My almost 8yo son is a lovely & sweet boy - also very competitive just like many other boys his age.
However, much more often than my husband and I would like to see, he gets into an aggressive behavior when he gets angry and/ or frustrated.
Today, he punched a classmate in the stomach after school at the playground. They were playing, then got into a verbal fight and according to him, the boy punched him first. However since he's so much bigger and stronger his punch really hurt.
These situations have happened a zillion times. He is the biggest kid in his grade, this other boy is much, much shorter than him.
Off course, it's irrelevant who punched who first at this point. The boy was clearly hurt, had a hard time to breathe and was just very shaken by what happened.
I made him apologize to his friend but everything seemed so confusing to him at the time. Later I called the boy's mom who mentioned to me that her boy has told her that at times my son is rough with him and he (her son) doesn't know what to do. That my son kind of chokes him on his neck and that he (her son) can't breathe!
Many things come to mind as factors that might contribute to the situation as a whole.
He seems to have a hard time putting feelings into words, he seems not to realize his size & strength. But the bottom line is, he simply cannot hit anybody if and when he gets angry.
Many times I feel that I am not figuring out how to help him, he gets very upset when he realizes he has hurt a friend.
We do time out, in school the teacher have told him to take some time off when he feels he's going to act upon a feeling of frustration.
I just don't see the situation improving - and by that I mean, an incident happen then we talk among ourselves, we talk to him and so forth. Then sometime goes by without incidents until the next one.
We definitely want to find a (good) therapist because we both think he needs help.
Has anybody experienced something similar? or are there any suggestions?
