Zips

8 Things We Don’t Want Our Neurodivergent Children To Chew

We often chew on our zips because when we are wearing coats or jackets they are right there in front of us and easy to pop in our mouths!

A great way to redirect from chewing zips is to attach our Toggle Board Chewigem.

Pens & Pencils

Chewing pens and pencils is actually probably helping your child to concentrate, but it’s not ideal.

Why not try the Chewigem pencil Covers to save those pens and pencils?

Cables & Wires

When we’re charging our phones or gaming putting cables and headphones wires into our mouths can become a habit.

You can easily redirect from this using a chewipal chewistrap.

Here’s how to do it

Hands, Fingers & Nails

8 Things We Don’t Want Our Neurodivergent Children To Chew

Chewing our hands, fingers and nails can cause infection and also make us more prone to illnesses from putting our hands in our mouths more often.

The Fingers & Thumbs Thumb Guards can be used to stop the habit of chewing on our fingers, thumbs and hands.

Hair

Chewing hair and swallowing it can be dangerous. Children often chew hair as a habit or when they are trying to stay calm and focused. Some children pull their hair out before they chew it which can cause other problems.

Redirect

Redirect hair chewing by switching to something more appropriate like a Chewigem. You will need to be consistent with this to create a new safer alternative habit.

Learn more about redirection and safer sensory habits in our understanding your senses course.

Toys

Usually, teething babies and toddlers will pop toys into their mouths to soothe their aching gums. But as children get older they might be doing it as a sensory-seeking behaviour. Chewing helps to calm and regulate the sensory system but it’s important to do this safely.

Rather than chewing on teddy bears, toy cars and wooden blocks, why not try our Chewigem Bubba Bag full of sensory chew toys?

Remote Control

Neurodivergent kids can’t seem to get enough of remote controls. Whether it’s the remote for the TV or gaming controllers they all fit well into their mouths.

You can save your remote controls by redirecting to the Chewigem Sensory Remote Control.

8 Things We Don’t Want Our Neurodivergent Children To Chew

Clothing

Probably one of the most common things we find children like to chew is their clothes. Kids seem to love chewing their collars and cuffs and this can become expensive when having to replace school uniforms.

We often get asked for advice on redirecting to fabric chews. The problem with chewing fabric is that it is easy to destroy. You can swallow the threads from the destroyed fabric which can be dangerous. Chewing on fabric can also cause dehydration as the saliva soaks into the fabric.

Depending on the type of chewer and the strength of the chewer we have many different products that can help here.

Personal Experience

My child was a fabric chewer and this is where the Chewigem Journey began. I redirected and encouraged Jamie to chew our Chewigems rather than school uniform and in just under a month we had broken the habit and were fully redirected to Chewigems.

If you would like some help doing the same please just send us an email at

hello@sensooli.com