My 8 yr old niece has been caught eating her feces and drinking her urine. She hasd also been making comments towards adults about doing sexual things to them. She complusively flicks her parents off and curses at them.She draws privates on her dolls and has impulses and thoughts to sexually touch younger children.she said she has played sex gamwes with same age children but would that cause tis behaviour.thanks.
A: Please. Get this child to a child psychologist immediately. Either she has been molested and is acting out her confusion, anger and pain or there is something seriously psychologically wrong. This is not normal behavior. She’s telling you in the only way she can that she needs help – now. The longer these behaviors go on, the more difficult it will be to treat her.
Her parents are likely going to need your support and love. It’s very, very hard to acknowledge that something is seriously amiss with one’s child. Often parents wait too long to intervene because they can’t stand the pain of the idea that something happened to their child or that their child is mentally ill. Often parents hope that whatever it is will go away by itself. It probably won’t.
You and others who love this family can offer practical help like caring for siblings so the parents can get to appointments, doing some of the groundwork to find a good child psychologist, or figuring out the insurance issues. They need to focus their attention on helping this little girl. The relatives can be invaluable help as people to lean on.
Thank you for writing.
I wish everyone well during this difficult time.
Dr. Marie
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Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 2 Feb 2009
Hartwell-Walker, D. (2009). 8 year old has bizarre sexualized behavior.. Psych Central. Retrieved on February 14, 2012, from http://psychcentral.com/ask-the-therapist/2009/02/02/8-year-old-has-bizarre-sexualized-behavior/
