Can we talk about discipline for ASD (or ASD-ish) kiddos?

[Mama2Xander]

(I'm posting this here specifically, rather than the GD forum)

Title pretty much says it all... just wondering what works for the other mamas here! I am definitely in need of some new ideas. I think we need to make a clearer system, I'm thinking of some kind of visual warning system leading to time-outs as needed - they use something like that at DS1's school and he really seems to respond to it there.

My DS is almost 6, but a lot of the time his impulse control seems to be closer to that of a young toddler. He has a lot of trouble with self-regulation and does not seem to show much (if any) remorse when he hits someone. He seems to find it exciting (?) - he starts getting really silly, very stimmy, kind of flops his head back and rolls his eyes back and refuses to look at me, starts shrieking... it's weird. Or he will just spit in my face when I try to talk to him, and start this super-rapid string of potty talk (I think this is one of his new stims). It's very frustrating.

(I know some of you are probably against time-outs, and believe me, I thought I would not use them as a parent either... but I need to do *something*. I am open to any other suggestions too.)

Edited to add: we already do time outs, and have been for a long time, but it's not at all effective and most of the time he won't go into a time out anyway. So I'm looking for different methods I realized that my original post made it sound like we hadn't even tried time outs yet, oops!

[sbgrace]

He sounds a lot like Andrew.
What works best for him is something called Nurtured Heart Approach. The best description of it is in a book called All Children Flourishing. I also use ideas from Kid Cooperation by Elizabeth Pantley. It works well with the Nurtured Heart techniques.

I think this is the blog post where I began thinking about trying Nurtured Heart with Andrew. http://kyraanderson.wordpress.com/20...urtured-heart/

[cchrissyy]

Sounds a lot like my 1st grader.

Unfortunately I have no discipline solutions. The only things that ever work are the preventative things, such as having a 1:1 adult around to catch all the minor problems before they get big, to walk him thorugh upsetting events or confusing social interchanges, and to remove him for breaks or activity as needed.

[kme]

I have no problem with time outs. We mostly use the 1-2-3 Magic system, although not as consistently as we should. I also often shorten the time outs from the recommended 1 minute per year b/c my son is a sensory seeker and sitting for 6 minutes is a very long time for him. I usually make the time out 4 minutes. This approach was recommended to me for my older ADHD child when he was younger and it seems to work pretty well even for kids with impulse control problems b/c you are giving warnings (unless it is a huge offense). The biggest thing about it is there is no yelling, no screaming, no emotion involved. It is just "That's one", "That's two". It takes the emotion out of it. It will not teach remorse but it will let your son know that hitting is not going to be tolerated (and in fact hitting is usually an automatic time out, no warnings.) It also works REALLY well for whining which is an issue for my daughter!!

For my older son, it was also recommended that I intervene when I started seeing him getting "wound up". I used to kind of pull him away and get him calmed down before things got out of control.

[heatherdeg]

My son got so bad that I actually turned to books on dealing with severe behaviors of kids in foster care. Time outs? Pffft... yeah--if you could get him to sit somewhere without restraining him! And 1-2-3 did nothing for him. It was like he totally had no regard for any kind of authority. It was BAD.

I'm not familiar with the ones that sbgrace posted (so they may be way more awesome) but I landed on the Positive Discipline series with the caveat that when my son wasn't able to function much beyond the toddler level (and that was really a spotty thing) then that's how I treated him--with redirection and the techniques you use with a toddler. It took me some time to adjust to shifting gears so I could address some behaviors like a toddler and some like an older child. At one point, I'm sure that he caught on to this and was "playing me" so-to-speak... acting more like a toddler than he was capable of. But I caught on because he found it obviously amusing.

We're having fewer issues now (this was HUGE from 4-5yo) but I still refer to the Positive Discipline books.

[Mama2Xander]

Originally Posted by sbgrace

He sounds a lot like Andrew.

Originally Posted by cchrissyy

Sounds a lot like my 1st grader.

Originally Posted by heatherdeg

My son got so bad that I actually turned to books on dealing with severe behaviors of kids in foster care. Time outs? Pffft... yeah--if you could get him to sit somewhere without restraining him! And 1-2-3 did nothing for him. It was like he totally had no regard for any kind of authority. It was BAD.

