed a big change in a positive way. However, the tantrums are still present with us. Long story, but I want to provide context question. What can I do better? Well, stop with the therapy sessions, by the way, you're a good girl, but sometimes it. Yeah, that stuff's just useless. Okay. And then you're focused on it too much. So don't do that. Okay. So what I would do is I would just start with the behavior board. It's free and start with a rule and you have a consequence too. You have a rule and a consequence just like she does. Just start there. The reason why she's acting like this is because of your reaction. Okay. Your lack of leadership. So they don't act like that because they feel very insecure when they're doing that. And and tantrums are not based on big feelings and big emotions. They're based on a lack of emotional control, not getting their own way. Okay. And also it could be a lack of leadership that throws them off too. They need Craven want to leader. You're just not being a leader for her. That's why she's acting out. And don't worry about her feelings when you're dealing with this behavior board. It is intended to help them with their own feelings. It's intended to calm them down and show them there's a system in place. My parents know what they're doing. My parents also have consequences too because we're all human. So in other words, it's okay to make mistakes. You're not a bad person because you make mistakes. Okay. But don't talk like that. She gets it. The behavior board speaks for itself. So does your calm leadership. You don't need to explain all this stuff. They just get it. They just do. Once you're a calm leader, they understand a calm leader very, very, very, very well. They lean right into it. You don't need to talk about it. You talked about that before where it's almost like a mentor. It's like, how did they make you feel and did they specifically have those discussions with you? Well, it's interesting. I always say I teach leadership, but it's really like mentorship in a way. Like, have you ever had like a coach or a teacher or a grandparent, someone that didn't take any crap from you at all? Cause you didn't give them any because you felt so great about yourself when you were around them. But you knew that they wouldn't put up with anything either and you made, you were a better person around them. You thought that is the person that you like that. Let you like yourself the most when you're around them. Okay. Cause I've worked with so many kids and one teenager said years later, I didn't even like myself until I met you. That is a leader. A leader brings out the best in them, making them feel the best. And when you feel good, you do good. And that's all we're doing here. You want to make your kids feel good, but they don't feel good when they're acting out. Your girl, your daughter does not feel good about herself when she's screaming and whining and carrying on. She feels like crap. Okay. You're not doing her any favors by trying to please her. That's that pleaser parent style. You're probably trying to avoid all the fit scenes meltdowns and tantrums. Those are the lessons. Okay. I have no fear of that. I'm like, that's none of my business. As soon as you're finished, we can go read a book or go do a puzzle or something. They always know I'm there waiting to connect when they're done. And that's part of the reward for all this stuff for all these fit scenes meltdowns and tantrums. They know that they're going to get attention as soon as they're done. So why bother having them? Why bother having a fit? If you know it's never going to work and then at the end of it, then you're going to get attention. They just pick up on this. Parents don't. Kids do. Is it the idea that you like rise up to those expectations? You do because the person, I don't take any crap from kids. They know that and I'm very honest. And also I don't give any crap. If I say something that they don't like, they, boy, I want them to tell me, Lisa, I didn't like the way you treated me then or you, you worked fair. You forgot something or whatever. Oh, sorry about that. Okay. How about I do this for you? I'm very quick to own my own mistakes, but there's no shaming in it. There's no, I don't feel bad about it. I just like, yeah, I made a mistake and I'm very quick to make amends. That's what I do for them too. Cause then when they make a mistake, they're very quick to own up to it. Oh, Lisa, I messed up. I forgot to do my homework last night so we can't work on math or whatever it was. I said, yeah, you messed up. Okay. What are you going to do for me now? Cause you got to make amends. There's got to be a consequence and they go, oh, how about blah, blah, blah or whatever. So I'd say, sure. Okay. Great. There's no shame in making mistakes. There's only shame in not owning them and making amends for them. And you've got, you've got to set an example for that. That's why you're a leader. Leaders own up to their own mistakes. Okay. And there's no shame in not being perfect. None of us are. Life's messy. People are messy. You just don't want to make big ones. Right? Okay. The next one is April from the United States. Four year old boy always getting in other kids personal space. Sometimes it's playing and sometimes it's when he's mad. He hits, kicks or just in their face. All he wants to do is play fight. Well, that's not getting in personal space. That's aggression. It's a little bit different. Put down no hurting other people. Okay. Put that as his rule on the behavior board and then get the school to tell you, yeah, he did hit and kick someone today. So then when he comes home, say, okay, I don't care what school does by the way. That's their, that's their business, how they handle that. But you just, when he comes home, you have to deal with it too. Say, look, the teacher told me she sent me a text or a note or however you communicate with the teacher. Don't go on about it with them unless you need to initially figure out what's going on. Like, don't ask the teacher too many questions because then she won't even want to report to you because she doesn't have time to always talk about this. Just, I sort of understand what teachers go through anyway. So then you just say, okay, so let's go to the board. So you hit. So here's your consequence. Okay. So have a consequence at home. That's not in personal space. That's aggressive behavior. You want to put that on the board. We have one final question. So Danielle from the United States, eight month old and almost five year old. Our almost five year old boy has regressed behaviorally since his little sister was born. He gets frustrated and threatens he's going to hurt her or me and screams and hollers if he can't find something. He sometimes will hit or throw his toys if he's mad. I feel like some days are okay and others. I'm purely walking on eggshells where I don't love being around him. He's constantly trying to pick up a sister and move her or mess with her. And I'm really uncertain on what to do. We've implemented the behavior chart and have his rule as not hurting others. Okay. This doesn't really have anything to do with her. This has to do with that. You weren't a leader to begin with. So things were going his way before and now they're not. If you were a leader, he would, he would adapt to that. Okay. So it's your lack of leadership is the problem here. So start with my free behavior board. That's the training wheels with all this stuff. Start with a behavior like no hitting. If he is, if he is hitting and being aggressive, you put that as the first rule in the first behavior board that that course. It's a little mini free course, the free behavior board. If you want to get more information, that's the bootcamp course. Okay. So yeah, you weren't a leader before and now it's just more obvious because he's got more things to get you upset with. So yeah, you were the leader before. He, you were probably just catering to him more things were going more his way. It was all about him. Now it's not just all about him, but like my son was five when his sister was born. He was fine, but I was already a leader. You see. So yeah. Okay. Well, that was it for the parenting questions. Okay. Hitting. It's not your fault that they start doing that when they're little, but if they're still doing it by three, four, five, you got a lot of work to do. That's on you. You got to work on that. Put it on the behavior board. You put down something like no aggressive behavior because often if you put down no hitting, you can put no hitting if that's all they do, but then you can also say that means everything else. So no aggressive behavior. Okay. Hitting, kicking, pushing, whatever. So start with that and go from there. It is embarrassing when you're out in public and they hurt other children. You got to be ready for that though. Don't just do the mini therapy sessions telling them to use gentle hands. Every time I see that, I just roll my eyes. I just think, Oh, it's not going to work and it never does. You know, it's the, it's the consequences that work. It's not these mini therapy sessions and saying gentle hands. It's useless. Okay. It's the consequences that make all this work. Okay. Well, I feel like that's a great place to end it. Okay. Thanks so, thanks so much for joining us. We'll be back again soon talking about another parenting topic. Happy parenting. 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