pulling hair out....how to stop it?

[mylittleone]

hi,

my niece has been pulling her hair out for past 1 month.
Ever since had started ABA, she started pulling her hair out and slap her forehead.
she use to slap her forehead sometimes before ABA was started but suddenly it became worse after the program started.

now she does IT when she wants something and if not given to her immidiately.

she does that most when her mom is changing her. the only way to calm her down is by showing her a video or elmo game online. she even does that when I come home and look at her. thats it nothing...just look at her.

it is very tough to see my own kid do this to herself.

she is 3 yrs old and she has a bald spot on the front of her head because she pulled her hair out.
we are now giving into her demands so she would not pull her hair.

she only does this with family members, she does not do it with her teachers.

we will be starting the RDI program soon, I hope that helps.

anything worked for your kid? any recommedations are appreciated.
VT

[StrictNon-Confo]

Perhaps the ABA is far from valuable, based on what you have stated: it sounds as if she is bottling up her natural self while stuck in ABA and saving all that up and acting on it once she gets out of the public eye and the eye of the ABA people.

Other than removing the cause of the problem (which seems to be, to some extent, the attempt at "curing" problems, perceived or real) the only thing that has a chance of working of preventing her from pulling her hair out is to shave all the hair off: what isn't there can't be pulled, right?

[CeleRate]

hi,

my niece has been pulling her hair out for past 1 month.
Ever since had started ABA, she started pulling her hair out and slap her forehead.
she use to slap her forehead sometimes before ABA was started but suddenly it became worse after the program started.

now she does IT when she wants something and if not given to her immidiately.

she does that most when her mom is changing her. the only way to calm her down is by showing her a video or elmo game online. she even does that when I come home and look at her. thats it nothing...just look at her.

it is very tough to see my own kid do this to herself.

she is 3 yrs old and she has a bald spot on the front of her head because she pulled her hair out.
we are now giving into her demands so she would not pull her hair.

she only does this with family members, she does not do it with her teachers.

we will be starting the RDI program soon, I hope that helps.

anything worked for your kid? any recommedations are appreciated.
VT


The increase can be for a variety of reasons. One reason could be that there is now an increase in demands to do things with which the girl does not want to do. She lacks the language skills to say to you that she does not want to do it, and may therefore be expressing her displeasure in the ways she knows best (i.e., hurting herself). If the demands are lessened, or somehow made easier, and the hurting oneself gets better, then it may be that she needs additional help (i.e., needs the tasks made easier).

It could also be that she has now learned that the quickest and easiest way to get something she wants (e.g., TV or Elmo game) is to hurt herself. If either is true, then ceasing the demands and/or putting on the TV, during, or immediately after she hurts herself, will likely lead to an increase in her hurting herself. There is nothing inherently wrong in asking a child to do something, but I would "listen" to the child (e.g., self-injury) and do something different BEFORE self-injury starts and something different AFTER self-injury occurs.

The tantrums around changing also have too many possibilities to surmise the reason behind the tantrum. If it's related to the diaper, it might be because there was a rash that hurt her when the diaper was changed, and now there is an unpleasant association with changing. If this is true, then the changing routine might need to be changed so that those unpleasant memories aren't triggered by whatever process is currently being used. The caveat here is that this is a wild guess.