loupin

How frustrating!!!! Our children do have the most endearing little habits don't they!!!! Could you look at pictures of buses either online or print some pictures off? Would it distract him? Could you say that the bus shop is now closed until summer time? At the moment we are having to watch youv'e been framed christmas special 4x per day!!!!! And god help us if we don't laugh at the right bits and the curse of sky plus!! he rewinds and pauses it until we oblige!!!!!

I know very little of the PECS and how you should use it as my son is very verbal. He does have semmantic pragmmatic speech & lang disorder so although he often sounds good quite often he doesn't really translate the meaning of your words. My son is 6 now but with hindsight when he was 3 I would of used the PECS system to encourage his communication,he did speak at 3 but it was muddled and confused. By 4 he was talking in film scripts and a very angry confused little thing. He is a visual learner and I do a lot of drawings and visual reminders that are all over the house and school now do the same and he is very responsive. From the little I know PECS can really serve to encourage a child to communicate. Hope that helps a little I'm quite sure that there will be lots of people with useful information on here I will also watch with great intrest!

<'> <'> Gosh really know how you all feel!!!! I get sick of being my sons punch bag!! I have gone through reasons why and various stratedgies but all to no avail!! Today I am sitting here with a really sore neck I hurt my back last week and then had a pinched nerve in my neck this morning caused by carrying my son upstairs last night because he was attacking me for turning the tv over!!! Today the little love has kicked me in the neck! Just what I needed!!! Later on when I couldn't carry him he said why what have you done? I said you kicked my neck and it hurts! Oh he said what does this switch do on my car, so I tried again!! "did u hear what mummy said you hurt me!:" yeah ok but what does it do mum!!! No remorse because he doesn't recognise what he does in fact i dont think he even remembers! I do choose my battles very carefully but I cant bear him hurting my other 2 little boys as they are too little to understand or excuse the behaviour, so where they get hurt I will always address the behaviour which usually puts me in the firing line as I remove the ps2 or similar as a punnishment after several warnings! <'> <'> <'>

Hi and welcome! We do the same holidays each year! This is year 3 of the same areas! Our son is quickly relaxed(well as well as one would expect!!)as I can do a lot of preparation with him as I know what is coming up!! We have a caravan and so pack all favourite and emergency things! It means that we can be a bit flexible in where we go he has the continuity of the caravan and we get to see different views!! We also rent an apartment in the south of france with my parents each year the first year was awful but last year was a breeze as he remembered everything even the resturants we go to! We also go skiing with the boys. We go with a small family run company www.familyski.co.uk that are based in a small quiet rural village on the portes du soleil. Again year 1 was really hard he even bit the ski school helper! but they were fantastic. In year 2 he actually was confident enough in his surrondings to go to ski school!!! The kids attend ski school in the morning and then snow play and lunch etc in the chalet all afternoon. I never thought that I would have a good holiday again after year 1 but he is now asking when we are going skiing and to the french beach holiday!!!! The child care with family ski is exceptional and we have always been honest about his diagnosis and the fact he bit some one one year!! We get a break everyday and then have lovely evenings with them and boy they are tired!! We did offer to spend more time with them as guilt slightly overcame us the more relaxed we got but they all said NO WAY!!!! they were building an igloo and having tobogan races!!!

This is like a fun xmas party game online!!!!! Hair cut Bedtime Nail cutting night No playstation Wiggly worm pasta for tea Make sure your brother is ok (Usually after he has hit them) Put it down please School shoes Time to go School work time

Poor little chap!! I give my boys MINADEX a build up tonic when they are ill. It tastes of orange and is quite nice. You have to be a bit careful if logan suffers with constipation? as it has iron in it. You can buy similar tonics with out the iron from haliborange. I encourage my boys just to nibble the odd biscuit when they are ill and like everyone says drink plenty. Hope he picks up soon.

Our son made us laugh this year he opened all of his pressies then went looking around for more! When asked what he was doing he said "Im looking for that car thing i wanted and the other ps2 game i asked for Santa forgot them!!!" Husband and I have decieded to do the same thing from now on especially when visiting family!!!!

my husband and i watched it and kind of really enjoyed it inbetween tears! We almost felt it was autobiographical as we could identify with so many of the scenarios! I thought that the itv people did really well with this one as it gave a good snapshot into the life of a family with an autistic child. I'm hoping that my outlaws watched this as they have achieved comment of the season!! "I don't know what you are worrying about You are over sensitive and being over protective with him, He will be fine" They actually are thinking that we have all got this one wrong!!! Roll on family lunch tomorrow as apparently it 'Will be an experiment!!!!" ie If he copes then he is cured and if not then he is probably just naughty.....Whoopee Any one needing a diagnosis overturning then I'll pass on my outlaws phone number!!!!!!!!

sugar

Thank you I will do a bit more research into the tourettes thing. The OCD angle hadn't occured to me as it isn't a constant thing however he does have another ritual when we get in the car that he must clean the windows at least once each trip. I have mentioned this to his psychologist who said to keep an eye on it. I think i may start to keep a diary. Thanks once again that is certainly food for thought.

