Possible child with ODD and already has autism

[megapterawhales]

Hello,
I am new to the forum,. and hope I can get some ideas and input. My daughter is diagnosed with Pervasive Dev Disorder/not otherwise specified. She is nine years old and was placed in the autism classroom because of aggressive behavior like kicking, biting, and hitting adults. Last December she was suspended for three days because of the classroom having to be evacuated while she tantrumed. Today she was suspended for a day because she kicked a teacher without any provacation. In talking to one of her autism therapists, we think she has ODD too. If anyone has any ideas, pleas let me know. We will see the psychologist on Thursday. Hopefully, the paychiatrist will call us soon. She is currently taking respiradone. Thanks

 

[helpangel]

Wow I can sure sympathize with what your going thru I feel so bad when my daughter gets aggressive with school staff. Not sure what testing your psychologist & psychiatrist did but it would be a good idea to get a full neuropsychologist evaluation done. At school if they haven't done a functional behavior assessment request one and hopefully they can come up with a BIP (behavior intervention plan) that can help school to be a less frustrating place. Prayers go with you as you start your journey looking for answers.

 

[compassion]

Reading and applying the suggeations on books about Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) has helped a lot with my daughter. I got some grat books from the Aspergers/autism website. I donot have them in f romnt of me. I know one is 5 is agianst the law: it is teachingn skills to id feeligns before they explode. We got a chart that she can concretly id when it is a 1 or 2. I try to break down skills and comeup wiht a few to work on. For exampl, the identifying anger before it reahs explosion, working on self contol, working on stress, beign able to say I messages vs. badgering. It has helped me to see skills and know that a lot of times she does not have the skills. I got a begining book on Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) snd it ehped alot. My daughter needs such concrte stuff. I also leanred how visual she is. This has helped so much. Comapssion

 

[BusynMember]

My son has Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD)-not otherwise specified. I respectfully disagree with the need to add ODD to the diagnosis. Her behavior is sadly common with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) kids and is directly related to the Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD). Since Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kids have trouble communicating and are sensitive to stimuli and change, they CAN act out (some are mellow, but many can get quite aggressive when out of their comfort zone). My son has Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD)-not otherwise specified and used to get aggressive until he learned how to communicate better and to socialize (he is still very shy, but he does have a group of friends who are probably mostly Aspies ). Does she have a para in school? What sort of interventions is she getting? Can she speak well?
What things set her off? It's common for Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kids to freak when somebody tries to tell them to stop doing one thing and change to another (transitioning) or when somebody tries to stop them from doing an obsessive movement. Also, the kids often tend to speak out loud (my son does that even at his room at home.) I asked him why he talks to himself and he said, "There's nobody else to talk to so I talk to me" . Then he said, "I understand better if I say it out loud." THAT I think is the bottom line. He knows better than to speak out loud in school, but my son is quite high functioning (even so, he is quirky).
Trying to discipline a Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) child as if he didn't have Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) won't work. The child will freak out and may get frightened and violent. Do those who deal with him at school understand autism?
Have you and your hub researched the disorder a lot yourself? It's very helpful to know all you can. Knowledge is power, especially when dealing with the school and when choosing the professionals who will work with your child. You can't expect this child to respond to "normal" disciplanary tactics.
Welcome to the board.

 

[SearchingForRainbows]

I agree with the advice MWM gave you. Kids on the spectrum often present as though they have ODD. ODD is usually just a symptom of an underlying disorder. Once the appropriate interventions are in place, the ODD behaviors usually subside.

Anyway, I just want to add my welcome and let you know I'm glad you found us. WFEN

 

[TerryJ2]

Hi Megaptera, welcome.
I agree with-MWM, that ODD is redundant when you're talking about autism/Asperger's. These kids often have no other way to communicate or express their frustration, so it just goes with-the territory.
The medications can help, but your daughter needs training as well. Sounds like she's already getting some intervention by being placed in an autistic classroom, but as others here can attest, there are no guarantees!
One of the things you can do--actually, not to do--if she has a total screaming meltdown, is do not explain or try to teach her in the middle of it. Wait until it is over and then she can listen. It's got to be fairly close in time, though, say, within an hr or 2, for her to remember. These kids can be so mean and hurtful, and we go for days licking our (emotional and physical) wounds, and they're back to normal in a jiffy.

