Living in Hell

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Well, the oldest bit the youngest today. I'm not sure how to behave or how to react. It all started with the oldest just trying to do his thing, when the youngest sees that he has something similiar to his. J-bird swears up and down to P-boy that what P-boy has is his and even tries to prove it. But P-boy is exclaiming the truth over and over again. Then J-bird snatches the thing from P-boy and won't let go. P-boy's gets frustrated. I just heard the chaos, I only came when J-bird says "You're an adult I can call the police now". Cause P-boy bit J-bird super hard, he didn't know what else to do because J-bird was trying to take his thing from him. They both are crying and were hysterical for a couple of hours. And now they are in their bedrooms. P-boy apologized to J-bird afterwards, but I'm living in hell. These two. A couple of weeks they are good and then all things spiral down into chaos.

I do not know how to talk to them nor how to approach the subject appropriately. P-boy was telling the truth, all though biting is wrong, but he was frustrated and didn't exactly know what to do. And J-bird wouldn't believe his brother which makes situations like this hard. Sigh.

And I want to keep this from my father because he'll take the systems away, since the boys had a fight over the game systems a few nights ago. And I know that won't solve anything at all because that's the relaxant. Especially for me, when I come home I play the game systems to relax.

Not sure what do in this house.

Ugh, sweetie, I'm so sorry - most of us have been there and it's no fun. Hugs.

Why in the world did he bite his brother?

Last time it was kicking his brother. But then again though J-bird did punch him and twisted his arm and wrist and he was complaining of wrist pain. But still...why...why in the world.

*hits head on desk*

I cannot fathom to think what living them alone while going somewhere would leave me.

I know that you love your brothers but you have to think of your life too. Is there anyway to get the one that is more severe some behavioral therapy. Typically when an older child bites, pinches, hits its because he or she is frustrated and has no other way to communicate.....and, as you said, you understand that. Is he verbal enough to express himself? Does he have PECS cards? (I just print mine from google images). Maybe if he could learn to seek out help when his brother is harassing him or be able to express how upset he is without the physical violence it would be better.

I have a token system, I think it would work just as well for older kids as it does mine. You can use rocks or little tokens from old games. If they dont fight for the day you can give them a token (or whatever) and then if they earn so many you can do something fun with them that they enjoy. It doesnt have to cost money you can do anything they like....even like having a movie night where you make popcorn and you watch a DVD or have ultimate game night....something like that. Try if you can to get you Dad involved and maybe you can help him to understand that positive reinforcement work better than punishment.

In my experience with my son, it's a combination of fight-or-flight, an impulse control problem with that Aspie black/white sense of right and wrong. Those are really difficult to parent through, we're still working on it with my son, though we've made lots of improvements.

If you really want to take this on, you might check out the Parenting Index under "violence and destructive behavior." I can go over what we did, but I think it might be useful to read all the other things other people have tried, too. Controlling impulses is a difficult behavior to teach - you have to get them thinking about what they might do well before it actually happens.

Up until now, you've been working to make your brother's lives more comfortable and reasonable: this is an area where you have to ask P-Boy to take responsibility for his actions (moreso than the cleaning up thing.) I know you don't like bringing your Dad into it, but you might want to consider it.

I understand totally about not wanting to take away the video games - but consequences did work for us as one part of a multi-part process; what we did was make sure they weren't so unreasonable that they made for more meltdowns (e.g. one day of no screen time vs. the "normal" punishment of one week or one month.) Maybe discuss this with your Dad.

P-boy is on the spectrum with a mood disorder [bipolar]. He's generally usually locked away in his room and never comes out of his fort. The door is usually closed, so no one can come in. I'm already dealing with issues of responsibility with him, as he has not being helping with the daily chores as Sparky has pointed out. It's diffiult situation because P-boy is already 19, but his behavior sometimes reminds me of a 16 year old or younger. And J-bird is on the spectrum at 15. I'm already 20+, but since the divorce of our parents I've been the one managing and regulating this household. I looked up PECS cards and bursted out into laughter cause I hardly imagine P-boy using those. He'd look at me like I'm crazy.




