Meltdowns and tantrums -- look at it from my side...

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I was wearing an eye patch when I went out yesterday - I had bought it so I could watch movies, but had to wear it on the way to the grocery store because we were stopped by construction in easy view of 5 vehicles with flickering lights.


I left it on in the store because i've always felt sick in that store and I noticed they had celiing fans near the lights which might be the reason why.

Its amazing how much kinder people were and how friendly they were, how many people tried to get me in line and front of them,etc. I'm less disabled with the eye patch than I am with out it. Some of these same people would have been given me bad looks or whispering nasty comments about how I'm jsut taking advantage of the government if I didn't have it on when they saw my food stamp card.

It turned out to be very wise to buy it because on the way home we also passed a police car with lights on and then took the ferry to avoid construction and my side of the river was awash with flickering light from the suns reflection on the water

If you punish by taking away something the austic child loves, it makes them feel forced to try to not to meltdown so they don't loose what they love. So when they get stressed, they have to shut thier eyes. Meltdowns can end up causing depression.
They have for me.

I find this subject very confusing as it relates to my older son (DS5). He has been having terrible tantrums which are caused by problems he himself makes! For example, he will terrorize his little brother (DS2), and I will separate them, then DS5 cannot control himself and purposely encroaches on DS2's space yet again, causing DS2 to cry, and I insist that DS5 stop it, and then DS5 gets mad at me for "yelling" at him (when I may only change my voice to a more stern one, but definitely not yelling), and then he goes full blown into a major tantrum. He will stomp, bang furniture, hit himself, hit me, yell very rude things, and on. I am simply at a loss what to do. He frightens me with the rage he has at such a young age. I have taken away privileges, toys, and I have tried the reward system as well, to no avail. It is extremely disheartening not to know how to manage your child. I love him dearly but I do not know what to do with him. His former ABA therapist says that he is manipulating and tantrums to get what he wants (even though he doesn't get what he wants!), and my psychiatrist believes that his neurological wiring is causing it and I should consider medication. Let me just say I would rather medicate myself first than medicate him! My son will say he hates me, he wants a different mother, or say that I hate him, even though I constantly tell him I love him, but nothing gets through. I sometimes do need to know, is it a meltdown or a tantrum? Do I let him shout horrible things to people when angry, without consequence? Isn't that teaching him that it is OK to verbally abuse people when angry? Should I let him kick the walls and furniture and destroy property? Lately I've been at my wit's end trying to figure this out. He's been getting worse over the past several weeks and I don't know why. Sorry to hijack this thread. But please help...

I was told my son was manipulating me as well, but it just didn't make sense because he didn't GET anything for his behavior. Its not like he had a fit and then I handed him a toy. he usually had a consequence he didn't like. So where was he manipulating me??

UGH professionals who have no idea what they are talking about...

We have found that "calming" timeouts are the most helpful thing, at this time, for us. Punishment timeouts enrage him and make him think things are unfair. Timeouts for calming calms him down (eventually.) A calming timeout is basically the same thing (being sent to his room) with the addition of the fact that we will actively help him calm down, instead of letting him stew in there by himself or try to "break out."

We have given a couple of punishment style ones (without calling attention to the fact that it was a punishment timeout) for things that were obviously more typical kid stuff. When we know (or suspect) he is not looking at it it from any other perspective than his own not necessarily rational one we use the calming one and attempt to explain the issue once calm.

I am not claiming loads of progess or anything, but it is way better than how these things went before.