What to Do When Your Child Hits You: Why It Happens and How to Stop a Child from Hitting
If you’re wondering what to do when your child hits you or struggling with the question, why does my child hit me even when they seem perfectly fine otherwise, you’re not alone.
It’s one of the most common (and confusing) challenges parents face.
As a clinical psychologist and a mom myself, I’ve seen firsthand how overwhelming it can feel when your sweet, cuddly child suddenly lashes out. The good news? There are clear, evidence-based steps you can take for how to deal with aggressive child behavior without damaging your relationship or your child’s self-esteem.
Why Does My Child Hit Me? Understanding the Root Causes
Before diving into how to stop a child from hitting, it’s important to understand why does my child hit me in the first place. Kids hit for a variety of reasons, and understanding those reasons is the first step to finding a lasting solution.
Curiosity and exploration – Sometimes, especially in very young children, hitting is purely exploratory. Toddlers are learning cause and effect, and they might hit just to see what happens. They’re testing their power in the world, and your reaction can reinforce or discourage that behavior.
Anger and frustration – Just like adults, kids have big feelings. They might lash out when they’re overwhelmed, tired, or frustrated. They don’t yet have the words or the emotional regulation skills to express their anger appropriately.
Boundary testing – Sometimes hitting is a deliberate boundary test. Your child might be trying to see if you really mean it when you set a limit. They want to know, “What happens if I cross this line?”
Seeking attention – If hitting consistently gets a big reaction, some kids will use it as a way to get your attention, even if it’s negative attention.
Why You Should Never Ignore Hitting
You might be tempted to brush off a slap or swat as “just a phase,” but ignoring this behavior can backfire. Here’s why you should set consequences for hitting and never overlook it:
It’s bad for your relationship – Allowing your child to hit you can build resentment, even if you try to hide it. Kids are incredibly perceptive, and they’ll pick up on the fact that you’re pulling away emotionally.
It’s confusing for your child – If you let them hit you, they may struggle to understand why it’s not okay to hit others. This can lead to problems at school, with friends, or even in future relationships.
It sets a dangerous precedent – A toddler hitting you might seem manageable, but a 10-year-old or teenager doing the same thing can be genuinely dangerous. Setting a firm boundary now can prevent serious issues down the line.
How to Stop a Child from Hitting – Real-Life Strategies
Once you understand why does my child hit me, it’s time to tackle how to stop a child from hitting in a way that’s clear, consistent, and compassionate.
Set a clear, immediate boundary - As soon as your child hits you, look them in the eye and firmly say, “No hitting. It’s not okay to hurt Mommy/Daddy.” This direct language is crucial. Vague statements like “Be gentle” might not cut it in the heat of the moment.
Physically block or move away if needed - If the hitting continues, physically block the strike or remove yourself from the situation. It’s okay to calmly but firmly prevent your child from hitting you again. This isn’t a punishment—it’s a way to keep yourself safe and model self-respect.
Follow through with consistent consequences for hitting - Effective consequences for hitting don’t have to be harsh, but they do need to be consistent. This might include removing your child from a situation, ending a playdate early, or taking a short break from an activity they enjoy. The key is to clearly connect the consequence to the behavior, so they understand why it’s happening.
Teach and model emotional regulation - In calmer moments, help your child find better ways to express their anger or frustration. This might include using words, taking deep breaths, or squeezing a pillow. Kids need to learn that their feelings are valid, but hitting isn’t an acceptable way to express them.
Reconnect after the incident - After you’ve set the boundary and enforced the consequence, make a point to reconnect. Let your child know that you still love them and that they are a good kid, even if their behavior was not okay. This helps repair any emotional distance and reinforces your bond.
How to Deal with Aggressive Child Behavior in the Long Run
If your child’s hitting is part of a bigger pattern of aggression, you might need to dig a little deeper. Consider these strategies for how to deal with aggressive child behavior:
Be a model of calm behavior – Your child is learning how to handle their emotions by watching you. If you stay calm, even when they lash out, you’re teaching them emotional regulation.
