My 3 year old gets into everything

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We have to keep all our personal stuff locked up. He paints the walls with toothpaste, found a spool of thread and unravelled it all over the place, has thrown our kitchen implements into the back yard, poured out half of a bottle of olive oil, dismantled my husband's electric razor, run off with all our toothbrushes, regularly shreds our newspapers or scribbles on them.

He has PDD-NOS. Is he going to grow out of this? When????

Mine does those those sorts of things, he's 4 ... I think he'll outgrow it, eventually ... but we still have a ways to go! You have my sympathies I know it's a constant battle, that olive oil must have been a challenge to clean.

Edit: It's been a while since mine has scribbled on the walls or carpet with crayons so we must be making some sort of progress. Though the newest thing is he'll rip up plastic/rubber foam toys into a million pieces so I've had to take away everything that falls into that category (so far we've lost at least two balls, a "huggy buggy" which was a rubber car, and a water pistol to this).

Last edited by Washi on 16 Jul 2012, 4:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I was like that too, I'm afraid I was that way until I was around 5. I broke everything, so many expensive and irreplaceable things as well as damaging furniture. It wasn't done with any malice I just liked to take things to pieces and explore things. I'm sure your son will grow out of it. My younger sister was allowed to roam freely, but my Mum kept me in a playpen quite a bit later than would be usual. It meant she could take her eyes off me for a few minutes and I was quite happy in there, focussing on my activities. I'm not sure whether that would work for you, or be something that you would feel comfortable with.

It must feel crazy some days. I remember. It makes me smile, because time has made all those incidences seem more quirky and endearing and less frustrating.

My son (PDD-NOS age 11) still picks things apart without apparent intent (couch strings, an entire mouse pad as school, holes in clothes/blankets/stuffed animals, scabs. If he can pick at it he will. He also tests things to see how they work, but his experiments are more thoughtful and less impulsive (sometimes), saving a bar of soap in a bucket of water to see how long it lasts (got very upset at sister for pouring out he water), putting bottles of various liquids in the freezer - (last time he froze some magnets in water to see if they would work through the ice). Remember action/reaction is science at its most basic form. At least he asks before he takes stuff apart now. He has taken apart a vacuum, computer, rocket, electric razor, radio, clock... etc. He gets so excited and loves to take things apart still.

Maybe you can help him find appropriate avenues for his adventures. Maybe you can help teach him that if he asks, you will help him find a way to try that or something similar. Messy is not always bad if contained. Those little plastic pools are wonderful for indoor exploration. for the experiments that are too dangerous/messy, my son is satisfied with seeing the you-tube videos. I would be careful with this though. It can backfire and instead they copy what they see on the video.

But don't you understand, all of that is rather fun?

I would focus on channeling his fascination with these things into a more controlled setting. Give him thread to unravel, finger paints to paint walls with, things to rip and scribble on and take apart, but let him have a time and place to play with them. Shaving cream is rather fun too.

I agree give him as many of those things as you can in controlled environment. DS also likes to take things apart. Legos and the like seem to be great for fulfilling this desire for him. We have gotten a lot of mileage out of the snap together blocks called Trios. We also leave plenty of paper crayons and markers (washable) where DS can get them whenever he wants. The only rule we had to work on was to only draw on the paper.

My ASD son doesn't do these sort of things by my NT 2-year-old is starting to. Last night he ripped the keys off my laptop keyboard...*sigh* Off to Best Buy! It needed replacing anyway...

My 3 1/2 yo would rip the keys off their laptop too, a few months ago ( he shares a laptop with his 6 yo brother) but he is over that now. Now he is into pouring his juice into his dinner or onto anything he can find. Any cup or class with liquid will be pour into or onto something. He also loves to spray the water from the faucet with his fingers, everwhere. Then gets upset when he realizes he is soak.

Now that I think of it, when my ASD son was two he once pulled all the keys out of an electronic keyboard (musical instrument.) That was the only time I remember him doing anything like that. So yes, these destructive phases do pass.

My 3 1/2 yo would rip the keys off their laptop too, a few months ago ( he shares a laptop with his 6 yo brother) but he is over that now. Now he is into pouring his juice into his dinner or onto anything he can find. Any cup or class with liquid will be pour into or onto something. He also loves to spray the water from the faucet with his fingers, everwhere. Then gets upset when he realizes he is soak.[/quote]

Yes! That is his new thing. He suddenly can't get enough of water. He used to be terrified of the bathroom, but one day, he got curious enough about the shower to actually climb in with me--with all of his clothes on, of course. Now he won't leave me alone in the shower and will climb into the bathtub and spray the water like you described. It's running up our water bill so bad we may have to lock him out of the bathroom. But then he'd regress in his potty-training.

I often keep my bathroom door closed for those reasons too (way too many things to get into trouble with in there, in addition to playing with water he's also unraveled a whole spool of dental floss and toilet paper of course, and he's a big Super Mario Bros. fan so he likes to play with the toilet plunger too like he's Mario the plumber). I leave his kiddie potty outside the bathroom door and he uses that independently if he's closed out and doesn't want to get me.