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Newly diagnosed

Mummy P

hello, my 8 year old son has just been diagnosed autistic and I am looking for help and advice.

he is in mainstream school and coping with that but when out of school it’s a different story. He is having more and more meltdowns at home with my husband and I. If one of us tell him to do something and he doesn’t want to it usually changes into a full blown meltdown and recently he has began to kick and spit at us. Everything is really affecting family life and makes weekends very stressful and not enjoyable. 

We have another boy so need help in how to get him to do things like tidy room, get ready for bed etc without it leading to complete meltdown etc

Parents

  • There is another thread in here on first page about someone who is fine at school but melts down at home - worth reading and I’ve responded from my experience there. 

    More broadly though, you might need to reasses some of your expectations of him. Although having a tidy room and teaching self care is important, really is it so important? Maybe focus on the stuff that is vital and let some things go. It’s been so hard for us to “not sweat the small stuff” particularly as it just looks like “bad behaviour” and also we don’t want to have double stabdarda between children. But they are different. We try to treat them fairly but that doesn’t always mean the same. 

    The best advice we ever got from someone who was supporting us with parenting strategies for children with autism was - if you see behaviour you don’t like, you need to keep asking yourself two questions: 1. Is it really a problem? 2. Who is it a problem for? If it’s just affecting you and it falls into “irritating” rather than “dangerous” camp then you might achieve more of the important things by choosing your battles. 

Reply

  • There is another thread in here on first page about someone who is fine at school but melts down at home - worth reading and I’ve responded from my experience there. 

    More broadly though, you might need to reasses some of your expectations of him. Although having a tidy room and teaching self care is important, really is it so important? Maybe focus on the stuff that is vital and let some things go. It’s been so hard for us to “not sweat the small stuff” particularly as it just looks like “bad behaviour” and also we don’t want to have double stabdarda between children. But they are different. We try to treat them fairly but that doesn’t always mean the same. 

    The best advice we ever got from someone who was supporting us with parenting strategies for children with autism was - if you see behaviour you don’t like, you need to keep asking yourself two questions: 1. Is it really a problem? 2. Who is it a problem for? If it’s just affecting you and it falls into “irritating” rather than “dangerous” camp then you might achieve more of the important things by choosing your battles. 

Children
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