Another thing you can do is find out what she was doing just b4 she lit off. For ex, you say that she kicked the teacher for no good reason, but I'll bet your daughter was doing something frustrating at the time. Maybe a math problem? Or the teacher told her it was time to go? Autistic kids do not transition well, as I'm sure you know.

 

['Chelle]

Hi meg. MWM's comments and advice pretty much echo what I was thinking. Until we got our diagnosis, ODD was the only thing ever mentioned in connection with our difficult child. We saw the psychiatrist, who specializes in developmental disorders, and she diagnosis'd him Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD). I mentioned ODD, and she said oh NOOO NOT ODD at all. As Wishing said, once the proper accomodations etc. were in place, his odd-type symptoms are pretty much gone. The behaviors your difficult child displays are probably the way she knows right now to express her frustration at whatever the real problem is. Kicking the teacher - it could have been something as simple as the teacher may have been humming under her breath, and your difficult child didn't know how to express that bothered her and to get teacher to stop. Simple things to us, may push out Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) difficult children to the breaking point. Many of my difficult child's meltdowns pre-diagnosis had to do with sensory issues - like one he had when they were piping Christmas carols into the classrooms, thinking it would be enjoyable for the kids. For my difficult child, the noise drove him nuts and he didn't know how or even that he could get them to stop it, he got frustrated trying to do his work, and so he kicked desks, tore paper etc. Took him a while to learn to voice when sensory things bugged him, and that he could actually ask them to change things.

Welcome to the site

 

[megapterawhales]

Hello folks,
Thanks sooo much for the advice. I do have a dilema. Here in Wa state we were supposed to go see Walking with Dinosaurs. When my daughter got suspended we told her she could not go. However, the tickets are fifty dollars a piece and it is SPECATULAR. If it comes to your area see it. Check out the website if you want, just google it. I digress. Anyway, it turns out my husband was going to sell his and my daughter's tickets. However, the person bowed out. So we are going to go with her. She will have another chance by luck. However, is this wrong.? We need to send her a message, but she also has special needs We are not going to tell her until tonight.
I will also investigate further about the ODD. I also know from developemental classes that nine years and pre-pubescent years are very hard on top of her disability.

 

[tiredmommy]

Personally, I think punishing her for something she very well may not be able to control is unnecessary. I'd tell her that you thought it through again and decided she can go, but encourage her to write a note of apology to her teacher (but only if that won't set her off again). I'd be spending my energy trying to figure out the trigger for her ODD-ish behaviors and work from there.

 

[midwestdad]

I agree that you should have some further behavioral planning, support and analysis done. You said she had been biting, hitting, etc., but have they identified antecedents? Does she have the episodes at home? How often? Do they happen at a certain time of day? One of ours has had issues at school because he seemed to go off at staff for no reason at all, but we think that the reason was internal - he was anticipating something bad happening, so he reacted, even though the "bad thing" hadn't happened (and might not have). Very frustrating, I agree.

Whether you put the "ODD" or any other label on it, you'll still need the same behavioral and medical supports, so I wouldn't lose too much sleep over it, even though I am wondering the same thing for mine.

 

[compassion]

Today I will be with difficult child all dayick her up at hoptial, take her to do community service, neuropsychologist testing, and then to health dept. A lot of transtins: I will try to stay calm. Compassion

 

[TerryJ2]

I agree, it's okay if she goes, just say things changed, but she still needs to do something to address her behavior--apologize, write a note, do extra chores, whatever.
Good luck!
Wish the show were here.

 

['Chelle]

I would take her, but do give her a talk about why etc. The school asked me not to punish my difficult child much further at home for school happenings, and they would do whatever at school. They did suspend occasionally, but for my difficult child he didn't want to be there so it really wasn't a punishment, and they quit doing it so frequently. When suspended, the punishment I had was during school hours he sat in his room doing nothing other than school work (worksheets / workbooks I had or work from school), and if not doing school work he sat doing nothing during the day, no playing or TV etc.. Made being home not much of a better treat, and after a few times he did try to not get suspended.

