Successful Discipline styles for our kids?

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I think you've hit exactly what I was going to recommend: schedule, make agreements, have some strategies for dealing with discipline and do not vary. Ever. If a certain behavior requires time out, then make sure it always gets time out, even if she won't stay in the chair--and have a strategy worked out because sometimes she probably won't.

My son is restless about falling asleep and my daughter is a tosser/turner--so it's kind of like reading about them rolled into one. With both of them, and me, we seem to sleep better when there has been some vigorous physical exercise nearly every day. When my son doesn't sleep well he spend a lot of time with the TV and video games--which (I've found) tend to make him more restless. Having some agreements about time spent (even though it is his 'thing') has helped him with that--plus the exercise helps.

The other thing I was going to mention is that you need to draw some boundaries that keep you functional and it is okay to demand those--your room being your space and that she is not welcome when the door is shut and locked can just be an absolute. Just be sure not to waver, and wait until she is in a calm space to let her know this. When my daughter has her meltdowns, she will escalate unless everyone completely leaves her alone. We cannot talk to her, touch her, talk about her, look at her or even in her direction. I usually tell her that she is welcome to rejoin us when she is ready and that we wish she would join us, but not until she is ready. Then we go about our business. This gives her the space to get herself regulated, and stops that Aspie thing of "I was awful, now no one is talking to me so nobody loves me..." When she starts calming, I used to invite her back again, just so she understood we were still wanting her to join us. Now that she's used to the routine, I don't need to reinforce that so much and she comes back to join us without more prompting.

The problem is, once she gets to meltdown, further stimulus is just keeping her in that state. You retreating is not only good for yourself, but it gives her a chance to deal. One thing that worked for me was to simply not react to the meltdown--drop facial expression, disengage physically and turn away. Do not respond, do not make eye contact. She will scream, you cannot feed that--it is not an NT plea for attention, giving it any of your energy will just make it harder for her to get under control. Attention (whether that's you talking to her or closing your bedroom door in reaction) feeds the meltdown and is adding to the sensory information that has already overloaded her.

When my kids were this age, we had a 'relaxation cd' that talked the kids through self-soothing. It was probably made for preschoolers, but we used it for years. We incorporated it into regular bedtime, along with the scheduled stories, pats, backrubs, singing and goodnight kisses. At some point we had to leave the room, and the transition into sleep was always bumpy. This cd bridged the gap. Most nights they were asleep before it ended, it helped them feel not entirely alone, soothed and really did help them wind down. It meant that lights usually went out at 8:30 at this age, because that meant they would finally be sleeping by 9:30.

Hope something in there helps...it is exhausting. Hang in there.

DandelionFireworks, that is helpful. My daughter mortally afraid of Policemen and although I've never tried to enforce that mindset I have told her if you steal or don't do as you are told you will grow up and go to jail. Guess I need to re-think that.

Pandora, i wish my daughter would allow a tape playing to help her go to sleep. This entire week, according to the schedule, we eat from 5-6pm, outside vigorous play 6-7pm (biking, trampoline, walk around neighborhood, hopscotch), 7-8pm bath, pjs, brush teeth, to bed, and 8pm-on in bed drawing, reading or listening to soft music. I am in there laying next to her. She does protest saying she "needs tv" or "needs to be in my bed". I rearranged her room so her bed is far from the closet and she can't see the closet and I think this helped.

Perhaps some day she will be able to put herself to sleep. Right now I am elated that she is sleeping in her own bed at all! Baby Steps!

BTW, she is awakening at night and coming into my room between 12:30am-3:30am. I am allowing her to come in. Eventually, though I would like to take her back to her bed.

Last edited by Mama_to_Grace on 01 Aug 2010, 6:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Mama to Grace, you are doing a wonderful job with your daughter. I know you have a lot of guilt about the past, but you are going forward now, and I don't think dwelling on the past will help. I think a lot of us think that we are not good parents because our children do not always obey, or because they do odd things. But, I think you are doing the best that you can under the circumstances.
I don't believe that sleep issues are the only thing causing her problems, but I do believe that sleep is VERY IMPORTANT, so I think that this is great that you are working on this. My son is 5, and we have always had sleep problems with him too, (not as extreme as yours), so I have always worked on his sleep. He is now sleeping pretty good through the night. I know that when I don't get proper sleep, I am a wreck, so I do think it has an effect on a lot of things.

As far as the TV, I think that some is okay, I have been letting my son watch a lot of cartoons this summer. But, over time, he starts to lose interest in it. So, I wouldn't worry too much about her watching it too much. It sounds like a good idea that you did start limiting it, and maybe it was causing some nightmares, who knows?

Anyway, my heart goes out to you. I am sorry you feel alone, and I hope that posting on WP does give you some comfort.

Im an Aspie with an Aspie daughter. One thing which stood out to me in your posts is your daughter is misbehaving a lot of the time out of fears, anxiety she has.

Ohh.. hearing you do that actually makes my heart pound, I feel a fear from just the thought of that.

