How much to push, how much to give . . .

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I know this is the mystical question that no one has a true answer to . . . but here I am asking anyway. How much do you push your AS child and how much do you give in when they struggle?

Background: Son, 5, ASD & SPD. Mostly very high functioning, but summer vacation, as expected, is sending him more over the edge than usual.

Example: Getting ready to leave the house this morning. I asked him to choose socks from his sock drawer and put his socks on. (Or to NOT wear socks was ok too.) He wanted socks, but he would NOT get his socks. 'Pleeeaase, You do it mom, I'm tired.' He slept well, he ate a good breakfast. I know he is capable of putting socks on. He would not do it. I was incredibly busy with my 3-year old daughter, getting myself ready and helping the visiting grandparents. Grandma offered to put his socks on--he refused and said, 'Only mom.' I told him if he wanted to wear socks and come with us, he needed to put them on himself or let one of the grandparents help him. He cried, he protested, he shrieked. I calmly stood my ground through his tears, but it turned into a process of tears and agony for him. Then, it was the shoes after that. He 'couldn't' do it. Mom had to do it. I told him he needed to put his shoes on unless he wanted to be left home alone (I am not glad I said that b/c of course I wouldn't.) But I had FOUR people to get out the door and I needed him to do what I KNOW he can do and help me out that way! I even told him--I need your help, I NEED you to put your own shoes on like a big boy.

Then, I was holding my 3-year old's hand and carrying 3 bags to go down the elevator to the car. My son wanted to be carried. He was tired he said. He fussed, cried. I told him he was a big boy and he could walk the 500 feet to the car. I would hold his hand, I would help him. He begged, pleaded, cried. I asked him to let grandma/grandpa help, but he refused (this is typical). I told him he would have to learn to let other people help him sometimes because mom can not always do everything. I told him grandma/grandpa came to help. His answer: "Maybe next year I'll let them." Sigh.

What would you have done? Just sympathized that he may be having a rough day and put his socks on for him? Carried him and made the 3-year old walk because he has hidden struggles she doesn't have? Or was I right in being 'tough' and making him do it (put his socks on, walk to the car)? I am not agonizing over it, but I do wonder in these moments how much to push him and how much to sympathize with what is obviously a very rough morning for him for whatever reason, no matter how much "I" needed him to be a big boy. But I don't want him to be lazy or selfish just because he doesn't want to do something that feels hard at the moment. But I also don't want to be so hung up on him doing something that I miss an opportunity to just let him know he can get the help he needs when he's having a bad day.
I was thinking, if he was 2, I would have put his socks on and carried him. He's not. He's 5. However, behaviorally, there are some ways that despite his actual 'ability', he is like a 2-year old, so perhaps I start expecting too much of him.
I know, it's the dilemma we all face in some form.

In the moment it's very hard to know when to push and when to accomodate. It depends a lot on how much of a rush you are in -- you have to have time available to do that sort of teaching. With the luxury of hindsight and time to think about the situation, maybe one option would have been to ask Grandma to help with the 3 year old so you could assist your son.

Some of the books I'm reading talk about consciously and deliberately teaching a few skills at a time. So the time to insist on your son selecting and putting on his own socks is when you've planned your morning to allow enough time for all the prompting and redirecting the teaching requires. Only once he is consistently doing it solo in non-rushed situations would you move on to expecting him to do it on his own when things are all different because the grandparents are here.

For what it's worth, my husband currently picks out clothes for our almost 7 yo and walks him through the steps of getting dressed most mornings. I had gotten him almost independent with picking out clothes and dressing himself (using a timer and lots of verbal prompts) but when school started last fall and DH started helping with the mornings, he decided gettting out the door on time took priority.

If you figure it out, let me know.

I think I have figured out where the "maybe next year" comes from. My daughter does it a lot. They learn it from us. When they want to do something that we do not feel they are ready for, our answer is "maybe next year" or "maybe when you are older" and our expectation is that they will just accept that answer and move on. I guess it is only logical when they use it back on us! LOL!

I don't know what to tell you with any of this, because these are the same issues I struggle with sometimes and I'll tell you...I've got nothing.

Out of curiosity, what would have happened if you would have put the 3-year old down to walk to the car, too? I mean, honestly, your older child was doing a lot more walking at 3 because you had a baby to carry. Maybe carrying neither of them would help?

I think in this particular situation I would have put his socks and shoes on for him, let g'ma or g'pa carry the 3 yo and the bags and carried him. But that's just me. AND that is sitting here calmly talking after the fact about something that didn't happen to me. For my son, having the grandparents here increases his anxiety and he doesn't know how to say it but it comes through in unexpected behaviors, like reverting to not wanting to do things on his own that I know he can do. If the grandparents weren't part of the equation and it was just a typical day and he was having this kind of behavior, I might try to ask him what his number is (our way of saying how are you feeling) and if is anything other than 1 (calm) or 2 (happy) then I would try to take a moment to see if I could and find out what is bothering him. Of course I don't have a 3 yo. DS has an older NT brother and that makes things considerably easier because older brother rarely demands my attention in the midst of a difficult moment with younger brother.

