Meltdowns, does reduced frequency cause increased intensity?

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Yesterday my son had the mother of all meltdowns.

Earlier in the day he had a little shutdown moment (this is a clue that something isn't right) but he ended up going to his equine therapy which he loves. Ok - all is well.

Then when we got home, we spent some time on the trampoline together. It was time for me to stop for two reasons, one - I have a bad shoulder and the instability of the tramp causes me to injure it and secondly, I needed to go inside and pay bills.

DS brought the dog onto the trampoline (which he has done many times) I watched them for a few minutes and then went inside to pay the bills.

All was quiet for a while until I heard a single shout. I went outside to find my son yanking the puppy by a single rear leg, and the puppy frantically trying to break free. Coupled with the bounce of the trampoline, it was very dangerous for the puppy, and looked like his leg could be broken.

I said, DS let go of the dog. He answered "I'm going to kill him". He had the meltdown look of complete loss of connection to consequences and reality. Not good. I said it again "let go of the dog NOW" he said f&ck the dog, I'm going to kill him.

I reached into the trampoline and grabbed for his hand and he yanked harder. I finally slapped him, ended up hitting his face. This shocked him enough to let go of the dog, and I was able to get the dog out safely.

DS cried for a minute and then stopped and said "now I'm gonna f$ucking kill you!". DS is 180 lbs, and I have a messed up right shoulder, so I'm not confident I could restrain him. (at full strength I can - but not now). He came barreling toward me, and I ran into the house and locked the doors. I wasn't letting him near me.

We have a huge steel rake that grooms the gravel where the trampoline is (it's intended use is asphalt work - the handle is 6' and the rake part is 4'. He grabbed that and started trying to break the sliding glass doors in with it - his hands and feet. For about 30 minutes he was absolutely scary - I couldn't decide weather to lock the dogs and I in the car or call 911. I tried to talk him down, but nothing worked.

Finally, something shifted and the meltdown was over. He was safe to come in. He hugged me and fell asleep on the couch.

This child hasn't had a meltdown in a year. He is on no meds, and frankly I don't want to medicate him for an annual meltdown. That said, all I could think about was that boy in Chicago who was killed by the cops for a meltdown.

After he woke up I did tell him, that had the door broken, I would have had to call the cops for help, if he ever hurts us I wouldn't be doing my job by allowing him to live here (if I can't keep him and us safe here, I need to find a way to do it).

I don't know what to do now and also if this happens again.

He really could hurt someone

Im glad you protected the puppy, animals are innocent and it sounded like he was serious. Im sure that was really scary. My oldest with Bi Polar who died in August at age 24 never went after me but I was worried he was going to hurt his sisters or my husband (his step father). His real father was abusive so I think when he was loaded (on drugs) he took things out on my husband who only tried to help him. I am thankful that my son got clean and made amends with everyone before he went off his meds, went into a depressive state and accidentally overdosed....he just wanted to feel better for that one night...without his meds he was really impulsive.
However, even before he started using drugs he would strangle his sisters and things like that and be laughing about it. I remember one time I thought about calling the police and I wish I would have but I understand your reasoning for not doing that being afraid of what you heard in the news. My son strangled my daughter and she had bruises on her throat. I did call CPS and we did have charges pressed against him. They told him if he hurt his sisters like that again they would remove him from the house.
That would not work in your situation and you know your son better than anyone so Im sure you will come up with something to do to help both of you but if I were you I would do something before you, him or the dog get hurt.
Sometimes the police will come out to your house, I did that once when my son destroyed my living room and the police man stood there and made him clean the mess up and then told him that he could go to jail if he did something like that again but that didnt do much.

Im glad you guys are all ok but I wish there were some easy way to fix things.....I just know after dealing with my son for so long there just is no easy way!

You didn't say how old your son is, but I assume that he is at least in his mid to late teens as you mentioned that he weighs 180 pounds. You need to come up with a plan for dealing with any future violent outbursts by him, now, while things are calm, so you will already know what to do next time it happens. It is too dangerous to wait until then to come up with a plan. Think of it as being like a fire emergency drill.

You also need to find a safe home for the dog. It doesn't matter how much you, or your son, or anyone else in the family loves the dog. What matters is that the dog is not safe in the same home with your son, and knowing that, you have a responsibility to rescue the dog from this unsafe situation. Also, you should not be getting any more pets as long as your son is living with you, as he gets violent with them when he has a meltdown. It is wrong to put a pet knowingly and needlessly in harms way. I realize this is hard but it is the right thing to do.