If that was done to me, locked out, Im sure that would make me hysterical too. This action.. is a complete rejection. In many Aspies who are loosing control.. feeling rejected on top of what they already are experiencing, may cause a further loss of control along with blaming themselves that the other (in this case, her mother) has rejected her.

Have you ever tried to ask her what she needs to help calm down?? What could do for her, that you want to work with her to help her calm down? (then discuss the situation later properly when she is in a good mood).

I myself find that if ive lost it in that way... i cant calm myself, your child is struggling to calm herself and making her feel rejected on top of that.. possibly isnt the way to go.

Only this week i ended up getting upset by a policeman and actually ended up chasing him to his car and tried to jump in the police car, they had to lock the doors to keep me out. In the end they had to ring an ambulance to take me to hospital to calm down.. due to the Asperger's sometimes i just cant.. and anyone doing anything which sets me off further ISNT going to help. I dont know how bad your daughters Asperger's is.. but there is a possibility she may not be able to calm down either once she reaches a certain point.. hence doing anything in which she feels like she's rejected or punished, may not be a good idea and may only add to the anxieties she already has.



my Aspie daughter.. i could never punish her by time out either. The lock on the door may work or it may be a very bad idea and start her destroying things. When i locked my daughter in her room cause she was being very bad (as her room didnt have a lock on it, I held the door shut from other side of the door), she ended up trying to smash the lightglobe on the ceiling by throwing hard objects at it. She also ended up ripping all the fly screen off her window and ran away out throu the window.. if that hadnt worked, she probably would of smashed the window!!. She started to put holes in the house walls during meltdowns at the age of 8 (and she was only a wee thing).


Im glad to hear you are sorting out the bed thing. I couldnt get my daughter to sleep in her own bed and hence she was still sleeping in mine at the age of 13 yrs old. She used to get terrified in her room, nothing would help her fears of being alone in there.



Im with the other Aspie with this.. be very careful here as what you are telling her could do harm.

People used to tell me that if i couldnt control myself I'd go to jail. My fears over this and the police got so bad that i decided i WANTED to be in jail so i'd know what it was like, i couldnt really imagine it and i was scared of the thought so wanted to know what it was like. i thought the knowing of jail by experiencing it would help my fears. So i ended up purposely doing something to get put into jail and ended up staying in jail for a whole month. (i didnt even need to be there, i refused bail as i Wanted to be there to see what it was like and cause i'd lost all faith that i could stay out of jail anyway... afterall i couldnt control my moods even when i tried.. im not able to be good no matter how hard i try.. i cant control my mood swings so i started to think of myself as being bad, so thought yeah i should be in jail as i cant control myself).

Hence the eposide this week.. when a policeman came to my door and the explosion then which was triggered by one coming to my door which ended up with me in hospital. Many Aspies have a great fear of police!! I basically cant deal with them at all. You making her feel uncomfortable with police could lead to BIG DRAMA later. Cause im scared of them, i actually look guilty when approached, they can see my nerves and probably think then i have something to hide.

I'm new to this forum and this is my first post. Thank you for giving this perspective. My son in 7 and I have often told him if he steals or doesn't wear his seat belt (a huge issue for us) that he could get in trouble with the police. I will definitely clarify this for him and not tell him that in the future. This is a very helpful insight.

Violetchild, I greatly appreciate your perspective. I have backed down from the timeouts. However, I have posted a HOUSE RULES posterboard and have gone over with her that if she Yells, Hits, or Bites she will lose all tv for an entire day. The prospect of that is equivalent to death for my daughter so she has been quick to turn things around. I have been giving her a warning when she is starting to escalate and so far so good. I know that a meltdown will happen again and I will have to deal with that when it comes. Like you mention my daughter will pound on and destroy things when she is enraged. That is why I wanted to seclude her in a room or seclude myself from her wrath. I have my own limitations in dealing with someone coming at me, seemingly hell bent on really hurting me (even if she is only 48 pounds ).

I rearranged my daughter's room where she can no longer see the closet and that has helped with her fears. Today we were at the library and I persuaded her to go up to the librarian and ask for help alone (she has never done this before) and she came back with a big smile and pronounced the librarian as "nice". I can't tell you what a milestone this is for her! So perhaps her fears are at bay for now as usually she is afraid of every stranger.

The policeman fear is real-how can she not be afraid of policemen when she is afraid of most strangers-add to that men with guns! I have thought about finding a nice policeman and invite him/her to our home to show her they are nice but I don't know that she would generalize that since one is nice they must all be nice. If I see a policeman out somewhere I will ask her if she'd like to go up and say hi and she shrinks in fear and adamantly refuses. Jail is a very real fear that all people have, not just Aspies, but perhaps it is especially severe for an Aspie like my daughter because being restrained is perhaps the most horrible thing that can EVER be done to her. She will go into full blown meltdown immediately if she is restrained. She has been in at least 3-4 papoose restraining devices by medical professionals and they have since given me emergency medication to use (sedative) in case I ever need to take her to the ER.

