Monday, August 17, 2009

Anxiety in purest form

It all started with snapping.

Dima learned to snap a couple of months ago. He started snapping so much that he developed blisters on the pads of his fingertips. Then as the blisters dried out and started to heal, he started picking at them. And then chewing on them.

Now Dima no longer chews on his fingernails--he chews on his fingers. Until they bleed.

These actually look much better than they did a few days ago! :(

So he is now wearing these until his fingers heal. He doesn't mind wearing them as he wants his fingers to heal too. It's making it really hard for him to do a lot of things because his fingers hurt when he puts pressure on them. He asks to put his gloves back on after meals.


And I'm just concerned that they're going to get infected and he's going to lose his fingers. Sigh. This is all related to his anxiety over school starting, so I'm hoping that once school gets going (and he's using his fingers and can't chew on them!) that things will settle down and his fingers will heal and he will stop chewing on them.

6 comments:

Tami said...
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Tami said...

Poor little guy. Isn't it amazing what anxiety can do to our little ones? We'll be praying that the gloves...and school...do their job. ;)

Diana said...

Ouch! I have a biter and a picker, thankfully not both rolled into one. But, I do know about the anxiety that drives it for both of them. It makes me hurt for them!

junglemama said...

Ouch. Lather them in Neosporing before you put on the gloves and they should heal quickly. Have him sleep with them on too-- that will help. Poor guy-- how old is he again?

Courtney said...

He's 7. I've been putting lotion and medicine on them to help them heal and he does wear the gloves (or socks) at night. All of our kids are fast healers so I know they will heal as long as we can keep the gloves on. I'm just still debating whether or not to send him to school with them on tomorrow! I don't want him ridiculed but I can't have him bleeding all over the place either!

Julie said...

Oh my goodness! It's sad and just a teensy bit funny. Poor guy!

Do you have any other good advice on helping children through stress? Maggie chews and peels the skin off of the bottom of her toes. She peels so much that they bleed. And then she can't walk. I can keep her from doing it most of the time during the day, but she still does it at night. When I can't control her as well.