Bite Me

There is a nasty habit that has worked it's way into our household of late. Courtesy of Master Felix. It seems we have a biter on our hands. At first, they were affectionate little nibbles. Now, they are full blown, teeth clenching, bites. I don't quite know how to handle this situation either, as Angus has never been a biter. I know it's fairly common in young babies and even toddlers, but it's vicious and nasty in my book. And I'm determined to put a stop to it.


I think I am still pretty raw about an incident that took place today. In fact, it was an incident within a rather disastrous half hour period, during preschool pick up this afternoon. The teachers and directors arranged a Mother's Day celebration, with food and drink provided (we were asked to chip in $10 + a hamper item + buy raffle tickets for the hamper we had contributed to... but that's another story for another day). Anyway, it didn't start well when I rocked up to the gate and noticed a little girl laying into Angus, on the other side of the fence. He retaliated with a slight push and shove and ran away. Only to have her chase him down and start belting him again. Who really knows how these things start between children. So I walked in and made my presence known to Angus, not wanting to acknowledge what I saw or make a scene. At which point, said little girl came up to me and announced that Angus had pushed her. Oh puh-leeease I thought. But alas, we moved on.


I had been there approximately 90 seconds when Angus began hounding me to take him home. I should have just gone with that notion, because things systematically went from bad to worse. The one drink I grabbed ended up in my shoe... thank you Felix for the pleasure. My feet were cold and sticky from then on. Angus became increasingly tired, frustrated and attention seeking, while Felix proceeded to remove the pile of plastic knives and forks from their position on the kiddy table. Then. Innocently chatting away to one of the other Mama's about her two boys, how they're going, blah blah blah, when Felix latches on to my chin. Well, more part chin, part cheek. He locked on so tightly, I could not remove his clench. It stung like crazy, as his tiny, razor sharp fangs, pierced my skin. 


I'm not sure if they were tears of pain... or sheer embarrassment... starting to well up in my eyes. All I knew for sure... it was definitely time to go. So with that, I rounded Angus up, said my brief goodbyes and headed for the hills. It is hard not to get cranky at someone who inflicts such intense physical pain, out of thin air. But of course, I didn't get cranky. My little pit bull obviously has a reason for using his chompers to communicate with me. Now all I have to do, is work out what that reason is and how on earth I make him STOP!