I was a biter. Then one day someone bit me back. I stopped after that.
Oh yeah - at my kids’ daycare, the older toddler class (18-24 months) is like a piranha tank. Based on the number of incident reports I’ve seen awaiting signatures, I’d guess a pack of toddlers could skeletonize a cow in five minutes.
Oooh this just came rushing back to me. In the 3rd grade, I was on the bus going home. A particularly vicious creature who for purposes of avoiding a lawsuit we will identify as " Laura L. " was sitting just in front of me. We were being mean to each other, etc. She hurled herself over the seat, landing face down in my lap. Yes. Face down. She bit into my upper thigh so violently that through blue jeans, she tore my thigh. Blood ran out. I remember screaming and throwing her off of me into the aisle, where she suddenly burst into tears.
Bus driver lit into me for throwing a poor little girl around- till he saw the blood. Oh, the drama. No scar to show now, but I remember her full name and I know just exactly where the bus was when she bit me, because I was looking out the window when she launched over the seat. Very weird- it was a house on the right with a red shingled roof and an iron cat hunched over as though it was hissing and rearing back, perched on the edge of the roof about 5 feet from the edge. Corner of Chapel Road and Lodges Lane in Elkins Park, PA. Holy crap. Perfect visual moment. :dubious:
If you sent your kid to a daycare made of solid gold and run by Jesus Christ himself she’d still probably get bit. It happened to my kid and the only thing that was memorable is that he was under 2 and still was able to tell me who did it. I don’t blame that kid any more than I blame the kid that fell on him last year and broke his collar bone. Shit happens when you have kids.
Reality show!!
You’ll also learn from her that stupid is a naughty word - pretty much right up there with things you can’t say on television.
Most of them do learn by third grade NOT to launch themselves at someone and bite a chunk out of a thigh.
One of our daughters got bitten in the toddler room at her preschool a few years ago. The teachers were a bit confused on the proper procedure for handling the event, because the biter was her twin sister. 
Oh, that sucks. My mom was really dubious about me working while our kids went to daycare (“overly, I’m just not sure how I feel about this. I don’t think it’s right.” “Mom, this time I’m the parent and unfortunately most people (us included) need insurance and need more than one income to send the kids to college and retire eventually.”), so I can sympathize with in-laws or parents looking for ways to prove that sending a kid to daycare is a Bad Idea.
I also understand the problem with getting bitten on the face. I’d probably feel the same way. Still, like you said, she’s probably forgotten about it, and since the parents are working on it, there’s no reason to worry. I’m sure they’re mortified, too. My son was never a biter, but he went through a very tough period when he was 3.5 and tried to hit a teacher once. I was horrified. There were some pretty serious consequences so he never did it again, but being that parent is awful.
When I was in nursery school back in the 60s we had a biter in the class and a few bullies. We knew biting was wrong and bullying was wrong. The teachers enforced the rules and explained what was going on. I was 3 or 4, not 2. I was not scarred for life by that, but rather by my mother’s over protectiveness. You are the most influential person in your child’s life by a big, big margin. Teach her confidence and caring.
Or at the least, they can demand the parents obtain a current rabies certificate.
Ah yes, the biting karma. My first kid was the one being bitten. It happened a lot (which, in retrospect probably meant a few times over the course of a couple weeks). I was ok the first time and then with the subsequent 2nd or 3rd times proceeded to throw a complete shit fit. I think I even literally stamped my foot. Nothing they said or did was going to make up for the injustice of it.
Fast forward 4 years, in another daycare with child #2: “Dear parent, your child has been biting children…” Me: “Fuuuuuuuuuuuuu…”
Hee! You always have such awesome posts that I’m not sure that I wouldn’t prefer if we were the same person, a little…
OH. I really, really like this.
Whoa. And I remember thinking, “Why the heck are they giving my child an STD vaccination?” Didn’t occur to me at all that there could very well be fluid transfer from other kids! (Of course, she was much younger at the time and wasn’t going to daycare.)
Well – like I said above somewhere – I would never yell at that kid. (Plus by the time I found out about it, it was a couple of hours later, and if having a toddler has taught me anything it’s that they have memories of MUCH less than that; no point in yelling at a toddler about anything that happened more than five seconds ago.) And I understand that kids bite, and I certainly would not blame the parents for it. I’d gotten over being upset at the kid in a couple of hours, anyway – but I’m glad they gave me a little more information. It’s hard to be upset with a kid that’s just started daycare at 18 months, because I know how traumatic it is for my daughter – I’m just lucky she’s not acting out by biting.
Thanks! And no, I would not actually kick toddler ass.
Hee. We have a lot of naughty words – thanks to Nurtureshock and a lifetime of being told I was smart and not being able to handle it when it turned out I wasn’t actually all that, she isn’t being told she’s smart, either, by anyone but my parents (we are so not having that discussion).
Yeah. I totally get that, too – I understand what I’d feel if it were my kid who were the biter.
Heh. I can just see it now – “Your child was bitten at 10:20 am on the swings but we can’t tell you who did it. In other news, here is an accident report on how your other child bit another child at 10:20am on the swings, but we can’t tell you who she bit.”
Definitely Wales.