Anyone have a young child that won't be touched?

[Prusik]

Dressing, nappy changes, washing face, 'round and round the garden', 'this little piggy', socks, shoes, kisses, cuddles, physical comfort when distressed, his baby brother accidentally putting his foot on his leg.

Anything, basically.

He's sixteen months and just hates being touched. If i touch his arm, he will physically push my hand away. He moves away if his baby brother touches him in any way.

He's otherwise ok developmentally but he's adamant about most kinds of touching.

Anyone else have this from such a young age? He's such a sunny boy but he definitely knows the power of consent.

Games you could play could be painting each other with dry/clean paintbrushes (get all different sizes, etc so it’s fun for him), even if it’s just letting him paint you for now. Let him do your arms, face, over your clothes,etc.

I am going to have nightmares about that, to me that would be torture.

sashh obviously some people won’t be able to tolerate this at all. It varies massively. The idea though is to start the sensory diet when DC are young in order to ‘desensitise’ and make being touched/wearing clothes easier. I’ve seen lots of DC who, like you, light touch is torture, be able to toterate it no problem or at least it become far less stressful.

ClownsAndJokers
Something like this may be a good place to start if you are worried about possible sensory issues.
www.developmentalpathways.com/services-sensory.html

littledinaco thank you for that, very interesting read. He fits some of the descriptors in different sections and I think I might go for an appointment with gp or health visitor if he is still the same in 6 months, although he has been this way since birth really... noticeably different to my other two. I don’t know if I’m overthinking it.

Clowns it can be really hard to know whether things are a ‘problem’ or just normal kid stuff can’t it!

With sensory issues, if it’s causing DC distress and/or they are registering things as feeling pain or if you’re having to accommodate a lot / do things differently (things like not just being able to just put clothes on - you have to carefully choose certain clothes, lots of persuading/cajoling to get them on and even then there are still tears) and it’s impacting your/DC everyday life then there’s probably more to it. Often, you can be accommodating more than you realise as you just adapt over time and it becomes your ‘norm’.

Unfortunately GP, health visitors often don’t have a great deal of experience in SPD. If you could afford it, a private OT with sensory intergration is your best bet. A sensory diet can be fantastic for NT kids too so you wouldn’t lose anything and would probably see a massive improvement very quickly. The younger the better usually.