OK, as awful as it sounds... this is actually really helpful to hear that we are not the only ones with this problem!! Things have been pretty rough lately (not that it's ever easy, but it does seem to have cycles of being worse and then a little better). I am SO TIRED of being told that it's all my fault for not "controlling" him, or that I'm just making it all up. It is a very tricky situation because he behaves really well at school, so hardly anyone else ever sees what he is like at home/with family. It seriously makes me feel crazy sometimes. And we don't even have a proper dx - they will not dx him with an ASD because of how he is at school. His only official dx is ODD but I don't think that is correct. So thanks, you guys, for making me feel a little less crazy.

Heatherdeg - oh my - that sounds very much like what we have been dealing with. His behaviours look a LOT like reactive attachment disorder, except there is absolutely no reason why he would have that. It's bizarre. But yeah, when you said "It was like he totally had no regard for any kind of authority", that is EXACTLY what we are constantly saying about my son. He just does.not.get.it.at.all. I read about all these other people doing time-outs and just wonder HOW do they get the kid to sit there in the first place??? Mostly he just refuses to even go into his room, and if he does he just slams things into the door which annoys the upstairs neighbours, or he sits there and screams, or just immediately comes back out, etc etc etc.


**OK, I need to backtrack a bit - I realized in my post earlier I made it sound like we'd never done time-outs, and that is not the case!! We've been trying it, very unsuccessfully, for ages. I meant to say that I want to make a more regimented system in the hopes that it might have more of an effect**

Originally Posted by sbgrace

What works best for him is something called Nurtured Heart Approach. The best description of it is in a book called All Children Flourishing. I also use ideas from Kid Cooperation by Elizabeth Pantley. It works well with the Nurtured Heart techniques.

Thanks. I just requested Kid Cooperation from the library, along with the No-Cry Discipline Solution (Pantley's newer book, I'm not sure how similar they are). I actually have "Transforming the Difficult Child" - I bought it a little while ago and just haven't read much of it yet. It does look really good though. It was easier to find here than All Children Flourishing, but I might get that one too eventually. I really need to get DH on board with it better though. He started reading it too and liked it, but he is very much a yeller (didn't use to be, but he's at the end of his rope too and it's been a hard habit to break), and so I got all discouraged that the Nurtured Heart approach wasn't going to work... yeah. Obviously something we need to work on.

Originally Posted by cchrissyy

Unfortunately I have no discipline solutions. The only things that ever work are the preventative things, such as having a 1:1 adult around to catch all the minor problems before they get big, to walk him thorugh upsetting events or confusing social interchanges, and to remove him for breaks or activity as needed.

Yes, the 1:1 adult is super helpful for DS too. The problem is that I have 2 other kids... one with (different) SN who is also challenging, and one baby who seems completely NT, very easy-going, a joy to be around (but he is really not sleeping well and I am sooooo tired!!!) I see that you have 3 kids too though, so I guess you kwim.

But yeah, our most successful times are when I am really able to focus on DS1 and give him my full and complete attention and help him stay out of trouble and keep him on track. It is very unsustainable though.

Originally Posted by kme

I have no problem with time outs. We mostly use the 1-2-3 Magic system, although not as consistently as we should. I also often shorten the time outs from the recommended 1 minute per year b/c my son is a sensory seeker and sitting for 6 minutes is a very long time for him. I usually make the time out 4 minutes. This approach was recommended to me for my older ADHD child when he was younger and it seems to work pretty well even for kids with impulse control problems b/c you are giving warnings (unless it is a huge offense). The biggest thing about it is there is no yelling, no screaming, no emotion involved. It is just "That's one", "That's two". It takes the emotion out of it. It will not teach remorse but it will let your son know that hitting is not going to be tolerated (and in fact hitting is usually an automatic time out, no warnings.) It also works REALLY well for whining which is an issue for my daughter!!

For my older son, it was also recommended that I intervene when I started seeing him getting "wound up". I used to kind of pull him away and get him calmed down before things got out of control.

Thanks, that is helpful. DH just made a traffic light sign with a little marker that can be moved up, to correspond to the warnings. I really think he needs something like that because it seems kind of arbitrary right now - we aren't consistent enough with the # of warnings he gets, so hopefully this will help us too. I totally agree with you about taking the emotion out of it too. It is so hard to do though! I'm working on it

Originally Posted by heatherdeg

I'm not familiar with the ones that sbgrace posted (so they may be way more awesome) but I landed on the Positive Discipline series with the caveat that when my son wasn't able to function much beyond the toddler level (and that was really a spotty thing) then that's how I treated him--with redirection and the techniques you use with a toddler. It took me some time to adjust to shifting gears so I could address some behaviors like a toddler and some like an older child. At one point, I'm sure that he caught on to this and was "playing me" so-to-speak... acting more like a toddler than he was capable of. But I caught on because he found it obviously amusing.

