DS’s obsession with his Willy!

[somanychristmaslights]

He’s always got his hand down his pants if sat on the sofa. What is it with boys and their bits?! He’s only 8 🤦🏻‍♀️

My 8yo has mostly grown out of this tbh.

Mind you, he's had his moments.

I will never forget him aged about 5 having a massive tantrum at a motorway services, pulling down his shorts and pants whilst I struggled to get them back up, and shouting furiously,

"If I don't pull my pants down, NOBODY WILL BE ABLE TO SEE MY PENIS!"

"Nobody wants to see your penis!"

"YES. THEY. DO!!!"

Table of young soldiers right next to us snorting their coffee through their noses 🙄

Children develop at different stages, though - and although 8 is obviously not a toddler, it's still young as humans go.

Plus, as has been said, ND children will often have very distinct experiences from NT children. You wouldn't tell an 8yo ND child who was stimming by repeatedly hitting things to make a familiar noise that they should have long left the (NT) toddler stage of playing the drums on pots and pans behind.

That isn't to say, of course, that parents don't guide their children appropriately when unwanted behaviours occur.

OP is asking if it’s normal at 8 years old. No it is not because parents are supposed to teach their children not to do that in public. What is your ‘children develop at different stages’ nonsense? He has had at least 4 years, maybe 5 where he would have had the level of understanding to learn not to do this.
posted too soon

Can we leave the ND shite out of this. OP asked if it’s noemail for an 8 year old so let’s assume no SN unless otherwise told.

Sorry, I wasn't aware that you know OP's DS - and every other 8yo - personally.

Do you really think that everybody learns the same skills, disciplines and knowledge at broadly the same time? There are plenty of functionally illiterate adults out there - but who nevertheless manage to make their way through the world and society. It's reported that Einstein couldn't talk in proper sentences until he was 5!

Even adults frequently baffle me at things they don't know or understand, which I took as read and obvious a long time ago. That probably works the other way around too.

@completelylostagain

I'm sorry that you think neurodiversity is 'shite'. It may be easier to just exclude ND people when discussing what we believe is 'normal', but they and their lives are every bit as important and valuable as all other humans, so it isn't helpful to other them and assume that nobody could ever go under the radar and be diagnosed late, or even not at all.

My god you are weird. Why so quick to defend an 8 year old touching their genitalia as normal? It’s absolutely not normal. I don’t need to know anyone’s 8 year old personally to hold that stance.

I see plenty of grown up men who do the same. Some clearly don’t grow out of this ‘comfort’ whatever the age.

Tighter elastic in his pants so it's not so easy and it might remind him he's not meant to be doing that if it's a bit more of a struggle to get his hand down there.

It's become a habit and you need to break it.

This is hilarious and caused me to have a flash back to the time DS had a screaming tantrum in Sainsbury's, shouting that he wanted cock porn, he loved cock porn, he wanted the cock porn RIGHT NOW as I wheeled him very quickly through the popcorn aisle.

Yeah my ds never did this…

Just tell your son when he’s got his hands in his pants to not do it in the lounge and to go to his room if he wants to do it! It’s not as problem he want to ‘explore’ but it is if he’s going it in public! Those are the things he needs to be taught

Are you asking a separate question, "can ND children be taught not to play with their genitals in public?"
That doesn't seem relevant to the OP.

Yes I have brought up three children including a son - and he was pretty sensible by age 8. I never had to make excuses about inappropriate cock fiddling.

Ugh

Jesus. You’re way off the mark.

Very few things on MN make me chuckle these days but that certainly did 😂

The length of human arms means that coincidentally hands land up in genitalia territory!

I had a GS who did this ... he grew out of it. I don't think drawing attention to it helps as it is just a habit and being made to feel twitchy about it seems to make it happen more or make the child feel unsettled. We all ignored it and it went away.