Out of control Aspie 7 yr old...don't know what to do?!?

Post Reply New Topic

I'm coming here for help, suggestions, commiseration, maybe? My 7 year old Aspie dd is going through a phase right now. The last few weeks have been terrible! It's just progressively getting worse and worse. This happened last year and she ended up getting suspended for a day because of her behavior (for throwing a crate at another child in PE and they just couldn't settle her down). When she gets like this, she doesn't really "take" to discipline. She laughs and laughs and continues to get out of control even more.

I'm not sure if we're struggling with the fact that she's starting to feel her emotions now more, or understand them. When she was young, she was seemed very "emotionless" and now she just blows up with things like "You're so stupid! I hate this! etc." This week she has seemed incredibly "jumpy" (in a sensory way...she jumps if you touch and seems to be on "high alert" mode). It's very easy to send her over the top in a good way and a bad way. She just gets out of control and then we can't bring her back down very well. She is deaf and has cochlear implants which I just had turned down and I thought that would help (maybe she was feeling overloaded auditorally, though nothing had changed with her programs). I really thought today would be better, but it wasn't. I also took her to the ped b/c she has been complaining about her forehead hurting. Yesterday, when we were there, she just when crazy. She slapped her baby brother across the face for no reason (she's NEVER done that before), tried to kick me and kicked her 4 year old sister. Today, apparently she shouted and spit during a test and then grabbed a bunch of tests that her teacher was reading to the class and threw them on the floor. I just don't know what to do with her. I feel like I'm doing everything wrong, but I don't know how to help her.

So far we've tried various discipline methods or ways to get through to her, included much talking, trying logical explanations, spanking (which just throws her even further into a tailspin), spending lots of alone time in her room, taking things away, behavior charts, and various other methods (including yelling and getting angry at her, which I know is wrong, but lately I've just felt so frustrated and hopeless). She seems to do well with each thing for a short time and then completely loses motivation. We also recently tried a GFCF diet which didn't seem to help, but now she's even worse when we took her off of it. I'm just at my wit's end. I don't have any idea what to do to help my child and it's throwing the rest of our family off. She does have 3 younger siblings, which I realize makes her life (and ours) significantly more crazy and difficult to deal with, but there's really nothing we can do about that. Her younger siblings are really getting the shaft because so much time is spent dealing with her. I'm so sad for her and at the same time angry and frustrated. Is this normal? I thought this year would be better. She was doing so well at the beginning of the year. And then, bam! She's just out of control. She has outbursts quite often where she'll just say "poop!" or whatever else when she's upset or just highly stimulated. She also really struggles winding down for bed. Her teachers say she needs more sleep. We put her to bed at 7:30 every night and she doesn't typically fall asleep until close to 9. I can't make her go to sleep. Even if I put her to bed earlier, she still won't go to sleep.

What am I doing wrong? What can I do to pull her out of the downward spiral?

We have had the same struggle with my 6 year old, but we were actually warned about it by his Pediatric neurologist. Apparently the the time before Thanksgiving to after New years can be hell for Aspies. Christmas lights, parties, breaks from school, changes in schedule, families and friends coming in and out. She said point blank, "expect the weeks around thanksgiving to the end of the year to see a total regression." So my logical question (and I'm sure yours) is what do we do about it?

First, does she have an IEP? My son does and some aids that work with him. I told them very clearly before hand that they would need to pull him out for some additional one on one time during the next few weeks, otherwise it would be hell on them. They have done that and the days that he gets this time are like night and day. Its not a "get attention thing", I've learned that its a "help him refocus" thing. PE is hell for him anyway (the noise, the chaos, the sensory overload) Perhaps they would be willing to allow her to do something else during this time, just for the next few weeks and then you can "reset" after holiday break. My son must participate in the 1st 10 min of PE and then the pull him out, we hope to increase this time gradually over time.

For bedtime. the sleep thing is key to my son too. He takes a huge winddown. I realized that a quiet activity that he enjoys is coloring in his dinosaur coloring books, so I got more and I have him work on this (the only thing he is allowed to do in his room after 'go to bed time -- which is usually 7:30) and he has to do it sitting in his bed. This does wonders for calming him down and making him tired enough to fall asleep faster.

My inlaws were here last week and they spoil my kids rotten. This is often very overstimulating for my son, so I made an extra effort to have alone time with him with little other stimulation (I know this is hard with 4 kids, I have a newborn and another daughter, but it really does make your life easier at the end of the day) I also make sure I am doing more deep pressure stuff like tight hugs, hands on his shoulders when he is getting wound up, etc.

