I recently had this happen to me. As I was changing dcb he started screaming, "you hurt me" when I lifted his feet to wipe. Then he started kicking me. I ignored him and did not react, keep going until I got him wiped. Then I had to step back from the table to let him calm down.

One of the kids keeps asking me why I was hurting him. My first thought was what if a child went home and told their parent that I was hurting this child?

When I told his parents I got "surprised that it did not happen sooner" and "he does that 90% of the time with us" This is what sealed the deal that I had to terminate him. He only did it one other time during the 2-week notice. But since I still did not react, he stopped after a few "you hurt me"

I choose to just ignore because I don't want to add fuel to the fire by giving the child new phrases that he can use to get a negative reaction from another adult (like "you lie").
Most words are just words until we add emotions to them. When you add emotion (including facial expression), you add power to the word and the child. If you don't add the emotion/reaction then you don't give them the power to the child to just throw around the words to get their way.
Just like when a child uses a swear word, if you react negatively and show that it bothers you, the child will keep doing it. If you don't react and pretend they said "truck" instead, it takes the power away from them.

Reply