won't touch his penis

Post Reply New Topic

So this feels like a weird question for my second post on here, and I'm wondering if it will even be allowed given the 'P' word, but I'll give it a go!

According to everyone I've spoken to, almost all little boys take great joy in playing with their penis. I've been told they like to stretch them out and find them fascinating. I have never once seen my (moderately autistic) three year old do it, never ever. And for me to clean it in the bath, I have to zip in there quick as lightening and do it in one second flat before he screams at me and pushes my hand away.

I know it's a weird thing to be worried about, but males tend to be quite fond of their little fella's, and I'm kinda worried. Even when I am changing his nappy he screams and pushes me away if the wipe goes near it.

By chance, could this be an autistic thing? Is it possible he's hyper-sensitive? Has anyone heard of this before?

You're gonna give him a complex!

hehe... unlikely, he also does the same thing when I try and clean his ears or nose or wash his hair.

Yeah, but you're not asking about his ears or nose or hair...

To be honest, of all the various issues and problems that are part of having an autistic child, it does seem a little strange that you have chosen to ask about this.

For what it's worth, I never attempted to wash my son's penis. He enjoyed baths, and stayed in for so long that he got a good soak all over.

I dont ever recall my son doing this, the playing with himself part, though i havent seen him since he was 18 months... but i havent heard anything from his father like this. he could just be sensitive, but this may be an issue best raised with his doctor?

Is he circumcised? If he is not, maybe there could be some type of infection going on. Or it could just be some type of sensory thing. My son is 7 now, and he never had this issue. I do see him pulling on his thingy in the bathtub, but now when he stands up to pee, he does not want to touch his penis to hold it down, so sometimes,, it goes all over the place! We are working on showing him that he needs to point it down.

Well I am not really sure what to think about that....but It brings to mind when my younger brother was very, very young. One day he looked down at his thingy and ran away screaming and hid under a blanket. I never did figure out why and he did not seem particularly upset just surprised.

So all I know is sometimes little kids are weird about such things....and maybe there isn't always an explanation.

My 3yo will suck his thumb and play with his wee wee. He use to love walking aroung with it hanging out of his pants. He would play with it until it stood up then show me and told me it was stuck. Or when I put him to bed, he would lay there playing with it hanging out. I used to tell him to put it back in and go to sleep. Unfortunately that turned into a game and when I checked on him at night, he would hurry and pull it out, laughing and looking at me to tell him to put it back. So now, I pretend I don't see him doing it. Hopefully he will get bored with no input from me.

What he started doing which is cute is he laughs when I smile at him. He doesn't want to laugh and covers his mouth and will try and stop me from smiling. But it's cute that he smiles and laughs even when he tries not to.

Sorry my question makes you uneasy Marcia, I guess not everybody is comfortable with this kind of conversation.

But to address your concern that I appear to be a weirdo who doesn’t want t to ask about his ears or hair, or any of the other ‘various issues and problems associated with having an autistic child’, google answers those things over and over. But I didn’t find any answers to THIS question, hence my coming to a forum where I thought people in the same situation might be accepting and non-judgemental enough to discuss it with me.

You’re lucky to have a child that loves baths I guess, it took us almost two years before he’d stop screaming when we tried to bath him. Thankfully now he appears to enjoy it a bit.

I guess you must get different advice wherever you live, because we are told to push back the foreskin in the bath to make sure it gets clean, until he is able to do it for himself. Apparently merely sitting in the water is apparently not enough to get the water under there.




No angelbear, he's not circumcised. I remember my Mum telling me that when my brother was a baby (he's almost forty now), circumcisions were frowned upon and you would be lucky if you could find a doctor who would do it. And even then, they would only do it if the babe's brothers were also done, so the boy wasn't different to his siblings. I haven't heard of anyone being circumcised here for a long time, apparently once the war was over there was no need for it anymore. Is it commonly done where you are?