It's hard to parent a 19 year old whom hides in the shadows. It's hard to take punish things because it's a matter of someone's property. See P-boy bought half of his games and even his new Xbox 360. So when talking to dad, he doesn't think that kind of punishment works because it shows we don't respect his property. It makes it diffiult when a child is 19, but behaves younger than that. Beause they feel they are entitled to the rights of adulthood, but they and others can see they are not an adult yet mentally.

I'll check out the Parent Index.

I had a separate conversation with them last night. P-boy is more mad that J-bird didn't believe him even though he hadn't given him a reason not to believe him. J-bird understands he jumped to conclusions, but is mad P-boy always hits him. Yes, this is more of a rare occurence. We got P-boy out of the habit of hitting his sibling years ago, but it's coming back again.

One situation which was the last situation we had to deal before any of these ones. P-boy was still in high shool, public schooling. And he was on the bus. Both of them rode the bus home. And P-boy never really had many friends, he was extremely isolated even in the K grades. There was one girl I'll all her C-friend. C-friend and P-boy were hanging out, he was socializing with her and what not for a good couple of months. And from what I understand out of the blue one day C-friend tells him that they cannot be friends any more because her parents said so basically.

P-boy gets upset, somewhat frustrated and confused. So he decides to follow when they get off the bus the girl and ask her why they can't be friends. "Just because" is never an answer for him. All the students are yelling at him now. Everyone is screaming at him to leave her alone. He hadn't touched her, he just wanted a clear answer and a real reason. It became an extremely jumbled situation and J-bird decided to protect the girl and grabbed P-boy to make him stop following the girl while the bus driver picked up the girl to drop her off somewhere else. P-boy is beyond his handling point and hits J-bird.

Dad was not particularly happy when that situation happened and he got a call from the girls parents and P-boy got in trouble. That was a few years ago and then he stopped hitting his bird completely. And we thought we didn't have to deal with it any more. But I guess that was wishful thinking on our part I suppose.

P-boy gets the feeling that J-bird is always protecting other people over him and that J-bird doesn't care about how he feels or what he is feeling. He's always trying to stop him instead of help him. He is mad that J-bird doesn't believe him and that J-bird is not on his side. I kind of told him biting him doesn't get him on his side. P-boy replies, "But he doesn't listen. I try talking. I tried talking. He wouldn't believe me. Even if the details were a little wrong he could give me the benefit of the doubt. But he doesn't."

J-bird is mad that P-boy victimizes him and hits him. Some of this stems from things in the past that we corrected and appropriately punished and nipped in the bud.

This sounds very much like my son's logic. I know it's tough when he doesn't have self-regulation skills appropriate for his age, but that's what's happening: he's acting like a much, much younger child, and you have to meet him there. That's what a developmental delay means in practical terms.

Even though you've taken on so much for your brothers, I worry that you taking this on without your Dad's support will play into his perception of being a victim. I'm not saying consequences are the entire answer, and I'm not saying that taking the video games is the entire answer (although, I will say that the logical consequence of biting someone over something you want is that you lose your right to that thing, even if it's yours.)

What I am saying is that this is a very serious issue. P-boy needs to take it seriously: just like with the housecleaning, if he wants adult freedoms he needs to take on adult responsibilities. Somehow, your family has to find a way to help him understand this.

Here's an article on "victim mentality" in younger kids - it should sound familiar, I hope it helps you: http://www.mental-health-matters.com/pa ... r-behavior

Hang in there, Pandora. This is heavy stuff for a young person to handle. I know you're understandably focused on the frustration right now, but you really do have a loving little family...you will get through this.

Well thank you for the article. All though some parts are not pertain to this situation. Since I heard P-boy's apology to J-bird, on his own terms when he was calmed down.

He said, "I'm sorry I didn't want to bite you. I just didn't know any other way."

So, it isn't that P-boy has a victim mentality completely. Just he doesn't know how to communicate or talk through his emotions and he told me once that his mind decides on one action and he goes through with it even though it may not be the best mode of action. He says that since everything is going all at once he doesn't know how to stop and think "is this the right course of action to take."

I understand because I too was in that situation when I was younger. I had some aggression issues. And my counselor told me to count to ten, but with ten different things going in my head breaths and counting to ten never worked. And neither did taking a moment to think because only one thought ever went through my head.

None of those anger techniques worked for me.

