Son always thinking he knows better.

I mean you’ll find he rebels against your punishments because to him it makes no sense that he’s being punished. Remember in all things his default position is likely to be that he should have complete autonomy. You’re going to have to justify every no with a reason. Otherwise when you do have to punish him for ignoring you when you say no the punishment isn’t going to make any sense, it’s just going to feel vindictive.

no matter what you do he will probably never get to a point where he trusts that you know best. At least not for years. So you’re going to have to start making it so he doesn’t have to take so many things on trust by explaining the reason for things very clearly.

Actually the objective in hungry hungry hippos is to get more balls than everyone else so not giving balls back till the game is over is entirely consistent with the rules.

the issue is you can’t use your hands. And it’s not normally posable to overfill the hippo with out touching balls with your hands.

I’d be willing to bet that switch that flips in his head is boardom. He heard you laughing and hoped you might be doing something fun. Then discovered it was boring. He wanted to join in but with something on his level. So he shifted attention to something he found more interesting than the game, the mechanism itself and its limits.

Are there any games you could play with him that might be suitable for an older child? Chess maybe?

You were just standing between him and his curiosity. And he couldn’t see a reason why you were saying no.

Also the hungry hippo game is stupidly fragile. I think ours broke a couple of weeks after we got it from aggressive hammering of the leaver. (Which is how you’re meant to play the game)

Also you know what. I might have stoped him but not the way you seem to be suggesting. I might have said, “if you want to see how many balls it can fit in the mouth you need to do it properly like a science experiment. Add one ball at a time. Count them as they go in the mouth. Gently close the mouth each time and if you can’t get it to close you’ve reached the limit. Show him how to satisfy his curiosity responsibly.

I’m not a parent but I think I’d talk it out. I’d tell my youngest that the broken toy would be fixed or replaced. Then I’d give my eldest a lecture. It’s start by telling him he isn’t going to be punished. That I believe he didn’t mean to break it and was only curious about the mechanism. But I’d also tell him that he has to be carful using other peoples toys so as not to break them. And that if he breaks them often he won’t be allowed to play with other peoples toys, not as a punishment but to make sure the toys don’t break.

I certainly wouldn’t try to stop my son trying new things. But I would remind him gently before hand that if he tries it and doesn’t like it he’s not allowed to be mad about it because a risk of trying new things is you might not like it.

I’d try to take a mindfulness approach of reenforcing that your actions have consequences for yourself and others with out apportioning blame.

Yeah my brother had a similar group of so-called "friends" while he was in school, a group of bullies. He was loyal to them too. They invited him to a house one day to hang out, and all of them ganged up on him to beat him up. He was bruised, and when he went home he looked upset and didn't want to talk to anyone. These "friends" thought it would be funny to invite my brother somewhere and then beat him up. I was really young at the time and I didn't really understand what happened, or that people could be so mean.

I totally understand that you can't use traditional parenting on these individuals, and you're doing your best to take care of everyone and yourself. And I think it's good to have somewhere to vent out your frustrations from time to time. Otherwise  stress will build up in your system, and that's not good for you. At least you have brief moments of everyone being happy and having a good time.  

Yes his PDA makes him extremely anxious and a desire to control everything makes his anxiety ease ever so slightly. He sees almost everything in life as demanding even things he enjoys can feel demanding to him. Yes PDA does make them feel like a victim when they feel wronged or controls been taken and as if they are hard done to but again I try to validate his feelings even if I don’t always agree with his feelings. 

Life pre pandemic was chaos at times with his behaviour and that’s why I try to no longer parent him by punishments, time outs removal of his favourite possessions as I now see that for years I was punishing him for his PDA profile and how devoted he is at resisting demands. He was reacting to me taking full control from him. I was the person who had to back down as he isn’t capable of doing it. 

I have done some workshops with Laura Kerbey and our local NAS branch and they opened my eyes to how traditional parenting is not going to work for individuals with PDA. I could watch Harry Thomson’s videos all day long as he gets it (he is also a PDA’r) Tigger Pritchard is also another speaker who is a PDA’r. I now try my best to model my parenting on there strategies and it works for us (well most of the time it works) I do have to let a lot of things slide and pick my battles which goes against the normal parenting but it makes life more bearable for us all.  

