How to teach child self defense ?

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My son is very insensitive to pain AND abuse. Not only does he not seem to notice accidental falls, cuts and bruises, but he also seems to quickly forget purposefully inflicted slaps and beatings from other people.

My twin nephews (same age as he is) are very aggressive to each other and to him. I walked into the play room yesterday to see one of them hitting him on the side of the head. Nephew fled the scene when he saw that I had witnessed the incident. My son reacted to being beaten with a tiny whine, but stayed where he was. He did not attempt to move away or defend himself or react to the slaps in any other way. When his cousin returned to the room and tried to interact with him, my son did not react, or avoid him. Rather, he seemed to have forgotten that Cousin had just beaten him. It took me all my of free will to not yell at my nephew for laying his hands on my defenseless little one.

Aside from tearing up because this is my helpless child who was being abused, I also worry about his lack of reaction or attempts to defend himself. Even kittens or puppies that are being beaten flee their abusers and avoid them like the plague. Why does my son not do this ?

Is this normal amongst people on the spectrum ? Are you very indifferent to abuse and pain ? I don't believe in responding to physical aggression with more physical aggression but my son's complete inability to defend himself breaks my heart. I won't always be around to protect him.

How can I teach him to defend himself or flee abusers ?

Please help.

Wow, I am sorry that you are going through this. This must be heartbreaking for you. I have a relatively high threshold to physical pain. Emotional pain, on the other hand, my threshold for that is really low. I wonder if just trying to explain to your son that certain actions are bad and should not be tolerated will help. Can you tell your nephew that if he continues this behavior he will no longer be allowed to play with your son?

People on the spectrum often have unusual reactions to sensory stimuli, including not feeling pain.

Perhaps take him to actual martial arts lessons?

Nephew knows that the next time he hits another kid (ANY KID) - both twins are EXTREMELY aggressive which makes me wonder if there is anything going on with THEM - he would lose his toys, access to his favorite TV shows and no ice cream / candy until the cows come home. He apologized to my son who, of course, does not really understand what an apology is, etc.

If someone were to hit you, skibum, would you react at all ? Would you attempt to move away ? Hit back ? Or would you just not react to the blows ?

He is a daredevil and has had a great many bruises in his young life already, but accidental cuts & wounds don't bother me as much as seeing him being WILLFULLY set upon and him not reacting to the beating he is getting. THAT makes me so mad, but also atarmed. I wouldn't want people to make him their punching bag just because he won't react or defend himself... KWIM ?

Last edited by HisMom on 06 Apr 2014, 6:23 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Do they react to being beaten at all ? That is what I am concerned about. If an autistic individual is being willfully set upon, is this how they would react ?

I don't know, I've never met someone who had quite such an extreme non-reaction to pain.

It's important to remember that autistic people are not a giant homologous mass. Personally, first sign of trouble I end the confrontation in the easiest way possible. Usually blocking a few punches will do the trick, someone nearby will restrain them or they'll give up and go away. Sometimes you need to run. Very rarely you need to use force against them.

Could you teach him to scream instead of reacting with a tiny whine?

No, I agree. I, too, don't believe in responding to physical aggression with physical aggression. However, my son also did not run away. This isn't the first time he has been hit by his cousins and I don't think it will be the last, even if I tried to protect him as much as I can. He just sat there, while the blows were being dealt. A little whine was all the sound he made, but that was it. So, he was probably feeling the pain but didnt know or realize he could run away ?

I am just confused and hurt. How do I teach him self defense ? And, given that my nephews are little trouble makers, it wouldn't hurt for them to get a taste of their own medicine from time to time. Maybe it will even teach them that hitting other kids isn't the smartest thing to do !

It is your duty to keep your child away from his nephews until such time as they are not violent. Their parents should be intervening to deal with whatever reason they are aggressive and violent. It is not your child's responsibility to teach them any lessons. Consider the nephews like 2 large aggressive dogs You would protect your child from such dogs. Maybe your refusal to let the twins be alone with your child will be their parents' wake up call that they need to deal with their children's behavior.

My reaction to physical aggression was to return aggression, but I was a lot older than 4 then.

I don't think you understand my posts. I am autistic. I say what I mean, there is rarely subtext.

I am not your son. Just as there are differences between you and him, there are differences between me and him. Again, autistic people are not all the same. We all have different unusual responses to sensory stimuli. Personally, I can barely think if I can smell something unusual, and I struggle with bright lights or loud noises or labels in clothing. I do not have reduced sensitivity to pain. I do not know if your son struggles with smells or lights or noises or labels.

