Understanding the big picture

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Hi,
So, last night my kids were at it again, bickering, teasing, etc. Things escalated and the middle one (NT, age 6) hit the big one (AS, age 10) two times with her hand. Not ok. But then the big one hit the middle one with a PVC pipe, about the length of a baseball bat. Really not ok. Luckily no lasting damage to either kid.

I talked to both about hitting, escalation, etc. and gave the big one a consequence. Also planning to have a family rules meeting and give middle a consequence. However, I'm not at all convinced big understands the seriousness of what he did. He can be very impulsive and has trouble with comprehension. He usually does not understand abstract concepts (As in, you could have accidentally hit her in the head). He's mad at me for giving him a consequence, but seems to have no understanding that he did anything wrong.

He currently takes a medication that is supposed to help him be more reflective but apparently it's not helping enough. He's taken stimulants for his ADHD in the past but they made him even more paranoid and aggressive.

How do I help him see the big picture and understand why we have the rules we have? He'll be 11 next month and I can't have him pick up a weapon every time he gets mad.

Thanks,

I'm in a similar situation, with no advice to give. Looking forward to whatever other responses you get.

Impulsiveness and lack of self control is common - I know our child is still impulsive. We spent a lot of time role playing a situation and having her act out the 'correct' response. This seemed to work well in teaching her how to interact with her sister.

We also read social stories to her, over and over again. If there isn't a social story already, make up your own. I am sure you are aware that changes aren't going to happen overnight, but those are the methods we used and eventually we started to see improvement.

While trying to explain all the why's, I also told my son that he would soon be large and strong enough for the law to hold him fully accountable, and if he couldn't learn to control his impulse to hit or grab things or throw, he could very well end up in jail. That this is the way society is: people can NOT hit each other, throw objects at each other, or otherwise use ANY type of physical aggression with each other without society issuing severe consequences like a jail sentence. I told him he didn't have to understand it, he had to know that this wasn't something I or his teachers or his counselors could change for him: hit with a post-puberty body, and there will be consequences that can literally ruin your life. I told him THAT was why I was focused on this issue; not only did I now want him hurting friends and family, but I also did not want him getting himself in trouble outside of our family.

Your son has only a few years before he will look like a teenager. All bets are off when he reaches that age. I didn't sugar coat it all for my son. I know it seems extreme, but nothing else seemed to get through to him.

We are 100% zero tolerance on physical aggression, because he can't distinguish fine lines. No playful punching or anything. It is all off the table.

He hasn't used physical aggression in years. Although he did go through a nose to nose intimidation phase that I had to work him out of.

When I didn't understand how serious it was to say I wanted to kill someone as a way to express my frustration, I was given articles to read about kids being suspended from school for talking about guns or wanting to kill or bring a weapon to school.

I was told I was impulsive as a child but what I will never understand is how can a child still be impulsive if they already know what the consequence will be? Either I was never impulsive to begin with and my mom was so full of it or something is wrong with those other kids than being impulsive. For me, all I had to know was what the consequence would be if I did it for me to not do it again next time. I had to be told also what could happen if I did this to know to not do that again next time.

Impulse control is not being able to (easily) stop yourself from doing something, even with knowing the consequences. If you don't understand the consequences, then it is a decision made with incomplete information. That is how I look at it, anyway.

It is like if you have ever had an irresistible urge to do something. If you can stop yourself from doing that thing, you have good impulse control. if you can't, you have poor impulse control.

If all it takes is knowing the consequences and making a calculated decision based on benefits and consequences, then you probably had better impulse control then what you were given credit for,

My mom could have been mistaken and maybe she assumed I knew of the consequences but I didn't. I was even on pills for my impulsiveness. I remember I used to just do things after being told to not to because I wanted to see what would happen. I hated not being told why so I would do it anyway just to see what would happen. Pretty common in aspies isn't it? How many of us have to know the reason why before we follow the order you know.

There is a difference between impulsive and impulse I found out. I thought it was a compulsion to do something because you felt the urge to do it and you had to do it to get rid of that thought. Kind of like OCD. I have had compulsions and also the need to do something like I would be told to not touch the stove because it's hot so I would touch it just to see how hot it is. Then it apparently got worse when I hit puberty so I was drugged for it.

That's how I deal with a lot of things my son does not understand. I explain that if he doesn't understand he has to trust me and accept the way things are. I explained he does not have to agree with the situation/rules but that he does have to live with them and accept it, in particular when the law could get involved.

Obviously I continue to try and help him understand and as he matures and becomes more experienced you hope that proves to be the case. I also have to accept there will be some things he will never get or understand. In particular he struggles with the moralities of what you can and can't say on social media. He needs to accept that being right (in his mind) does not always justify what he writes on a computer. Fortunately he is much better on the aggression side of things these days so I don't have a specific worry there any more, although he is going through that mid-teen Mr Angry phase.

Next up is my little girl (12), diagnosed last week...

I think you are right. I would not group either needing to know why, or an OCD compulsion as being caused by the same thing as impulse control. It may all look like non-compliance but the causes and fixes are very different.