M is 11 years old. He has been a victim of bullying several times. Most recently he was bullied by a group of boys he believed were his friends. They took advantage of his loyalty and vulnerabilities. For a long time we’ll over a year M did not believe myself or school that these boys were taking advantage of him and the things they did to him was bullying. They would kick him in the face with a ball and say it was an accident, or he would be tripped up and again say it was an accident. It took for them to assault him by kicking him in the stomach he got badly winded and smashing his water bottle and kicking his school bag around that’s why he finally admitted they weren’t friends. M was fiercely loyal to them and on occasions they would say M this person hit me go hit them or Such and such said this to me and made me upset and M would be sent forward to say why did you do this to my friends and on occasions the person hadn’t actually done anything, the boys just wanted to see M make a fool of himself and of course M would be then the one in trouble. He went along with it all because he was hurt his so called friends were hurt. School brought it to my attention lots of times but they would always worm there way back in and unfortunately it took for M realise the hard way. 

I can’t always use these strategies I’ve learned as I am only human and at time become overwhelmed with parenting two kids on the spectrum who are totally opposite from one another and I have my own difficulties too. It’s exhausting at times and to be honest I’ve felt that way this week.

Lau said:

He does not have role model that’s been consistently there throughout his life

This would be my first port of call here. He sounds as though he's identifying as male. And he's 'trying' out male assertiveness, which is overtly apparent in society around us. 

I read a few books on how to mother a son (my son's father passed away a few years ago and wasn't the best role model, but it's amazing how even a less-that-substance of a male provides useful lessons in how not to behave). I could only find really useful ones in the Psychology/Christian genre, but regardless of ones beliefs, they were incredibly helpful. One was John Eldredge's Wild At Heart & the other Cloud/Townsends The Mom Factor. 

My mother was abusive right up until she stonewalled and ghosted me but I still let my son go see her. She has a completely different respect for him. He learns added behaviours he doesn't wish to engage in while being the king of her castle for however long he can stand being there. Having blood relatives, sometimes it's better to know our own possible faults if not to just be made aware. We can all choose our own family eventually but it can cause a sort of heart-breaking jealousy in one young male to have a half-brother with a complete family. This is worth therapy, if not just to learn to express the deeper things one desires and mourn that loss. We want our men to feel familiar with this technique, even if it's in a dignified quiet and secret location. I used to take my son to therapy (NHS) to deal with difficult circumstances he had to go through with his father. He hated it, but that was OK. 80% of making it though difficult things is just Showing Up. We carried on and eventually in Uni, he sought out therapy himself. This is the way, though. Of course we all hate it at first and even a few times. We are angry about washing dishes or mindful eating. And then one day, we desire it. One always needs a hand to hold and a graceful act of acceptance. Someone to do it with us is even better. 

I had a mentor who taught me a little about speaking to men. She would pretend to be afraid of a spider or something that encourages her partners strength, just to afford a little win to her husband on occasion. She made more money than him. Apparently it helped give him confidence he wasn't taught as a child and assigned tasks he eventually would assert himself. With my son, I'll task him the rubbish and call it a "man's job". Or he'll take all the bags up 3 flights of stairs and not let me handle any. Everyone needs purpose. Many want to identify in a particular way - straight or gay male, non-binary, musician, acrobat, whatever it is, it's all OK. Sometimes if I'm a bit overbearing and my son is irritated by it, I might demand a moment to just Be a Mum "don't take away my purpose!" LOL.  

With games, as with trying something new, there is a mental step-by-step undertaking to achieve a sort of success (trying a Brussels sprout without falling out of your chair and setting the house of fire could be an achievement, here). That needs a bit of focus and a moment in a safe space to engage. I wouldn't suggest he's limited or restrained or weak before undertaking the assignment, "QUEST" or task. I would first ask him what matters of strength he'll need to summon in order to complete his journey. How do you hope to win? What will you need to get through this? What would Thor or Spiderman or X do? How should you appear should you eat something horrifying? Even if in the moment, the only mentor is a Fantasy Figure, perhaps any male he looks up to would be useful. 

Hi Juniper, He does not have role model that’s been consistently there throughout his life. I cut ties with my mother’s side of the family due to her neglectful and abusive behaviour throughout my life and I could not expose myself or my children to it any longer. That was nearly 4 years ago. My step father who M classed as his grandfather passed away in January this year after a short battle with cancer. He hadn’t seen him since before the pandemic. Ms has no relationship was his biological father. 