As for your son's violence towards human family members, you should also realize that it is not right to put people in harms way, either. Perhaps he needs to be on some sort of calming meds, or in some sort of residential facility. I would try the meds first. But whatever you do, you need to plan now, before his next meltdown.

My son is 12. All of the previous meds caused him to become quite overweight. Since August he has been med free (and meltdown free since last January) and is starting to reduce his weight.

So questor, what you are saying is that after having one meltdown in one year (a doozie), we should get rid of the family pets, and put my son into a residential facility? BTW - this is a kid who still has to cuddle me or his dad every night to get to sleep.

My question for the aspies out there (preferably those who have struggled with bad meltdowns).... How would that have worked for you? My mom's gut says that would destabilize my son more than help BUT I am open to hearing other's experience. After reading about the impact of giving away toys, I can't imagine the impact of giving away pets.

The point of my original post was actually the question... does less frequency lend to increased intensity? Does the repression of meltdowns kind of contribute to them being worse when they happen? Does this mean we can expect them to worsen or is this normal in the elimination process? This is specifically for those who have walked the meltdown path either yourself or as a parent. I am not looking for advise from anyone who hasn't been there.

My son and yours sound similar in many ways, although mine was able to tolerate school once we organized it in a way that he was able to habituate to the parts of it that bothered him (meaning, I think we have somewhat less intense sensory/social deficits) The difference is, my son always held in meltdowns for months and months and then had explosions similar to the one you describe (I just gave this to my husband to read, he looked at me and said "yep, been there.")

Since we don't know any other way, I can't generalize this to other types of meltdowns. However, one thing we have been working very, very hard on in therapy is for my son to learn his own cues for stress and a possible oncoming meltdown, and to find ways to de-stress himself: these days, if he's able to do that, it does help in reducing the intensity of a meltdown. We also try to make sure he has tools to calm himself down: isolation, a balance board (I'd say trampoline would work, but I can see where something could go "wrong" which I'm guessing was the stressor here.) drawing tools (when he was little, we had to restrict him to crayons, which he hated, so he wouldn't stab himself/draw on himself or deface our house) writing tools. I've learned not to give him anything that can become a projectile during these times (electronics would help but are too easy to throw.)

I wrote earlier about alexithemia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexithymia I think these types of "holding a balloon under water" meltdowns are related to this deficit, so direct intervention for that particular deficit is important. In your position, I'd also pre-plan with your local law enforcement's juvenile bureau and ask what they do in a situation where a child may need to be physically subdued, and why. I'd ask if he could meet the officers in an "officer friendly" kind of a situation - do this without connecting the dots between the violence and what you told him earlier (maybe a research project for homeschool?) This will work for you both ways: it will humanize your son to the police officers, and the police officers to your son and will hopefully have the effect of a 911 call becoming about defusing a situation rather than using force to overcome it. (Interestingly, re: the Chicago situation - departments that use non-lethal force tend to rely on force rather than finding ways to de-escalate a situation.)

I do think, with kids who have the potential for violence, it's critical to have a 911 plan: I do a lot of volunteer work with local police and know most of the juvenile officers and paramedics in our area, as does my son. I've told a few of them that I trust that my son is autistic. We haven't had threats of real violence from him yet this year (not counting what happened at school, which was less serious than I was first afraid it was,) so I have not yet discussed this possibility with the department on an official level - but I'm planning to.

And - hugs. I've so been there, and I'm so sorry. I wish I could fix it for you.

Thanks Momsparky -

I see many similarties with our kids too - except mine seems completely incapable of accessing the event or emotions tied to it. He was in therapy for years, when we decided that his concious brain had all the right answers to stuff - he just cant access those answers when his switch is flipped. He has been unwilling to acknoweledge stressors at all. We have just removed them and he feels better. That said, he still thinks the stuff that was removed is fine and he can handle - he doesn't see that it bothered him at all.

I like the idea of a research project - that could be good,

It has been our experience that as my daughter gets older, the meltdown frequency has diminished and the intensity has increased.

Yes, this is actually the same between the two of them: a lot of our more successful therapy was about identifying emotions and emotional states. DS has to use the physical symptoms of an emotion in order to label it; in this way the Secret Agent Society videogame was incredibly helpful to us - as part of the game, kids had to correctly label the emotion in phrases they might use, what heart rate went with what feeling, what body posture, etc.

We'd had years of traditional therapy that did nothing, but doing this, and being able to talk through it with him now, really helps a lot.

