SusanF Report post Posted January 12, 2007 My otherwise very bright 10 year old refuses to accept the need to adopt certain acceptable social skills eg not picking his nose and eating the contents; putting small amounts of food in his mouth not stuffing in huge quantities. Yet he gets upset when he recounts that 'everyone at school hates me and doesn't want to sit next to me'. More worryingly he refuses absolutely to accept that we are his parents and that although we listen to his views ultimately we have the authority to decide things - not him. He is adept at finding arguments to support his case - 'it's what's on the inside that counts, not what you look like - - other people need to learn this'; or 'God says we are all equal & I'm going to carry on until you learn that: I just don't accept that you should have more authority than me'. (He cannot explain rationally, however, why he conforms for his teachers!) I have got books on teaching your child social skills; but they all presuppose that the child is willing to learn. They don't tackle the child whose entrenched intellectual position is that the rest of the world needs to change because the rest of the world has got its priorities/views wrong. Sanctions don't really help since his firm view is that he just needs to keep on until we finally manage to get things right.... Has anyone cracked this one? SusanF Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
curra Report post Posted January 12, 2007 Hi Susan, I can relate to your experience. My DS is also very opinionated, talkative and he's always challenging parental authority. It worries me that he also denies having AS although he has been diagnosed by 4 professionals. He wants to have friends but he can't because of his poor social skills. He says that teachers have authority and that he has only me to vent out his frustration. It's very hard to help him because he's so bright and obstinate. Sanctions have never worked with him, he becomes more aggressive and can't see the point of it. Sorry I don't have any advice but I wanted to let you know that you are not alone with this problem. I hope someone else gives better ideas. CurraXX Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SusanF Report post Posted January 12, 2007 Hi Susan, I can relate to your experience. My DS is also very opinionated, talkative and he's always challenging parental authority. It worries me that he also denies having AS although he has been diagnosed by 4 professionals. He wants to have friends but he can't because of his poor social skills. He says that teachers have authority and that he has only me to vent out his frustration. It's very hard to help him because he's so bright and obstinate. Sanctions have never worked with him, he becomes more aggressive and can't see the point of it. Sorry I don't have any advice but I wanted to let you know that you are not alone with this problem. I hope someone else gives better ideas. CurraXX Thanks Curra: it IS good to know I'm not alone & the words 'opinioated, talkative...' etc etc all rang very true. We haven't yet told my son he has a label - that's another thing I'm wondering how to do - so we still have that joy to come... Susan xx Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
oxgirl Report post Posted January 12, 2007 (edited) SusanF, my 13 year old is exactly the same. He complains that the less able children in his unit at school are 'disgusting', that they make a big mess when they eat, and yet after he has eaten his lunch, the area around his plate is festooned with crumbs and he has crumbs plastered all over his hands and face!! He eats very noisily as well, with his mouth open, and gets annoyed when we ask him to chew or drink a bit more carefully. He's taken recently to gulping his drink down, puffing out his cheeks and swallowing, followed by a hearty burp....charming!! It's almost like he is over critical of other people, but is totally unable to look at himself or his own behaviour, he is not self-aware at all. Maybe this is something that develops with age, but at 13 my lad still eats like a three year old and it does set him apart from his mainstream peers. I feel embarrassed for him sometimes when I think of him in the canteen at school. ~ Mel ~ Edited January 12, 2007 by oxgirl Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
darky Report post Posted January 12, 2007 i have a similar problem with my DD 7. she does not see herself as a child in the family, she sees herself as equal, im not authority, i am her friend and if i have to disapline her or disagree with her or tell her what to do, she starts crying and says that if i was her friend i wouldnt boss her about, because friends dont do that. she does not even like me showing any affection to my boys, when i do, she thinks that means i love her less. she also does not seem to understand why her peers often take a wide berth, when shes picking things up off the ground, or playing a game, she can't understand why others might not want to share her interests or play by her rules. she also has many discusting habbits that i have been working on from day dot. nothing seems to get through. she seems to have her own agenda most of the time. i cant be any tighter with boundries and expectations!! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
