Should I respond or not?

[Eva]

Hi all,

 

I'm having lots of arguments with my son lately. He's 6 and I suspect school might be stressing him out a bit, as at home he's been pretty bad in the evenings.

 

He says things like he's leaving home, he wants a new mother/brother/father/house, no one likes him, he's not clever and he's going to put me in a rubbish bin and close the lid, or put himself in a rubbish bin, etc.

 

My friend Sojourned said he's winding me up and I shouldn't repsond and I think up to a point he's right. It's so hard though not to anything. I always tell him that he is clever, etc, but the leaving home and wanting a new family stuff I'm not sure about.

 

Any advice welcome.

 

Eva

[Cat]

Sorry but I do not agree with your friend. While I do not for one minute believe that children with autism can not push a button or two I do not think that many six year olds can or do. The reason I say this is because autism is a developmental delay and the yard stick appears to be that you take a third from their actual age and you are then left with their emotional age. That would make your son approx 4 years old and I don't know many NT 4 year olds who wind up their parents as such. Most would do this because they were anxious and frustrated and unable to communicate their feelings and I think that this is probably what your son is doing.

 

Many children with autism have very low self esteems and that is why they say that they are rubbish. They see everyone around them doing so much better than they are - or at least that is the way they view it - and they feel badly about themselves. As for saying that he wants a new mother, brother, father, house etc I suspect that he says these things because he wants you to have the answers to everything, including why he feels so down about himself and of course you do not have these answers. Living in a new House may take his problems away or at least he might think that this would be bthe case. However I would not ignore him if he were mine. This is no ordinary cry for attention he is looking for help. It can be hard to find the right words to make any child with autism feel better, and telling them that they are clever when they don't feel it sadly does not help. Maybe you could ask him why he thinks that he is not clever. If he can find a way to tell you what the real issue is then he will begin to understand that Mum does want to help him. This could be the begining of your son trying to make sense of himself and he sure will need a great deal of time and understanding to help him to do that. Please do not think that he is too young to be doing this, my son was five when he became aware that he was different and started looking for answers, even though he did not realise that he was doing so.

 

Cat

 

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[Eva]

Thanks for your reply Cat, I found it very helpful and it has given me a bit to think about.

 

It's so hard to get an answer out of my son - he gives half answers. When he says things like he's not clever I tell him that he is clever and when he says no one likes him, I tell him that he has lots of friends (true at the moment) and I love him. It's tricky getting to the root of the issue though.

 

It's when he says things like he's leaving, that's when I'm not sure what my response should be. The problem is that he hates being questioned and gets cross if I ask him too many questions and tells me to be quiet because I'm giving him a headache.

 

Eva

[allie]

Cat thanks for all the ideas there.

Eva my son - 6 yers old - ASD is just the same. It does feel as though he tries to wind me up and although I do understand that its his way of asking for help at the end of the day I'm human and I do take the bait sometimes - then just get angry at my self for not dealing with things properly!!!!

<'> <'> heres a hug for you, because I know how hard it is when my ds says he wants to leave home, doesn't want me as a mother etc.

 

Allie

[Cat]

When my youngest son talks about hating us and wanting to move out, I first of all tell him that I would miss him a great deal. To which he will either say 'good' or 'I don't care'. Then I remind him that I am his parent and the law says that I am responsible for him. He will usually then tell me that the law is rubbish to which I usually say 'yeah I agree'

 

Sometimes there is nothing you can say that will be right because sometimes they need the buzz which they get from a confrontation, that helps them to focus on something other than what is making them feel sad. My youngest will punch himself in the head if he is upset or angry. He does this because the pain that he creates in his head is a better pain then what he is feeling inside of his head. He is ten now and at least we can talk about this. He has requested a punch bag for Christmas and he will be getting one. Working through their own emotions is progress in my book.

 

My eldest who is now 20 had quite a few friends when he was small but would always say that he had no friends. Now that he can tell me what he is thinking and feeling he tells me that although they were his friends he just knew that he was different and did not like that feeling. How was I supposed to know that? Yes it makes sense now I just wish it had all of those years ago.

 

Cat

[Suze]

My son was very similar at that age.He was just begining to realise he was different in some way and was struggling at school a great deal.My sons self esteem became very low.Upon talking to a family therapist about things , he told me to try not to engage in a battle of wills with my son .That winning any disagreement invariably was never worth the fight as both me and my son would get stressed and upset.So my advice is to perhaps ignore some of the behaviour , your son sounds like he takes out his upset on those closest to him, because he feels safe and secure enough to do so.hugs suzex

[shortcake]

my son does this alot also he says he hates his stupid brain and recently has started to say he wishes he had been born normal he gets very angry at times and at least once a week is leaving home as he hates me etc. I find by telling him that i love him and dont want him to leave calms the situation a bit i try not to raise my voice and try to get to his level if he will let me i dont think he is trying to push your buttons as a child with autisum is ( i feel I may be wrong) unable to do this he is more likely getting to an age where he is starting to notice that he finds dealing with situations etc difficult. Hope it gets better ofr you <'>

[jb1964]

Hi Eva,

 

For us personally I agree with what Cat has said. There isn't a day goes by that our daughter doesn't make some remarks - either she's stupid, I hate her, or she wishes she was dead, frequency during the day depends on how she's feeling or what has happened.

 

She has a very low esteem and no matter how much you praise her or help her, coax her etc, when she feels 'stupid' (her words not mine), or 'frustrated' or 'sad' etc, she automatically thinks that is what everyone else thinks of her and she finds it difficult to understand that anyone could love her or think anything differently than what she feels.