Last, we have a points system with my son's school that we carry over to home too. I know this seems like one more reward chart, but by having all parties enforce it in the same way, it has been key to having him understand the weight of his actions (bigger infractions like hitting, lose more points) and he has really responding to the black and white nature of it. the key is changing up the reward to whatever works for THAT WEEK. So every week I write in his notebook, "my son is working towards X this week." Like during Halloween, if he came home above a certain point scale each week, he got the costume early so he could play in it. Last week, it was time playing with the new toys my in laws bought. The reward system works, if you can change it up frequently enough to really appeal to them in the moment.

Hope some of this helps, I am sure others will chime in with more
Kat

Kat,
Thanks so much! It's funny because last year was hell, but December was actually her best month (right before we had our littlest of course). Daddy also left to go out of town, so I'm sure that's a huge thing for her this week (all those the decline started long before he left, I'm sure it's made it much worse). We're getting ready to try a new behavioral system called Accountable Kids that I hope will help her and will be able to transition b/w school and home. I will ask her teacher to give her more one on one time. She does have a para in her class with her AND she goes to the see the deaf/hard of hearing teacher for writing help. I can ask them to keep her in that class for longer just during December so she can have a little bit more wind down time. I think they may already be doing that, though.

You said it's not a "get attention thing" but a need to refocus. I really need to get that across to her OT at school. Argh! She is so rude about this all (everyone else is great). She honestly doesn't think dd has Asperger's and just says she's lazy and doesn't want to try. It really makes me angry. I want someone different working with her, but there's nothing I can do about it. She says that T just wants attention and doesn't want to do her work. If only I could make her walk in my daughter's shoes for a day, maybe she'd understand what it's like. Shoot, I wish I could walk in her shoes...maybe I could understand how to deal with her better. One of the things that boggles me is that transition is so hard, yet it's like she craves it (with the lack of motivation for behavioral system/incentives). She's not attached to anything...no special lovies, nothing that she particularly loves to do (well, she does really enjoy reading). It's like she craves change, but in a routine sort of way, so maybe your incentive program would work for her. Thank you so much for your words. Sometimes it's just good to know that others are dealing with similar situations and have experience in ways that may work with our kids, b/c heaven knows that all the normal parenting tools don't work at all with her (they work fantastically with my 4 year old).

Well, if it's getting worse, could it possibly be hormones? I don't have a child of my own, and seven might seem a bit young...but I do know that I'm not by any means the only Aspie that started developing and entering puberty early (I was 7 - my Mum took me to the doctors, and they said it was normal). I also started getting into trouble a lot at school at that time. I was in detention just about every week!

Now I understand that she's not me, but I'll just tell you how I remember that period of my life. I had no idea I was doing anything wrong, and I wad honestly trying my utmost to behave, but somehow nothing I did seemed to be right, and I just spent a lot of time being frustrated and upset, and therefore getting into more trouble. My parents were angry with me all the time (I wasn't diagnosed with anything at the time), and now I just feel negatively towards them when I think about it, even though I know they were only trying to get the message through to md that I was behaving badly.

Not having children myself, and not knowing the first thing about parenting, I'm afraid all I can do is to wish you and your daughter the best of luck and hope that my perspective has been even a little bit worthwhile.

OMG, doesn't that make you want to beat her over the head. I feel your frustration. I am sick to death of teachers refusing to acknowledge my daughter's condition. It drives me insane. She has undergone months and months of assessment and doctors who specialise in Aspergers have given this diagnosis. I didn't just make it up.

The next time she tells you that your daugher doesn't have Aspergers I suggest you tell her straight that that is because she doesn't have a clue what she is talking about. Tell her that if you wanted a second opinion on your daughter's condition you would get it from someone actually qualified to give it.

(On second thoughts, better not.)

It could be chemical, food intolerances etc.

I have read of many cases of children, long before autism was a widespread diagnosis, who became increasingly hyperactive, violent, over-emotional, aggressive, manic, irritable, etc, ( starting at any age ), and their calming down, etc etc, quite astonishingly, as soon as cut gluten, or casein/dairy, or sugar, or artificial colourings, or potatoes, onions, corn, etc out of their diet.

.

All the symptons you describe tend, in my experience, to be signs of stress and an inability to cope. My son always acted the same way. If she's got an OT who feels the way you've described, there is a good chance that this professional is contributing to it. Honestly, behavior plans should not be the main focus; figuring out what is wrong should be. Not to say you don't deal with the behavior as well, but you absolutely MUST get to the triggers. Which is not easy, I know that, but very important. Check for anything that might be physically wrong, look for environmental stress; stay open to EVERYTHING.

Does your daughter meet with a counselor? That might be helpeful.

What does your daughter do to self-calm? Is she a chewer, a pacer, a squeeker? Most AS have some sort of repetitive motion behavior that helps them re-center. There may be more than one. Remember that these are behaviors your daughter NEEDS, and are NOT something that she can be trained out of without causing issues somewhere else. If she isn't allowed to wiggle and move at school, or click and chew on a pen, for example, she will be expending so much energy on reigning in the behavior that she will not be able to focus on getting the work done. And she won't be self-calming, which leads to build up she won't be able to control. How is her school about so-called stimming? Is your daughter allowed to do these things? What about at home? What does she like to do in the way of odd behaviors that perhaps she has been discouraged from? Its just another angle to look at, if perhaps she doesn't have enough venues for releasing negative energy.

