Published on 12, July, 2020
My son 19, was diagnosed in 2017. He has and always had meltdowns with high aggression. Things in the house have got broke, holes in doors,things thrown at me , verbal abuse e.t.c. I don't want to put up with this anymore. I've advised him to go to anger management courses,courses around asd or anything that could help.him . He will say yes but it never happens. Today I was helping him move his drawers out his bedroom cos they're broke and I said he could borrow my unit till he found a new one. Cos he couldn't fit everything back on the unit he started swearing,shouting e.t.c..His 5 year old was there saying stuff to him he told him to piss off. Threw a pot noodle down stairs and chucked a towel in my face. Now I know I should have removed my little one and I could see him getting a bit anxious whilst I was moving his stuff but he's be ok one time and not another he's so unpredictable. Just fed up with feeling like everything is my fault like I didn't react to him the right way or didn't pick up on something. The reason why I've posted this now is the fact his biological dad who was mentally and physically abusive to me did a similar thing . He called me a stupid ••••••• *** and got me round the throat just for tidying his wardrobe. It just brought it all back and I don't want my son to end up doing the same thing wether it be to me,his future partners or children. I do I get him to see he can't do the things that he does to people and think it's ok?
[Edited by Moderator]
Sometimes, it can get better...
I grew up with a violent dad (who lashed out whenever things weren't going his way). During my childhood, I guess I took on the same mantle as my dad. I was violent at home, breaking things, hitting both younger and older brothers (we were all born within a few years of each other so similar ages). In short, I was a nightmare.
At 16-ish, that changed. Some epiphany moment. I'd pushed my older brother through a glass cabinet we had, threw a small pot of paint on the floor and then I broke down. From that point on, my outward rage against others became an inward rage.
After 16, I would still occasionally break things but I wouldn't hurt others. I took the pain out on myself, (relatively lightly) self-harming instead when I needed some way to cope.
The difference may be a question of self-awareness.
My dad was unaware of how much damage he was doing. I've questioned him about it and at first he kept denying that he hit his infant children. This is low self-awareness and this might be a touch harder (albeit not necessarily impossible) to deal with. [I've been having progress with my dad more recently about developing self-awareness.]
In my case, I was more aware in the moment. And perhaps this is why I had a moment at which I recognised I couldn't keep turning my anger on others. I'd grown up and was now roughly as strong as my dad and it probably helped things that I didn't want to be like my dad. So, maybe at 16, I recognised I was basically becoming him. This is slightly better self-awareness, and may give hope that more/faster change may be possible.
My question is, then, how aware is your son of what he is doing? Have you had a chance to talk through afterwards of when things like this has happened to get a feeling or knowledge of how aware he is?
In my own experience, people who are willing to recognise that they have caused some harm tend to be easier to deal with in terms of overcoming a difficult problem.