loulou Report post Posted January 12, 2007 Hi, Kai is 8 and he acts in a similar way too. He eats like a pig, doesn't wash his hands (kicks off if forced too) and is generally not very house trained (despite my hard efforts). He doesn't seem to care about it either. When i try to explain to him about not being rude to people (ie shouting "go away" to strangers), he says he doesn't care and it doesn't matter because they are strangers. However, if someone shouted "go away" to him, he would be prepared to do battle! He seems to think he's "invincible" too and that nothing can ever harm him. He doesn't see me as an authority figure at all, and will answer "but i am stronger than you". I have threatened him with the police before, and he will answer, "I will get them with a sling shot and they cannot beat me because i am a Ninja." . Sorry i don't have any advice, as i am still trying to "crack" this one myself. Loulou xx Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
phoebe Report post Posted January 12, 2007 Me too!!!! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Devon mum Report post Posted January 12, 2007 More worryingly he refuses absolutely to accept that we are his parents and that although we listen to his views ultimately we have the authority to decide things - not him. He is adept at finding arguments to support his case - 'it's what's on the inside that counts, not what you look like - - other people need to learn this'; or 'God says we are all equal & I'm going to carry on until you learn that: I just don't accept that you should have more authority than me'. (He cannot explain rationally, however, why he conforms for his teachers!) SusanF Show him Ephesians 6 verse1 - 3. Children be obedient to your parents in union with [the] Lord, for this is righteous: "Honour your father and [your] mother"; which is the first command with a promise: "That it may go well with you and you may endure a long time on the Earth." See what he says to that. I wouldn't worry about the teacher thing, they don't have the same buttons as you do for your little angel to push. They don't have to guide him through life as you do. DS1 picks his nose still and hasn't quite got the thing with cutting stuff up when eating, but DD is the only one who will eat her own nose-gold! DS2 will not use his knife and fork at tea time at all if he is not told to and kept on with all the time, DD does use her cutlery at times. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
UltraMum Report post Posted January 12, 2007 Me too!!!! Me three! J doesn't see why he needs to learn 'manners' - if they don't like what he does that's their problem! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Lucas Report post Posted January 13, 2007 I don't know where to begin as usual. I often hear parents talking about what their kids do but never in the context of the reasons why they are doing it, which I think are more important. For me when I was a child, the biggest problem I had was my limited vocabulary which prevented me from fully explaining my point of view. Since gaining such a vocabulary I learned that I needn't have bothered: people aren't even making the effort to understand most of the time. Most requests made by Autistic children in my experience are not for luxary items or unreasonable demands, but are pleas for some kind of information or another. Information is not hard for the unapathic person to provide. I never felt like a child, I thought I was an equal and the lazy explainations in this failed to ever explain that a child can still be equal, but their limits as a child don't go away because they're equal. So I felt that as long as I was regarded as a child I couldn't be equal because that is exactly how I had the other point of view explained to me. If I had ridiculous things to say in my defense it was because it seemed to me I only had the most bizzarre and illogical things said to me and I was expected to accept them as proper explainations. No one seemed prepared to explain, but they didn't have any problems making objections to anything I did. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Kathryn Report post Posted January 13, 2007 Show him Ephesians 6 verse1 - 3. Children be obedient to your parents in union with [the] Lord, for this is righteous: "Honour your father and [your] mother"; which is the first command with a promise: "That it may go well with you and you may endure a long time on the Earth." See what he says to that. He might counter that by quoting the very next verse, "Parents, do not exasperate your children..." SusanF, my daughter also feels that appearance doesn't matter. We were watching the makeover programme "10 years younger" the other night. She didn't see the point of the programme at all. Her question throughout was, "But why?" She didn't see the point of improving one's appearance, even though the woman was delighted with the results. Her view was that people should just accept the woman as she was and not be so rude about it. Maybe she has a point. People are obsessed with how they appear to others, but we consider this "normal" behaviour. K x Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Devon mum Report post Posted January 13, 2007 He might counter that by quoting the very next verse, "Parents, do not exasperate your children..." K x Yeah! Mine cannot get the Golden Rule right ... Treat others as you want them to treat you. We get "Well if they did it to me then I'm gonna do it back to them! Because they are treating me the way they want to be treated" There is some logic there, but not the correct way to translate it!! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
