Clothing issue

[Doyle1984]

Hi, I have a 7 year old daughter who is picking holes in her clothes and has been doing it for 2 years now. Seems to happen more at  school, I don't get how she does it but she can pick a hole through any kind of material. It is getting expensive as clothes are having to always be replaced. Although she knows it is wrong she persists in doing it, when I ask her why, she replies I don't know! Help!!

[Sandman2]

   Yep, agree with specialmom completely.  She needs something else to fidget with.  How are her fingernails by the way?   You might also want to talk with her teacher when she starts school again and explain why she has the benderoo so the teacher doesn't think she is playing and takes it away from her.  And maybe asking the teacher to keep an eye out for if there are any times when she seems particularly anxious to see if you can identify any triggers.  Best wishes.

[specialmom]

Does she subconsiously fidget when nervous??  maybe she is nervous/anxious at school and that is her calming technique.  I'd say that working on her underlying anxiety would be what you would need to do if that is the case.  

What we do with our son who has sensory integration disorder and who will involuntarily do things that are undesirable is to help him switch to something that is.  

Here is an idea to try----  get a 'benderoo' (which are those bendable, colored sticks I think also called wiki sticks) and cut it in thirds or halves.  Give it to her to take to school.  She can play with that with her fingers instead of picking at her clothes.  It is small and she can pull it out at any time and roll it and bend it and probably reproduce the same feeling she gets from picking holes in her clothes.  

try something like that and consider that she may have something under the umbrella of anxiety.  Straight anxiety or a mild ocd tendancies.  good luck