Me and my boy. Help!!

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Both me and my son (he's 6, I'm 40) have been recently diagnosed with Aspergers. It has also been noted that I have anger management issues related to specific situations. It tends to work like this. My wife, myself and Dom will go out. We always do our level best to make the day as interesting for him as possible, usually by trying to use public transport as much as possible. Unfortunately, there will ususally be a point where he will try to run away or run into the road or something that isn't safe. My wife handles this beautifully, dealing with the incident and then moving on to the next thing. I, on the other hand, seem to be totally unable to siphon of the stress of these incidences and end up dealing with every subsequent issue very poorly and usually very negatively. It culminated yesterday in me getting so stressed about getting the final train back to the car that I got all stroppy when he said he needed the toilet and when I said we might miss the train, he then said he wouldn't go to the toilet. Unfortunately, this flies directly in the face of the work we have been doing to get him to remember to use the toilet. My wife was understandably furious with me and it resulted in a rotten end to what had been quite a nice day.
I will be attending anger management sessions once the NHS have sorted out the last bits of my referall, but in the meantime, does anyone have any experience in dealing with this kind of situation. I accept that I am completely culpable for the day spinning out of control (I am supposed to be the adult) and really feel that some form of intervention is needed to stop hanging on to all this stress.

Thanks for listening

I don't have any experience in dealing with children on the spectrum, however you and I were once children on the spectrum ourselves so you should realize that children aren't very aware or mature yet. The most important traits when it comes to raising a child would be understanding, empathy and patience.

Also posting here will help you to understand different situations and problems experienced by people on the spectrum of all ages and good strategies or productive ways to counter those problems when they do arise, you might find a better answer in Parents discussion.

All I can really say to help is: you are not alone. This is my husband too. And generally just what you described is what often happens when we go out with our son. My husband knows this and has gotten better with some of his anger issues, but some of the problem still remains. He is 'working on it' . . . and I think you are headed in the right direction too.
I can tell you want the best for you/your son and are willing to get professional help to get there. I think 'intervention' (counseling) is huge. You will get there, a step at a time. Recognizing what sets you both off is a HUGE start.

Deleted your thread at general autism discussion.

(Sorry but a topic can only be posted at one board if you want you can elaborate a little more in your issues and create its own thread elsewhere but the same thread on several boards is not allowed due to the amount of people that would repost threads to get more attention... and how that would affect the boards(having to see the same topic everywhere missing other threads that are just as important...))

I mentioned in another post; re-framing is a very helpful tool in handling these situations - and it's a tool we need to teach our kids, too. I wasn't able to find much online, but this post offers help with the basic principle: http://reepicheepscoracle.blogspot.com/ ... oying.html

So, in the example you provided, you could try to look at your son as adventurous and spontaneous, and not that he's constantly placing himself in imminent danger. I am guessing your wife has some sort of way of looking at it positively that helps her; you might want to ask how she thinks about it.

Don't get me wrong - you still need to keep him safe, you still need to do all the same things you've been doing: the key is to make a difference strictly in your emotional response.

You are on the right track in getting help through an anger management class. They are likely to teach coping strategies that will help. Remember though, it took you 40 years to get where you are now in terms of your emotional state and your ability (or lack thereof) to control it so have patience. It will take some time to re-train yourself and alter your reactions. I have been working really hard for about a year now on changing my reactions to my son's behavior. I feel I have made a lot of progress but I still slip sometimes. I have been reading (or rather listening to) Eckhart Toole's The Power of Now and a quote from that book has been rattling around in my brain for the past few weeks. Paraphrasing: If there is nothing you can do to change a bad situation you can accept it as if you had chosen it. I guess this is probably the same as re-framing as momspraky suggested. Also remember that you are in a very challenging situation, so don't beat yourself up!

I dont think anger management is going to help you. You dont have an anger problem, you have a stress problem. You were stressed and you felt you were not allowed to express it. Most of us that are diagnosed older (I was dx at the same age you are btw, after my youngest daughter was diagnosed with Autism) learn to suppress our stimming as we are told it looks "weird" when we were growing up...we may have even been punished by our parents for doing it. What you should have done was sit down and talk with your wife about how much the incident upset you, how stressed you are....you did not allow yourself time to deal with whatever happened and you need to do that. You can also talk to your son, he will understand you better than anyone else. He is only 6 now but the older he gets the more you can talk to him and help him to see how certain things upset you. I know Im a good Mom but I do tend to be over protective and when something happens or one of my kids comes close to hurting themselves, I freak out (strangely enough if they do hurt themselves I go into "fix it" mode and have a mega meltdown later....you may be doing this as well). I lost my oldest son in August so now Im far worse and I also have a really bad Auto immune disease that has caused me to be basically invalid. I have to deal with the stress of this and the stress of my kids stress as they get very upset when I have to go to the hospital and I have to go for two weeks next month and the hospital I am going to is 20 minutes away.

It helped me to talk to my Psychiatrist who still did "talk therapy" and was an expert in Autism. He helped me see what I was doing and he gave me a little pill called Ativan that I could put under my tongue when I started stressing out. For me that wasnt enough and I had to start using Valium but I only needed it maybe once or twice a week as I learned to see what I was doing, I allowed myself to stim (dont give a crap what people think). Yeah you are an adult but you also have Asperger's and you never got any therapy so give yourself some credit that you were able to get to the point you are at now. I hope you get the help you need whatever you decide to do. Im going to see a new Psychiatrist, she speaks English, I have to be re evaluated for my French handicap card...not that I care I have my auto immune disease. I could care less if the French government thinks Im Autistic. I just hope that I like this lady because I REALLY need someone to talk to who is completely removed from the situation and is not judging me (in a way some person on the street or on facebook that I met LOL). I never thought Id like talking to someone but it was actually nice. Sometimes Id just go on about my interest and he would listen and that was awesome as, Im sure you know, we do our best to try to prevent ourselves from doing this because people have been telling us how weird and or stupid we are for doing it....finally someone who not only lets me do it but LISTENS and is actually interested. My Psychiatrist was very interested in the knowledge that I had swimming around in my head....he had a hard time sending me home sometimes, not because I wouldnt shut up but because he was interested in what I had to say. I really hope this lady is like this. I miss my doctor!

Just wanted to say thank you to everyone who has posted a response. I am very interested in the idea of reframing. I just feel I need a method to help deal with out of the blue situations. The alternative is to not go out with him at all and that isn't an alternative as far as I am concerned. I've been doing a lot of thinking about this over the last few days (maybe to much) and do wonder whether the reasons I give on here about why I get stressed with him, i.e. his safety, are just an attempt from me trying to be noble. I'm beginning to think that some of the anger stems from the fact that he is a very visible symbol of my own impotence and inability to be in control of situations with him in it. This makes me think that the need for some sort of outside help becomes even more critical becuse as he gets older, he is only going to become more difficult to control and the thing is is that really I want to cherish and enjoy him, not control him. Unfortunately, as a lot of us on here know, control of our enviroment is almost the esscence of what we are.