At any rate, I guess I try to consider DS's behavior in light of whether or not there are any added stress factors in a given situation. The trouble here is things that are stress factors for him, I may not recognize as stress factors though I think I am getting better at recognizing them. If a situation does involve added stress, I try to adjust my expectations accordingly.

I only have the one child, and honestly when he was 5 we had no idea what was going on and I was a terrible parent to him. FWIW, me holding him to the standard of his age and being rigid about it (I thought I was trying to be consistent) didn't help him improve at all, and caused an awful lot of stress and pain in our family (socks. OMG.)

The good news: even kids with AS are resilient. Now that I have a better idea how to parent him, and things have changed in our home, I don't think we lost any ground (although he does have that *&^! AS memory, and brings up every one of my major screw-ups as the occasion arises. God bless the child.) I still have frustrations on how to tell what is too much pushing and what is too much accommodating, but I think at least I know how to tell when I've messed it up - at least on the pushing side.

So, my answer is - muddle through as best you can. I do think you're about right in setting your expectations about three years younger than his actual age...but you also have to take into consideration the rest of your family, including yourself. If he was two, and had a twin, or you had a younger baby - you'd expect him to be attached to you, you'd expect him to be unhappy and possibly throw a tantrum - but you might start having his grandparents help him a bit more anyway, right?

Maybe using the techniques that work for other kids: a visual schedule of how the morning goes, including which times you will help and which times grandma or grandpa will help? I realize that a schedule is tough to keep with small kids, but you might set which tasks are "theirs" early on.

In your shoes I would have done just the same. Being there, done that. Sometimes you find out later that he had a good reason (he was really feeling tired because he is sick and ou didnt know) and you will feel like crap. Some other times you will comfort him later for being so good and cooperate when he did not want to and you will see next time he will not ask for your help and do it himself. Bottom line: you never know... until later. All I know is I have a 12 years-old Aspie daughter, and she is doing damn great. And I am one of those who do not give in: she needs to do it herself no matter how hard or how "bad" she is feeling at the moment. And my Aspie husband agrees with me: she needs to be pushed. I think it works. Some times she hates me, but overall she loves me.

Advise: NEVER threathen him with something you are not willing to do.

I have a NT 6 yo, 1 1/2yo and my ASD son is 3 1/2. I have been in many similar situations and I always attend to the baby first. Meaning, if they are both crying, I pick up the baby and hold her and hug my 3yo with whatever body part I can spare. I can't always drop everything for either one of them, I kinda have to juggle everyone around so they all get some attention.

Another example, this morning, we were getting ready for church. I was putting on the baby's clothes, I told my 3 yo to pick a shoes to wear. He gets a sneaker that is too tight. He gets upset and starts crying that he needs help (since we taught him to ask for help, he does constantly). He then asks me to put his shoes on. I spent about a minute explaining that his shoes was too small and he needs to get something else. He finally agrees to wearing his sandals and wanted me to put in on him. I told him he had to put it on himself since he is a big boy (everynow and then he denies he is). I didn't threaten to leave him but I opened to do to start putting the diaper bag, etc outside. That triggered something in him and he hurried up and put his shoes on and ran outside ahead of me (our yard is fenced all around). He did regrees about 6 months ago with putting on his shoes. He had become extremely slow. Even then, we would partly put on his shoe nd have him finish it.

Well, if for no other reason I am looking forward to my son starting school next year, is the school uniform

I know. What is it with socks and shoes? Sheesh. Funny thing is, the thought of not wearing them is detestable to him . . . it's just getting them ON him that sometimes becomes such an agonizing process.

Anyway, I very much appreciated hearing everyone--even though some perspectives may seem opposite each other, I think they both have their place. It's just knowing when/where/how. Yep, I've made the mistakes where I look back and know I messed it up, but thankfully life goes on and we can learn from it.

For what it's worth, I didn't carry the 3-year old either--just the bags. She didn't mind not being carried. My husband wasn't around, and the grandparents are too old to carry kids. In hindsight, I probably should have let them carry the bags and just picked up my son. Honestly, I was worried then that my daughter would start asking for me to carry her too. And I get tired of her 'picking up' his slack. I never thought about that--what do people with twins do? Maybe I should start thinking of them more that way . . . they are 20 months apart but getting pretty close in size AND development.

HA! I happen to have 2.5 yo twins and there are a lot of ridiculous things that I do twice. For instance, they both love to press the button for the garage door, so I let one press it, then stop it, then pick the other one up to send the door back up and then back down again. Or in the morning when both want to be carried down from upstairs, I might carry both at once, or leave one at the top of the stairs and go back and get the other one. Too accomodating, I know, but it keeps my sanity. They're old enough to walk, so I really don't carry them around much.