I have to say the greatest help I receive is from the perspectives of adult Aspies. Quite frankly pretty much all 1st hand Aspie advice I receive is completely contrary to popular psychological opinion. At first it was so hard for me to believe that success could be achieved with my daughter if I threw out what all of the NT Drs had advised all along (my daughter has endured more psychological abuse from me listening to their advice than anything else!). I throw my hands up with Western medicine, they only want to medicate the will out of my daughter. Sometimes I am so forlorn with the thought that society will inevitably judge and scrutinize my daughter's strange ways....and that is already happening.

That won't help at all. My mother has a close friend who's a cop and I've gotten nothing but gifts from her. (...Well, she also caused me to go on that vacation where I used a dirty hot tub and got a rash you know where, but the bearded dragons made up for that.) She even gave me my first public singing gig. It has not generalized yet. It's probably best to instill the fear in her, but remind her that even if she can't parse what behavior it is now, she'll eventually figure it out, so by the time she's an adult she'll know how to avoid it. The realization that it's not totally random, and the realization that I might someday (maybe even soon) figure out what causes other people to take offense, has gone the furthest toward giving me a little confidence.

Hi I'm a little late posting on this but as the mom of a teen with Asperger's it sounded familiar, my son was afraid of the way his room looked in the dark, I let him sleep with the light on until I found a small lamp that was bright enough but not too bright for him to sleep I also let him pick his own bedding sheets blanket pillow ect.. some textures and soft/rough material is very irritating to an aspie. My son also watched a show once that made him think that ghosts were real he assumed that if it was on T.V. it was true thus he was suddenly haunted by ghosts he wasn't lying it was real to him this is where trust between an aspie and their parent is very important you must ask them why they think these things. remember an aspie child isn't malicious there are almost always reasons why they do the things they do we just have to figure that out which can be very hard. there isn't any medication to *fix* an aspie only to manage anxiety and attention difficulties these must be given to your child in low doses aspie kids ususally need a lower dose so if she's medicated discuss this with your doctor. Also incentives and compromises work better than consequences. i hope it helps.

Mama to Grace, I agree with you. I have gotten the most help for my son from therapists and Wrong Planet, and reading on my own than from doctors.

As far as the tv goes, if I can take my son out to play during the day, and make a routine of it, where he knows he can watch a few shows in the morning, then I can put something on after playing during quiet time has worked for me.

Before I knew it was even a real possibility that my child was AS, and I was busy trying to ignore all the signs, I would read to him with his light on, and let him sleep with his overhead light on. I read chapter books and would read until he was asleep. After he snuck out of his room, dismantled the baby gate, and cut his hand open with a knife when trying to get some string cheese, I started letting him sleep with me, plus I didn't like the idea of leaving his overhead light on all night. I do the same thing with the TV. I'm the same way and cannot sleep without the tv and the fan on. My deal with him is that he has to go to sleep, and I have to leave it on the weather channel so he doesn't stay up watching it. It's not an issue, and to him it's just something comforting. He does insist that there is a monster under the nightstand, so I let him look under there to see there isn't.

Here here! A dr just looked at my ds and saw that he looked at him and interacted some and said I was being silly. Things didn't get better. I called the screening center and we are working on getting a dx, but they took things seriously enough to continue on and actually come to out house. The state here I was told doesn't help with aspies which I don't understand, but I'm getting more help from wrong planet and just going with my gut for discipline than using mainstream discipline methods. They don't work on him. Letting him settle down at night with the tv works. Discussing cause and effect and the reason why I have a rule works. Giving him a safe place where he can see me and he can have his lovey helps. Distracting him by asking him questions about his special interest works. Reguardless of a dx, I'm still finding things in here that actually work for my child, and the past few days have been a delight with him. I'm not stressed and anxious and getting set off, and he is actually managable and I haven't had to raise my voice. I understand him a little better now, and that is invaluable reguardless of what the medical community thinks.

"Finding a nice policeman and inviting him/her to our home to show her they are nice" seems out of the question. After all, police officers have a real fear of simply going into a strange home because they have no way of knowing what type of people might be living there. And honestly, if you have something that you might not even know that's against the law, you're just exposing yourself to legal trouble. I think it's best to take her on a tour of a police station, so she can see the police in the context of their work environment, as well as the tools they use. It's more realistic than seeing one officer in her home (out of normal context) whose niceness may be an act. I don't think she should generalize that all officers are nice, since the way she gets treated depends on her role in the interaction. It's better to generalize that officers will be "civil", rather than "nice". It's an officer's job to remain rational and detached, as opposed to sympathetic, although it might be a defense mechanism for coping with what they encounter.

The first-hand perspective from adult aspies is definitely much better than therapy and/or medical advice. Talking about my problems here on WP gave me real solutions and/or insights I could work with. When I did the same with therapists, all they did was grill me about my feelings, and accused me about not being honest, despite the deceitful platitude "there are no right or wrong answers". I ended up coping by memorizing "right" answers, which killed the point of therapy.

I was talking about physical therapy, speech therapy, and occupational therapy.