Catch them being good – Praise your child when they use their words or handle frustration without hitting. Positive reinforcement goes a long way.
Consider underlying triggers – Sometimes hitting is a sign of anxiety, sensory issues, or an unmet need for connection. If this is the case, addressing the root cause can reduce aggressive behaviors.
Final Thoughts on What to Do When Your Child Hits You
Parenting through aggression isn’t easy, but it’s also not a sign that you’re failing. Every child tests boundaries, and every parent has moments where they feel like they’re in over their head. Remember, you’re not alone, and with the right tools, you can guide your child toward more positive ways of expressing their big feelings.
For more in-depth guidance, real-life examples, and expert advice, listen to my full podcast episode, What to Do When Your Child Hits You: Why It Happens and How to Stop a Child from Hitting.
I walk you through practical steps for how to stop a child from hitting and share my thoughts on consequences for hitting that actually work.
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[00:00:00] Leah Clionsky: Welcome to the Educated Parent Podcast. I am your host, Dr. Leah Clionsky, and this is another one of our chats when it's just us no guests talking about a common parenting dilemma. And the parenting dilemma we're going to be talking about to is so relatable, and this one is what to do if your young child gets angry with you or gets upset and ends up hitting or hurting you.
[00:00:28] Leah Clionsky: How are you going to handle that? Well, that's what our discussion is about today. You are listening to Educated Parent the Parenting Podcast, where I teach you realistic expert parenting hacks to solve your everyday parenting problems so that you can reduce your stress, build your confidence as a parent, and raise thriving children.
[00:00:51] Leah Clionsky: My name is Dr. Leah Clionsky. I'm a licensed clinical psychologist, owner of Thriving Child Center and PCIT experts, child psychology practices, and a real life parent of two young children. I am the same as you. I am invested in being the best parent possible and raising thriving children. I also get overwhelmed.
[00:01:12] Leah Clionsky: I make mistakes and I forget what works. I do have three unique parenting advantages that you may not have a PhD in. Child clinical psychology, over 15 years of clinical experience working with families and a network of other experts that I can text for parenting advice whenever I'm lost. I'm here to bring my expertise and my expert network to you so that we can solve your everyday parenting dilemmas together.
[00:01:38] Leah Clionsky: I am so glad you're here. So I do wanna put a caveat right away into this episode. So this is an episode about little kids who are in the middle of their big feelings or their own curiosity hitting parents and what we should do about it. This is not about how to manage the behavior of a child that you are afraid of because they are hurting you.
[00:02:04] Leah Clionsky: Did you hear the distinction there? So if you have a child who is older or is hurting you, or you're feeling afraid this is a different level of problem, or no longer in developmentally appropriate world we're in, we need to take some active therapeutic intervention world. Well, the idea of the strategies might apply, but at that point, you're gonna want to see an actual psychologist and get help.
[00:02:29] Leah Clionsky: But in this case, that's not the topic at hand. Our topic is what to do if our little kids are exploring the world and hit us in the process. So let me tell you a personal story. It's always fun to start off with a personal story. So if you have never met me, you may not realize that I have very long blonde hair.
[00:02:51] Leah Clionsky: And my son loves my long blonde hair, right? It's like total temptation for kids. You see long hair and you're little, what do you wanna do? You guessed it. You want to pull that hair? So when he was a very young toddler, probably starting at around a year old, he got into a habit of pulling my hair, just yanking my hair.
[00:03:15] Leah Clionsky: And I have to tell you that behavior is extremely painful and it was causing a big problem because every time I picked him up, he wanted to pull my hair. And while I can understand that urge, that curiosity fueling hitting. It was not good for us. Like I, for a while, literally did not want to pick him up because I didn't want to give him access to my hair because pulling your hair actually really, really hurts.
[00:03:46] Leah Clionsky: And when he would pull my hair, even though I understood that he was very little and didn't understand the fact that it was actually painful for me, it made me feel really angry with him. Like being in pain makes you angry, and it was just not a positive place for our relationship to be, and so I had to start working with him on not doing that, right.
