The dog, the hand-washing and the ASD child.

As you may have read, we've just got a puppy, a labradoodle. He's very cute and has transformed our elder ASD son's life. The dog is the first thing he thinks about in the morning and the last thing on his mind at night. He's even okay at scooping the poop without fuss, although washing his hands afterwards is a bit more of a problem.

Youngest, who loves dogs, has got the hang of the hand washing, just not the dog. They're definitely not the pack leader where the puppy is concerned. The dog jumps and nips all the time which Youngest finds very distressing. The hand-washing though, is going over the top. Youngest has always been known as a very, very clean child, never forgetting clean hands after using the lavatory. The length of showers is such I'm surprised Al Gore isn't on our doorstep offering a lecture on water wastage.

Every time Youngest so much as brushes against the puppy with their hands, they're at the sink, massaging soap into fingers and doing an inadequate rinse job. It's become so bad that in the space of two weeks, they've come down with eczema on the knuckles. Turns out, using washing up liquid instead of handwash isn't a great idea, despite it being an eco-friendly detergent. The doctor has now prescribed a special handwash that can be used as often as needed along with a tube of aqueous cream around in the pocket for use at school. Sadly however, I think getting the dog to see Youngest as anything more than another plaything is going to take longer to sort out.

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Tania Tirraoro

Founder, Co-Director at Special Needs Jungle

Founder of Special Needs Jungle. (She/Her) Parent of two young adults with autism. New grandma. Tania, who is autistic, is a leading SEND advisor, working with the Special Education Consortium, Ofsted, and Whole School SEND. She is also an Advisory Board member of the Royal Holloway, University of London Centre of Gene and Cell Therapy and an Editorial Board member of Springer Nature Gene Therapy journal.
Tania is an experienced broadcast and print journalist & author. She also runs a PR, web & social media consultancy, SocialOro Media.
Tania is a rare disease & chronic pain patient advocate with Ehlers Danlos syndrome.

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