Basically, you're in for some detective work. I know you have a lot on your plate already, but if you can find triggers and mitigators everything else becomes soooo much easier, it really can be worth it.

DW, that's exactly where I'm at. I now know that there's something that's really bothering her, I just can't pinpoint what it is. She did slightly better today at school. I asked them, at least for the time being, to allow her to eat lunch somewhere a little quieter and less visually stimulating than the cafeteria. Most of these behaviors are occurring after lunch and I think that may be a big trigger for her.

She is definitely a chewer (her sleeves, hair, shirt collar, small toys, anything within reach, except food of course). It's not a constant thing, but of course, since she's stressed, she's been doing it a lot more lately. When speaking to the OT about this, she said "some of my kids have chewy necklaces, but I like to stay away from them for the germ issue, especially during this season" WHAT?!? So she can just struggle through this with no outlet? I guess I need to be a little stronger towards her. This is a challenge for me because my daughter's primary disability is deafness. Therefore, she qualifies for an IEP and has had one since she was 3 (and IFSP before then). I've never had any issues getting services regarding that and her deaf ed teachers were wonderful in pre k and k helping us cope and T cope with what was going on. Now she's in 1st grade and people aren't quite as helpful. Her deaf ed teacher is great...we just don't have the pre-k deaf ed teacher behind us anymore (and she was an amazing woman who genuinely cared for her students). So, I'm going to have to stand up and fight a bit more. Hard for me, since I don't deal well with conflict.

How would you go about finding a counselor qualified to deal with our kids? It sure seems like there are a lot of things that are different in the way they process things that I'm not sure a regular counselor could get through to her. I do agree, though, that it could be beneficial. She's just really starting to feel her emotions and doesn't know what to do with them.

We just stopped GFCF after 2 months. She was doing well when we started it (I was trying to see if she could focus a bit more on it), but soon after we started, she started to have more trouble with some things. Then when we stopped it two weeks ago, she seemed to just drop off a cliff in her ability to control her impulses, so now I will be putting her back on it. Stinks, since she loves cheese and bread so much. On GFCF, her diet pretty much consists of peanut butter on rice cakes, some fruit and hot dogs (which I'm not super fond of)...oh and hard boiled eggs. I hate having it that limited. But in the name of sanity for all, she will be back on it as of tomorrow.

You should be able to get more GF/CF foods than that, we eat a normal enough diet, theres really good breads now (brand called 'genius' is fab), pasta, my kids have a lot of rice, there are so many foods which dont have gluten, why not try and get recipe book on amazon?

My kids have always had difficult behaviours (rather than a decline) but I think it does get harder as their behaviour starts to fall more noticably behind their peers.

we have these chew toys which are great.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Chewy-Tube-Green- ... 4cec630464

and we found useing a 15 min timer good, with a reward for every 15mins with no screaming or hitting, it works well as they can just bout hold it together for 15 mins.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Large-Fifteen-15- ... 4cec84b016

she might find some visual rule cards helpful which include what to do instead on them, such as 'no throwing, ask for a break' , 'no hitting, insted stamp your feet '

I found this book very very helpful
http://www.amazon.co.uk/People-Autism-B ... 811&sr=8-1

What helps my Auntie son alot when he's ready to lose control is to send him to his room not as a punishment but just to give him space he need to calm down in. Maybe you could try a chill out space for her she can go to if she needs the time to compose herself. A tent or even a closet with big pillows and other things she likes in there. In our last house we took the door off Jake's closet and put a pile of pillows and blankets in there. He even hung posters on the walls. It was a space just for him to go too when he wanted to be alone. Having a place for her to retreat to in school might help as well so once she's learned to remove and defuse herself she'll beable to do so at school as well as home. I hope this helps alittle best of luck

Finding counselors is always tricky. Start by asking some of the professionals you've worked with and really like for referrals. Check that they have some knowledge of AS. Then, I guess, you try it out, and remember that if it isn't a good fit, you can and should switch.

As for the diet, have you considered going GF and not GF/CF? From reading around on these forums, I would say that gluten as a sensitivity is far more common than casien. Most AS families do not find the need to eliminate both. That would make your life a lot easier, since there seem to be better substitutes for gluten than for casien. Plus, getting away from casien can lead to increasing soy, when soy may be a sensitivity of itself (that is the one that runs in my family - we are soy free).

Its all tricky, I know. I wish you the best of luck. It would be nice if there was something better than trial and error for so many of these things, wouldn't it?