Constant whining and crying.......

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My 11 year old, is a VERY good boy, he is helpful, sweet, kind, most of the time, and very smart. BUT if he doesn't get to play his games or have snack during a movie or whatever it is that he wants at the moment, he will whine and cry. UGH!! !! Even over the silliest thing. And quite honestly I KNOW that I am probably not handling this the best way. But my husband and I both do not know what to do! I have tried and tried to explain to him that if he would just talk to me like a "gentleman" It would get him a lot further. But he doesn't get it! We have been sending him to bed, we have sent him to timeout, we have taken things away. But nothing works. He still whines all the time. My four year old doesn't whine as much as my 11 yr old. When he whines and I start to get upset he says "your mad at me, are you mad at me?" And I don't know what to say to that. I don't want to hurt his feeling by telling him that I am mad, But I also think he needs to know how I feel. I just am feeling very lost right now. When he has good days, he is the most wonderful boy. But when he has a bad day, he leaves our entire family dumbfounded. None of us know how to deal with some of his behaviors.

Any Ideas would be much appreciated! Thank you!

My kids are NT, but I'm an Aspie, diagnosed a few years ago. When I was a child, nobody knew about AS, so I was just "wierd" and at times a "brat". I was also very whiney and given to bad meltdowns over very small things.

Please remember that they didn't know anything about AS then. The way they handled it was I got absolutely nothing if I whined and carried on and cried and "pitched a fit". If I had a meltdown, I was punished or spanked. It didn't make me not have them but it made me not have them around the people who would spank me and also the nature of them changed for a while. Rather than the violent throwing toys and screaming and crying and hitting myself it became more of a crying on my bed and punching the mattress thing. I am NOT saying to spank for a meltdown. What I am saying is that they didn't handle it the way we know today it should be handled and I don't think I'm damaged in any way for it.

I think it's perfectly fine to let him know you are mad at hime. After all, if he doesn't know then he won't know that he should change his behavior or try to change it or at least to talk to you about it. Just because he has AS does not mean that in situations where it is appropriate that you shouldn't say something to him that will hurt his feelings. Telling him you are angry with him may hurt his feelings but it also gives him the chance to learn that certain actions of his can cause those feelings in others. It's not like you are being mean to him to hurt his feelings over something unimportant.

I don't know if your child has AS or is in a more symptomatic place on the spectrum, but if he has AS, I would say from my own experience growing up with it, that treating him like you should never come across negative is a huge disservice to him. My grandparents would treat me like "normal kids" were treated, but my mother was very overprotective and would never do anything to upset me in any way. The way my mother treated me with kid gloves, in a way, reinforced the idea in my mind that no one SHOULD ever upset me by saying or doing something that would, no matter what I did.

Now, that is just my own experience, and people with AS are all individuals and respond differently to things. You know your child best, and if he is very sensitive then showing anger may upset him, but then again, denying him what he's asking for and giving appropriate responses as you would to an NT kid may be what helps him the most. You have to decide that for yourself and I honestly think if you try that and it doesn't work it won't harm him, if he's AS like I am.

I know next to nothing about classic autism so if he has that, then I've been no help.

I think the thing that I would like parents of kids with mild to moderate AS to know is that we can understand the concepts that parents try to get across to us, but we don't always process them right and we may need more time to be able to respond in the manner that we need to. Not being able to process or get control of emotions does not equal not understanding the entire premise. Some of us just have trouble learning control.

I would imagine that what you would need to be trying to teach him about the whining and crying is control. Not like my grandparents did, with the hickory to the legs or the hand to the behind, but by talking, explaining, having him give you his feelings and opinions on it and why he has to learn not to do it, and then following through where he gets NOTHING that he's whined or cried for, while you also say something like "We talked about this, and when you ask me right you can have it. You won't get what you want by asking like that or actng like that".

You should also talk about the appropriate times for whining and crying and there truly are those. He should be allowed to do that when its appropriate, just as adults we do all sometimes whine and cry. Even NT's do that at times. He needs to know that this isn't a "never again do this" type of scenario.

Anyway, I hope I've helped and I've just assumed he's an aspie so I've given my opinion from my own experience.

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I'm giving it another shot. We will see.
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My daughter is 10 and still whines way too frequently. This isn't a good social skill. So, what I've done is tell her in a calm time that whining is very annoying and nobody wants to give her what she wants when she's whining. Nobody will want to be her friend. Whining doesn't work. When she whines I just remind her that I can't understand whining. Would she please tell me what she wants without whining. Usually she will rephrase it. It works with that snotty tween tone too. The key is to tell the kid why what he or she is doing won't work and what effect it has on people. Then make sure it doesn't work. I've found that punishment doesn't go very far with KB. The other thing she's had to learn is that you don't always get what you want. Not for whining, not for a complete meltdown. No punishment, just no pay off.

I too believe that a big part of the whining issue is understanding that its not okay to whine, and how it makes people feel and react.