 

Take care,

Jb

[cmuir]

Hi

 

My son comes out with similar stuff (and a lot worse eg wants to kill me or says he wants to die because he hates living!). I ignore anything that's likely to cause him to be frustrated. If he tries to start an argument by asking me a question then refuses to accept my answer, I tell him I've answered his question (which he tries to argue about) and advise him that I'm not going to argue with him. That way, I end the situation and don't give him the amunition he needs to continue with, resulting in situations escalating. Obviously there are some things and some things which he needs reassurance and comforting eg wanting to die. Have to say, walking away from arguments works really well for us.

 

Best wishes

 

Caroline

[Eva]

Thanks everyone for your great replies - it's a relief to know that others are going through this too. I've learnt a lot from all your replies!

 

Jb1964, I wonder if my son thinks the same - that if he's feeling bad then everyone must feel the same way about him. That's an interesting point.

 

I reckon I'm going to have to take a deep breath and try and not take the bait and ignore the more confrontational things DS might say. (I often start off okay but then before I know it I find myself embroiled in an arguement). Suze you're right, winning isn't really winning, it's too emotionally draining. (Sojourned said that you can't win an arguement with an Aspergian - you'll lose both the argument and your dignity -

 

Cat you're spot on when you said that sometimes nothing you can say is right, how true is that. That's why our arguements just go round in circles because the more he answers negatively, the more I try and convince him that he's clever and I love him, and that just adds fuel...

 

So thanks again everyone - you've all helped me heaps !

 

And the cyperhugs are very appreciated!

 

Eva

[allsetuk]

this is so interesting as my 5 year old is exactly the same, always saying im going to be put in the rubbish or he is going in the rubbish......with being off for 9 weeks and i saved up all year and used my family fund money and rented a tiny place in italy got cheap ryan air flights and made sure the cabin had big enclosed safe garden.....to avoid climbing the wall in the uk on a weekend never mind 9 weeks..we viewed it as an adventure and it was , very difficult at times but much better than staying in our little house.

 

i noticed without schoool to obsess about , he became fixated on collecting pottery fragments every day and lining up.....all of his day was spent obsessing about tv schedules and comparing english and italian programmes as over there you have the option using your remote to change the language....he was setting reminders by clock and tv remote, first words out of his mouth were about tv schedules and everyone he met he talked incessently about tv schedules..he regularly woke up at 3am and wanted to get up ......

 

.the worst part was major boistrous argumentative behaviour, either totally ignoring me on a degree ive never seen before or if i tried to talk about it he became so aggressive towards me i was in tears, the slightest thing i said he misinterpreted and retaliated too ...and shouted back at me saying i was saying something mean when i was just giving simple instruction, if he made any kind of game mistake or couldnt beat all the computer games he went berserk or if i told him to break from what he was expecting to do, he would attack me, repeated slapping, hiting , biting, i was taking myself away into another room trying to give him space to calm down but this just made him do it all the more.

 

he wouldnt listen to me at all, nothing i said made any difference and he was obsessed with who was the boss and we had a sheet of holiday rules and everything i said he would just do back to me and the concept of me being in charge seemed to upset him so much, we had a star behaviour chart and i tried to make it fun and in return he just drew me a sad face chart saying he didnt like what i was saying ...i took away his leapster and tv ....he took away my books and anything i liked .....we are back now but my goodness im so tired, and so sad we ended up fighting every day ..and i didnt have a computer so i couldnt ask advice from here

[Wardie]

Thanks everyone for your great replies - it's a relief to know that others are going through this too. I've learnt a lot from all your replies!

 

Jb1964, I wonder if my son thinks the same - that if he's feeling bad then everyone must feel the same way about him. That's an interesting point.

 

I reckon I'm going to have to take a deep breath and try and not take the bait and ignore the more confrontational things DS might say. (I often start off okay but then before I know it I find myself embroiled in an arguement). Suze you're right, winning isn't really winning, it's too emotionally draining. (Sojourned said that you can't win an arguement with an Aspergian - you'll lose both the argument and your dignity -

 

Cat you're spot on when you said that sometimes nothing you can say is right, how true is that. That's why our arguements just go round in circles because the more he answers negatively, the more I try and convince him that he's clever and I love him, and that just adds fuel...

 

So thanks again everyone - you've all helped me heaps !

 

And the cyperhugs are very appreciated!

 

Eva

 

Hi Eva

We had a problem a couple of years ago where my son's confidence suddenly plummeted and he was miserable - led to lots of arguments and nothing was right. Took the best part of the year to realise the root of the problem was his teacher. She didn't really understand (or even like him) and had somehow managed to make him think he was useless at literacy (he has a better vocabulary than most adults and reads all books avidly). He took that as he was useless at everything and it was all downhill from there! Once I realised the root we were able to deal with his worries and his confidence improved. His teacher the following year was light years ahead in handling him and his school results at the end of that year were outstanding. You said in your first post you thought it might be school, it was in our case - maybe worth digging some more?

Edited September 8, 2007 by Wardie

[Eva]

School is the only thing I think which could be making J upset - apart from the usual other stuff - but I can't figure out what aspect of it that is making him feel so bad. The classroom teacher is pretty hopeless and barely understands ASD's despite me, the OT and a Speech therapist trying to give her info to help J. I wonder if she's said something to him, you've got me thinking now Wardie!

 

I think I'll go and see her and tell her what's going on at home...maybe she'll shed some light, inadvertently...anyway, I'm working on a self-esteem 'book' for J at the moment which we can read together when he's feeling bad.

 

Allsetuk <'> <'> <'>, I feel for you, it's awful arguing all the time isn't it .