I may be a subjective term. I looked up impulse control and lot of stuff pops up like internet addiction, gambling, shopping, drinking, not being able to control your temper, etc. There is also impulse control disorder an it's found in many conditions.

So it's not impulse control if you just do things without knowing the consequences? What about not thinking before you do things? What would you call it if someone just does things after being told to not do it? I am sure everyone has poor self control every now and then such as how many parents would beat a person if they caught them harming their child? They sure wouldn't be thinking about the consequences. Only about protecting their child while I know if I kept at it after they stopped harming my child, I would go to jail so I stop when they run. So it seems like there I would have good self impulse control than the majority. I am so terrified of getting in trouble and having consequences it gives me good self impulse control and I sure don't want to be locked up. I can remember fighting back harming a child because they were making me upset because I knew I would be the bad guy so to me little kids were evil because you are defenseless and can't do anything to stop them or you're the bad guy so I screamed instead for attention.

I think there are a number of different issues:

I think everyone probably has some trigger that renders rational thinking a moot point. I agree that no one is completely immune from impulse control issues of some kind.

People at a younger developmental age don't really get right from wrong. They do things because they want to. Later they understand right and wrong better, and understand consequences. Some consequences and some moral issues are more complex than others, so the simple ones are understood first. Ideally, it is better if a kid does the right thing b/c they know it is the right thing to do, as opposed to fearing consequences. Aside from the morality of it, it is better b/c then you don't have to worry about them looking for opportunities to get away with doing the wrong thing.

If you have incomplete information and act not knowing the consequences, either because the consequences are indirect or not told to you in advance, that is different from knowing and doing it anyway. That is why it generally helps if a child knows in advance what the punishment is. If you "surprise" them, it seems unfair to them.

If you can't help acting even when you know the punishment would not make the action worth it, that is an example of an impulse control issue.

If you don't think the consequences are enough and do it anyway, that is not an impulse control issue. That is an issue with the consequences not being harsh enough.

That is why it is often hard for me to figure out what do when I figure out that no matter what consequence I use, it is not going to work b/c the control is not there. The other workarounds are harder.

I definitely feared consequences so I was always lying to try and stay out of trouble and I thought fearing consequences was normal and so was fear getting punished or into trouble and then I was an adult when I just learned that when you spank, children fear getting hit so they follow your orders and rules because they fear pain. I was like "Wait, I feared consequences and punishments and I hated being in trouble so I feared those, is it wrong to take away privileges or to send a kid to time out or to their room by that logic?" That is why the spanking debates have never worked with me or we will mind as well say it's wrong to punish your child or else they will fear getting into trouble so they follow your rules because they fear consequences. I just realize I was a strange kid and kids don't fear these things and I did so I thought it was all normal and that was the reason why kids followed them and adults. I followed rules as a child because I didn't want to get in trouble. I was scared. Then I would get anxiety when my mom would yell or anyone else because I would realize I did something wrong so I would lie about it. If I was asked about anything, I would get anxiety because I feared it was maybe wrong to do so I would deny it. That makes me think perhaps you shouldn't punish your child and only punish them the second offense they do it after you had told them not to and have talked to them about it. You don't want them to lie to you and you want them to be honest. You don't want them to be afraid. But unfortunately if I didn't get in trouble, I thought it was the right thing to do because of no consequence and it would be hard to make me not do it and to get me to understand so my mom was trapped. What could she do? So making me fear was the only way to make me listen and using threats because I took them all seriously. Even I don't know any other way of raising a kid like me without making them following the rules and not do stuff because they are afraid of getting consequences.

Even my therapist acted amazed that my reason for not doing things like harming an animal that always gave me tremendous anxiety was because I feared hospitalization. My reason for not shoplifting was fear of jail. My fear of harming others was jail or hospitalization. And because of these fears, he was not concerned about me and didn't think I was a danger to society because of knowing the consequences despite my violent fantasies. I thought this was normal and he said "No it's not" and blamed it all on my AS.

I remember getting a PM back from someone asking me why do we continue locking these people up if they have no control or if they don't learn from their consequence so they go out and do the same crimes again and I said to him if they are not able to control themselves or learn to not do them, then they need to be kept away from everyone so we are all safe from them and he agreed with my point and said there has to be a better way than prison since punishment does not teach them. I do agree there is stuff wrong with our prison and I know some people are so used to being locked up and having a routine, they don't know what to do when they are released so they do a crime to go back because it's better than being homeless. I assume those people don't have families who can help them and plus it makes it hard to get employment when you have a criminal background. I was even an adult when I figured out why we had laws, they are not to keep people from doing them, they are to protect people and that way if someone does something like break into your house, you can press charges because the law says they can, no law, they can't do a thing about it. So I say now as an adult we shouldn't have to have laws to make people not do things but unfortunately we have to have them because not everyone is moral so we have to have them to protect people and to keep more people from doing them because they don't want to go to jail right or get tickets or pay fines or lose their licenses.

