Bizarre Behavior/Grandson

[mthackeray]

I am so worried about my grandson.  He's twenty-six months old, and so far he's accomplished most of the learning benchmarks right on schedule.  As time goes by, however, he seems to be regressing.  A new sibling was added to the family four months ago, and at first, we all felt like his behavior might be due to the new baby, but not any more.  He used to be a very verbal child but he has stopped talking.  Now he points and whines.  We tell him he has to use his words to tell us what he wants or needs and after much coaxing he will say one or two words that are barely intelligible.  He whines all the time, which is new for him.  He has also started to develop very strange obsessive behaviors like holding his hands in the air next to his face and shaking them repeatedly.  Or he may hold his hands in the same manner and flick his fingers.  Sometimes while he is shaking his hands he moves his head rapidly from side to side.  For the last two days he's been jumping all around the house for hours at a time.  He jumps for two or three minutes, stops and rubs his chin in exactly the same manner each time and then continues to jump.  If I tell him to stop it's as if he can't hear me.  If I pick him up to make him stop, he screams and squirms uncontrollably until I'm forced to put him back down or I'll drop him.  It's like he's in another world.  I can't get him to make eye contact during these times at all.  I tried smacking my hands really loud right in front of his face to see if I could interrupt his focus, but he didn't flinch, jump, scream or even acknowledge my presence.  Another strange behavior he has developed is laughing uncontrollably for long periods of time (40 minutes) for no apparent reason.  A couple of days ago he sat all alone on the couch in the living room (a room we seldom use) and laughed continuously while he stared as if he were daydreaming-again unresponsive. The interest he used to have for so many activities like looking at books, bath time, playing with toys, trips to the park or splash pad etc. just isn't there anymore.  When he's around other children, he completely ignores their presence.  He doesn't watch them or seem to be curious about what they're doing.  He sleeps at night, but it is almost impossible to get him to nap during the day even though he can barely keep his eyes open.  It's as if he's afraid to allow himself to let go-lose control?  Eating time has become a nightmare.  When first introduced to solid food he ate everything: cereal, fruit, vegetables, and eventually some protein.  At twenty-six months he eats some fruit, some nuts, cheese rarely, vegetables almost never, bread and crackers often and absolutely no meat of any kind.  He does drink milk and juice.  Also, since a very early age he has been obsessed with playing with his penis.  He is always sticking his hands into his diaper and flicking his penis or pulling it out of the top of the diaper.  In the process of doing this he destroys his diaper so we have to watch him closely and constantly tell him to get his hands out of his pants.  In bed at night, he pees all over himself even though we put him in footed pajamas that zip up from his feet all the way to his neck.  This has helped some but when he's determined he can still get his hand in or his penis out of his diaper without unzipping his pajamas.  Of course at first everyone excused it saying things like "He's a boy and that's what boys do."  But we soon discovered that most little boys don't play with themselves like our little boy.  The scariest thing of all has been the realization that our grandson seems to have stopped progressing developmentally.  Each day we see him slipping away from us a little bit more.  He does have perfectly normal days, hours...but we notice now that the bizarre behaviors are starting to become more prevalent than his normal behaviors.  Does any of this sound familiar to anyone else?  Has your child or grandchild suffered from any of these types of behaviors?  I have tried looking up many different symptoms on the Internet but nothing seems quite right.  Help!

[jdtm]

The scariest thing of all has been the realization that our grandson seems to have stopped progressing developmentally. --  your words

This can be serious.  Please have his parents contact the family physician or pediatrican.  You might wish also to post on the Child Behavior Expert Forum - Dr. Kennedy usually replies in less than a day.  Because only a few posts are allowed each day, you might have to try to post for several days.  All the best ...

[margypops]

Yes and I found they acted out to get more attention especially when a sibling had been born ,it didn't go away after a few months it continued,.As you are concerned its always good to have him checked in case something else is going on but a lot of what you describe is normal .he may realise that his behavior is getting him a lot of attention from all quarters and a lot of talk about it.I suggest ignoring as much as you can of the behavior and see what happens ..sometimes we make a lot about something in our concer it  then feeds on itself to become an issue.Do his parents feel as concerned as you do ? .