Son being so aggressive, any advice?

im wondering if old upbringing style of smacking kids would help here... if your son knew that any violent action would result in equal violence back at him and he doesnt like the pain it causes himself perhaps he wouldnt take to violence for he wouldnt want ti back at him?

just wondering on that mind you.... it does kinda make sense and is likely a reason alot of kids brought up these days are violent as they are not taught this consequence and dont fear anyone doing anything back to them and think they can do anything harmful to others and not have it back at them. they used to say spare the rod spoilt the child. its kinda this.

i mean people can say its wrong, but what is worse? smacking your kid when they are young, or seeing them murder someone elses kid and losing them to a life long prison sentence where your kid gets hurt even more in many ways in prison?

sometimes cutting some trees down lets light in and saves the forest and allows for better tree growth, to spare more trees you have to cut some down... i dunno it probably still wont get through to people what im trying to say.

main fact of the matter though is its pretty serious if it gets violent and death threats and causes harm and threatens to use knife... that sort of thing requires immediate serious fix no matter if anyone thinks the fix is immoral or unethical or whatever... because a unethical fix by todays standards is better than the outcome of allowing it and then someone else getting stabbed and then losing your kid to a prison sentence... any unethical fix to this issue is better than the potential double loss for you and for another if it isnt sorted.

Not assuming, speculating. It’s been my observation that you get more information by taking an educated guess and having people correct you when you are wrong than by asking an endless series of questions about peoples personal circumstances and home life many of which may not be relevant.

see exploding over the breakfast table over something that may not make sense is exactly the kind of thing I would expect from autism. for example I am told of one autistic genius who was literally dragged from a hotel breakfast room screaming because they served breakfast five minutes before it said breakfast was served on the sign. The notion that people might serve breakfast at a time other than the time indicated on the sign was so upsetting to him that he had a meltdown.

I don’t know what upset your son but it could’ve been any number of things. The bowl his breakfast cereal was in was different than before. His favourite cartoon character has been removed from the packaging on the  breakfast cereal box. Something little that seems insignificant to you that provides him with a sense of comfort has been taken away most likely.

maybe yesterday you said there would be pancakes and today it’s breakfast cereal. Maybe you even forgot you said it but he didn’t. Maybe his dad just poured a new brand of incredibly strong smelling coffee and it’s smell is just too overwhelming for him.

you’ll probably never know if you never ask. When a child particular not out is very angry, ’why are you angry?’ Is a better response than ‘don’t raise your voice at me.’

so just that we can be absolutely clear on what is and isn’t going on. Telling a child off for being angry is not acknowledging their anger. Until you’ve  shown you care about why somebody is angry you have not acknowledged their anger.

I mean with a whole bowl thing from your son‘s point of view it’s his ball. he probably reacts to his sister picking up and taking it in the same way he would to a total stranger doing so. It’s not sharing it’s theft. The concept of sharing in this context probably doesn’t exist for him. The notion that she might give it back, or that you his parents might tell her to give it back, probably does not occur to him. She’s stolen his ball the only way he can get it back is to take it back by force and discourage her from doing it again.

You know if you lived in some lawless country with no Police and someone walked into your front door picked up your TV and walked out with it you’d probably clonk them over the head with a baseball bat. In his mind he only has himself to rely on in this matter so he acts.

Thank you again for replying xx

Thank you xx

It does feel to me that there is more than autism at play here although it is possible a significant factor.

I wrote some book recommendations for a similar case in this post that may offer some help:

https://community.autism.org.uk/f/parents-and-carers/32418/am-i-just-doing-everything-wrong/301059#301059

I think you are going to need to engage a child therapist with experience of autism and anger management in children as the techniques needed here are beyond most of us.

Good luck.

Make sure they give him lots of assessments because that sounds like more that just a child tantrum, autistic meltdown, or "typical" emotional dysregulation and anger issues, I think your son will prove to have more than just the ASD at work with these behaviours, ASD might be the trigger for individual outbursts but it doesn't explain the premeditated side or how the aggression comes on that strong that quickly on a regular basis. I say this because I find CAHMS to be a bit lacklustre to say the least and you'll want to know fully what you are having to deal with in order to help your son and your whole family even. Good Luck OP.

I guess the problem here is my son wasn't in an argument. He had simply lost control of the ball. 

I listen to my son. I certainly don't brush over his anger. This is quite upsetting.

I spend all my time with him. 

I know his triggers and signs. 

I don't understand frustration and aggressive situations when it was over something at the breakfast table with no warning. 

Upon putting him to bed he had self harmed today. 

Thank you for replying but please don't assume things. That I'm making it worse but brushing over his anger. 

I think I may have mentioned here once about throwing a chair at a teacher as a child. Someone asked me did you know you could’ve really hurt her if you’d hit her. And my response was if I meant to hit her I would’ve hit her.

my point being I was in an argument with the teacher and she wasn’t listening and I was becoming progressively more and more frustrated and she was completely oblivious to that fact. I was about to explode and she had no notion at all. I think autistic children often resort to violence when they can’t get others to acknowledge their feelings.

because our feelings are not easy to read in the face or in their tone of voice. I don’t know if it’s the only factor or a factor in your child’s case. But is it possible that one of the reasons he sometimes explodes because he cannot seem to convince you or get you to acknowledge that he is extremely angry or stressed or upset about a given situation. You may think the right thing to do is to brush over his anger and act as if it’s not there but actually that’s probably making it worse.