If he gave a whine, then he felt some pain. However, it seems he is not very sensitive to it. On one hand, this is good because nobody likes to feel pain, but on the other hand, we feel pain for a reason - he might not notice he is being hurt.

If you want to teach him self defence, the first step is to get him lessons with someone who actually knows self defence. Look for karate lessons in your town or something. However, this will only work if he has a vague interest in martial arts, or at least is not opposed to the idea.

If he is opposed to the idea, you need to teach him to scream if he gets attacked so someone can come help him. This is difficult. Have you ever trained a dog? I'd suggest using techniques like those. The only problem is that you'd need to ritually subject him to the conditions you want him to learn to scream in, which is of course illegal. So maybe role play or something?

Probably best you consult someone who actually knows about teaching autistic children how to behave! Do you have any friends with older autistic children?

Hi.
I don't know if this will help in any way but nonetheless my thoughts are wih you.
I grew up with a father who used to beat his own daughters. It was called "education" and a way to teach respect. Many years have passed until I eventually understood how wrong and abusive it was, so my first advice is to make your son clear about the issue: it's wrong. Try to make him undestand the faces people put on and the body language they adopt in those behaviours. Make him hold an egg to comprehend, what happens if it gets hit too hard and if someone smashes it. Teach him the words he should look out for. And yes, if he doesn't know how to tell the diference, it's a red flag. When you get beat up as a child and it becomes "normal", you'll most likely grow up with a higher chance of not being able to tell the diference of what is right or wrong as far as to people's intention towards you. Even if later on people use only words.
It's not like he doens't feel the pain, IMO. It about not understanding it as something one shouldn't have to feel or be exposed to.
If he doesn't understand it's wrong for others to act upon him like that, he will hold nothing against those who did it.
Stay strong and try to make it clear for him.

With regards to the mention of Martial Arts -- Martial arts is good if you've got several years to master it before you ever think about using it. Some martial arts may be better than others when it comes to the time it takes to become useful. But personally I think boxing classes are a good short term solution if someone needs to learn something useful quickly. (we're talking about ages significantly older than 4 though)

I do have an 11 year old who is AS/ASD and we put him in martial arts but he couldn't handle the disciplined environment and the idea of actually hitting someone (ever). So with him we are in the same boat as in the beginning, a little lost on how to teach him to handle the bullying.

That is a really good question. Now, I would mostly block blows. When I was in high school I was on a competitive martial arts team so I can almost instinctively block blows now. Outside of the dojo, I think it would be very rare that I would hit back. I know I could possibly do it but I most likely would not. I am not violent in my nature and even when I was actively doing martial arts I never considered it for self defense but purely as a sport.

When I was little, even younger than your son is now, I remember that I used to get hit and punched and even kicked and stepped on by an older member of my family. He was only two years older than I was but was bigger, stronger, and more aggressive. When I was little I don't remember fighting back. I don't remember being able to fight back. Sometimes this person would just walk by me and give me a sucker punch in the belly just because he thought it was fun. I would be doubled over and by the time I could breathe he was gone. And I could not physically win in a hitting fight with him so I would just go somewhere quiet where I could be alone and lick my wounds. This sort of thing went on for years. I am sure I tried to hit back sometimes but I could never win those battles.

And there was always an emotional part of it because I could never figure out what I had done to deserve this. I think that part troubled me more than the physical abuse.

I think that if someone hit me now, I would probably block the hits and then be terribly confused and go through emotional turmoil. My self esteem is very low though so sometimes if someone does something to me I can easily convince myself that I deserved it. In fact, I kind of do that a lot. But it might even be a possibility that your son might not even realize that there is something wrong with being hit. I know that there have been times when I have been abused that I did not even realize that it was wrong for me to be abused until someone else told me it was wrong.

Last edited by skibum on 06 Apr 2014, 7:21 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Where do nephew's parents stand in all of this?

I agree with capricasix... but I think one of the very best ways to teach him to defend himself is for you to react instantly when someone is abusing him. Lots of little kids need to be taught to keep their hands off other kids... and that is because many parents fail to teach their children not to touch others in hurtful or aggressive ways. I would have shouted out, and stormed in there saying, "Hey! Keep your hands to yourself!" When you do that, not only the cousins learn about proper behavior, but your son learns too.

I agree with capricasix... but I think one of the very best ways to teach him to defend himself is for you to react instantly when someone is abusing him. Lots of little kids need to be taught to keep their hands off other kids... and that is because many parents fail to teach their children not to touch others in hurtful or aggressive ways. I would have shouted out, and stormed in there saying, "Hey! Keep your hands to yourself!" When you do that, not only the cousins learn about proper behavior, but your son learns too.