new here... long but opinions wanted

[happymomof2]

Welcome, kinda new here myself but everyone seems to be very nice and lots have been there done that and have great advise.

My DH also likes to do the knee jerk reaction thing and take everything away for a long period of time. My son is now 14 and that still doesn't work. When we do that he doesn't feel like he has anything to loose so he just gets worse. Plus then I don't have any bargaining chips to use.

Your son is so young maybe he would do well with taking one thing he really likes away and when he changes his behavior/attitude then give it back - same day type deal. Just a thought.

I know how you feel, before my son was diagnosed he was getting ready to be expelled from Elementary school. He was diagnosed with ADHD and put on meds and placed in Special Ed at school which did wonders for him.

Just a word of caution with the Special Ed. Seems like it was real easy to get him in but is extremely difficult to get him out. If that is the route they are suggesting at school see if they can put him into a plan but keep him in regular ed classes.

Hope things start going better for your family soon.

[flutterbee]

Hi there and welcome to the board.

I'm with BBK on this...if she was punished at school for her behavior at school then that should be it. Our children are not being bad for the sake of being bad. They don't have the capacity to handle stressors the way we expect neurotypical kids to. As parents, we have to guide them in that process. Punishment for something the child has little control over is going to backfire, imo. Instead of making the child feel even worse - because in my experience they already feel bad enough after the fact - it is our job to identify triggers and then help the child learn to identify and cope with those things.

I also highly recommend The Explosive Child. It explains (much better than I could) what I was attempting to explain above.

As far as not letting her pick out her own clothes as punishment, if she has SID I would be totally against that. That is asking a child who is already struggling to hold it together to possibly wear something that is going to be the equivalent of a thorn in the side for an entire day AND be expected to maintain behavior. That is setting her up for failure. My PC has some minor SID issues and if I made him wear what I wanted him to wear, we would have explosions here and he's 16. He's very particular about how things fit and feel. Both of my kids are. With both of my kids, there is only one detergent and one fabric softener that can be used on their clothes. In fact, we made a late night run to the store Saturday night because I had gotten a different fabric softener (they were out of what I usually buy) and PC couldn't stand the way his clothes felt. It's a very real, albeit hard to understand, disorder.

I understand where your DH is coming from. My knee jerk reaction, even after years of doing this and learning what I have, is to do the same kinds of things. Years of experience has taught me that with our kids, it just isn't effective at best and backfires at worst.

I also recommend sending a certified letter to the school asking them to evaluate your child for an IEP. There is more info on this on the SpEd forum. Sheila and Martie there can help guide you in the right direction. One of the things it does is provide protection for your child when it comes to behavior/discipline issues that arise. Again, Sheila and Martie can answer those questions for you. My GFG didn't act out at school. Rather she shut down; turned inward.

The principal at your daughter's school is an idiot, and arrogant, but unfortunately we've all come across many staff members like that with our kids. They're not all that way. They just ruin it for the rest of them, you know?

Good luck! We're here anytime you need an ear. Welcome, again. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/flower.gif[/img]

[trsturself]

Ok... here's what happened last night. DH got home and talked to gfg about what happened. At first she kept saying she didn't know what happened. DH said, when you're ready to talk about it, come get me. Eventually she came out and told us what happened. Then she told DH that she threw the fit trying to get put in a new class. Thanks daycare for showing her that if you make enough trouble you get to get out of a place you don't like!
In this case since she said she did the act on purpose, she was grounded from TV for the week.
We also had a long conversation and some role-playing about situations that can happen and good ways to handle them. She was cracking up watching DH pretend to throw a fit. [img]/forums/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smile.gif[/img]
I was very proud of DH. He stayed calm and caring throughout the conversation and tried to give her other options for her choice of behavior. Yes, that is assuming it is within her control. No, I'm not sure if it is or not. The main goal of mine in getting her dx is to know whether or not she can control the outbursts. That way DH and teachers will be more patient with it if she can't. We have seen an improvement at home since calming ourselves and being making sure we are firm and consistent.

Her triggers can be as simple as asking her if she's hungry. instead of a simple "no thanks" her reaction is more inline with us forcing food into her mouth. It's as though she thinks we can see her thoughts and when we act opposite them it puts her into an emotional frenzy. We're working on getting her to use her words and explain things to people without jumping off the deep end immediately. We have made significant progress at home, but I have a feeling they just start threatening her and/or sending her to the principals office immediately instead of helping her calm down and use her words. It's like dealing with a 3 year old except that when she does use her words you get a paragraph about what she wants and how she feels. lol

Food... she's not that picky with food so I wasn't worried about the meal. I just wish the daycare would've told me that no outside food was allowed so she wouldn't have thought she could have it. We will most likely eat at home before we go, and she can have snack on some fruit there if she's still hungry.

