behavior

My child is 4 years old and will be 5 in May  I was wondering if it is normal for his penis to be hard when he wakes up and when he goes to bed  I notice him touching it alot when it is hard and he squirms around alot while it is like that and he may not go to sleep for several hours because of it. He has it out of his pants all of the time when he is in bed. I was wnting to know if that is normal or not.

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

Yes, it is perfectly normal for this to occur in young children. The only need for worry is when a child, due to insecurity or other means of soothing himself, relies on self-stimulation for this purpose. Generally, if it is a problem, the behavior occurs at other times in addition to when the child is in bed.