# Teaching a toddler to be gentle with pets



## April Dawn (Oct 31, 2009)

Hi all,

My son (just turned two) absolutely adores our dog and our cat. The problem is that he gets super excited when he plays with them. Hugging them often turns into squeezing, and his idea of petting them is so hard it's almost hitting. I worry he will actually hurt them, or that they will get fed up and snap at him. He's not trying to be mean or rough, he's just overly enthusiastic in showing how much he loves them. He doesn't seem to understand what he's doing wrong when I tell him to be more gentle. I keep showing him how to pet them gently, but he's still rough. Any tips for how to teach him to be gentle with pets?


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## crunchy_mommy (Mar 29, 2009)

This might sound silly, but we used to 'pet' DS. If we showed him on the animal, he just kept doing the same thing, but when we pet him gently on _his_ arm, cheek, etc. he got it and now understands what 'gentle' means.

Another idea, a la _Playful Parenting_, would be to spend some time wrestling with him so he can experiment more with his own strength. Once he grasps the idea of gentle, you could pretend to be the dog and have him play 'gently' with you then 'roughly' with you etc.


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## organicviolin (Feb 23, 2011)

so glad I read this post as we're having the same situation with our 2 year old DS. Not to be gender stereotyping but I do think it partly has to do with that dang y chromosome. Not like that excuses being too rough with the lovely family pets. Now, here's a question, how can you wrestle with the toddler when you have a newborn strapped to you who never wants to be down because he's too little as of yet??


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## April Dawn (Oct 31, 2009)

Quote:


> Originally Posted by *crunchy_mommy*
> 
> This might sound silly, but we used to 'pet' DS. If we showed him on the animal, he just kept doing the same thing, but when we pet him gently on _his_ arm, cheek, etc. he got it and now understands what 'gentle' means.


That's a really cute idea, I will try it! Thanks!


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## 1blueheron (Aug 22, 2009)

Quote:


> Originally Posted by *organicviolin*
> 
> so glad I read this post as we're having the same situation with our 2 year old DS. Not to be gender stereotyping but I do think it partly has to do with that dang y chromosome.


I think our poor dog would disagree with you on the Y chromosome thing. 

In addition to excessively enthusiastic petting/hugging/pinching, DD loves to wave food right in front of his face and then giggle maniacally while he sits there drooling. (He's such a good boy.)

We have some success with actually holding her hand and showing her what amount of pressure = gentle touch, but she forgets if she's tired or excited.


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## hildare (Jul 6, 2009)

our 19 mo has been pretty rough with the animals in the past, she's gotten better now. what we've done has been to use one of those animal books with big pictures and practice petting the picture of the kitty gently. i imagine you could use a printed picture and do the same thing. i don't know if that's what worked or if she finally figured out why they ran away from her, though.


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## organicviolin (Feb 23, 2011)

hysterical! Must be a little kid thing then. Oh fun!!!

Quote:


> Originally Posted by *1blueheron*
> 
> I think our poor dog would disagree with you on the Y chromosome thing.
> 
> ...


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## April Dawn (Oct 31, 2009)

OK, so I've been trying to "pet" DS gently on the back and tell him "gentle!" He thinks it's really funny, and I think that's great - maybe the humor will help him remember what gentle means.

I do have a cute story for you all. He was trying to pet the dog earlier when she just wanted a nap. She was tolerating it, but kept trying to roll away and just really didn't want to play. So I told him "Doggie doesn't want to play right now, she's tired. We will pet her later." And he waited a minute. Then, he reached out one single finger and very gently poked her. He was looking at me the whole time like he was wondering "OK, if petting isn't ok, what about just touching?" It was pretty funny - he was trying to follow the rules, but he just *really* wanted her to play. I got out some toys to distract him then, and I didn't reprimand him, because he wasn't exactly disobeying... just testing the limit of what I meant a bit!


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## crunchy_mommy (Mar 29, 2009)

LOL that's cute!! I love when they test the limits... at least when I'm not so frustrated that I can't smile/laugh and admire his ingenuity...


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## lifeguard (May 12, 2008)

If you find something magical I'd LOVE to hear 'cause I think we've tried all of this & we still need to watch ds like a hawk when he is near the animals.


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## EmTheWife (May 28, 2010)

We have Pat Them Gently, a cute little book that talks about how to treat pets and animals; we act it out with DS and his toys to teach him (we don't have any pets yet).


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## SilverFish (Jan 14, 2010)

we had success with "petting" our dd, as well as with petting the kitty along with her, either on top of her hand or beside her.

but really, the best teacher was the cat himself. i approached this less cautiously because we are dealing with a cat, not a dog, and a full-grown young adult, not a fragile kitten or senior, but if she was mean to the kitty after i had shown gentle a few times, i let him remind her himself. she got his claws in her hand a couple times, and lo and behold, she never ever forgets gentle now. in fact, she is not only gentle with the cat but is remarkably gentle with other babies and toddlers too. i felt a bit conflicted at first (not that i could have really stopped it anyway... cats and babies are quick!) but i saw how deliberate and patient he was... it wasn't wild clawing that i thought would really be a danger, just a firm "no" on his part. anyway, i don't think you should go around letting your cats claw your babies, but i was very surprised how quickly and well she learned from that experience.


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