Clothing... i'm big on giving control of stuff like this to the kid. she's been picking out her own clothes since she was old enough to grab. As for the SID part of it... all of her clothes are ones that she can wear. I would never force her to wear something that bothered her. I pick out her clothes when she is grounded from TV simply because I let her sleep in the extra 30 minutes and get her dressed at daycare before we go in (putting the clothes on the heater on the drive over so they're nice and warm when we get there is always a good incentive).
I just didn't feel like it was a good punishment because it had no correlation to her behavior. I think logical punishments work best, or if none available then a privledge taken away. Picking out your clothes isn't something I consider a privledge, so taking it away without a direct correlation to misbehaving seems silly to me. Now if she had purposefully destroyed her clothing or something like that, it would make more sense to have clothing be involved in the consequence.

school... She gets a new teacher tomorrow that has a lot more experience (according to the principal so you know how much weight I give that). Hopefully that will help things. The other big thing is that she thinks she doesn't have any friends at school (some of the kids like her but she doesn't feel like it). Having someone outside of family that likes you is so important. She has a good friend from her old school that we try to see as often as we can, but it would be so nice for her to have a friend like that at school. I think it really helps her handle all the other stuff of the day. Not having friends just adds stress and makes her not care about anything.

I'm sure there's more topics I was going to reply to but I've forgotten them by now - besides this is long enough.
Thanks all for your replies!


Ah yes... I meant to mention that my mom has her masters in special education and was a resource teacher for years (currently teaching a 4-5 combo). she knows the system and says a diagnosis is good but to keep her from being labeled as special ed.

The Explosive Child... sounds good. Someone on here wrote a great summary of the ideas presented in the book and it sounds a lot like what we've figured out through trial and error. Biggest problem is getting DH to change his way of thinking. He grew up with a barely tolerant father who used physical punishments and a cowardly mom that catered to the men's (DH, FIL, BIL) every need. He's come a long way from that! I'm very proud of him, just wish he was a reader so he could get the same info I do w/out it seeming like I know more than him or am nagging him.
I'm hoping for dx so I can convince him that his ideas are good for a PC but not gfg.

[flutterbee]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Her triggers can be as simple as asking her if she's hungry. instead of a simple "no thanks" her reaction is more inline with us forcing food into her mouth. It's as though she thinks we can see her thoughts and when we act opposite them it puts her into an emotional frenzy. We're working on getting her to use her words and explain things to people without jumping off the deep end immediately. </div></div>

I feel your pain there. My GFG is the same way. When I repeat her words back to her, using the tone she used, she becomes angry and says, "I didn't say it like that!" Oh, yes you did, darling girl. I've threatened to secretly record her so she can hear herself. I really don't think she realizes how she sounds.

I just ignore her now when she does that. (Ok. Most days. I'm human, too, and some days her tone and attitude make me want to come out of my skin.) When she can talk nice, then I'll respond.

[trsturself]

Our current tactic when she is demanding or rude is, "I'll give you one chance to say that in a nicer way" and if she doesn't know how we will give her the words, such as "can you please get me a drink of water" (instead of yelling Thirsty!). if she chooses not to say it nicer than i choose to say no to whatever she was asking until she can say it nicer.
if i try to just ignore her it makes it worse. she doesn't understand why i'm ignoring her but if i bring it to her attention and then ignore, it works most of the time.

so nice to hear from others that have the same issues. as i'm sure most of you have experienced, most people think i spoil her or am a horrible parent because of her outbursts. it truly makes you realize that what works for one kid (or even thousands) doesn't mean it will work for yours.

i was attending a lecture on gifted kids and a lady had a great response for unsolicited advice. "When you have given birth to and tried to raise MY child, then you might have something helpful to say"

[Shari]

Trst, are you raising my gfg's twin? Wow.

No additional advice, everything you've gotten here is gold, in my book, just want to let you know I feel your pain, too.

Welcome.

[trsturself]

lol shari.

[Wiped Out]

Just wanted to add my welcome as you have already received great advice. As a teacher I'm appalled to hear a principal say something like that-I love Star's response!

[Marguerite]

Trsturself, you said, "In this case since she said she did the act on purpose, she was grounded from TV for the week."

When I said, "Don't punish, you really don't need to in a lot of cases anyway," I really did mean that this is very important. If she has accepted the punishment you have now given her, then keep going as you are. But do you realise - you have just punished her for being honest with you?
By admitting it to you, she did a really brave thing. An honest thing. And it was also a free admission that she did the wrong thing and knew it. THIS DOES NOT NEED TO BE PUNISHED. Instead, reward with praise for the honesty, but sit with her and talk it through - how SHOULD she have behaved? What does SHE think she needs to do?
This will put the ownership back onto her, not only of the problem she herself caused, but also of the solution.

