My cat it hitting my 2 year old...

Maybe Chloe sees the cat post as her place, and does not want to be petted while there. Even though Jade is gentle with her, maybe you could have her not pet Chloe while on her place. It would be a shame to separate them now. I think it is great that she knows to be nice to kitty at such a young age. If you give Chloe away and get another cat, even if they say it is good with children, you could be in for a different problem. At least you know Chloe. I hope this problem is resolved soon.

Just my 2 cents:

We had a similar "problem" 12 yrs ago with Ashlie (cat) and little Carter (boy) who was about 1.5 ...

After our first and only GENTLE hit paired with "No" we eliminated any future hit completely (making it just "No") (although gentle we felt bad because we subscribe to the never-hit approach - and so it was determined that once was too much and unacceptable ) and Ashlie got the general idea and her batting stopped. Ashlie used no-claw batting (just the soft velvet part, I assume that's true for Chloe too) but ultimately batting became a non-issue when she understood what was going on.

You see, after about 4 or 5 No's Ashlie altered her response to Carter by calmly walking away from him (Carter was shown from the start on how to treat Ashlie gently by the way)

The "problem" was normalized in less than a week - Carter & Ashlie became true family members complete with the imperfect nature of family (I love you, hey how are you, leave me alone right now, etc etc)

So in closing, I'd suggest you lose the hit and stick with the "No". Cats are smart

We had a similar situation with my oldest nephew and my sister's cat. Just like you, we taught him to be very gentle with the cat. Unfortunately, since 1 year olds don't have the best small-motor coordination yet, he did have times when he would be just a little rougher than the cat liked. Plus, as he was learning to walk and still holding onto things, he went to grab for the sofa and grabbed some fur instead. It was an accident, but the cat didn't like it. She would bat him whenever he came near her if she was up on something. She was fine with him on the floor. She never really hurt him with her batting, no claws were involved.

As he grew, the batting ended. It was just a matter of making adjustments. He learned not to try to pet the cat when she was up high, and she learned to jump down to his level if she was feeling friendly, or higher if not. It won't last forever.

I agree with Sweets. This is a behavior that will stop once your child gets older. Most cats are afraid of toddlers because toddlers tend to be loud and clumsy and inadvertently frighten or hurt the cat without meaning to. Cats are smart creatures and quickly learn to avoid the toddler or to bap the toddler to keep it away. Basically, the cat bapping the toddler is exactly what you did to the cat! You were trying to tell the cat to stop and the cat was trying to tell the kid to stop. You both tried modifying behavior with aggression and neither one was successful! So, obviously, swatting doesn't work for cat nor child!

Keep the child away from the cat. Help the child learn that that the cat is a no-no. Once the child is old enough to have good fine motor control, then start letting the child interact with the cat. However, the child should be sitting on the floor and quiet during all interactions with the cat. If the child is up and moving and making noise, the cat will be on edge expecting to be hurt or frightened by the child. If the child intercats with the cat only when quiet and sitting calmly, the cat will learn that the child is safe.

So...my suggestion is to forget modifying the cat's behavior and modify the child's behavior instead. Once the child is calm and quiet and in control, the cat won't have any more reason to hit her!

I think having a climbing pole and cat furniture, somewhere the cat can retreat to, is a good idea. She can leave if she wants/needs to get away.