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Teenagers

Parenting teenagers has its ups and downs. Get advice from Mumsnetters here.

Teenager with moderate learning difficulties and social skills

3 replies

TottyAnn · 04/03/2023 12:41

My thirteen year old granddaughter has moderate learning difficulties and attends a Special school. There are many difficulties and problems but I want to help out my daughter by trying to find ideas for problems one at a time. My granddaughter was in and out of hospital as a baby as she was not feeding , either the breast or formula. The toddler years were a nightmare trying everything to make her eat at all never mind nutritious food. 13 years on she is extremely fussy and will only eat a few foods of certain textures. Every effort has been made for her to eat a healthy diet but even encouraging her to eat something will bring tears and she will because distressed, heaving and even being sick. However she is constantly asking for food and will stuff it into her mouth as if she was starving . Her fifteen year old brother is horrified by her table manners and there are difficulties in that respect when he has friends around.
My granddaughter will almost choke when putting so much food in her mouth and she will leave her face covered in food..All attempts to make her understand that it is unpleasant to see her with food around her mouth only causes distress or she will ignore all comments. This is only one of the many problems , some more serious, that my granddaughter experiences but I thought I would start here and hope someone would be able to give me advice and help.

OP posts:
KathieFerrars · 04/03/2023 12:45

An occupational therapist may be able to give some direction as to mealtimes. Social stories with lots of pictures can work well. However, her special school may already be tackling this.

MistyFrequencies · 04/03/2023 12:49

Occupational Therapy with an OT trained in sensory integraton might help. The food stuffing/ lack of awareness of food on her face could be sensory.

Mumof1andacat · 04/03/2023 13:06

There are specialist OTs for this and dietitians who could provide assistance. I'm surprised her school haven't looked at this. Not sure what part of the country you are in but there is a brilliant team at Southampton children's hospital who deal with this sort of thing www.uhs.nhs.uk/for-visitors/southampton-childrens-hospital/childrens-services/bursledon-house/diagnosis-admissions-and-treatment

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