I know this is a radical idea, but this really does work. You have to get back to the aim of the punishment - it is to help them learn the right way to behave, and to help them learn self-control. When the lack of self-control is at least partly NOT under control, then punishment not only doesn't work, it eventually teaches the child "I can't be good no matter how hard I try, so I might as well accept that my life is going to be one long punishment. And why try? I might as well enjoy myself if I'm going to end up being punished no matter what I do."

Think - why did she confess? Your DH did a wonderful thing, when he said to her, "Come talk to me when you are ready." That is EXACTLY what she needed and it worked. She came and told you because she was feeling so bad inside herself, knowing she had done the wrong thing. And as you said yourself, this was a 'wrong thing' which she had been trained to do! Can we really punish our children for doing what they have been taught to do? Instead, we need to find more effective ways to teach the RIGHT way.

You said yourself, she is bright. She will learn fast, where she is capable of understanding. Where she is not capable of understanding or performing, no amount of punishment can change that. But if you have her cooperation (and it sounds like you do), then SUPPORT and respect shown to her will teach her to MIRROR this and give support and respect back, in turn.

As I said before, this seems counter-intuitive. But this is what we have done, and it works, brilliantly.

PDD kids (and your daughter seems very similar to this so I admit I am working on this premise) are VERY law-abiding. But the laws they abide by are the laws they assess for themselves, winnowed from their observations of people around them. If you show them respect they learn that it is best. If they instead are exposed to dog eat dog, that is how they will behave. When they experience 'because I said so," they interpret this as someone else exerting control over them purely for control's sake, and resent it. But they then will adopt this behaviour for themselves and it is often interpreted as insolence, rudeness - and what do we do? We punish them. All this does, in that scenario, is reinforce the problem.

If, instead, you teach the child to be their own moral barometer, you can take a step back from the bossy parent role that so many of us assume is the right way to raise a child. It seems scary and I'm not advocating walking away from parental responsibilities and ignoring what your children do - but what you then do, instead of chivvying your children to do this or that, is you stand back with your hands outstretched at the ready, to support them if they stumble. You help them get their balance back and let them try again, with you as the safety net.

We didn't start doing this until GFG3 was 11 (nearly 12). Two years ago. We saw improvements within a week, but it has taken two years to get us to where we are now. Still problems (especially as viewed from the outside) because we have recognised that he doesn't distinguish between adults and children, parents and child (he can't, I don't think - part of the inappropriate social stuff in his autism) and so we don't punish what seems to be rudeness, although we do correct. Instead of guiding him with punishment/reward, we view his communications/interactions as rehearsal, and just as you handle a rehearsal of a music piece (make a mistake? Then stop, practice that little bit, then try again) that is how we view his interactions with others. He said something tactless? We stop him, point out gently that what he said was inappropriate and try to prompt the correct response, then have him say it again.
Any malice is tromped on and corrected - reminding him that he doesn't like to be receiving malice is generally enough (these days) but may be too advanced a concept for a five year old.
Example - in GFG3's drama class (for Special Ed kids) is a boy who is VERY difficult. Yesterday he was being inappropriate and touching everybody else, apparently trying to provoke a reaction. He is unhappy in the class, I think he knows the other kids don't like him. And they don't like him because he is socially inappropriate - vicious circle. The teacher sent him out, much to the relief of GFG3. But another boy, also autistic, was singing a made-up song about how glad he was that the difficult boy had gone.
As we were leaving I talked to GFG3 about it. "Poor boy," I said. "How mush he feel, knowing you all dislike him and want him gone? No wonder he didn't want to ask if he could go back into class! How have you felt, when other kids were like this? How would you feel if you heard someone singing a song about how they were glad you had been thrown out of the class?"
It's difficult to get this across when they are so thoroughly egocentric, GFG3 still isn't good with theory of mind, he will be looking at the computer screen which is facing away from me, and say, "Doesn't this picture look great?" It has been very hard to teach GFG3 that this boy is naughty because he is unhappy and he doesn't know how to handle it in a more acceptable way. His life is unhappy because of his particular disability. Yesterday he was being taunted, it even seemed to him that other parents were taunting him too. So he began to be even more disobedient, but in subtle ways that most people didn't notice. I suspect his mother had a hard time with him when they went home, he seemed to have the attitude of, "I give up!"

Sorry to go on for so long, but I do feel this is a really critical issue, where so many of us go wrong.

And before I get jumped on, there are times when punishment CAN be appropriate. It's just that too often it's our knee-jerk reaction and it's far less necessary than we think.