My youngest sons dad has been there for M since he was 6 and they get on great, we go on days out on his day off but he works 6 days a week so he’s not here a lot. 

He can be very helpful and caring towards me and his brother he’s not always tricky to be around. In he is a buddy to a primary 1 child and he is also on the STEAM committee. Do you have any suggestions of a reasoning task you mentioned above? 

He has many passions and things he’s good at. When he’s engaging in the things he enjoys he could play for hours. He loves Pokemon, he loves making clay models he’s great at drawing  things from imagination and loves story telling.  He’s at his happiest building Lego or playing with action figures and dinosaurs. 

Your son seems like he tries to take control of the situation and be the authority, and even feels like he is in control of the police and sends them at you, and he'll hurt you, and he'll take anything you're afraid of and uses it against you. He does whatever he wants to do. He sounds similar to my older brother. I'm not sure how old your older son is though.

I mean in school my brother was the school bully, and when the other students finally stood up for themselves and attacked him back, he always claimed afterwards that he was the "victim" of school bullying, and he justified his own actions of bullying them as "defending himself" from bullies, even though he bullied them first for the fun of it, because he gets a joy out of causing pain and suffering to others.

Anything you do to your son to reprime him for his actions, makes him into the so-called victim, and you as the so-called offender, so it's difficult for you to discipline him, because he does not react in a typical way other children would, and he'll go to extreme lengths to get what he wants (not eating, calling the police, attacking you).

It's very difficult to handle these types of behaviors. I mean on the odd day they seem to be doing okay, and then they get frustrated and everything turns upside-down. I know that normal disciple like from books and other conventional methods does not really work on these types of people. And these types of people have a lot of demands, and it's either you do it for them, or you don't, and if you don't, they go to an extreme length to get you to do it for them using any means necessary at their disposal. They don't take no for an answer, and will punish you in return for not getting what they want. That's a very difficult thing for you to handle as a parent. 

You’re oldest sounds like he is trying hard like every young man to mature and failing. Realising he’s failing and then trying to cover up that failure. Dealing with shame and frustrations of not understanding the process and not having a rule book for LIFE. or how to be an adult. 

Does he have a male role model (uncle parent grandfather) who can help?

Having a son myself, I might give him tasks that appeal to his becoming-man. Kind ones like opening the door for strangers (would you mind doing x - or "please do x" straightforward is better) and if he wants to try something new, ask him to assign himself a reasoning-through task. Trying it. Mental comparison. Really spend a moment thinking about it. Or with games, if he wants to play he should be in charge to learning and then setting the rules. Once he has an internal contract in his head it will be hard for him to renegotiate. Trade Autistic Secret!

I remember the discman. That's rough that your 'dad' broke something you bought with your own money. Some parents are controlling and don't want their child to 'waste time' on what they deem is a bad thing, or they think that something (like music) is evil and don't want it to brainwash their children. 

I've had many of my things broken and my money stolen from family, and they've also abused me, and one of my family members even discarded me and wanted to throw my items into the garbage or outside in the rain, so I've felt like I hit rock bottom many times in my early life. But I still managed to get straight As, but I still felt worthless at the same time, and home was utter chaos. I always had to breathe in deeply before putting my keys into the lock to enter the home. I'm glad now as an adult that I have my own place, and I rarely have to talk to my family anymore. 

I know he will be gifted some money at Christmas time and I have thought about asking him to replace the game and see how he will respond. Or as you have said I may wait until he asks for something and explain unfortunately I can’t as I need to replace Hungry hippos. 

He does not understand money very well and doesn’t understand the value of it.

Hello,

His behaviour sounds awful. I do get that, I’m going to give a bit of back ground prior to lockdown last year I would hold M accountable for a lot of his negative behaviours and his reactions and there was appropriate punishments in place for said things. I used this style of parenting since he was little. 

These are some of the responses I would get when said punishments were give out or if I gave him into trouble. 

He climb out of windows, I locked all the bottom windows he would threaten to climb out top floor windows I was terrified that he would during one of his meltdowns. I used to have to keep all the window keys in my pocket.

He would run from the house (which I allowed if it wasn’t dark outside) usually he would walk off the anger and come home feeling better. I don’t mind him going for the walk as he would not go far and we live pretty safe area. 

If he wanted a certain food that I hadn’t planned to make or he wanted a take away and I said no, he would say I’m not eating then and he would go 2-3 days with no food. He did this a lot when he was younger. We still have the odd occasion he will do this. 