We're having fewer issues now (this was HUGE from 4-5yo) but I still refer to the Positive Discipline books.

Thanks for the recommendation, I will take a look at those books too. Argh, I have this huge pile of books next to my bed, in the hopes that one of them is going to contain the magic answer to all our problems, lol. (and also in the hopes that I will somehow magically have the time to actually *read* them)

Heatherdeg, if you don't mind me asking, does your son have other dx besides ASD? Did you know from early on that he was on the spectrum, or was he dx'd with other things first?


Thank you all SO MUCH for the replies and for being here. It really means a lot to me.

[cchrissyy]

Right, I have 3 kids too, and honestly, we have arranged life so that any time DS is home or out with us, there is a designated aditional adult there for him. So we rely heavily on both parents and extended family nearby.

DS's behavior problems range from astonishing hyperactivity and silliness to serious self-injury, property damage, and harm to others. He gets worked up quickly, and then he is agressive to anybody he can reach.
He does not respond to warnings or simple cause-effect threats. I use these constantly but they blow right past him

umm, back to techniques. there is a book "Aspergers Syndrome and difficult moments" with focuses on rages and severe acting out, mainly from a teacher/professional perspective. We do rely on medication. Schedules help - he is calmed by knowing the scheudle and ideally every minute of the day would be scheduled. For example, mine does better at school than home, and so we lengthened the "good" part of his day with aftercare. The hardest times are morning, evening, and weekends, and I know when we have more of a plan for the day, he is more comfortable and less likely to erupt.

[heatherdeg]

Originally Posted by Mama2Xander

Heatherdeg - oh my - that sounds very much like what we have been dealing with. His behaviours look a LOT like reactive attachment disorder, except there is absolutely no reason why he would have that. It's bizarre. But yeah, when you said "It was like he totally had no regard for any kind of authority", that is EXACTLY what we are constantly saying about my son. He just does.not.get.it.at.all. I read about all these other people doing time-outs and just wonder HOW do they get the kid to sit there in the first place??? Mostly he just refuses to even go into his room, and if he does he just slams things into the door which annoys the upstairs neighbours, or he sits there and screams, or just immediately comes back out, etc etc etc.

Actually, I got frustrated reading the RAD books because they were SO driven toward adoptive children, but ONE of them had ONE paragraph that made it click with me: kids who--for whatever reason--cannot connect to a primary caregiver early in life. They used the example of children with severe medical needs and extensive hospital stays, but I knew that my son had no clue we were even in the same room with him for at least the first 15mo and then wasn't actually "attached" to us for easily another year beyond that. And the books didn't help. The mainstream books were NOT going to work. The RAD books were dealing with more severely disrupted attachment and they weren't giving me any help with managing my son vs. repairing severe attachment issues. But the Positive Discipline book totally rocked. I got through the first chapter and told my husband about it and HE read it. We are now trying to finish the book and are regularly tag-teaming as needed to maintain the direction we need to and helping one another with reminders when needed. It's worlds better than it was. WORLDS better.

Originally Posted by Mama2Xander

Heatherdeg, if you don't mind me asking, does your son have other dx besides ASD? Did you know from early on that he was on the spectrum, or was he dx'd with other things first?

My son just turned 6yo and his dx was lifted just last month. He was initially suspected for cerebral palsy at 8mo. He had seizures, reactive airway disorder, central sleep apnea, and food intolerances (and man--those totally manifested in major behavior disruptions as well as development disruptions). We never treated the reactive airway (they wanted daily inhaler plus another illness inhaler) and he's really been fine (dx'd around 18mo or 2yo and was king of croupe until this year). He hasn't had seizures in years, but only had one major one and then "absence" seizures after that one. We eat around his intolerances because the behavior backlash is not worth it--beyond the other issues it causes.

We had no clue he was on the spectrum. Once they were in the process of ruling out cerebral palsy as an infant, he completely by fate landed in the hands of a national lead researcher in infant identification of ASDs. She apparently cleared room on her schedule to see him and her dx was "red flags of ASD" when he was 11mo. She gave us the course of actions to follow for therapies and the neurologist working with her saw the food reactions and encouraged us on that front. By the time he was 3yo, the dx was PDD-NOS but he was night and day from the child he was at 11mo. Night. and. day. I think removing the food irritants allowed the therapy to catch him up--ya know?

