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Encouraging self-care . . . ideas needed
Yes, I know self-care seems pretty common sense - if you want your kid to dress himself - let him try to dress himself, right? If you want him to feed himself - let him feed himself . . . So why is it so hard for me to work on these things with my LO??
I am kind of starting on dressing himself -washing himself and feeding himself are other things I need to work on too but I am having trouble. I guess in the grand scheme of having 2 kids at home and wanting to make it to appointments before say daylight ends I end up doing it all and never getting him to try on his own.
What do you guys do with your kiddos? Any tips ideas?? Where to start??
Yesterday I said to him ok you pull up your pants after I pulled them up about 3/4 of the way and he was like - what the heck are you talking about lady you do this stuff, not me. 
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Re: Encouraging self-care . . . ideas needed
My 3.5 year old is just starting to dress himself. He will put underwear and pants on usually, but shirts are a mystery/Chinese puzzle to him.
I'd start with boots/shoes and hats. Things that he can be successful with. And then on the days where you don't have to be anywhere, give him a chance with pants. He's still very young.
You might try doing dress up for fun as an activity to get him to try on different things.
We would talk about what we're doing (this is your foot, your sock goes on your foot...we wash your body, this is how we wash your tummy...)
There was (and is) a lot of hand-over-hand help, and the things I know he can do we wait for him to do it. Even if it takes 5 minutes for him to pull up his pants.
Lots of praise, lots of setting him up for success (elastic pants as snaps are really tough for him OT-wise) One tip is to have your LO put their hands in the front and back to pull up pants vs on the sides. also have the back hand facing palm-out; try it, it's SO much easier.
From someone with an adult ASD child I got this advice:
1. Picture schedule (step by step - putting on a sock was like 10 steps: take sock, open sock, take foot, point toes - you get it)
2. Starting backwards - exactly what you did - let him pull up pants when they are almost on (but over the diaper can be hard). tehn work backwards - next time start an knees, then ankles.
3. Lots of HOH prompts and praise when it is done corectly.
Hope any of this helps!
My ds always does better with self-care if we reinforce it with a positive outcome. So, if he wants to play on his I-Pad, he has to eat all his food, by himself. Or if he wants to go see his uncle Michael, he has to put his own shoes and socks on. That seems to speed things up a bit. Or, like Auntie said, make it a game, as we do often with ds younger sister.
May I ask what your sons (?) diagnosis is? I have a 5 year old with Arthrogryposis and we are starting to work on this. I wasn't sure if he would understand what we were trying to tell him before and I didn't know how much he would be able to do himself. My son has no muscle in his arms, one is bent and the other strait. His range of motion is very limited. We are going to have to get very creative with helping him accomplish these things. Make adaptations to his clothing by removing snaps and zippers. Not sure what else we will have to do. I now just tell him let me see what you can do. I give him a half hour before we have to go to start. Even now I have a hard time standing back and not helping. Must be the mom in me. Just make sure you give him extra time. Allow for it. Let him start long before you have to leave. Good Luck!!