Kailuamom, I also wanted to state that with my daughter we can have quiet periods for a while where there are what I call "low grade" meltdowns but not the "grand mal" type like you described. However, when one of those "grand Mal" meltdowns do happen it throws me completely off, questioning my parenting skills, questioning whether she will ever live a "normal" life, etc. But then time gradually fades the horror of the memory and the nice times return.

What I am geting at is that you should be proud this is the first "grand mal" in a long time! That shows you are doing so many things right! I do not believe, with hormones, stress, anxiety, etc we are ever going to be completely "grand mal"-free. Don't sink into the doom and gloom (I KNOW it's hard!). Try to talk to him about how badly that scared you, how it could've gone so wrong, how you guys can handle it in the future, etc. Use it as a learning experience, if possible. I am sure it was just as horrific for him as it was for you. I feel for you-I really do-I've been there!

Thank you - I am extremely proud of all of us. Life has gotten infinately better since I came here and started learning how to listen to him.

The scary part is this was the first time where I was not convinced that I could keep us safe. With my bum right shoulder, I just didn't have the mama bear confidence that I could take and keep down this hulk of a boy when his adreniline was surging. In the past he was almost as big, but I knew how to manuver him in a way that we were all ok. It took all of my strength, but I knew we'd be OK. This time, I knew that I couldn't hold him for any period of time AND I knew that if we couldn't de-escalate, he could do serious damage to me with that rake. Further - restraint, if not successful will actually escalate things - so I really didn't want

So that's the conundrum - life is better, he's better, we're better as a family. I don't want one hour in a year to change everything. BUT, I also know that he can't do this in another year or year after that.. My older son is towering over me and I have seen his muscle structure grow - this is what lies ahead with the younger one, but he's likely to be bigger.

My child is much younger (not yet 7), and he tends to turn his meltdowns inward, rather than outward, but here is what my experience has been, for what it is worth: My son has a certain amount of pressure that builds up. If he releases it in small, frequent ways, the build up does not accumulate too badly, and the meltdowns stay smaller. When he has to control the small outbursts (like at school) it builds up and either results in disproportional meltdowns for small things to release the excess pressure, or a big honker of a meltdown for a larger issue. It is like releasing a pressure valve.

If I can give him enough time of perfect calm (not as easy as it sounds) then the pressure releases more like a balloon that gradually loses air.

I can only imagine what happens once 12 yr old hormones and problems are in the mix.

It could be that things piled up on him and that one little agitation set him off. I get what you are saying, that if they go a long time without any meltdowns than they are more explosive. I think that may be true. When I was sixteen I had a huge meltdown that included kicking several holes in the wall and throwing all the forks out of the dishwasher. I know I was winding down then because I made the conscious effort not to throw them at my Mom who was actually being very calm and speaking calmly to me. I had not had any meltdowns for years and I think I started burying things inside around age 14 when my Dad got clean and was in the house all the time yelling at me, telling me what to do and even slapping me across the face when I was talking to my Mom once. My Mom came to my rescue and was really mad at him....I think my Mom always knew I needed more help that most kids even though I had no diagnosis of anything, besides she is also an Aspie, still undiagnosed while I am DX. I hyperventilated but no meltdown. I was accused of lying when I had the huge meltdown with the holes in the walls, ect.
It was not as severe as your sons but he may have been holding in many things that has happened and because he wanted someone to jump with him and first you and then the dog bailed on him, he lost it. Its simple but complicated.

Like I said, this kind of anger and incidents are hard to deal with and he was probably really freaked out about what he did later....I would imagine, I know I was. Maybe the person who said you should put him in a group home missed the fact that this is not a common occurrence. Sometimes its hard to give advice online. Also, I dont mean this in a bad way but sometimes the way you write is confusing. I hope things get better for you and this doesnt happen again but I would certainly have a talk about it, Im sure you have, but maybe look into why he was so angry and what has happened in the past few weeks or even months.

I certainly know what Im talking about (I know this was not aimed at me but I am just pointing it out) and I have had far worse....I had a 6 very large men, swat team, big guns and bullet proof vests and a battering ram, come to my door looking for my son and going through my entire house including in my teenage girls bedrooms while they were sleeping, like that didnt freak out my then 16 year old aspie (Im glad my little ones were at school), they made my daughters and my daughters boyfriend come out and sit on the living room floor. I kept telling them my son was not there!.....insane since my son had only stolen a car not robbed a bank or did any violent crimes.....the only time he was violent was at home and that was only when he was pushed by his real father or loaded on drugs and told he was not allowed in our house. I had to call my Psychiatrist and get him to call me and my poor daughter in some valium that day, his poor secretary had me repeat the story about three times because I was so scared I was talking really fast in between sobbing.
We may have different issues since my son had a mental problem and a drug problem and your son has Autism but I deal with Autism every day and I dealt with some pretty horrible things because of my son and my little ones are getting bigger and even though my son has been learning to control himself his level of anger worries me sometimes. I always say my oldest son made me a good Mother because If I got through all the things I had to go through with my son I can handle anything (Ok I still get stressed but I now look for solutions instead of howling in dispair). However I would happily go through all of it again, everything, just to have my son back!

