I Think I Did This Right!

B

Bunny

Guest
easy child came home from school and I was trying to get him settled to start his homework when difficult child comes running up the stairs and asks easy child if he wants to play with him "right when you finish your homework." easy child says say. I step in because I was sitting in the room and I say to easy child that what he is saying is that the minute that he finishes his work difficult child will expect him down to play. Is that what you mean? easy child looks at me like I'm crazy and says, "No. I mean later. After that." difficult child starts to get angry because that is not what he wants. "This is why I hate when he does this! He says he'll play with me, but then he never does!"

So, I suggested that they set a time to play together. Provided that easy child is done with his homework at that time, easy child has to stop what he is doing and play with difficult child. I asked easy child if that would work for him. He said yes. I asked difficult child if he would be willing to wait for easy child to finish his work and have a little quiet time before he plays with him. He said yes.

I think I may have just killed two birds with one stone: difficult child knows that easy child will play with him and when, and difficult child isn't coming into the kitchen a hundred times asking, "Isn't easy child done with his homework yet? What is taking him so long?"
 

InsaneCdn

Well-Known Member
I think you're on the right track.
I'm also thinking your difficult child sounds more and more spectrumish... :D
Concrete answers really help. They really like "measurable".
 
B

Bunny

Guest
Yeah, I'm beginning to really think that this is something that is being missed. When I go for a second opinion I am definately going to bring this up.
 
T

TeDo

Guest
You did AWESOME! That is exactly what we have to do with difficult child 1. It has eliminated a LOT of meltdowns. You'll have to explain the why to easy child so he's learning as well. I hope it works out as well as it does in our house. Absolutely keep a parent report with the past situations and this one with the "results" listed. Make sure it's clear if it is the "vague" language that is causing the problems for the most part. Also keep this in mind in ALL aspects of dealing with difficult child. In our house, the other big thing was not expecting a sudden compliance to requests. That means that I can't tell difficult child 1 to do something without some warning and a countdown. I have to either say a specific time or phrases like "at the next commercial you need to ____" or "when you're done with this level on your game I need you to" and then watch for that marker to remind him. That was the other huge change I had to make. GOOD JOB Mom!
 
B

Bunny

Guest
In our house, the other big thing was not expecting a sudden compliance to requests. That means that I can't tell difficult child 1 to do something without some warning and a countdown. I have to either say a specific time or phrases like "at the next commercial you need to ____" or "when you're done with this level on your game I need you to" and then watch for that marker to remind him. That was the other huge change I had to make.

That is something that I've been doing for a while. I would remind him that I needed him to do X and I would say that it needs to be done by a certain time. Or if I need everyone to clean their stuff off the dining room table I will tell him a few days before that I need it done by a certain day. That seems to work for him because he knows that he needs to do it, but it alleviates the anxiety of having to do it RIGHT NOW!

I also had a talk with easy child yesterday and told him that difficult child has a hard time with subjective words, like "later". He needs very concrete words like "at 5:30 I'll play X game with you." I'll have to work on that with him because it's really new to him.

I guess I did really better than I thought I did because difficult child came up from the basement to do his homework and he left easy child in the basement playing on his new game. All by himself. He NEVER EVER does that! I asked him why he chose to do that and he said, "Well, easy child was a good boy today."

I have to say that I gave difficult child a HUGE hug before he went to bed last night and told him that I was really proud of him for stopping to listen when I was trying to make things more concrete for everyone, instead of just flying off the handle about easy child not wanting to play with him immediately.
 
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