Autistic ? anger in young child how do you reduce their anger?

Mandles

My 4 year old is on the borders of autism/asphergers(??) and that syndrome.He is currently being assessed but in the mean time he has very poor communication and if you tell him off or if something has made him angry he really starts trying to hurt me or anyone else in the house or playgroup(including teachers). I think he is the sort of kid that you could stop doing this as we have got him out of other various actions that he did(like self harming).
So my question is has anyone else been in a similar situation and how have you got over it? I say "No!" and loudly say don't you dare touch me and he just stands right next to me for ages as he can't bare letting it go and moving on , he just has to get that pinch in , pretends his hands are birds and says "peck you!" . He really looks like he will explode if he doesn' do something to me and as of now has always managed to get something quick done to me at the very least.
I really need to stop this so any ideas. Reasoning does not work with him (he has extreme trouble with this definately wont work).
Someone suggested a stress ball but that was yesterday so wanted to get more ideas.

Nicki

There is a lovely little picture book which you can get from Amazon called "I feel angry". It's not written for kids with ASD but is perfect for them as it is very visual, and also it tells them what to do when they are angry, rather than just what not to do, which most kids with autism find hard. I've used this with my ASD DD with great success.

What I did was read it with her a few times when she wasn't cross. Then when she started getting really worked up, I quickly whipped out the book, and said "X is cross, Let's stamp our foot, bang the cushion, etc". Although she will even now from time to time try to headbutt or hit us when really worked up, she is much much better, and this really worked for us.

If your child is quite bright, and high functioning, there is another really good book aimed at this age and older called "How big is my autism". You work with the child at identifying what it feels like to feel good, to be starting to get worked up, and to be in full scale meltdown, using traffic lights, with green being good and red being off the scale. The child is then taught to recognise where they are on the traffic light scale, and to go and use some methods to let off steam before they get to the point they blow. That one is also on Amazon, and probably also on the NAS site too.

Hth

NoahsPennilessMummy

Hi

sorry you are having problems.
My son is 5 and was diagnosed with autism at 2 and a half. He used to have severe angry tantrums mainly as he couldn`t communicate at all.
Once he was diagnosed they taught him to communicate using the PECS system and eventually to talk which really improved the angry outbursts.
So hang on in there and things will get better:o .
Obviously my son still has meltdowns and there are still communication issues but i am in a much better place than before he had the help.
I have the book from Amazon" when my anger gets too big" which is aimed at children with behavioural/emotional problems.
Also once he is diagnosed you will be introduced to REBUS symbols which can be useful in making a plan for what is happening in the day as not knowing the plan for the day makes autistic children stressed and they are very much visual learners so these symbols help.

3onitsway

Hiya - my son is 11 and severely autistic with no speech. He uses a little PECS - when he really really needs to, but would rather not.

Most of his tempers are around him 'needing' to do something, like posting something under the door, opening and closing something several times etc.

If its something thats not going to harm him, we've found its best to let him do it, he does it and the tantrum passes. Its when we try to stop him doing something that he lashes out with hands and feet - which isn't ideal as he's a big boy and i'm 8+ months pregnant!!

Obviously if its something dangerous, or something he can't/shouldn't do, we tell him NO. This normally results in him throwing himself on the floor (I don't know how his knees are still in one piece!), and hitting out at the floor or walls. He also does look like he might explode if he can't hit something - but i think he's realising that if he hits the floor/wall - it hurts, so this kind of behaviour is decreasing.

Is he at a special needs playgroup? And will he be going to school this year? I only ask because once mine started at his special school, the staff there were very supportive and gave lots of wonderful tips for dealing with his behaviours. If we have any problems at home, we can speak to school about it so that we can try and treat him the same as school/home so he's not getting mixed messages.

Mandles

He has one to one at playgroup at the moment and first team are involved. He seems to be going through a new phase which includes getting up at 6 am and when he wakes up he is so alert and it is like "right, now what can i get up to?!"(i know, 6am is nothing compared to others) also he has night terrors which you can set your watch by, usually exactly 4 hours after he goes to sleep and he has these most nights.

Did you find a big schools or small school better for yours?

3onitsway

Mandles wrote: »

He has one to one at playgroup at the moment and first team are involved. He seems to be going through a new phase which includes getting up at 6 am and when he wakes up he is so alert and it is like "right, now what can i get up to?!"(i know, 6am is nothing compared to others) also he has night terrors which you can set your watch by, usually exactly 4 hours after he goes to sleep and he has these most nights.

Did you find a big schools or small school better for yours?

We had a choice of two special needs primary schools (he wouldn't have coped at all in normal school), both similar sizes, about 50 children, but nice small class sizes, about 7/8 children in each class.
Would yours cope in mainstream school, 25-30 to a class, with one to one help? We would have had no chance of him settling in.