Oh, just one more thing....if he is using "tools" try to meltdown proof your house. My Bi Polar son (which started at age 2 btw but the stupid psychiatrists would not believe me and just blamed everything my son did on me.....my son woke up in the middle of the night and got out the rice steamer and stuffed things in side of it and plugged it in starting a fire, my fault, I spoiled him. He was always waking up in the middle of the night and doing things....going outside and flooding all the neighbors yards by turning on the outside taps. We finally had to glue and nail his window shut and turn his door knob around so I could lock it......the older he got the more doors I had to replace. I finally got him DX at 12 by then I had left his abusive Father.....he did great the first year then he started self medicating because he met an older boy whos parents were addicts. Anyway, he was obsessed with fire and knives....he never hurt anyone with a knife but he would stick them in the walls and doors all the time. However we still hid everything....might be a good idea for you. I know its hard to think of everything. My son put some lighter fluid in his drinking bottle when my second daughter was three years old and he was five so he could catch bees in it and kill them.....I let her out the door, she picked up the bottle and took a big swig out of it. She was in the hospital with hydrocarbon inhalation (she vomited and inhaled it) and burns in her throat and all the way down to her stomach, for two weeks. We had BBQed the night before.....its hard to remember EVERYTHING!

Kailuamom, I don't have suggestions but I do think that momsparky's idea of a project with your local law enforcement is a good idea..police as well as fire fighters (typically, the first responders). I think if it's done in such a way where there is a general "project" tone vs. his specific emergency plan, it may allow for your boy to not personalize the incident. In our household, if DD personalizes her more traumatic situations (recalling them to either us or a therapist), it takes a bad turn. She has told me that she doesn't like revisiting those "bad situations", as recalling them is as vivid as reliving them. In addition, she gets hurt and embarrassed by recalling them.

That being said, do you think your DS would be able to step back and explain what may have been going on in his head that day? If you were to write out his full schedule from when he first woke, with one side being what the activity was, the other being "How were you feeling?" do you think he would be able to respond? Maybe you could find those things that were triggering the melt-down?

My DD hasn't gone through something this extreme yet, but I know that she has told me that she essentially "blacks out" when her rages happen. We haven't had them happen for awhile, but when they did happen they were frightening to witness, especially when we know how generally even-tempered and sweet she is. Similar to liloleme, my DD has described a state of agitation already happening from when she gets up in the morning and then there is just a few things happening here and there...then WHAM! Meltdown...With her CBT we've tried to get her to slow down and identify how she is feeling right from when things seem "off" (and sometimes that can be right when she wakes up, or even how she wakes up)...we use lots of descriptions to try to get to the core anxiety. But a lot of this depends on me (who spends the most time with her over the course of the day) picking up on these nuances. As her CBT has said to me, DD doesn't have the capacity to recognize when she is going off the deep-end, so we have to be a little like Jiminy Cricket and be "the little voice" to help sort these thoughts.

Many hugs to you...people who know you know how far you all have come and what a sweet kid your boy is...

I agree with Liloleme, I think the solution here is to remove all objects that could be used as weapons from his access. Sounds like a pain, but if you have a shed or some place where you could place the rake and lock it up I would do that. I know you can't lock up everything but I would try.

wow, nevermind my last post this is kind of above my head, as for the suggestion of having cops help with those situations is not a terrible idea.......but you better make sure they understand your son has psychological problems and want you want for them is to protect others from him and protect him from himself. Otherwise sometimes these situations can become much worse. So In my opinion that is the last resort though.

First I would try and get the help of a therapist or other mental health professional, as typically they are more fit to deal with psychological/mental issues than cops........sometimes cops are not very good at handling people with mental problems. Also I am not an autism expert but are you sure that is all that's going on with him? that is another thing a therapist/psychologist could help figure out and come up with some effective treatment and therapy So yeah that is all I really know.

Do you think that having meltdowns less often keeps your son from practicing the skills necessary when he does have a meltdown? Then they would be more intense, because he does not have the skills to cope with the overwhelming emotions/sensory.