was told my son was manipulating me

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Congratulations on having such a wonderful son, Ladivegas! I am perhaps biased because I behaved much like he does. Haha. I never stopped talking in class, gave the teachers a hard time, and never did my homework. By the time I was 9 years old I was getting kicked out the classroom - don't remember before that. I remember kids in more senior grades being astonished and asking me what I did because they didn't think that grade 4 students could get kicked out of class.

Before I comment on the psychologist, let me say that despite my so-called "behavior problems" I have lived a lovely and very successful life. Keep your son's confidence high and encourage him to accomplish notable things. Despite what his teachers think, his excessive talking in class is a minor side show.

Next, your psychologist is a fraud. Your son is not manipulating anyone; he is simply misbehaving. I wish I could tell you why he is misbehaving, but I am not sure that I know. I think that I was simply having fun and amusing myself in school, and I wasn't impressed by detentions, which were the main punishment. A number of witty comments, or an enjoyable argument with the teacher were definitely worth a detention. And once I had a few weeks of detentions in the bank, one more was meaningless. I actually enjoyed school, but I was never bullied since I wasn't shy and was able to reply very ably to any unpleasant remark.

Now for my advice. How are you supposed to be responsible for your son's behavior in school? This is nuts!! The teachers have a university degree of some sort and a salary, and they want you to do their job for them when you are not even there?! Do your son a favor and and stop giving him a consequence for what goes on at school, and stop lecturing him. Treat him with respect, pride and courtesy, and listen to him calmly if he wants to discuss what went on in school. Give him serious consequences, without the lectures, for transgressions at home, such as the lying. I wouldn't put up with the school suspending him for talking in class and they wouldn't be phoning me every day about my son's behavior. I would tell them if they want me to do their job for them they should resign and I will take their place. You can see that I haven't changed too much in 50 years

I could go on about how my parents handled my school issues, but this is getting too long. Let me just add that a great irony is that I have a wonderful, accomplished AS son who is of the perfectionist type. I am sure that all homework ever assigned to him was turned in to perfection, and he would have been mortified by the slightest disciplinary scrape. It's a crazy world!

And by the way, in my view your son is normal; he is just not typical.

Thank you for your post. I love it. You said exactly what I want to say to the teachers and administration. I actually pulled him out of one school and got very upsest with them for always giving my son detention and letting other students off the hook. The principal of that school told me after my son left he didnt have another problem in the class and my son was the reason for all the distributions in the classroom. Only he continued the same behavior at the new school and the students kept calling him the bad kid.

He doesnt realize what he is doing is wrong and he doesnt care what the conquences are because he always feels he was right and he is not backing down. Also, I am not so sure if everytime he lies that he is really lying. Most of the time I think he just has a very different version of what happened and he believes his version is right. I know because I do the same thing. I always feel I have some insight into situations that others dont.

The problem is that it is not socially accept to call people out on their mistakes or give them advice they dont want and so you become the outcast.

Thats fine I will just home school him so he will not be a distruption to anyone. He interacts with people just fine he just doesnt respond well in large groups. Because he like to point everything out and tell it like it is constantly and doesnt know when to be quiet and stay out of peoples business.

Him and I used to get along very well until this pyschologist got me think he is getting over on me so know I cut him off and wont let him agrue his point and I tell him not to comment on other people and what they are doing he can only comment about what involves him. this is creating a lot of tension between us. I hope it is for his own good and he learns how to behave if that is possible.

I know a lot people in this world who are still successful and yet dont have to behave.

I totally relate to your post. Thank you again.

I am pleased that you appreciated my post. Obviously I relate to your son, and am pulling for him. I doubt if there are many people on this board that can relate to him as I do.

Following are some comments on your last post. They won't conform to conventional wisdom, but then your son is not conventional.

If your son was like me he probably was the main source of disturbance in the class, and he probably deserved the detentions according to the school's standards. So what? Why the drama from you? I had some very kind-hearted teachers who clearly felt terrible when they gave me detentions. I think that I coped with the detentions better than they did . They just didn't know what else to do with me. There are big differences among schools, but moving your son to a different school won't change his behavior, as you found out.



Bravo for your son!! First, what he is doing is not WRONG, it is merely against the rules. Murder, theft, and being mean to others are wrong. I am an extremely moral person despite of the fact that I (horror of horrors) talked incessantly in class and argued with my teachers. I suspect that he knows that what he is doing is against the rules (I did), but he doesn't care a whit about those rules. Second, I hope that you are not falling for the NT nonsense that thinking you are right and not backing down are negative attributes. When your son gets out in the real world, having confidence in his decisions and sticking to his guns will be huge assets. Rather than doing anything to sap his confidence and self-esteem, teach him proper etiquette and common courtesy. This might be a hard slog, so keep hammering away at it.



I don't think that is a good reason to home school him, although I am sure it suits the school. Please do what is best for your son, not the school. I am not an expert in home schooling so perhaps take my thoughts with a grain of salt. Home schooling deprives the student of a lot of important social interaction, so it is less than ideal. If a number of conditions are present, notably that the student is absolutely miserable, probably because of bullying and the bullying cannot be stopped, and there is no better school available, and a parent is able and willing to home school, it is obviously the best option. We actually moved so that my son could attend an excellent school suitable to his needs. From my personal experience, children who have been home schooled for a few years and then tried to reintegrate the school system had severe difficulties. The only successful cases I have seen are those where students were home schooled until completion of high school, and then were able to transition directly to college.