He now has a diagnosis of Auditory Processing Disorder and is red-flagged for ADHD. We are revisiting dietary intervention for the ADHD just because, hey--it worked once (in a monumental way).

Oh--and he NEVER SLEPT. Seriously. Never. Dh and I slept in shifts. Until he was 3-1/2yo, he slept 6 fitful hours of every day. At 3-1/2, we started him on an adult dose of fish oil and within a week he was sleeping 9-10 solid hours/night PLUS a 1-3 hour nap/day. To this day, he gets his fish oil daily (although he has finally phased out the nap). They say fish oil supports neurological function and whatever was miswired in my kid was certainly helped (and continues to be helped) by fish oil. All the specialists said "Learn to cope--it comes with kids in the spectrum".

Hope this helps. I would grab the Positive Discipline for Preschoolers and just read the first chapter or two--even if you do it AT the store vs. buying it. It may give you enough to go on. It did for me.

[Mama2Xander]

Originally Posted by cchrissyy

Right, I have 3 kids too, and honestly, we have arranged life so that any time DS is home or out with us, there is a designated aditional adult there for him. So we rely heavily on both parents and extended family nearby.

DS's behavior problems range from astonishing hyperactivity and silliness to serious self-injury, property damage, and harm to others. He gets worked up quickly, and then he is agressive to anybody he can reach.
He does not respond to warnings or simple cause-effect threats. I use these constantly but they blow right past him

umm, back to techniques. there is a book "Aspergers Syndrome and difficult moments" with focuses on rages and severe acting out, mainly from a teacher/professional perspective. We do rely on medication. Schedules help - he is calmed by knowing the scheudle and ideally every minute of the day would be scheduled. For example, mine does better at school than home, and so we lengthened the "good" part of his day with aftercare. The hardest times are morning, evening, and weekends, and I know when we have more of a plan for the day, he is more comfortable and less likely to erupt.

Believe me, I would LOVE to always have another adult with me, but it's just not possible right now. DH has to work, and my mom helps when she can, but she can't exactly just drop her own life to help me, yk? She does pick him up from school once a week and have him over for a couple of hours, and she can often help for special events or appointments. So at least that's something. We don't have any other family here who can help.

The day to day stuff is pretty much all me (except for when DH isn't working) and it's really tough to always be right there to help DS1. I try my best to watch him, but mostly I just try to avoid situations that will be hard for him if they are not absolutely necessary. For example, after school we often stay and play, and DS1 likes to go over to a far corner of the field and dig in the sand with one friend of his who is a good match for him. This is MUCH better than trying to play at the playground with a bunch of kids around - that almost ALWAYS ends up with him hitting someone (or worse). I am always *so* nervous though pretty much any time I'm out with the kids. I try not to show it, lol. Other people tell me I look calm, so I guess I'm doing a good job of pretending But seriously, between DS1 and his outbursts, aggressiveness, social blunders, etc, DS2 with his extreme tendency to run away (seriously, you look away for a second and he's *gone*) along with his love of lying down in puddles, climbing fences, etc (plus his speech issues which means I need to "translate" for him all the time), and DS3 who is newly walking and very much a "I must put everything I see into my mouth" kind of kid... yeah. You can see why I don't look forward to going out with them

You're right about the schedules. That definitely seems to help here too. The Christmas holidays were BAD. Lots of structure is good. I feel like 98% of what I do at home is just damage control though, it's so hard to really DO anything with them I really wish I had more help... it's hard not to get bummed out about that sometimes.

[Mama2Xander]

Originally Posted by heatherdeg

Actually, I got frustrated reading the RAD books because they were SO driven toward adoptive children, but ONE of them had ONE paragraph that made it click with me: kids who--for whatever reason--cannot connect to a primary caregiver early in life. They used the example of children with severe medical needs and extensive hospital stays, but I knew that my son had no clue we were even in the same room with him for at least the first 15mo and then wasn't actually "attached" to us for easily another year beyond that. And the books didn't help. The mainstream books were NOT going to work. The RAD books were dealing with more severely disrupted attachment and they weren't giving me any help with managing my son vs. repairing severe attachment issues. But the Positive Discipline book totally rocked. I got through the first chapter and told my husband about it and HE read it. We are now trying to finish the book and are regularly tag-teaming as needed to maintain the direction we need to and helping one another with reminders when needed. It's worlds better than it was. WORLDS better.

