ASD and chewing everything!

[daisy5678]

J has lots of weird sensory stuff, and always has. For the last three years, he's been a lip-licker, sometimes until his mouth and all the skin round it bleeds.

Now he's largely stopped but has begun chewing eveything - the remote, his hand, his toys, his clothing...

All of his white school shirts are now grey and ruined round the neck area, with even buttons chewed off and I can't afford to keep replacing them!

His autism outreach lady offered to buy him a chewy tube, but he raised an outraged eyebrow and screamed, 'what do you think I am? A dog?' and hurled a chair.

What do people think about chewing gum? (If the school would even let him - it's happening more there but I'm thinking that they may find it too much of a rule break)

Not sure, Givemesleep. DS2 is a chewer and sucker - used to be very constant not as much now. He would chew his cuffs and collars of uniform, also his snuggy blanket (which I have just washed, although, he prefers it filthy - Lynas from Charlie Brown springs to mind, however)

Anyway, chewing gum might be the only other option or sometimes, identifying the opposite can work, ie sucking. If the school didn't allow chewing gum, would they allow him to suck a sweet of some kind?

What age is he givemesleep? I only ask because it could be just a phase - my nf girl chewed her school jumper for about a year at aged 5 and then just stopped. I found that completely not reacting to it did the trick. My ASD boy also recently went through a phrase with a particular coat of chewing it endlessly. But strangely it was only that one coat, so we threw it out and now he doesn't chew other clothes. I didn't find the chewy toy thing made any difference either. With chewing gum, oddly, my boy just licks the flavour off it and then discards it - he does not see it as something to be chewed. What about sugar free lollipops at set times?

we have just been told about chewelery[sp?] like jewelery so discreet and can just chew on it when needing to as ds is becoming a chewer and im concerned when he starts school don't know anything else about it though as was mentioned to me briefly yesterday

He's 7. All great ideas, and I hadn't thought of the suck thing instead. I have tried ignoring it, but it got worse, and he does get into behaviour patterns far too easily which stick forever!
Will look at chewerelly!
Thanks guys - will let you know.

Ds (9) is also a chewer of collars and cuffs ! I have tried supplying alternative chewing fiddle toys but found the more we worked directly to replace the worse it got. We have been following a 'sensory diet' aimed more at his other issues and his extreme chewing does seem to be a little less now. He is allowed to fiddle with bluetac at (sn)school as the fiddle compulsion will redirect his chew compulsion! The sensory diet was designed by the OT who has an interest in sensory issues in ASD but we are still fairly new to it. We are awaiting a wobble cushion but I have no idea if this will affect his chewing!

J tried the wobble cushion and had sensory intergraton therapy from the NHS OTs for a year last year. The wobble cushion seemed to help a bit with his concentration but he doesn't want to use it now because someone else touched it and so now it's 'dirty'

I might actually ring the OT and see what he suggests.