what should do when your 2 yr old wants to hit a newborn

bris21

hi well i just had my baby she is a month already but my 2 yr old seems to hate her. Every time i turn my back is trying to hit her. What can i do?

etude de la vie

try to get them involved. If they feel useful they will start to show affection. I had DD bring me wipes and help clean the baby (after I was done cleaning the diaper area). We would also change diapers together with her doll or side by side (her with doll me with DS). Help feed the baby if bottles are used, put the pacifier in baby mouth, read book about being an older sibling helped, and she loved to "rock" the swing with my supervision.   

Praise if they show affection, Make a big deal if they give a kiss. When they hit say No firmly and remove the baby but don't make an over reaction. Sometimes DD would do things just to get my attention (good or bad) and if I didn't over react it would fizzle out quicker.  

We did a lot of practicing with dolls too and when the baby went to sleep we had lots of 1:1 time and mostly did art stuff so she stayed quiet, was doing an activity we couldn't do with DS around,  and was engaged with me 100%.