[00:04:09] Leah Clionsky: That physical aggression towards me was not going well. I. And this happens with little kids. Little kids sometimes hit push us, pull our hair spit at us, do aggressive behaviors that later on will be a really big problem. But when they're little and they're cute, sometimes we're just not sure what to do about that.
[00:04:30] Leah Clionsky: You know, some people think, well, if I tell them no, am I a bad parent? I read somewhere I'm not. Supposed to ever tell my children no. Some people think, oh, well, their feelings are just really big, so I just need to sit there and co-regulate and let them hit me over and over again. Spoil alert, I'm absolutely not in favor of that strategy.
[00:04:50] Leah Clionsky: We'll talk about that in a minute. Sometimes it makes people so angry that they end up screaming at their kids or sometimes even hitting them back, which probably works in terms of getting your child to stop doing something 'cause they're afraid of you. But it's also not the approach you wanna take. So that's what we're gonna talk about today, is what do you actually do when your young child does get physically aggressive with you?
[00:05:15] Leah Clionsky: How are you gonna handle that? What are safe ways of responding and limit setting? So why do kids hit us? Let's talk about that first. Where is this coming from? Well, one place it's coming from is curiosity and exploration. I. So one of the things about little kids is that they do not understand that their parents are human beings, right?
[00:05:37] Leah Clionsky: They don't understand that if I hit you, you are a human and it will hurt, and you will have feelings about it. Like they just cannot get there in their brains, especially parents. Sometimes kids will get angry with you because it was raining outside, right? That's unrealistic. The amount of power you have as a parent just doesn't make sense to little kids.
[00:05:58] Leah Clionsky: They think we can do almost anything. So if they hit you, they don't realize they're causing you pain. And it might be kind of interesting to explore. So if your kid is just little and they reach out and they hit you in the face and you go, blah. Then they think, oh, that was funny. Like I hit mommy in the face and she went, blah, that was a funny noise.
[00:06:18] Leah Clionsky: I'm gonna do that again and see what she does. So some of it's just curiosity. I'm pretty sure that the first time my son pulled my hair, it was just a sensory thing, like he saw it dangling there, he put his fingers in it. And then it was like, oh, just pull it, see what happens. So I think that felt good probably first, and then I went, then I made a noise, right?
[00:06:41] Leah Clionsky: And now it was like an interesting way that he was interacting with me, at least for him. For me, it was a painful, upsetting way for us to be interacting. So it makes sense that kids would explore their world by doing things that sometimes hurt people. So it doesn't mean that they don't like you. It can just mean that they don't understand and they're trying to figure out cause and effect.
[00:07:05] Leah Clionsky: Another reason that kids can sometimes hit is that they're angry. Right. They're having a big feeling. They don't feel good, right? So they're mad at you. You said, no more candy. They're mad at you. You gave them the purple cup, but that's not what they really wanted. Even though that's what they asked for.
[00:07:24] Leah Clionsky: Maybe they're mad at you because they don't feel well, and you're supposed to fix everything. So they're angry. And when we are angry, it's very human. It's biologically hardwired. We want to be aggressive. We want to hit. And so in that moment, your child might get angry and hit you as a way of expressing that anger, maybe also as a way of seeing if you will do something different if they hit you.
[00:07:50] Leah Clionsky: So that's another reason kids hit. We don't want them to hit us, but it's understandable. I find a lot of the time, if you can try to get behind why something's happening, then it does make you less angry. And if you're not so angry, then you react. More with strategy and less with your own overreaction.
[00:08:11] Leah Clionsky: Third reason sometimes kids hit is it's kind of curiosity mixed with limit testing. So they realize like, I'm not supposed to hit, but what are you going to do about it? It's like this second level, like I'm gonna break the rules and see what you're gonna do. That's when your kid might give you that look of like, what you gonna do?