That being said, my DS is a whiner. Pre-parenting years, I was always hypercritical of parent who "allowed" their children to whine. So when my wonderful DS finally learned to talk and everything came out whine, I felt I got my justice for all my judgement of others. After several years, we finally realized he had no clue he was whining, nor did he know how to not whine. While my NT daughter could be told "try again" or "I didn't understand you with that whine" and she could change her tone, my DS just got frustrated. He literally did not hear the whine. So when he would whine (at around 8 years old) we would model the way to say it emphasizing and pointing out the facial expression, body posture, and tone of voice and do a "redo" of the conversation. At 10 (almost 11) he still whines, but it is much less, and he can now respond (about 70% of the time) to "that sounded a bit whiney, could you try again"

Thank you ALL! I have done most of the things mentioned but I will for sure use the "try again". I know it will take time and I'm sorry I should have mentioned he has AS and ADHD.

I will keep working with him, He wants so badly to please us. That's why I have a hard time telling him I am mad at him. But I do think he needs to know it, then he can try to avoid doing the same thing again. Thanks so much for your help!

I do the same as eurekac but i will also ignore requests made in whining voice and say I don't understand whining, can you talk in a normal voice so I can understand? Whining is usually a sign my daughter is overloaded so sometimes I just need to get her to a calmer location.

My four-year-old with AS and OCD has a history of whining and crying over things thas seem little to me, such as people not doing thing "right," being separated from me, not getting his way, etc.

What has helped for him is a prescription for Prozac (an SSRI anti-depressant that also reduces anxiety) and work with an ABA therapist on his behavior and fixations.

The change brought about in him as a result of the meds has been astounding--better mood, less stimming, more verbal, more interested in learning and doing new things, more social, and more cooperative. He has experienced no negative side effects with this med, from what I can tell.

My older son is also on Prozac and doing well, but he initially experienced some hyperactivity with the med that wore off after a couple of weeks.

I've always thought that parental anger is a natural consequence. "I am mad. I don't like it when you hit me. It hurts." Then walked off. This worked better for me than punishment and gave her a name for feelings along with a consequence. I am very confused when people talk in a really sweet voice but really they're angry.

I agree with explaining why whining is not a good idea...........provided they know its whining they are doing, because I remember sometimes as a kid people thought I was just being whiney when I was actually overloaded and did not know how to deal with it. For instance I am sensative to light....so as a kid I might complain about the light being too bright because for me it was so unpleasent it was impossible not to but no one else understood it was that big of a deal to me.

But yeah it helps to explain why not to whine, and what constitutes whining if they are confused about it.......also I do not suggest ever saying anything like 'you are a whiner' to your kid as I remember taking that sort of wording too litterally and personal as a child. If my mom or someone actually sat down and explained things to me without labeling me as a negative thing it usually turned out better.

Oh, sensory issues are another matter. If KB is whining about lights or noise then that's different. That's pain and I'll get her out of there. That's a different kind of whining than a complaint about something or wanting something.

My son doesn't have much for sensory issues. If fact I can't even think if one. He used to be sensitive to noise but doesn't seem to be anymore. It's usually just whining that he didn't get to play his games, or doesn't get this, or his brother did that.

When I first saw your post I was going to say that my daughter started whining, crying and screaming all the time lately while she used to be easy to calm as we have learned not to overstimulate her and we learned to help her with coping with her sensory issues and anxiety. However my daughter is 6 and has classic autism and her issue right now is that her school is not set up for an autistic child and she is accustomed to being handled by people who understand autistic children. Her issue right now is extreme stress. We are hoping after the holiday that things will get better as we are going to have more assistance from her therapy center....they will even be coming to school with her on Friday afternoons.
However, I also have a 9 year old son with Asperger's (I am aspie too and he is kind of a mini me at times). We also do not put up with "temper tantrums". If he gets upset because he cant do something he is asked to stop or he has to go to his room which usually (if he ends up there) starts screaming and throwing things around so we tell him that the timer doesnt start until he is calm. However your son sounds more sensitive like my daughter who will get very upset if she does anything wrong she starts saying "Im sorry Im sorry" and we DO NOT yell at her or she will have a major anxiety attack and cry for about an hour. I would try sticking to one thing or speaking of sticking....have you tried a sticker method?
We use tokens for my kids and when they have gotten enough tokens then they can buy something at the store or use them to go somewhere special. Loosing a token or not getting a token for the day is very upsetting to both my kids, it took my daughter longer to figure it out but now its very important. We usually dont take them away from misbehavior because we mainly use them to get them to clean up after themselves. If you dont pick up your toys you dont get a token. The only time we take them away for misbehavior is for hitting or throwing something at someone.
I used to run a little day care many years ago and I had one little boy who was very difficult. He was in the "naughty chair" ALL the time so I got a different idea. I got a bowl and filled it with little candies and little cheap toys and if you did not go to the chair all day then you got something out of the bowl when you went home. It took a few days but he learned really quick and I didnt have any more problems with him. I think reward systems work better than punishment systems for kids who do not respond or are over sensitive.