Violence towards siblings

my daughter is still at the referral stage, these summer holidays have been hell (I won’t go into the many and varied reasons why!).

Her behaviour towards her sibling is now spiralling out of control, today she’s left huge red and bleeding scratch marks down her chest. Every day she violent or aggressive towards her she’s tells her daily she wishes she was dead, that she stupid, fat, ugly etc.

I just don’t know how to deal with this, she literally doesn’t care about any punishment I might give and can’t actually seem to understand why her behaviour is wrong. If I ask her why she’s done it she says “I hate her, I want to hurt her so I do”.

I don’t even know if I should be punishing her behaviour (it doesn’t seem very fair on her sister if I don’t). I’m at my wits end, I feel like I’m failing both of them, she’s almost 8 she should know this isn’t ok. Her behaviour in general has got so bad over the holidays I’m now really worried about her going back to school.

Any and all advice on how to manage this would be very welcome.

Chloe Mod over 6 years ago

Hi NAS39316,

I am sorry that you are going through such a challenging time with your daughter.

We have a page on our website that centres around physical challenging behaviour. Including the possible causes, as well as strategies and interventions you can adopt to improve her behaviour:

http://www.autism.org.uk/about/behaviour/challenging-behaviour.aspx

You may find it useful to have a look at our behaviour guidelines and general behaviour page:

http://www.autism.org.uk/about/behaviour/guidelines.aspx

http://www.autism.org.uk/about/behaviour.aspx

You may also like to contact Young Minds https://youngminds.org.uk/

who are the UK's leading charity regarding children and young people's mental health and wellbeing. They have a helpline offering confidential support to anyone concerned about the emotional problems or behaviour of a child or young person. Their Helpline number is 0808 802 5544.

If you were looking for further more information, or if you have any more queries, you may like to contact our Autism Helpline team. You can call them on 0808 800 4104 (Monday to Thursday 10am to 4pm, Friday 9am to 3pm).Please note that the Helpline is experiencing a high volume of calls and it may take a couple of attempts before you get through to speak to an advisor.

I hope that this helps,

ChloeMod.
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Mum on a mission :) over 6 years ago

Hello,

Sounds like you are balancing everything and dealing with the holidays. It’s really hard sometimes. I am not the best for advice as I am so new to all this and I struggle greatly dealing with my own daughters. I have in the past been worried about the effect my (undiagnosed Aspergers) daughter has on her siblings. In regard to violence and not nice behaviour. I have spoken aside to them about triggers and how not to “wind her up” and how to step back and not let things spiral out of control. This had helped them to stop the situations worsening and I do feel this has helped. I have spoken t the eldest about the condition and how it feels to be her sister. Knowledge is power etc ! The ASD drop in gave me advice that I need to show the siblings that I am in control and I can work it all out so they don’t become scared, I have shown this to them, even if I just say “i’ve got this it’s all okay” and that has helped. Also I do not accept any violence and there are always consequences. Usually I take the phone away or send her for time out and I afterwards explain why it’s not okay. It’s really hard, the holidays are not easy I hope all is a bit easier for you when school is back and the routine etc and that you can get some support. Sometimes I find I panic about things becoming the norm but they are a phase. I’m new to all this so I hope someone else responds, I wish you well x
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