It is not abnormal to fear consequences. As you stated that is (part of) why consequences are given, whether it is loss of privileges, time-out, or whatever the consequence is. I don't think it is bad to use consequences when it is appropriate and helpful.

I am not sure what the therapist meant, other than maybe he felt NT people could do the right thing without fear, or that he felt your fear was disproportionate. Also some people know when to get away with things a lot of times, and so don't always have blanket rules of not doing things (like speeding) but make a calculation based on how late they are and how likely it is to be caught in a particular instance. If they don't think cops patrol a certain road they may speed on it, but not on a different road which they know to be a speed trap. They don't fear the ticket too much. They just make a calculation.

In the US (not feeling qualified to talk about any other country's penal system) prisons are not especially rehabilitative in that I don't think most people learn anything from being in a US prison about how to behave better on the outside. Prison is used punitively, to make society feel better, and to get people who are labeled as dangerous off the streets so they don't commit crimes for the time they are put away. With some people that is probably necessary, but some probably could be rehabilitated if Americans were willing to spend the money and the effort doing so. There is also a debate about the things people are imprisoned for like drug consumption, and how uneven punishments can be across the system.

Some people do have to be put "somewhere" b/c we don't want future victims and we don't have the psychological science down on how to fix certain things.

Now I feel confused because if it's not abnormal to fear consequences then I don't understand the spanking logic about hitting does not teach the kid right from wrong, it teaches them fear so they do the right thing because they don't want to be hit. That is how consequences work too, it doesn't teach you right from wrong, it teaches you fear of consequences so you do the right thing so you won't get a consequence. That is why I thought this was all abnormal of me.

Knowing right from wrong is not the same as not doing something because you are afraid. Morality/ethically is not the same as consequences.

Ideally, a child should know certain things are right and wrong from a moral/ethical perspective without having to threaten to punish them.

I punish, but I wish I did not have to, obviously. I don't spank, b/c I don't think I would be teaching my child not to hit, if I hit him. There are things adults are allowed to do, and children are not, but I don't like to add to that list of things. It is easier to say that hitting is wrong, period. I don't personally believe it is an appropriate consequence, regardless, but this is a contentious issue and not all parents agree with that. Some parents do believe in hitting.

<nervous pit in my stomach because I recognize I may be stepping over some kind of boundary, so please know I am trying to be helpful>

I am starting with the generalization that kids on the spectrum tend to be at least 2 years behind developmentally. I am then adding the generalizations that fit my house that state that people on the spectrum tend to be very black and white about rules, are very sensitive to perceived unfairness, and have a pretty strong sense of justice.

Keeping those generalizations in mind, here is what I see:

You have 2 kids who are likely very close in age, developmentally speaking. You have one child, the 6 year old, who initiates the aggression by striking first, who also--as of yet--does not have any consequences. You have the second child, who responds to the aggression with increased aggression (which will likely be seen as legitimately provoked), who suffers consequences.

I just can't see any way in which this particular situation will be "seen" by your kid with AS. In his mind, the rule is not being consistently enforced and the fact that she initiated the aggression is not being recognized at all in terms of consequences. I find that with my kids, the sanctity of all the rules is violated as soon as one rule is violated. So, I suspect that your son's likely perceptions of lack of consistency, unfairness and injustice will interfere with him seeing any "big picture." He will be too stuck on the fact that she started it and nothing happened to her to even consider the severity of his own response.

I have not yet had to deal with use of weapons in our house, but I am adding that to my real rules as a suggestion (which of course, you are under no obligation to consider). The rules need to be discussed when no one is angry and they need to be discussed more than once. Everyone needs to be very clear.

Rules regarding physical contact:

The rule in this house is that no one engages in frustration- or anger-based physical contact with another living being.

1. EVERYONE engaging in physical contact will have consequences, regardless of who started it or why
2. THE FIRST PERSON to engage in physical contact will have a higher consequence
3. ANYONE engaging in physical contact with any kind of weapon (weapon=anything that is not part of your body) will receive a higher consequence

And then you stick to it. If she slaps him first and he slaps her back, her consequence needs to be higher because she started it. If he slaps her and she hits him with a book, they both have higher (than usual) consequences, he because he started it and she because she used a weapon. If she slaps him and he walks away, she needs to have a consequence. If he throws something at her and she walks away, he needs to have a consequence (higher than usual because of starting it and weapon). And, if something really bizarre happens and I slap one of them, I need a (higher for starting it) consequence. The rule is that NO ONE engages in frustration or anger-based physical contact. NO ONE includes the adults. To me, it has to be that black and white. Otherwise, all cognition is focused on inequity, unfairness and injustice.

I don't mean to minimize your issue. Having an impulsive pre-teen is scary because the potential consequences start to take on a whole new meaning. But I know that the only way my son would be able to hear me is if he felt the same rules applied to everyone, that things were fair, and that the outcome was just. If any of those things are missing, he has a really difficult time getting past it on a cognitive level. As a matter of fact, the same is true for my daughter (also the younger in my house).

Last edited by InThisTogether on 10 Oct 2014, 9:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.