Thank you thank you thank you!!!! Well we did go!! After weeping and typing for a while I put myself in the shower wept a bit more then asked my son if he wanted to go. He did!!! So we did!!!! and i am still bouncing with joy because it went really well. He PLAYED with the other children and took photos of everything with his new digital camera(courtesy of granny just before we left!)He even ate finger food and behaved impecably. I am soooooo proud of him that i could burst! He recieved his pressies graciously and even managed to go and thank our friends for them in a crowded room!!!!! All of my boys are asleep now with their stockings at the end of the bed I think now I am crying tears of utter joy! <'> <'> <'> <'> <'>

I need to unload sorry guys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We have bee asked to friends tonite with boys for prechristmas drinks. Lovely i first thought cant wait. Now I'm dreading it. Yesterday had friends over great for a while then the timer came out to set the routines for us all followed by licking!!! Early melatonin followed by cuddles on the bed! Today my son is as high as a kite and worrying about not being able to sleep I spoke to my friends husband in a moment of bravery and tried to cancel saying that we need to remain at home and quiet ish no real changes etc etc. Oh god not the response i expected!!!! He said yes all boys are like that, cant do conversation etc, dont worry have invited other families over with kids so it will take his mind of his worries and he can just join in and play!!! Its all relaxed and casual just a house full!!!!!!!!!!!!! I feel like weeping. I want to go so does my husband, he thinks lets do it like an experiment see what happens. I feel panic striken and sick because it is the aftermath of these things that are so hard. Actually am weeping now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well thanks for letting me rant/weep! Must go and see what james bond has done on the ps 2 now!!! being summoned. xx

Thanks. Giving him something to fidget with is something my husband ansd i discussed this morning actually! Our Ot said that he fidgets a lot and can't keep still as its a way of keeping the brain alert/awake. She thinks that if he is still he isn't so responsive. She is going to look into a thing to fidget with that is appropriate for school etc. she mentioned blue tac in his pocket. I will try the 'do it in your head approach' but i'm not sure he will get the idea yet. The difficulty is that he appears so (hate the word! ) normal but the reality is he just doesn't get language, maybe i'll do some picture work with him today. I think we are going to cancel visitors today and let him chill before the odd old man comes down our chimney!!!! Thanks again!xx

Hes 6 nearly 7.He does it to me sometimes and yes we have told him that it really isn't acceptable behaviour but he has semmantic pragmmatic speech disorder and his understanding of language is quite poor especially when stressed. He appears to be able to understand you but he doesn't. What is a stim? Loupin x

Tradditional ish for us! We are having cockeral that my dad has reared and killed. My son will have what he calls chicken on a stick(the legs) and roast potatoes and gravy followed by icecream. My middley(NT) will have vedgetables and fish cakes as at the age of 4 he wants to be sort of veggie!! and my baby(2yrs NT) will eat everything! Husband and I will drink lots of champagne an eat whatever we manage to eat inbetween refereing the 'hes looking at me' he touched me' 'i'm not eating that'........... Fab african hamper idea. Where on earth did you get that from?! Would of made a great pressie for the outlaws!

Hi all! My son has started licking my husband! The penny finally dropped after seeing this behaviour for a while that he does it when he is stressed. We took him to a rugby match 2weeks ago and he didn't enjoy it at all. My husband looked after him whilst i had the other two. After the match husband said oh yeah he was fine but the licking was a bit much!!! We kind of laughed it off and thought no more of it. Tonight after a day of visitors my son was fed up and i was watching for the usual signs of stress which were all evident! and then he started trying to lick his dad in a kind of aggressive way. Its really odd. I dont know what to do about it. My husband obviously tells him its not nice and asks him to stop it but he takes no notice of course!! Any ideas would be really appreciated. Thanks in advance. xxxx

Wow what a brave son you have!! I feel very proud of him and i dont know him!!!! Hopefully at last you have a good professional on your side. Really hope you have a good christmas. <'> <'> <'>