Interesting. I haven't done a lot of research into RAD, but what I have read seems pretty similar to what you said (focused on adopted/foster kids or those with NICU stays or similar situations). DS was *extremely* high needs as a baby, but I don't think it was the same as what you described - where your son didn't know you were in the room.

Originally Posted by heatherdeg

My son just turned 6yo and his dx was lifted just last month. He was initially suspected for cerebral palsy at 8mo. He had seizures, reactive airway disorder, central sleep apnea, and food intolerances (and man--those totally manifested in major behavior disruptions as well as development disruptions). We never treated the reactive airway (they wanted daily inhaler plus another illness inhaler) and he's really been fine (dx'd around 18mo or 2yo and was king of croupe until this year). He hasn't had seizures in years, but only had one major one and then "absence" seizures after that one. We eat around his intolerances because the behavior backlash is not worth it--beyond the other issues it causes.

We had no clue he was on the spectrum. Once they were in the process of ruling out cerebral palsy as an infant, he completely by fate landed in the hands of a national lead researcher in infant identification of ASDs. She apparently cleared room on her schedule to see him and her dx was "red flags of ASD" when he was 11mo. She gave us the course of actions to follow for therapies and the neurologist working with her saw the food reactions and encouraged us on that front. By the time he was 3yo, the dx was PDD-NOS but he was night and day from the child he was at 11mo. Night. and. day. I think removing the food irritants allowed the therapy to catch him up--ya know?

He now has a diagnosis of Auditory Processing Disorder and is red-flagged for ADHD. We are revisiting dietary intervention for the ADHD just because, hey--it worked once (in a monumental way).

Oh--and he NEVER SLEPT. Seriously. Never. Dh and I slept in shifts. Until he was 3-1/2yo, he slept 6 fitful hours of every day. At 3-1/2, we started him on an adult dose of fish oil and within a week he was sleeping 9-10 solid hours/night PLUS a 1-3 hour nap/day. To this day, he gets his fish oil daily (although he has finally phased out the nap). They say fish oil supports neurological function and whatever was miswired in my kid was certainly helped (and continues to be helped) by fish oil. All the specialists said "Learn to cope--it comes with kids in the spectrum".

Hope this helps. I would grab the Positive Discipline for Preschoolers and just read the first chapter or two--even if you do it AT the store vs. buying it. It may give you enough to go on. It did for me.

Thank you so much for sharing your experience, it does help. I have seen a lot of flags for Auditory Processing Disorder in my son too, but I've been told that he's too young to test for it.

We do fish oil too, but I have not been good lately about giving it to him every day - I'm working on it!! I wonder if I should be giving him more though? We use the Nordic Naturals Children's DHA (cod liver oil) and he gets the recommended dose which is 4 soft gels per day, which provides:
-82 mg EPA
-125 mg DHA
-45 mg other omega 3s
-120 mg oleic acid (omega-9)
Does that sound like enough or do you think I should be giving him more? It seems to help with DS2's issues too, I wonder if he would also benefit from a bigger dose.

Oh - thanks for the book recommendations - I requested "Positive Discipline", "Positive Discipline for Preschoolers" and the A-Z one from the library.

[cchrissyy]

Believe me, I would LOVE to always have another adult with me, but it's just not possible right now. DH has to work, and my mom helps when she can, but she can't exactly just drop her own life to help me, yk?

I know it sounds like a luxury, but in a way it's not. I passed a breaking point where I couldn't stand to be physically attacked by a growing child any more, and a few super disturbing incidents occured with his little siblings, and I flat out decided I would not watch all 3 children alone ever again.

The solution hasn't been cheap but not too expensive either. Certainly worth it for everybody's security.

Weekdays he has school + aftercare . or, home therapy so that's the 2nd adult.

weekends we parents split the kids so that there is a 1:1 and a 1:2 . If any part of the day this isn't possible, we deliver a child to a family member to avoid the 1:3.

In a pinch, like if dad is late and aftercare is closing, I will pick up all 3 and drive around. usually people are safe with eachother or zone out during car rides. thoguh sometimes he screams and it stresses everybody so I don't like that.

This is a big kid now but he's had TONS of theraputic and medical intervention. He handles school time much better than home time, so again, extending the "school day" is really a relief to him. It gives him more hours of the day to feel successful, so that's great. And then it gives me and the siblings more hours of the day where other trained adults are responsible for him. that's huge for the rest of us trying to stay happy and let the younger sibs develop into their own happy people.