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7 year old emotions

Helen

Hi. Only in the last 6 months have I realised my 7 year old boy has autism. Now I understand more it’s so obvious but I’m fairly new to it all and trying desperately to help him manage his emotions better. 
he’s in an all boys school, is an august baby, loves dancing and singing, adores maths and numbers, but has zero friends (and the boys he plays with aren’t the nice ones). And last week he bit a boy and kicked another boy. His grandad passed away last week and so we know that’s having an effect on his behavior (despite the lack of reaction when we told him), but he internalizes everything and can’t explain how he’s feeling. 
the school are being good. He’s now got a counselor, uses colours to help describe how he’s feeling, sits on a quieter table etc. but what else can I do. He doesn’t show remorse really and I can’t see to get through to him how important it is to be kind and to just take a breath rather than lash out. 

  • Hello, I am really interested to hear about your son. My son is 12 and we are only now embarking on seeking some sort of assessment because we really thought he was growing out of the issues we were having and just thought him to be a quirky kid. Also, the majority of the time we trundle along just fine and we start to think ‘ah he’s fine!’. He has never had any trouble at school, being terrified of getting into trouble, Being fine at school is another reason why we have never pursued anything because we have had teachers and even a GP think we are bonkers.  However I do believe wholeheartedly he would be capable of masking. We only discovered he was severely colourblind when he was 10 as he did such a good job of getting by. What really resonates with me though is controlling emotions. He has been prone to meltdowns that are so severe it is hard to believe he is the same kid, Awful language, he totally sees red, he can be violent towards us and things in the house. I reckon these started when he was about 7. We have had months at a time when he is fine, but since Christmas we have had I reckon around 5 meltdowns. And he is 12…and tall. Time to accept we need help.

    The other thing you said which resonates is how your son doesn’t really show remorse, or seem to care if you tell him something major like his grandad has died. Our son was the same BUT actually the fact that he seemed to hate himself after such episodes led us to believe he really did care, enormously. Sometimes he would apologise but a week later and I would just feel so sad he had been sitting on it for so long. Now, he is much quicker to apologise. But he doesn’t forget events, ever. Mulls then over for months years. Sometimes he will actively say the opposite thing to what you want/expect him to say. Like recently I told him about the earthquakes in turkey and said ‘goodness, the size of the population of our town has died’ and he said ‘that’s not that many people’. But I know he doesn’t think that REALLY?! My thinking is that he is incredibly sensitive and empathetic but so much so doesn’t know how to express it and buries it. 

    Sorry to be of no use to you at all but I just wanted to share, I hope you don’t mind. 

  • I was only in school for a year and got in lots of fights. But as I remember most of the time some one else picked the fight with me. I just responded. But it’s hard for a student under pressure to explain that other kids are picking on him. Especially if the other kids have the bigger bruises and the teacher seems to like them better.

    my limited experience with autistic children who fight (gained in my childhood) is that once the fight starts they tend to commit to the fight more and are generally more aggressive. It doesn’t follow that they are starting the fights though.

    so think about it logically from your child’s perspective? Why would you show remorse for winning a fight someone else started?