Happy Christmas to everyone and a very happy new year!!! Hope fully we will all come through this odd few days with out to much stress(well no more than is usual!) Love Loupin xxxx

poor you! I have made a visual wall chart showing how many sleeps it is until xmas for my son as he gets so stressed when he knows an event is coming up but he cant understand the time concept of when. Its a really simple one just numbers that we tick of each day. Youre son maybe harder to deal with at the moment if he is stressed about xmas as so many of our children are! Maybe that is why he is becoming more destructive? I do think putting all of his toys away is a little harsh. What about every time he does something good or nice he gets one back that way you are praising all good beaviour and ignoring the bad. I did something similar with my son and it was exhausting as i focused on everything good that he did even down to sitting nicely on the sofa or smiling nicely at his brother!!! But it did work and got me out of my negative spiral of everything he does is bad. Good luck its not an easy time of year. Hope you dont mind my opinions!! Realy its about what ever works for you and youre famiy. <'> <'>

Thanks all for the suggestions. Can't believe i didn't see the web link on Liz's post!!! Very blonde at the moment !! I asked tobe referred to a dietitian who specialised in the gf/cf diet but was told they didn't know of any and as it wasn't clinically proven no one could really recommend it. We did dairy free for 2 years and it worked initially but then the constipation returned. Will check out the website... thanks again

I have moved a lot of so called dangerous things but my son has a great knack of making the most innocent of things into a weapon!!!! Its hard being pregnannt and dealing with everything look after yourself and try to to get some help in place for when the baby comes along. I moved my mum in! I made myself ill after my 2nd son trying to cope although i didn't know what i was coping with. After my 3rd son lesson learnt I moved my mum in!!!!!! <'> <'> <'> <'> <'>

Everyones an expert aren't they!!!! I agree with the other posts about trying to maintain the relationship but be clear to them that he has got AS and that it is unquestionable thankyou! but take the complement that your son copes well at their house!!! I have friends who have said things well meaning like I cant see anything wrong, don't all kids do that etc,etc.....which instead of making me feel great make me panic and doubt everything that I know in my heart is real. My closest friends are the ones who matter the most and are the ones who never pretend to be experts!!! Good luck <'>

My son we are sure has a leaky gut. He like a lot of autistic children has suffered with chronic constipation since 3months old. He has gone a whole month without a bowel movement. At the age of 23mnths he was unconscious and blue as a resultt of constipation. He had several admissions to hospital because no medication, homeopathic or conventional has worked. After a phosphate enema he would come around and was always instantly better. He is always more autistic and less able to function when constipated. Obviously the bowel stretches as the constipation worsens and he physically must feel awful. But what concerns us is how he so quickly regresses. A lot of his developmental delays we put down to the toxins in his body and his brain. If fat cells or gluten molecules can pass through the gut then surely faecal toxins can aswell. Whenever I have said this to paediatritions or dietitians they have swept it under the carpet and not really offered any advice. My son is now on a great medication called movicol which makes it possible to have a bowel movement but he has just gone 2 weeks with out the toilet!! Believe it or not this is an improvement!! I do worry about the effect longterm these toxins may have or the damage they have done to an already develpmentally challenged little brain. Any info anyone has i would be fascinated to read. Does anyone have a website address for the sunderland institute?

I go up and down my son has been diagnosed asd for 18mnths and diagnosed with a learning dis and communication disorder for 12mnths. One week i think to hell with the world they are all strange and it doesn't matter if my son is different but on other days i go to school and hear the conversations the other boys are having with their mums and feel gutted. I watch them play football and have sleep overs and i feel really sad. But i know that when my son tells me he loves me he really means it likewise the little kisses i get for doing the simplest thing like making his favourite tea and then i think i'm the lucky one! Its definately a strange rollercoster of emotions!

Oh I hate this period in the school year! My son (asd, spd) did his performance last week. I took him to school in the evening he started to get tearful so i told his teacher he didnt want to do it. At this point i was ready to run with him! His teacher kindly took him and said oh gosh he will be fine bye mummy! I hid to watch him and saw him stood not able to remember how to get changed ( he cant function when stressed and has to copy others when changing). He was close to tears & so was i. The teacher as soon as i had gone had returned to the other children! She then caught my eye and i mouthed he needs help!!! I left as i could feel myself boiling up. Needless to say he did the play no speaking part just dancing and singing. But what i find is that my son follows the other childrens actions and memorises the songs, where the other children enjoy it he just does it and so i wonder what the benefit is to him doing it when he clearly doesnt want to? My mother thinks its a great acievement that he does these things and i do too but to what cost in the long term if he will look back and say but mum i hated it? On a positive note he seems so far to be coping well with the whole christmas thing and actually looking forward to it!! I however am on edge at the thought of the previous years disaster!!!! I do think that all teachers should have a comprehensive training in asd/adhd etc as i'm sure that at some point in their careers they will all meet a child like ours. My sons teacher has 'an understanding' of asd but not enough to know that although he appears 'normal' he doesn't see the world in the same way or respond accordingly well i feel better for that thanks for reading my rant!!!!