How to remain calm when autistic son is displaying challenging behaviour

This is a tricky one to answer as different types of autism may lend to different approaches perhaps.

I shall do a bit of sharing of my being a 'nightmare child' when I was around 7. I would be loud and I would get violent with my brothers. I would throw these, I would sometimes break things.

It seems, looking back as an adult, that the problems that precipitated these may have come down to me as a child lacking the control I felt I needed in a situation.

Often I felt misunderstood. I reacted badly and then I was made to feel shame for my reactions which dealt a double blow. Possibly my outbursts could have been reduced if my parents had softly and compassionately asked me what I felt was wrong.

By screaming, a child with autism can claw back some control to some degree.

If your son were to be screaming to regain control, then shouting over the top could (would likely) reduce his control further. It makes sense that escalation would follow.

I could way off mark but here's a fairly blind guess:

If your son screams or has an outburst, give your son space and try to remain calm. Hopefully your son won't break anything important or hurt anyone.

Avoid any confrontation or shaming ("stop that", "you're being silly").

Watch to see when your son is looking to make contact with you - this could be via body language or eye contact or simply if they go quiet.

Then, if you can, calmly ask your son something compassionate like "how are you feeling?" or perhaps "is there anything you need?".

If your son's outbursts are not like mine were at his age, then possibly this may not help.

I give this rough blueprint more as 'something to try if you lack another way to turn'.

I'd be interested to hear if anything you try does help a little. It could be good to gauge what works quite well and what doesn't work so well.

Lastly, you have my sympathies. Dealing with outbursts are not easy. I commend you on your bid to find an improvement for your son and the family as a whole.


PS to answer the 'how to remain calm', I'd put it forward that it helps to understand that each outburst in autism always has a strong logic behind it for the child. It might seem random or irrational but there is pretty much always at the heart some rationale going on. I think just having faith in that can help with the staying sane and calm when something seemingly a bit crazy is going on.

This is a tricky one to answer as different types of autism may lend to different approaches perhaps.

I shall do a bit of sharing of my being a 'nightmare child' when I was around 7. I would be loud and I would get violent with my brothers. I would throw these, I would sometimes break things.

It seems, looking back as an adult, that the problems that precipitated these may have come down to me as a child lacking the control I felt I needed in a situation.

Often I felt misunderstood. I reacted badly and then I was made to feel shame for my reactions which dealt a double blow. Possibly my outbursts could have been reduced if my parents had softly and compassionately asked me what I felt was wrong.

By screaming, a child with autism can claw back some control to some degree.

If your son were to be screaming to regain control, then shouting over the top could (would likely) reduce his control further. It makes sense that escalation would follow.

I could way off mark but here's a fairly blind guess:

If your son screams or has an outburst, give your son space and try to remain calm. Hopefully your son won't break anything important or hurt anyone.

Avoid any confrontation or shaming ("stop that", "you're being silly").

Watch to see when your son is looking to make contact with you - this could be via body language or eye contact or simply if they go quiet.

Then, if you can, calmly ask your son something compassionate like "how are you feeling?" or perhaps "is there anything you need?".

If your son's outbursts are not like mine were at his age, then possibly this may not help.

I give this rough blueprint more as 'something to try if you lack another way to turn'.

I'd be interested to hear if anything you try does help a little. It could be good to gauge what works quite well and what doesn't work so well.

Lastly, you have my sympathies. Dealing with outbursts are not easy. I commend you on your bid to find an improvement for your son and the family as a whole.


PS to answer the 'how to remain calm', I'd put it forward that it helps to understand that each outburst in autism always has a strong logic behind it for the child. It might seem random or irrational but there is pretty much always at the heart some rationale going on. I think just having faith in that can help with the staying sane and calm when something seemingly a bit crazy is going on.

Thank you for your reply. It is very helpful to hear from the other side of things. I have always said that it would help if I knew what it was like for him in different situations.

It is easy to walk away from all of the situations at the moment. If I am honest, I need to remember that all of this does not exist myself a bad parent. His autism changes the way that he reacts to situations and I need to remember this on these occasions. 

I will let you know what we try and how things go.