He started at big school last September - a much bigger school for ages 11 to 18. Again, the classes are nice and small and not strictly set on year groups. He's in a class of 6 very similar (but very different!) autistic boys. He seems happy in this class - i think particularly because theres no girls - they're too noisy!! He's settled in remarkably well, but things like lunch/assembley in the busy noisy hall are a bit of an issue for him at the moment - he doesn't like crowds/noise, but school are trying to work around this.

I don't know whether your little man is the same, but most of the things mine gets obsessed with/upset about - normally pass in a few weeks.
A couple of years ago, two of the tables in his classroom 'had' to be upside down!! It was the first thing he did when he got to school, and would't settle til they were turned. We and school were quite worried about how to get him out of this one - and then he stopped!!

It makes his difficult behaviour easier to deal with if I know, in my mind, that he'll be over it in a few weeks and onto something else.

He also has periods of not seeming to need to sleep - but thankfully these are few and far between! I know speaking to other mums at his school, sleeping seems to be quite a problem with a lot of autistic children.

Mandles

I did not think about assemblies.There is no way he will sit for assembly . He will just walk out He has tendancies to escape from the most secure enviroments. He is in the grey area apparently of that autistic spectrum(but i am forcing a statement which they all think he should get). He can go to a mainstream school but i am looking at small schools as my other son was a bit slow and went to mainstream large school and got good help 2 times a week from special needs lady but the rest of the time was just left and really neglected for all of first school.

He hates loud noises and goes in his own world when we get him from playgroup(seems too much fun makes him withdraw into himself).

Someone was saying there is a school that only has 7 kids with special needs in a class but i dont want to sound snobby but it is not a very nice area and my son loves outdoor play and it does not look very exciting.(the other school has tonnes of great outdoor stuff). My only problem is the great small school with all the fab stuff is open plan so i just know he will wander around all the different classes.....it is hard to know what is best .

NoahsPennilessMummy

My son goes to mainstream with support ( he has a statement). However it is not really working and we are just starting the process of looking at special schools/integrated resources.

My son also has phases with his sleeping and will have months on end when he starts his day at 3-4am:eek: , this is a killer:rolleyes:

3onitsway

Mandles wrote: »

He hates loud noises and goes in his own world when we get him from playgroup(seems too much fun makes him withdraw into himself). Mine is the same - when he comes home from school he grabs something to eat, then chills in his room for a bit - just to recover from the information overload of the day I think.

Someone was saying there is a school that only has 7 kids with special needs in a class but i dont want to sound snobby Dont worry about sounding snobby - but the chances are, as its a special school, it won't have children from that area in it, but special needs children from all over the area. but it is not a very nice area and my son loves outdoor play and it does not look very exciting.(the other school has tonnes of great outdoor stuff). My only problem is the great small school with all the fab stuff is open plan so i just know he will wander around all the different classes.....it is hard to know what is best .

Our little school didn't have so much a big playground, but for security, each classroom had its own little playground/area with bikes/toys etc.

All you can do really is go and look at as many schools as possible - you'll get a feel for the one thats right for you.

pink_numbers

Hi, I have asperger's syndrome and as a child (I'm 29 now) I had real communication problems and anger issues.

As a child, i found that body contact was helpful when I needed to calm down, particularly laying on the floor with my head on my mum's lap for half an hour. Obviously, body contact is not the best thing when your son is absolutely mad, but this may help him if he's mildly upset or calm down quicker after a fit. He will also have his own version of what body contact calms him down most.
Another technique that helped me was when I got over upset (as in I-don't-even-remember-what-I-was-upset-over kind of upset), my mother used to go through breathing exercise with me, just to calm me down enough so that I could try to communicate.
I have had mad fits in my adulthood (last one was about 2 years ago) and the best thing for me now is just to have a person hug me or hold my hand. This might not be suitable for your son, but again, he will have his own thing that will calm him down, such as a particular blanky, a teddy or sitting somewhere he likes.
don't worry about him not sitting in assemblies, I never sat through one in my kindergarden years, but I am now doing a PhD and lecturing students... so it can't be all that bad!

Savvy_Sue

My friend found that it was essential not to say NO to her child at that age, ever, or there would be a real meltdown. Of course this didn't mean the child was able to get their own way all the time, just that saying NO was a NO-NO.

Even now the child is (just) at secondary school, I think NO is a bit of a dodgy word. At school and home they try to say things like "hurting people is not allowed" rather than "Don't hurt people".

I don't know if that would help you at all. I know you say reasoning doesn't work (and I can understand that!), but would there be a better response to him knowing what is and isn't 'allowed'? eg hitting the cushion is allowed, hitting people is not allowed.

Anything useful on the NAS website?