But yes, the infection thing crossed my mind too, however he's always been like this and he's three now, so hopefully that's not it!




You might be right, if there was an association with autism it would seem likely I’d be able to find some mention of it in google.




I loved reading this MomofThree, I could just picture you sitting there typing it with an amused smile on your face, it’s clear you adore your son! Is he autistic? He sounds like a happy little chap

Zeezee - thanks! He has always been a laughing and happy baby, especially with his immediate family. He was evaluated by the school and was scored borderline ASD but did not meet the criteria for ASD by the neurologist. The neurologist did say he had autistic traits and for now we should give him the interventions as if he was ASD. His major traits are communication, he can ask for what he wants but has a lot of difficulties with back and forth conversation. He also has about 50% echolalia. He also has poor social skills, he doen't know how to make friends. His teaher also identified those as his major issues and is working with him on those. The school diagnosed him as mentally challenge but his teacher thinks that it's the opposite since he is so far ahead academically.

What was the neurologists criteria? I have been told there are three symptoms all autistic kids share, and the rest vary from child to child. The first being poor social skills, the second being delayed language development, the third being repetitive behaviour. You've named two of those, does he not have the repetitive behaviour? I'm still learning about this, so excuse my ignorance!

On another note, I googled for some different keywords this morning than I have so far, and came up with some links saying that some autistic people are sensitive all over, so maybe that answers my question about my son. And it would explain why he was the only baby who hated it when I took him to baby massage class

Hopefully that subsides with age? Or will the 'quirks' he has now last for his entire life?

Hi Zeezee-

I am in the US, and we are given the option at birth to circumcise or not. I could be wrong, but I think most parents here go ahead and circumcise. However, I think more people are not automatically choosing to do it. My sister chose not to have her son circumcised and he has not had any problems, and I don't think he necessarily takes a bath every day LOL! (he is not autistic).

That was just a thought that crossed my mind, but it is probably more likely some type of sensory thing.

My son is 7, and some of his sensory things have faded, and other things start up. For instance when he was 2, he did not want the grass outside to touch his feet, and now he is perfectly okay with it. Last summer, he decided he did not want to get his hair wet in the pool, but he is okay with it getting wet in the bathtub? Now this summer, he is okay getting it wet in the pool, he just doesn't want to go under the water. For awhile, he freaked out about riding in other peoples cars, but now he is getting better about riding in other people's cars. It is so funny, because he absolutely refused to ride in my sister's car for about 2 yrs when we went to visit her. Finally, the more verbal he got, I asked him why he would not ride in her car, and he said "because it smells bad" Lol! Well, she got some air freshener to put in her car and lo and behold he got in her car and rode in it! Another example is sunscreen. He hated to have that put on, and I figured out that it was the smell of it that he could not stand, so I found some with a very light scent, and he is now okay with that.

I think the sensory things sort of come and go, some of them probably are always there, but you can learn to work around them. And over time, some of them just simply fade and become a non-issue.

Hang in there! You sound like a great mom!

Also, IMO, there are really no strange questions here. All of us are dealing with unique children, and you should feel comfortable asking anything here. That is why we are all here.

I am not sure the answer to your question, but thinking back, my son at three did not want to touch his penis. We had many frustrating days potty aiming because of it. He also didnt like to stand up. He usually ended up peeing between the rim and lid and soaking his pants. We finally compromised on him taking his pants all the way off, sitting backwards on the toilet and leaning forward. Later, lots of trips to men's urinals with daddy convinced him to learn to stand and pee. I don't think it's any problem now. He is 11 and I haven't asked.

However, at age 4 he was taking a bath with his cousin, age 6, and his aunt walked in to find both boys poking each others penises and giggling. She was quite upset.

I wouldn't worry too much.

This may be the problem. It's my understanding a child's foreskin should never be pushed back prematurely, he needs to do that to himself. A quick google search brought up a lot but not a source that I feel is reputable enough to link as a reference, I'm going to look some more to see if I can find one.