I wonder if your son is really that unhappy at being in school. It would be an error to assume that just because he is in constant trouble means that he is unhappy. As I said, I had a very happy childhood and actually had a lot of fun in school. I expect that many students who were never in trouble were much less happy than I was.

Here is a thought. I am wondering what would happen if you put your son in the best school available and told the school that he is a very good boy in many ways, but that he has a history of disturbing the class. Tell the school that you have tried in the past to control from home his in-school behavior and that this does not work. Tell the school that the only option is leave your son in their hands and to trust them to do best for him. It seems to me that they have an obligation to deal with him the same way that my school dealt with me. If your son comes home complaining, listen calmly without taking sides and tell him that you are not in charge of the school. If the school complains about your son, try to fob them off with some NT diplomacy, such as that you appreciate how much they are doing for your son and that you know it is not easy. But don't intervene at home! Teach your son that he is a great kid, and don't even mention his behavior in school if you can help it.



Teach him right from wrong, to be considerate to others, to be kind to people who are weaker than him, to pull his weight in society etc. He will then know how to behave, no problem whatsoever. If he is like me, telling him to be obedient won't impress him. However, I am an upstanding citizen and have never been in trouble with the law.

Please continue to have confidence in your son.

In response to the OP my son was the exact same.

He is 8 yrs old and after almost a year of this i finally agreed to a "Behavior Intervention" (special ed) class at an alternate school that offered such and it was of great comfort that the main teacher of this class, whos kids are now grown, struggled with this kind of behavior from her youngest son and so now is the special ed teacher..

There are 8 kids in the class from 1st-8th grade with 4 aids to help teach and it's divided into two rooms.
My son loves going to school now and they help each other out, it's also helped him see different types of kids, such as one who communicates using sign language that his other school was not exposed too.

He loves his "special" bus that picks him up and drops him off. The key signal is that he doesn't question any of these changes.. his response to is has been typical of anything else.. strong clue for the autism spectrum.. I have it too but learned just to cope but this is the source for a lot of our struggles and frustration between us both..

Ofcourse, i don't care who you are or what condition you have, if you are not being heard you are going to retaliate or find some way of venting, so working on understanding him will cause unwanted behaviors to start to subside.. An anti-depressent can help with your patience a tad after you've been on it a while.. i'm saying that from experience..

Good luck and best wishes..

i just read your post and i feel like crying because many of your issues are exactly the same for us. Sometime I feel like life is impossible and will never get better and I wish i were never born. I just try to cope and take one day at a time

defiant
likes to argue until the end and beyond
thinks she knows all but in reality she's clueless
wants everyone to listen to her and do the things she likes but everyone else around her is less important
likes to impose her will on everyone
lacks social skills
doesnt learn from her mistakes

she was just diagnosed with AS so we are seeking new help as we were seeing a therapist for a long time
because we were just told she has ADHD and is a difficult child. Now that we have the diagnosis of AS we need a specialist in that field.

I think you need a different psyc...and you need to hold the school accountable too!!

My son is 8yrs old. @ like 3 or 4 was diagnosed as adhd

last yr was diagnosed AS?ADHD

School was a nightmare up until last year.(Their report...he was rude, disruptive, defiant...etc...)

He is actually, blunt, inqisitive, and when over stimulated he stims (which is disruptive)
Since the diagnosis: We have an IEP, one on one aid, in home/ and outside therapy. He persieves the rules in a very black and white way. If it is one way one place then it should be the same everywhere. Sometimes when he is percieved as rude, it is more of a miscomunication or tone of voice issue (social).

I agree...it is my job to teach him how to socially survive in society. But i believe, as a child (for him)....It is every adult who comes in contact with him responsibility to be patient and understanding and even tollerant....and to participate in helping him learn these social skills. I am really upset with the way the school and his doctor have handled the situation. I would seriously get a new doc....and Politely demand that the shool accomodate him....they have a legal obligation to educate him....the way he is....not the way they expect him to be

I know Im new, and I not had much to say up to now because others on here have always expressed exactly what I feel, but this is about your son, not about what you can do to your son.
This thread makes me cringe, because all the people are recommending things that pretty much come down to torture. Removing him from things that are familiar, and putting him in situations with even more people he doesnt know.
You have to realize that in his mind, rules are gospel when they are right, and illogical rules are meaningless. Your punishment is not punishment, but you being cruel in an illogical situation.


Rules are supposed to be logical. Punishment for logical rules is just.

He is trying to find logic in everything, and if there is a rule that is not logical he will break it because logic is gospel and he is drawn to follow it. Hes not breaking rules because its a rush, he is ignoring stupidity in his eyes.

Therefore, he expects logical rules to be enforced, and at the same time he considers the punishment for illogical rules not as punishment, but as you lashing out at him like an idiot. Punishment for breaking an illogical rule does not make him want to follow illogical rules, it makes him hate the person enforcing them and makes him feel that the punishment is for the enjoyment of the person punishing.

I still have trouble dealing with illogical rules, and even things like artificial time frames (such as periods and classes) made me uncomfortable. I have never been able to force myself to fill artificial time frames with a fixed amount of work. I do what needs to be done, and if I get it done halfway through class and I get punished for it, its going to make me have very little respect for the illogical person punishing me for being EFFICIENT.

The thing is that even if he is given his own time frame for something, he may have suffered such emotional distress that he will be unable to function and instead will look for logical sources of self esteem. Pretty much wasting his energy that could be productive because he is too miserable.

You have a very good point. I see this in my son. I work really hard to get him to see the logic behind rules; we spend a LOT of time talking round about such things. It is a very necessary part of the process when raising an AS child.