Reallytrying, Sara PA gave you exactly the right information. Whether ODD itself really exists as a stand-alone diagnosis - I am not an expert, I really don't know. But I DO believe that the label is often applied to a kid who is, in reality, struggling with any one of a number of problems which (for reasons which shall become more obvious later) results in what LOOKS like ODD, but is in reality just the child's reaction to the combination of their underlying disorder and our parental attempts to exert strict discipline.
OK, we can't change the underlying disorder. But we CAN change the way we respond to it and try to control the kids.
I strongly recommend (and I'm amazed nobody has yet suggested this) you get a copy of "The Explosive Child" by Ross Greene. In fact, let your fingers do the walking and stroll over to the Early Childhood forum and look at the stickies - one of them is a really good overview on how you can apply this book to younger children.
Iamhopeful - you go have a look too. This book really is amazing. But you need to really think, from the point of view of your difficult child and to also hold in your mind - no child WANTS to be bad.
I really loathe the connotations of "Oppositional DEFIANT Disorder" because it sends a mixed message to us as parents, that these children are being deliberately naughty and it is part of their basic nature to cause as much devastation as possible.
Very misleading, and as a result I think a lot of parents give up hope, because they're led to believe that their child will never be any better than they are now.
difficult child 3 was never formally diagnosed as ODD - doctors here tend to be very wary of labels. But difficult child 3's teacher in Year 1 was convinced that ODD was the right label. And she had more understanding than most, she had an autistic child of her own. So I did some digging to find out more about ODD. I could see why she thought it fitted him - difficult child 3 certainly had almost all the diagnostic criteria. Where it didn't fit - difficult child 3 was not, in my opinion, being deliberately provocative.
And there is where the problem in diagnosis lies - SOMEONE at some point has to make assumptions about why the child behaves in this way. And generally for the child, there are very good reasons. If you, as the parent, can get into your child's head and work out why he (or she) behaves that way, it can help you find a way to steer (not force) your child into a more productive direction.
For a lot of these kids, it is about control. Their world is confusing and distressing enough, they have little control over their life and what little they have, they want to keep. Then WE come in as parents believing that the only way to handle kids like this is to micromanage every little (and big) thing, and we find the Irresistible Force meeting the Immovable Object. Our kids' determination for some control is so desperate, that if we keep meeting them head-on, they will win. It is far better to never buy into that battle, than to engage, and lose.
You would think that backing off the control with a difficult child would be a recipe for disaster, but we've found it short-circuits the behaviour problems surprisingly well.
So, back to difficult child 3 - it was Year 1 (aged 6) when his desperate teacher said, "He's a classic ODD! I can't handle him! And I KNOW autism, and your kid is being deliberately argumentative and defiant!" Over the next few years things only got worse. We tried everything. It didn't help that the school did nothing to stop bullying - difficult child 3 only got worse, more aggressive, more reactive, and a bigger discipline problem. He and husband especially used to clash badly, because husband was a strict disciplinarian who felt his word should be law. difficult child 3 would need time to change tasks (we had worked this out) but we felt he had to learn to overcome this. As we tried to find ways to work around all this, we always felt resentful that we needed to make these accommodations, because surely all we were doing was teaching the boy that he could control US and making our problems with him worse, not better.
difficult child 3 would have been about 10 when we found this website and were first told about "The Explosive Child". Someone described it and it made sense. By that time we'd tried everything we had access to and none of it had worked, things were worse tan ever. The defiance was intolerable, the violence was extreme, difficult child 3's moods were rock-bottom. Trying to get compliance was almost impossible, we were walking on eggshells. Then other people - their reaction to us was one of "You are terrible parents."
Nothing worked.
Then I read the book. The first, biggest lesson - get into your kid's head. There is always a reason. The next - don't engage in a battle you're not sure of winning.
Then - make a list of what you want to change. Prioritise. Then skim off the top two or three things on the list and put everything else on the backburner. Don't try to do everything at once or the kid will feel overwhelmed and will simply stop trying. As the behaviour improves you can move to the next issue.
Also, it takes time to turn things around.
As I read the book, I must have already begun processing this information. difficult child 3's behaviour began to improve even before I got to the end of the book.
That was less than three years ago (I think). I had got a library copy of the book (eventually - it's popular). It took me another year before I could get the book itself. And husband still couldn't read it - he "couldn't get into it" even though he really wanted to. So I summarised it for him. I found that to be a helpful exercise, because it consolidated the information in my own head.
Now - You would hardly know difficult child 3. He's a good kid. Always was, it turned out. he was just handled wrong. Of course, we ALL thought we were handling him right. After all, we were using discipline techniques that are found in all the good child-rearing books, methods that had worked so well with our older kids, and with us when we were kids.
But sometimes what works for one kid, can be a disaster for a difficult child. But this method - works fine for easy child kids too.
difficult child 3 still has trouble task-changing. But now he KNOWS we won't discipline him for failing to stop his computer game on time, by just walking over and shutting off the game (although I might threaten). What worked, is that I responded to HIS lack of respect, by showing him respect even though he didn't deserve it. Slowly he learned the right way to behave and also learned to feel safe.
Where he is now - he is far less stressed. So are we all. He still gets stressed in various situations but now we understand it and can help him through it.
School - he loves learning but can no longer attend a mainstream school. He learns by correspondence and his teachers (on the other end of a phone, mostly) are very understanding. difficult child 3 can still seem rude and disrespectful, but again, we've learned to see this is not his intention. He is simply being honest. So if what he says or does seems disrespectful we WILL correct him, but not with anger. We keep focussed on the main aim - to help him learn most effectively and positively. If he gets upset or angry, he won't learn from it.
difficult child 3 is still autistic. High-functioning. But to most people, they don't see this. They see a polite, helpful, willing kid.
He's 14. We don't know yet what the world has in store for him. But what we DO know - he's in the best position possible to be the best he can be.
What I'm trying to say - this works. Not perfectly necessarily, but hey - ANYTHING is an improvement.
And once you've got the overlay problems out of the way, you can see what is left and thereby get a better 'handle' on what the underlying disorder really is.
We're here. With most of us, we're just other parents of difficult kids. We're just like you. We've been where you are.
Sorry you need to be here, but we're glad to be available.
Marg
