Little girl and our pet cat

[ruthandsam]

Hi

My 4 year old daughter is usually well behaved apart from when she's tired. She attends pre-school at her nursery. She's been with the nursery since she was 1 year of age and now attends both the nursery and pre-school at primary school as well.

We've noticed that since she has started at the primary school her behaviour has been very trying. This is especially when she is with our pet cat. Pulling her ears, chasing her until she runs and hides. Tonight she shut the washing machine door on the cat's tail and is trying to hit her with a belt.

I've tried time out on the silly step. Telling her off. Taking away toys that she loves, etc. Even watching programmes about animals and how we must look after them and praising her for when she is good with the cat. My daughter has numerous scratches on her arms as the cat tries to defend herself but my daughter still doesn't stop the behaviour. I'm at a loss what to do next. Any ideas would be most welcome as it feels like the cat is being terrorized and it is very upsetting.

Many thanks

[wolf63]

I can't believe that this thread is still going.

Your daughter is behaving like a child of 4 - testing boundaries and doing what she knows she shouldn't.

If the cat is annoyed at your daughter it will give her a quick swipe, ideally it will avoid her. At some stage she will get the hint and leave poor puss alone.

If the cat is able to get away from your little girl - it isn't cornered in a cupboard there should be no problems. If it is able to get outside to get time to relax that it good. If the cat is really upset it will find somewhere else to live.

In a short time you will be looking back at this problem and smiling - but when you are in the middle of the situation it is difficult to see clearly.

Wish you all the best with your daughter and your cat.

[B00]

I'm surprised at your comments wolf, considering your obvious love for your own cats.

I can't imagine anyone looking back and smiling at the thought of a cat being hit with a belt or having its tail shut in a washing machine door.

[LoftyLottie]

Me too BOO. And I still maintain that this isn't normal behaviour for a 4 year old who is testing boundaries.

[LoftyLottie]

Some people must have experienced awful behaviour from 4 year olds if they think this is normal behaviour. I can see that a two year old might do such things, but at four it is just weird. This child is at school for goodness sake.

[LoftyLottie]

Oh, and I am not a professional, but I am a Mum and have worked with children over a long period.

[chrissa1]

Am I missing somethimg here? I read all the posts throughout the evening and while sympathising with the problem, I couldn't stop thinking that if my 4 year old had done this (25 years ago), I would have told her "Stop Doing That", explained why and she would have done as she was told. End of.

[LoftyLottie]

Our children are the same age Chrissa. Perhaps things have changed.

[chrissa1]

Yes Loftie they must have, But Why?

[boxtops]

I think so, lottie and chrissa - (not that I want to reopen the smack-or-not discussion) but in my childhood my mother would have chastised me immediately with a sharp smack for tormenting the cat (as she did when I hit out at my little brother on occasion), and it wouldn't have happened again. It is different now.

[chrissa1]

No me neither boxtops. However, I've never totally subscribed to the "no smacking" ideology. As it was rarely needed to be used, as a "No" meant No, a quick smack on the bottom made my two realise that Mummy really meant what she was saying.

[LoftyLottie]

I still think that by four years old this wouldn't have been happening either. We were not indulged and had to grow up a lot quicker in my opinion. We mixed with loads of adults and quickly absorbed what was right and what was wrong. I am still amazed that a lot on this thread think that it is normal behaviour for a four year old to act like this. A two year old perhaps, yes.

[LoftyLottie]

This is with no disrespect to Ruth, but I still think that our culture these days has a lot to answer for. Our children were not at nursery school at one year old.

[rowanwitch]

REhome the cat regardless... any incidence of cruelty and this is what it is should be dealt with with the animal's best interest being paramount..keeping the cat is too much of a gamble...neighbours child started off with teasing their young cat ended up using a tennis raquet to see how far he could hit the cat across the room and killed it...he was under 5 This is not normal 'teasing behaviour' its nasty, and spiteful and should be unacceptable from a child of this age if it is not stopped it may well escalate as the little girls tests out the boundaries further.

once the cat is safe then poor Ruth can start focussing on the behaviour of her daughter... tiredness might lead to impulsive behaviour but using a weapon ie a belt seems excessive and abnormal ... Hopefully it is something she will grow out of for her families sake but I suspect we will hear more as the months pass.
I don't often join in the parenting threads but this worries me....I have seen similar behaviour in another accquaintances child as well and both needed a lot of input to learn appropriate behaviour as they'd been allowed to carry on so long with people excusing them on grounds of age /stress from starting school /additives in food/etc

[LoftyLottie]

Rowan. Absolutely. You and I are t hinking alike, completely alike. I thought I was alone. This is not normal behaviour and child and cat need to be separated. It needs sorting out very quickly.

[LoftyLottie]

LOL Doc!!

[carlton23]

I`m sick and tired of to-day attitude to not giving kids a clout across the ear, as I had a few as a kid and so did my sons, and we have never held it against each other. They are always visiting me and will do anything I ask of them, and both are big strong men who could mangle me if they liked. Children to-day have life made too soft and grow up thinking they rule us and can do as they wish.

[B00]

I'm with carlton, as if you couldn't guess from my previous replies!

If my child, who's now 6, does something spectacularly bad, she will get a wallop across the bottom, or legs (whichever I get to first!). She is, on the whole a polite, reasonably well behaved, well adjusted polite child who clearly knows the boundaries between right and wrong. I can't help but thinking this is because she knows that if she majorly erros, she will be punished.

For generations, children have been brought up with physical punishment as a deterant, and please bear in mind i don't mean beatings here, just smacks and taps, and the majority of those kids have grown up fine. Now we're in a society that's gone all hippy and tree huggy and frown on smackings, and look where we are? A generation of kids who have no moral boundaries.

[rowanwitch]

a good friend uses physical examples...so hitting a cat with a belt would probably mean a flick of the belt across the palm with a 'now you know how tiddles feels...its not nice is it' and I know when her little boy bit another child he was held and the other child told to bite him back.... not saying its right but at least it is a way of associating action with outcome...