[00:08:29] Leah Clionsky: And then they like pull back their arm and they're like, what will you do if I hit you? Is the implied threat. So that's another reason why, and again, developmentally appropriate kids are limit testing. Kids want to see where's the boundary, which is makes sense. You know, everyone kind of likes to see where's the boundary in relationships.
[00:08:50] Leah Clionsky: That's a safe, understandable thing for them to want. The hitting is the problem. So I said before that I was not in the camp of your child is overwhelmed with their emotions. Absolutely. Sit there and let them hit you. Right. We, we should be working on not letting our children hit us. And I'm going to tell you why I think letting your child hit you is an extremely bad idea.
[00:09:11] Leah Clionsky: I think it is bad for you as a person. I think it is bad for your relationship with your child, and I think it is actually very bad for your child. So let me explain why. So if somebody is hitting you, it's not good for you, right? We all deserve to feel safe in our bodies, so if somebody is hurting you, it's not good for you.
[00:09:33] Leah Clionsky: I don't care who they are. If they're 1-year-old or 50 years old, they shouldn't be hurting you. And so it's not good for anybody to be in a relationship with someone that is hurting them regularly. It's damaging to that relationship. So I have what I think is a very reasonable rule about hitting and that for me, and that's that nobody's allowed to do that if I can stop them, right?
[00:09:56] Leah Clionsky: I'm not gonna let anybody get physical with me if I can do something to prevent it. I think it's a pretty reasonable standard. So it's not good for you if your child is hitting you. It's also really bad for your relationship, and I alluded to this a little bit before when I was telling you about my son and his hair pulling.
[00:10:17] Leah Clionsky: But when he would pull my hair, it would make me like not want to pick him up. So if he was going to pull my hair, I didn't want him anywhere close to my face. Like it actually caused some distance in our relationship until he stopped doing it. And that's true with anyone who is hitting you. Even if you adore your child, if when they get mad, they hurt you.
[00:10:40] Leah Clionsky: You're not gonna feel comfortable around them, you're not gonna feel as good about them, and they are gonna pick up on that. They're gonna pick up on that like discomfort or anger or resentment that you're feeling about them, even in those moments where they're not hitting you. So it's really damaging to your relationship to allow them to hit you.
[00:11:01] Leah Clionsky: You know, one of our primary responsibilities as parents is to do everything we can to have a positive relationship with our kids. And part of the way that we have positive relationships with people is by setting boundaries so that they can't do things that make it hard for us to be close to them. So making it hard for your child to hit you is good for your relationship.
[00:11:25] Leah Clionsky: So you wanna set a very clear boundary there so it's bad for you, it's bad for your relationship, it's also really bad for your child to hit you. Why is it so bad for your child to hit you? Well, it's problematic in our general society. So one of our big cultural values is that physical aggression is not allowed, right?
[00:11:46] Leah Clionsky: It's not tolerated. It's not tolerated work. It's not tolerated at school. It's not tolerated with friends. It's not tolerated in romantic relationships. So you don't want to get your child thinking that hitting other people is an okay thing to do when they are angry. You wanna really kind of nip that one in the bud.
[00:12:05] Leah Clionsky: So if your child is aggressive with you and then they're aggressive at school with their friends, you know, and aggressive maybe with teachers, that's when kids start getting expelled from school. And then later on it can lead to a lot of problems with holding down a job and relationships. And sometimes, I mean, physical aggression can cause legal problems.
[00:12:25] Leah Clionsky: There's also a big difference between your adorable 2-year-old who hits you. And your 12-year-old who is still hitting you. So things that are really cute when a child is little, become really dangerous when a kid is older. Unfortunately, one of the reasons that I have often seen kids end up being psychiatrically hospitalized is for physical aggression.
[00:12:47] Leah Clionsky: So they are so aggressive that their parents get scared and call the police and they end up being hospitalized for that. So setting this boundary really early on with your kid about not hitting is also within their best interest so that they don't end up in those uncomfortable situations later on.