 

[megapterawhales]

Hey folks,
Thanks for the advice. Once more, the ODD idea was thrown out because it is redundant and my teacher of the autism classroom agrees with it By the way we did go Walking with Dinos. It turned out to be an awesome time and my daughter was great. I am new to the forum, so what does difficult child stand for? As for the questions about her aggression, we have seen our psychologist. He did tell my hub about punishment for the long term and said that disciplining should be approached differently. He also agreed to ignore the idea of ODD because of redundancy. As for our psychiatrist, we are putting her on a new medication called seraquil. It is in the same family of respiradone, which she was taking before. It is also a higher dosage. I have had to stay home ALL WEEK and am going STIR CRAZY. My daughter has a combo cold and allergies.

 

[TerryJ2]

I hope she's feeling better, and that you've been able to do something on your own by now.

I'm glad you got to see the dino show.

 

[Marguerite]

Welcome, Meg (from Marg).

You said, "Today she was suspended for a day because she kicked a teacher without any provacation."

Trust me - for a Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kid, there was provocation. It may not have been provocation that we would agree with, but in her mind, she was provoked. Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kids don't do this sort of thing out of the blue. There is ALWAYS a reason.

Also, I firmly agree - punishment at school for school offences stays at school. You certainly can (and should) talk about it at home, but just as you don't expect teachers to punish your child for not eating their dinner the night before, you shouldn't punish your child on top of the school's punishment. Home should be a refuge from school, if school is a struggle for any reason.

You are new to this site and I suspect you have been struggling in isolation with your daughter, following all the advice you're given and feeling like you're rolling with the punches instead of being able to predict what is going to happen and get on top of it.
How I read this in you - you are accepting what the school tells you as fact. "She kicked a teacher without provocation". There are many things where your child is held to expectations she simply can't yet manage. An example I often use - it's like punishing a blind child for failing to copy accurately form the blackboard. Some kids just can't do it. You hear adults say of a child, "He should be able to do this AT HIS AGE."
Or as we heard about difficult child 1 at 16, "We shouldn't be doing so much for him with reminding him about his assignments and explaining how to break up the tasks into steps. Because if we help him this much, he won't learn how to fend for himself when he finishes school at the end of the year."
The answer, each time, is "This chils simply is not capable of doing these things at an age appropriate level. You cannot judge this child by normal standards, because this child is not normal. He can get there, with help, but until then, he needs help. A child who cannot swim will drown if thrown in the deep end. Provide water wings and the child won't drown, and has a chance to survive long enough to learn to swim. Provide swimming lessons in the shallow end and the child should do even better. So what if other kids his age can swim already and would therefore survive being thrown in the deep end? We're talking about THIS child, not everybody else."

You may feel the school staff are loving and compassionate - and perhaps they are. But I suspect they are trying to use punishment to make your daughter "toe the line" and learn appropriate behaviour. But this is often exactly the wrong approach, with Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kids (and a lot of other difficult children; "difficult child" = "Gift From God", the child that brought us to this site. "easy child" = "Perfect Child", even though no child really is perfect).

Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kids tend to need to control their environment. They hate changing task and this can be a BIG bone of contention at school. A teacher saying, "Put away your spelling sheet and get out your maths book" can trigger a meltdown. They need to be assisted in various ways to make the transition. In our family we have learnt ways which help. It's not perfect, but it is a whole lot better.

For a better understanding, as well as some useful methods of dealing with the behaviour of these kids, read "The Explosive Child" by Ross Greene. It's not a cure but it is a different way of approaching this, it can actually be easier instead of more difficult. A lot of us on this site have found this book useful. Grab a copy from the library or do some searching online. If you look on Early Childhood foru you will find some discussion on applying this book to younger children; you might get some idea just from reading those stickies.

Again, welcome. Help is here, from a lot of people who have pooled experience and learned the hard way, so you don't have to.

Marg