He would trash his room

He would punch me,kick me or scratch me. I had to restrain him once when I was pregnant because he was kicking me so much. 

If we were out & about and he wanted something and I had said no he could run off, I would be there chasing him around pushing his younger brother in the pram which was really difficult as we live in a hilly area. 

There was also a time he wanted to buy 20 5pence lollies and I tried to compromise and say let’s buy 5 lollipops and we can come back in a couple of days and buy more he then grabbed the money out of my hand to buy the 20 lollipops and I was so frustrated I held his hand and took my money from him I somehow managed to scratch his hand. It was the tiniest scratch. This caused a total meltdown in the shop for a good 10 minutes because I had scratched him and because he knew I wasn’t going to buy any lollies now. We managed to get home. Then 20-30 mins later there is two police officers chapping my door. He had actually called the police to arrest me for scratching his hand. The police spoke with me and then spoke with him himself and then spoke with us both together.  They said No further action would be taken. A few weeks after that happened two female police officers appeared at my door and asked to come in, I said yes and the said they were checking up to see how M was. I could not believe this was happening and thankfully they didn’t come back again. 

I’ve asked M to cut his food up, he refused and he then purposely swallowed a large piece of sausage and began chocking I had to call an ambulance he has done this twice now. After that I always cut his food up smaller and he would then refuse to eat it as he felt I was treating him like a baby. 

He would say you don’t love me and you don’t understand me. He wanted to die. 

One time I took his PlayStation remote controller as punishment and he then hid all the remote controls in the house so no one could watch tv in any room

These are just some of the examples of behaviour responses I would get and to be honest I would have an ever ending list. 

Right now M is in mainstream and has never coped well with mainstream. He does a reduced timetable and has a full time pupil support assistant. If anything happens in school that upsets him angers him or he feels too challenged his PDA anxiety gets the better of him and he runs out of school and comes home. He has 2-3 staff members chasing after him. This happens daily. There are also days when he can’t cope with school and he is uncontrollable crying, he has head aches, his IBS flares up and terrible sore stomachs at the thought of going to school on these days he will stay at home. He’s extremely sensory. 

I try not to dish out punishments now I try to see things from his PDA view. How I word sentences to him and how all these negative behaviours are from some sort of trigger. It can make parenting him very tricky and time consuming and I try to take a friendly joking approach with him as he responds well to that I try to analyse situations and pick my battles as I have my younger son who has a diagnosis also. Life can be really hard going for both of them due to their ASC and I try to make home as easy going as I can.  

I know that I need to give him consequences but I also know that those consequences on him have consequences for me and my other son and unfortunately I can’t seem to find a balance that works.

so like, he wants a game, sorry we cant afford that game you want as we had to use money on fixing the stuff you broke. hit him with consequence.

i dunno, id maybe try make a lesson about cost of things and make it so he cant have the things he wants because you deduct from him the cost of the game he broke. make sure he doesnt take things for granted, make sure he knows to not break things because things have a cost, a more material lesson but perhaps one that may even drill into him more of a lesson as he perhaps may realise there is a cost in emotions aswell as in monetary cost.

Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia said:

I'd say that no person would understand what they have, until they don't have anything

and long term repercusions in adult life

I saved some money and bought myself discman when I was 16, to introduce myself to music, so at least I know, what people are talking about, but I left at home when I went to school next day, when I came back home, my 'dad' already turned it into liquid courage

so one possible reason to make it easier to talk to people gone

and I did not find out what music actually is until a year ago, !!!!

just an example how horribly wrong it can go if you have nothing

You seem to give a lot to both your sons, but I'd say that no person would understand what they have, until they don't have anything, and I don't think your older son appreciates what he has in his life, because he's been given so much. I mean, he can break a toy, be unapologetic, call your younger son a brat, and then go play ps5. Does that sound like a reasonable thing for any child to do?

I mean, I was going to suggest temporarily removing the game console for awhile until he learns to behave appropriately, but there's been enough bad stories of an angry child hurting their parents over a removed game console, that it's probably best to avoid that. But perhaps you could temporarily remove something else. I mean I used to be addicted to tv shows as a child, but once those channels got removed (which I was really angry and upset about), I needed something else to do with my time, so I started putting my goals together, I started studying, and I got straight As, and I never really went back to watching tv again after realizing my own potential. Sometimes removing something will teach you something else in life.