[00:13:05] Leah Clionsky: You really wanna do that clear limit setting. I'm not saying like if your 2-year-old hits you, they will be hospitalized. But I'm saying that we don't want this behavior to continue. It's a top priority to get the physical aggression to stop. Also, kids are aware in our culture that we're not supposed to hit once they get older, right?
[00:13:26] Leah Clionsky: Once they're in preschool, they know, oh, that we're not supposed to hit our friends. And if they're hitting you at home, that's a really confusing message for them. They know that they're doing something that is not okay, and that's uncomfortable, and that can make kids have lower self-image. It can affect their self-esteem.
[00:13:48] Leah Clionsky: So part of. Helping them not to hit us is also helping them to feel good about themselves. At this point, I hope you are deeply convinced that sitting there and allowing your child to hit you is bad for you and everybody involved, and you are committed in your heart to setting some limits around this.
[00:14:05] Leah Clionsky: So how do we set some limits in a safe way if we're afraid to set limits? So let me tell you what to do. So let's say that your child gets angry with you for some reason, and they hit you. What do you do? The first thing you're going to do is you're going to look them right in the eye and set a very clear message.
[00:14:27] Leah Clionsky: You're gonna say, no hitting, or We don't hit mommy. Or we don't hit that hurts. You're sending a very clear message. Hitting is not okay. Just like when my son would grab my hair and pull it, I would say, no Pulling mommy's hair, that hurts. Sometimes people are afraid to say no. They've heard that you can't say no to kids, that that's a bad thing to do.
[00:14:51] Leah Clionsky: I think that's completely fine to tell your kids no hitting. That's a great no boundary to have. And also, you wanna be super clear so that they're not confused. If you're really vague and you say something like, gentle, gentle, gentle. They're like, what are you talking about? But here's the problem. Hitting.
[00:15:08] Leah Clionsky: No hitting. Do you have to scream? No hitting at your child? No. Do you have to say it in a scary voice? No. Do you have to say mean words with it? No. Right. You can very safely, respectfully say no hitting, and sometimes that's the end of that. So sometimes you set that boundary, no hitting, and your child says, okay.
[00:15:30] Leah Clionsky: And you say, okay, you know, thank you for listening to me. Thank you for using your gentle hands so you can set that boundary. And then they respect it, and that's your best case scenario. They did something. You set a boundary. It's over. You move on. Sometimes though, that doesn't stop the hitting all by itself.
[00:15:49] Leah Clionsky: Sometimes then your child will go to hit you again, and this can be for a couple of reasons. Sometimes they're just still angry with you because you gave them Cheerios instead of goldfish. Or sometimes it's almost like a, what are you gonna do about it? Sort of reaction. You say, no hitting. We don't hit.
[00:16:10] Leah Clionsky: And they're like, well, what? What are you gonna do if I do it? So then they go in for the second hit. If that happens, you keep them from hitting you. You take some gentle physical action to keep them from harming you. So that may be taking a step back so that they can't hit you. That might be gently pushing their hands away so that they can't hit you.
[00:16:33] Leah Clionsky: When this happened with my son, when he pulled my hair and I said, we don't pull mommy's hair. And then he went to pull again. That was me gently taking his fingers off my hair and putting him down so that he was no longer able to pull my hair. And that's not what he wanted, right? He wanted to be. Close to me.
[00:16:51] Leah Clionsky: He wanted to be in my arms, near my face, and now he was on the floor, and that's because I needed that space so that he wasn't able to hurt me. So you can take that space for yourself. Don't allow your child to hit you again, if you can see that that's what they're going for. Now, let's say that they are still interested in hitting you right now.
[00:17:11] Leah Clionsky: This is the challenge. So now they're, they're determined to hit you. They're like really in a mood about this. And what you're gonna do then is you're gonna leave and give them some space. So that might be that you walk out of the room, that's okay to do. That's totally fine. Or let's say that you walk out of the room and they like are trying to chase you down and hit you.
