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What are the most common triggers and calming tactics for a meltdown?

James Stark

Hello all, 

I am new here but not new to autism. We have a 12 year old son, who (after many years of trying) only last September got diagnosed. Our son can be the nicest of kids at times, but so often gets with the wrong crowd and gets himself into all sorts of trouble. He has just changed school on a trial as he was not doing very well at his last one in the hope that they are able to help him.

I am also studying at the OU, doing a design degree. This year I am doing a project on our son and others like him as a high functioning autistic. Most of the problems that gets him into the most trouble is when his starts to get upset and all his little triggers set him off into a meltdown. We do recognise when this starts, so can sometimes prevent a meltdown to let him calm him down. But it is a learning curve. 

My goal is to find most of his common triggers and work out the right calming tactics for a meltdown. Hopefully with this knowledge I can help other children like him, teachers and parents.

Any help or feedback is very welcome, I would love to hear about any obvious triggers other children like him have and what helps prevent them blowing up. 

Parents

  • Many things can be triggers.  With some of the service users I once worked with at an autism unit, it could be things like someone whistling, being told 'no', being given too many instructions at once... and, of course, unexpected changes to routines.

    For me personally, it's having too many things happening at once: needing to multitask.  I'm not always aware of how quickly the anxiety is building up inside me.  So, I can be under pressure with a task, and then something else happens to escalate it, and before I know it I'm at screaming stage.  Anyone shouting at me will always trigger me.

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  • Many things can be triggers.  With some of the service users I once worked with at an autism unit, it could be things like someone whistling, being told 'no', being given too many instructions at once... and, of course, unexpected changes to routines.

    For me personally, it's having too many things happening at once: needing to multitask.  I'm not always aware of how quickly the anxiety is building up inside me.  So, I can be under pressure with a task, and then something else happens to escalate it, and before I know it I'm at screaming stage.  Anyone shouting at me will always trigger me.

Children
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