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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Will it still be cute or ok in 5 years? If not you should fix it. [/quote]
Myself and another poster explained that the stim could very well fade. It's not something to 'fix'. He isn't broken.[/quote]

Or it could become a bad habit like biting nails... you choose how to frame it...[/quote]

that’s not actually how stims work. Stims come and go - sometimes it’s flapping, sometimes pacing - and you’re never going to cure a kid with autism out of repetitive behaviors because the underlying impulse is literally necessary for the dx. When a kid gets older, if they are normal IQ/language, then you can teach them at a higher level about stimming and how others perceive them. But 4? no. you focus on the stims that are disruptive or dangerous, but you can’t extinguish the drive to stim. [/quote]

You can’t extinguish “the drive to stim” completely but you absolutely can teach competitive behaviors and reinforce those more heavily than self-stimulatory behavior so the opportunity for it to occur across the day is minimized. So if a kid loves hand flapping then teach them to love riding a bike or jumping rope. The two can’t be done simultaneously. Or teach them to play T-ball, or swing, or rock climbing, or play dough, or crafts, or yoga, or swimming, or a myriad of other things incompatible with hand flapping. You teach new skills and new behaviors that over time decrease the opportunity for the occurrence of hand flapping. You literally keep them busy all day and minimize down time. This way you avoid it getting to the point where all they do is walk around flapping. If you just ignore it and don’t do anything to prevent or minimize it, don’t teach new skills, then you get to the point it’s much harder to intervene. 4 is a perfect age to address this because life is full of new skills. You just have to think strategically about which skills you select next.[/quote]

You’re describing child abuse. Note: I am not against behavioral modification at all but that level of effort to change hand flapping is abusive and wrong. [/quote]

DP
What is wrong is NOT teaching your child how to cope in the existing world.  PP is demonstrating coping mechanisms, we all have them.  This is literally your job as a parent.  It doesn't have to be abusive.  I would never advocate to do it in an abusive way.  Teaching these things with empathy and kindness allows them to function in the world as it is, not the fiction you envision.[/quote]

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