So I really have no way to help him through his aggression. I just sort of mellowed out.

What we're doing with my son is getting him to notice when he starts to get confused and upset - well before the aggression (he said his "lips get tight") He tends to be blindsided by his own emotions, so keeping track of the "early warning" signs helps him.

Alternatively, maybe some role-playing will help your brother, so he has a couple of alternate plans of action in situations where he might become upset.

Thanks btw, you always have helpful advice make me feel better about situations.

That's a good idea. Roleplay. Now let's see if he'll actually do it with me. But I'm sure he will.

You're very welcome, and thanks for saying so - I'm never sure when I cross the line into busybody. If I ever do, I apologize in advance - my intention is always to be helpful.

Again, your brothers are lucky to have you.

Continued talking to P-boy and he says he doesn't know when his body is saying he is getting angry. So we need to work on that first.

This took a good long time and a LOT of detective work for us. Hand-clenching is another clue for us. Maybe his voice changes, or he'll start to stutter.

We all rise our voice when we get angry though. We'll have to do some clue work with this one.

You probably dont know but I have three (my son is gone) adult children from my first marriage so I do know about teenagers and adult kids, even ones with special needs. I also have two little ones from my second marriage (10 years now). My daughter is classic Autie and she is turning 7 this weekend. She still does not talk well and has communication issues but is not violent anymore as she can now express herself in one way or another. My son is 9 and is an Aspie.....I also have a 19 year old with Asperger's and we are worried that she is developing paranoid schizophrenia (a lot of mental illness in my X husbands family, he was also very abusive and I think both my daughters think they MUST have a boyfriend as I left him when they were very young and did not remarry until they were too old to accept my new husband as a "Daddy")
Regular PECS cards probably would be silly to a teenager and its one of the reasons we just print pictures off of google images because I have a 9 year old who would not use regular PECS cards. Actually the pictures help me. I use them in the hospital.....my favorite ones are from a girl who makes cartoons....I have posted about her on another board because some of the content is not something that would be appropriate for this forum but you can look her up, the name of her blog is "Hyperbole and a half" I suspect she is on the spectrum or she has possibly BP as she has a few things about depression but she is very clever and very funny. The pain scale I use I printed out from her you can find it on her site, its hilarious....it goes to 11 and says "I am actively being mauled by a bear". It amuses my doctors and nurses as well and kind of breaks the ice because I have a lot of difficulty being social and I am living in France and do not know the language very well.

I have Aspergers and writing or using pictures helps me to express myself, sometimes not so nice things come out of my mouth that I save for adults but I have called a kid a little jerk for making fun of my son (sorry kid, I was pissed and I was in my 20's, not that its a great excuse but I cant stand seeing my kids bullied). My oldest was Bi Polar so I know how that is and they are very impulsive. It is the reason my son is no longer here. He, I think, forgot to use his medication and he impulsively went back and used heroin to ease his depression one night and it killed him. He forgot or maybe did not think that he no longer had the tolerance he had two years before when he was actively using. I also understand about the age thing. My son was 24 and in many ways acted more like a 12 year old. I miss him desperately and I wish that I could have taken him with me when we moved away to France...my parents wanted to take him as well to Arizona. He needed someone to take care of him but he had been to prison for stealing cars for drug money so the state of California would not let him leave and they also would not give him the help he needed. They focused on his addiction more than his metal illness....mental illness is ignored in the US as if it does not exist, people dont want to deal with it. I just wanted to edit in that people with BP have a hard time expressing when they are upset or sad, they do not like people to view them as having problems or as not being able to take care of themselves which makes things even more difficult. They also have about a 80% rate of using illegal drugs. My son was mainly manic and his BP started at a very young age, around the time he could walk. I found the book "The Bi Polar Child" and cried as I read it in the book store, after being through so much with him and having so many so called professionals tell me I was too soft on him or that I just not cut out to be a Mother....I had found the answer. It took me another few years to find a Psychiatrist who listened to me and then got him to talk and he diagnosed him at age 12.

Im sorry you are having so many problems, you are very young to care for your brothers but it is also very commendable.

We're now working on indetifying the clues of when he is going to blow a casket. This is a lot of work, but P-boy agreed to work with me on it strangely enough. His agreeance is frightening.