DS and his "sucking" habit

[CatPower]

Hi there,

My DS is five, and speech-wise he's really articulate. However, inbetween some words he has a habit of sucking back his spit. It's a real "sooooooook" noise iyswim, and is become more and more noticeable.

DP and I are trying to work out how we can get him to stop this habit, without making it into a huge issue that will torment him and end up with him seeing a psych for it in his adult life!

Has anyone any advice on how to stop a habit in a strong-willed five year old?

Thanks in advance. x

Does he produce a lot of dribble? Does he have troubles moving food round his mouth, can he stick out his tongue, you say he is articulate - does he prn words oddly/lisp?

If yes then he might have oral dydpraxia, am on mob so can't link. Do have a search on here

Sorry, oral dyspraxia

He sometimes says "f" instead of "th", for example "fankyou" instead of "thankyou". If he's asking for the remote control (eg he likes to play Lego Star Wars on the PS2, and we've been letting him change the channels on the tv etc for himself) he'll ask for the "remoke ontrol", but this is very rarely, and usually only if he's tired.

Apart from those two things, his speech is dead-on. Chats away happily, very imaginative, and reads out loud a lot, cereal boxes, newspaper, you name it, he'll read it out to us.

It's really just the sucking back on his spit rather than swallowing that's the issue. He's starting Junior 2 after the holidays and as he gets older I'm aware that other kids may pick up on it and make fun of him for it.

If I notice him doing it loudly, I'll say "don't do that, DS, swallow it when you've finished speaking", and he does his best but sometimes forgets. I think it's just become a habit that's hard to break.