Published on 12, July, 2020
My daughter is 7 and has asd and severe speech impairment she can tell me 'I sad' but can't give more detail. I informed school today that she has started to bite her arm or scratch herself down her arms but while I'm waiting on any further action I wondered if anyone could give advice as to how I could sooth her anxiety. My son also has asd and severe anxiety but I can find out from him what the issue is to deal with it but with my daughter I'm at a loss. Thanks for reading.
Could she choose from a list of options what the problem is? Does she have a communication system to suppliment her speech? ( If not, it would be worth getting a speech therapy referral, to get one in place.) Wherever you have an idea what had upset her, you can help her by modelling this for her e.g. If she scratches herself because something is broken, use this an opportunity to model "I sad toy broken." Etc I used to draw my son cartoon stories to help him make sense of upsetting events and to model the language needed to label it/ talk about it.
Dear Kel34,
You may find it useful to have a look at the following link on behaviour and strategies from our website : http://www.autism.org.uk/living-with-autism/understanding-behaviour.aspx
Also you may like to contact The Autism Helpline who can provide information and advice in regards to your daughters anxiety and how to help her. You can call them on 0808 800 4104 (Monday to Thursday 10am to 4pm, Friday 9am to 3pm).Please note that the Helpline is experiencing a high volume of calls and it may take a couple of attempts before you get through to speak to an advisor.
I hope this helps.
Ayshe Mod