Older kids who have different issues with behaviours they can clearly control, kids who deliberately invent complex lies and fantasies purely to get other people into trouble, kids who have learned to be manipulative, kids who have got involved in drugs, theft, vandalism - this won't work. They have learned to manipulate on principle and they will manipulate this as well.
But if you can begin early enough, you can change a great deal, and without wearing yourself out in the process.

Avoid blame. Avoid fault. Instead, focus on helping the child do better next time. Sometimes no fault is involved, sometimes bad things happen which maybe with hindsight we could have avoided, but it's not a matter of blame and punishment, it's a matter for talking out, "how can I do better?"

You also said, "It's as though she thinks we can see her thoughts and when we act opposite them it puts her into an emotional frenzy."
I think you've hit the nail on the head. (As I said before, I think you and your husband are doing a lot of things just right).
This again comes back to theory of mind. And autism. To a certain extent you get this also in very young children.
To test theory of mind, I give you an example:
The child being tested is in a room with the tester and her mother. It is a standard room - chair with cushion, toybox, couch, table. While mother is in the room, the therapist takes a doll from the toybox and hides the doll behind the couch. Mother then leaves the room.
With mother gone, the therapist takes the doll from behind the couch and hides the doll under the cushion on the chair. The doll is completely hidden. The child saw it all.
Then the therapist asks, "Where is the doll?"
The child answers, "Under the cushion on the chair."
The therapist asks, "Where does your mother think the doll is?"
A child with good theory of mind will say, "She still thinks it's under the couch, where she saw us hide it."
A child with poor theory of mind will assume that her mother sees and knows exactly what she does, and will answer, "My mother thinks the doll is under the cushion on the chair."

If your child has poor theory of mind (as I said, common in very young children anyway) then they will get frustrated when you ask what seem to be dumb questions. Or when you ask them to do something that they're not ready to do. And if you get 'heavy' with them, it WILL provoke a tantrum, because to their mind - why are you being so obstructive? And as I said before, these kids will give back what they observe, and so they will become obstructive in return, modelling what they perceive your behaviour to be.

You need to find a way of asking the question, that will not have her feeling 'got at'. It's like the coats again. I can't help you there, all I can suggest is maybe ask her to help you choose what meals to prepare FOR LATER. If you don't react to her tantrum but instead simply wait and reassure her calmly that you're NOT about to make her eat, you just want to know how she is feeling, she might settle down. I used to say calmly, "Why are you shouting at me? I'm not shouting at you, am I?" Her behaviour is coming from anxiety - fear that you are about to exert control over her and her body in a way she can't handle. She needs to know this will not happen, and it takes a lot of reasoning to overcome blind panic. GFG3 still panics and I still have to use MY calm voice to help him regain control of himself. Getting her to use words is really good - it's what we do also. It DOES take time. And you're right, her problems with foods are probably part of the problem, a big part of SID for a lot of kids involves foods - tastes and textures.
Giving her one chance to say it more nicely - if it's working for you then that's great. But with some kids, knowing they only have one chance can make them more flustered and more frustrated (with themselves as much as with you for not reading their minds!)

About getting your DH on the same page - he already sounds like he's making great progress. But I do understand, my DH (Marg's Man) is dealing with the same issues himself. Brought up to be a bit of a martinet. He's been lurking here since I first joined and finding he understands the problems better now. Not tat I was keeping my feelings and thoughts from him, but sometimes there just aren't enough hours in the day to remember the tiny, fiddly details. This way we have taken what was already very good communication and cooperation, and taken it to great heights. He's now a member here also.

And last night - he had been asked to address a forum of other fathers of autistic children, talking about how they are coping, answering questions about what to expect as they get older. He was flattered to be asked and somewhat terrified, I think. But he did great. We talked things through beforehand, which was useful for me, too, to try to crystallise all these years of radical parenting!

Marg

[flutterbee]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body"> if i try to just ignore her it makes it worse. she doesn't understand why i'm ignoring her but if i bring it to her attention and then ignore, it works most of the time. </div></div>

My GFG has a few years on yours. If I ignored her when she was 5, it would have been the same reaction from her as you get from yours. They need to understand and be taught the appropriate way to communicate their wants and needs and I really like how you give her an opportunity to do it over. I did something similar and then as she got older, it evolved into: GFG: "I'm hungry." Me: "That's nice." GFG: "I said I'm hungry." Me: "If you would like something to eat, you need to ask. 'I'm hungry' is a statement, not a request."

With mine, by this time I *know* she knows the correct way to ask or respond because I see her do it with others. Sometimes, it does become a habit they get into it with us - the way they talk to us, etc. It's easier than having to put some thought into it. Since I no longer feel like being a broken record - and to maintain any remaining sanity I have - I ignore. Plus, I think I deserve better treatment from my child.