[00:17:30] Leah Clionsky: Then it's okay to close the door. You can say to them right now, you're hitting me. And that's not safe. When you're able to use your calm body, I am happy to be back in the room with you. This is not like child abandonment. It's not hurting a child. You're not doing anything mean if you physically prevent a child from hitting you.
[00:17:49] Leah Clionsky: In fact, it's good boundary setting that we want them to use as well. Think about your child in school. Someone hits them. Do you want them to just stand there and let people hit them? Absolutely not, right? You want them to say, it's not okay to hit me. You want them to set a boundary. You want them to get away from the person who's hitting them.
[00:18:08] Leah Clionsky: And then for, in their case, you want them to go to the teacher, right? You want somebody to intervene. In your case, you're gonna be the one intervening, and that's in a safe way. Also, if your child has now tried to hit you several times, I guarantee that you're pretty upset and you actually need a break from your child.
[00:18:23] Leah Clionsky: I. You don't wanna react in your upset feelings and end up saying something horrible or worst case scenario, hitting them back, which is very attempting when you're, that worked up right? If some of your adrenaline's really rushing and someone has just hit you, your natural response might be to hit them back, and that's not what you wanna do because then you're.
[00:18:44] Leah Clionsky: Hitting, which I'm not a fan of, as a discipline strategy. And also you are showing them that when you're mad, you hit, so you're hitting them for hitting you, which is not where you wanna go. So you tell them no hitting, you prevent it. And if that doesn't work, you leave the room. So it's really prevented.
[00:19:02] Leah Clionsky: And then once they're calmer and they're not trying to hit you again, they don't have to be. Calm. They just have to be not aggressive. Then you go back and you rejoin them. You know? At that point, maybe you can just be near them and you can end up hugging them as they calm down, you can be available to them.
[00:19:22] Leah Clionsky: Maybe you start playing with something and they come over and they start playing with you. This is not the time to have the big talk about hitting, 'cause everyone's feelings are still too big about that. They probably can't have that discussion yet. But you create the space, you give yourself time to calm down so that you're not being aggressive or resentful or passive aggressive, you know?
[00:19:43] Leah Clionsky: Like, oh, well it's great to see you again now that you've stopped hitting me, right? You wanna be able to calm yourself down enough. You're not saying things like that, and then you're rejoining that play. So how are you feeling about this? It's just kind of step by step there. Yeah, for an older child, you can have consequences later on for that as well, but that's not really what we're talking about right now.
[00:20:03] Leah Clionsky: We're talking about little kids sort of exploring the world. If you are in the extremely painful situation where we are well past this point where your child is regularly hitting you, hurting you, you've had bruises, you're feeling afraid, this is the time to do something about it. And I recommend working with a very seasoned clinician who can teach you about parent management training.
[00:20:28] Leah Clionsky: So how are you gonna set those limits? How are you gonna work on emotion regulation? You can do that at Thriving Child Center. You can do that at PCIT experts. If your kid is between two and eight, and we can help you there. It's not too late. We can definitely work on aggressive behavior, but it is okay for you to set those limits right now if it's happening in your house.
[00:20:50] Leah Clionsky: Thanks again for being here on the podcast today. I hope this was helpful to you. Take very, very good care of yourself and I'll see you in the next one. Thanks again for spending time with me on Educated Parent. If this episode helped you feel more confident in handling those parent curve balls, I. Hit follow.
[00:21:11] Leah Clionsky: So you never miss an episode. Know a parent who's stuck in the endless cycle of conflicting advice. Send this their way because we all deserve parenting strategies we can actually trust. And hey, if you have a minute, leave a review. Your support helps other parents find real expert back solutions instead of just another opinion online.
[00:21:32] Leah Clionsky: One last quick reminder. This podcast offers general advice, but every family is different. The advice offered in this podcast is not medical advice and is not appropriate for every family. If you need personalized parenting support, connect with an experienced clinician at Thriving Child Center or PCIT experts.
[00:21:53] Leah Clionsky: That's it for today. Thanks for listening, and I'll talk to you next time.