Picking on me...literally!

[chamomeleon]

All right, this is a strange question, and I'm not even sure I'm posting it in the right place, but at this point I do sort of feel like it's a discipline issue...

My son (3) has always had this habit? obsession? comfort-seeking measure? of picking on my moles. (I have a lot of them.) He used to do it while nursing, and he does it most often when he is tired, upset, or falling asleep, but is apt to do it any time we are in physical contact. My husband also has a mole on the back of his neck, and DS does it to him as well. It sometimes seems as though he does it unconsciously, almost like it's his way of confirming that DH and I are physically the same as he remembers us, does that make any sense? The problem is, it hurts! He uses his fingernails sort of like he's trying to scratch the mole off of the skin. DH and I have told him time and time again since he was an infant, please don't do that, it hurts and makes us upset. When he is fully awake and aware, I will ask him once not to do it and if he does it again I will set him down if I am holding him or get up and walk away to make the point that I don't want to be near him if he is going to hurt me. But after 3 years it has had no effect whatsoever. It's like he can't help himself. I know he understands that it isn't OK to hurt people - every other normal toddler "hurting" phase that he has gone through (hitting, biting, etc.) has been short-lived and relatively easy to reason with him about.

The hardest thing is when he does it as he's falling asleep at night. When I ask him to stop he does, but less than 30 seconds later, he's running his little hands over my skin searching for another mole to scratch. Sometimes it makes me so batty I feel like I'm going to explode! But getting up and leaving during that bedtime wind-down, I feel, isn't really an option. It would only upset him and then it would take several more minutes (and probably more mole-picking!) to calm him, and wouldn't resolve the issue anyway.

It seems like such a silly little thing, but honestly I'm at my wits' end with this! I thought he would eventually grow out of it, but it's been 3 years! Any tips would be much appreciated!

[phathui5]

Actually, leaving the room might be exactly the right response if he doesn't stop when asked to. If you say something along the lines of "Stop picking and Mama can stay here with you" and he doesn't do it, then I would leave the room for a minute, come back and explain that you had to go because he was hurting you.

[LaLaLaLa]

My DS, who is 2 1/2, is a picker as well. Actually, he's more of a pincher, since I don't have many accessible moles for him to pick. When we were nursing, he would snake one of his arms around my side and pinch at my rib cage. We're not nursing anymore, but when he is tired and settles down with his thumb in his mouth, his favorite thing is to use the other hand to pinch the skin between my (or DH's) thumb and index finger. Man, that hurts! Sometimes he goes for the loose skin in front of our necks, instead of on our hands. Also ouch.

We've done a lot of redirecting and these days just shake him off when he's pinching our hands. A stern warning that he is about to be put down usually causes him to let go and pinch his own neck instead. When he was younger we sometimes had to hold his hand briefly in our hand to get him to recognize what he was doing and stop.

Can you cover your DS's fingernails when he's going to sleep? Band-aids or thin mittens on his hands? Does he just need a physical reminder or something to impede him from this automatic behavior? Is he just fidgety and needs something to fondle? Could you string some textured beads on a leather cord and wear it as a necklace when he's going to sleep, so he'll have something to put his hands on?

I hope you find something that works for you--DH and I sometimes feel like we're going absolutely crazy when the pinching starts!

[PMolly]

Originally Posted by chamomeleon

It sometimes seems as though he does it unconsciously, almost like it's his way of confirming that DH and I are physically the same as he remembers us, does that make any sense?

My DS does the same thing. As soon as anyone picks him up, his fingers go straight to their mole, he's got them memorized. It's like anyone could LOOK and SOUND like Grandma, but they wouldn't think to impersonate the mole, too, now would they? For DS, it's definitely a comfort thing. No real suggestions on how to get it to stop. We call DS a mole picker and say "quit that pickin' mole picker" which sends him into a fit of laughter and he moves on to another activity.

It sounds like it is a deep habit, that will have to be "broken" somehow. I've always heard that the easiest way to break a habit is to replace it with another one (i.e., the necklace PP mentioned)

[GracesMama]

My 3 year old does the same thing while she is nursing. It drives me crazy!!! I've explained to her that it hurts and ask her to stop, but she always starts up again a few seconds later.

I'm interested to hear some more suggestions.

[chamomeleon]

Originally Posted by PMolly

As soon as anyone picks him up, his fingers go straight to their mole, he's got them memorized. It's like anyone could LOOK and SOUND like Grandma, but they wouldn't think to impersonate the mole, too, now would they?

Yeah, that's exactly it!

I like the necklace idea, I might have to try that. Typically when he's going to sleep, I ask him if I can hold his hand and that usually stops it temporarily, but as he falls into that almost-asleep phase he'll pull his hand away and go mole-hunting.

I'm sorry that others are dealing with this as well - it's so frustrating! But I'm glad to know I'm not alone.

[Roar]

I think this behavior will continue as long as you feel ambivalent about it. You are expressing that he can't control it. That says to me that you really aren't full on board with stopping it. It may seem like a nice thing to not stop it, but I don't think it is. It is sending the message that sometimes it is okay to do hurtful things to other people and they are so fearful of your reaction if they set physical limits for themselves that you can continue. This is not a good message for a kid.

If you want to stop it I would:
Make a firm decision that this behavior needs to end.
Talk to him outside of the moment about how and why it needs to stop. Make a plan with him about how he can stop. That could include - having his hands otherwise engaged while he's going to sleep, wearing mittens, going to sleep not in physical contact with you, etc.

And, if he can't remember you will break physical contact and move a distance away or leave the room.

[Enudely]

my kid was/is a picker too, but I just told her "no more" and basically just never let her do it> If I felt her hands wandering up there I would just say, don't touch my moles, and move my hands to block her. I would rest with my arms covering where my moles are (lucky that I can do this).
What I might do in your situation is just tell him the moles are going bye bye, and cover them up with little round band-aids for as long as you need to.
good luck, I know, this drives me NUTS too!!

[indeospero]

Wow. I had no idea this was so common. This was a huge problem for us, too, but it sort of faded with the nursing when dd slowly weaned. It drove me absolutely wild. To this day (many months later), there is a section of my lower right torso (location of the prime mole) that I can't stand for anyone, including dh, to touch.

I think Roar is really onto something with the ambivalence factor. I know that was big for me, and I should have set firmer limits. But she'd do it when distressed, to comfort herself, and I didn't know how to be firm about it and still be kind. I'd reach up and remove her hand from the neck-mole when she went for it to self-comfort, but sometimes that would just make her wail in even greater distress, as if I were depriving her of something she really needed. I could tell that her intent was far from malicious. And yet, the physical sensation was unbearable to me. So, just like Roar suggested, I felt totally ambivalent and unable to be firm.

Obviously, I have no advice to offer, as I am still working through this scenario myself, even after the fact. But I am so intrigued that this has come up for others, as well, and I will be listening in here, since I am still wondering how I could have handled the situation better with my dd.