Restraining autistic violent child, is it ever OK?

Oh, and my friends child would never understand any kind of telling off, he's 11 and non verbal. Well, he screams and repeats words but with no apparent meaning attached to them.

Have a look at the challenging behaviour foundation, there is some great stuff on there

www.challengingbehaviour.org.uk/for-family-carers/

That sounds really challenging. Im not sure it’s relevant what the general consensus on restraining a violent autistic child is and I don’t know why you would post such a contentious issue on AIBU of all places 🤦🏻‍♀️ - Surely all that matters is doing what’s best for your child and for you and your family.
Might it be better to ask MNHQ to move this to the SN Children topic?

It’s absolutely terrible that you are having to wait so long to get support from your pediatrician and children’s social care. I hope you hear from them soon.

Yes, it's okay, but you need how to do it safely. There is training available. A the special school where I taught, we used Team Teach. Their trainers came to us though, and taught us and carried out regular refreshers with us as a school staff, on training days.

I'd need to look into it more to find what's available to individual parents.

You have my sympathy. It's hard to explain to anyone the damage that a snall child with no 'off button' can do to a grown adult. One of my TA's ended up in hospital due to an injury that an out of control 5 year old caused. But of course you need to protect your boy from self-injury as well.

Restraint in those situations, like you’re doing, is fine. Do you have CAMHS involvement for him? In our area you would, though it's different elsewhere. They would be working with you on management strategies. Keep going and good luck getting some support

A friend of mine has a slightly older severely autistic child, she does a similar thing to your pillow thing. She also does rhythmic beating with side on fists on his back to calm him down. The beating on the back thing isn't done out of anger or frustration on her part, it's a tactic she's found works and, I believe, was trained to use. It's quite hard beating though, but it's not done to hurt him, and is with a certain rhythm to it.

Sounds like you are doing the right thing. Your son could really injure himself, or you or another person. I’d think as long as he’s not injured and his breathing isn’t compromised it’s ok. And of course you’d only hold him as long as necessary.

That sounds so hard, OP. And he’s only 4. Gosh I really feel for you. Friends I know have transformed their child’s room into a safe space do he can have a meltdown peacefully. Only soft surfaces.
I hope you get some help soon.
If you can keep a diary ho track the abc like previously suggested, I think that might help. I know it’s not easy analysing in the middle of it.

Interestingly I was talking about this with DS best friends mum tonight. Her youngest is seven, severely autistic and very big and strong. She has no choice but to restrain him sometimes as he will walk into the road, or hurt her or his brother. She's been reported to social services on a couple of occasions by neighbours/school run parents who are presumably less aware of his difficulties. Social services have never taken the reports beyond a simple checking in call as they are well aware of his needs and why its necessary to restrain him.

Its really tough OP, I hope you're getting support.

Having worked with children in both an inpatient mental health setting and secure care setting, I would say there are times when there is not much else you can do.

The law fully allows for people to use reasonable force to defend themselves.

I have to sometimes, mine goes for windows and electrics. For all our safety.

I mean there's restraining and then there's restraining. What you're doing sounds like it's as gentle as you can make it - a comfortable surface, staying with him, using the minimum amount of restraint needed to prevent him hurting himself or others. Restrainst should always be a last resort and, based on your OP, it sounds like it is.

A strategy that worked for us was to keep a diary of these sorts of episodes, what had happened that day, what happened immediately before everything blew up, what happened during, what happened after. It helped us to look for patterns and identify trigger points, we didn't spot 100% of them but it did help reduce the number of meltdowns as we became better at spotting when one was imminent and better at predicting what was likely to trigger one. This information helped us to intervene with regulation strategies before it got to the meltdown stage.

for you, OP. You're in a rough patch right now but you're not in it alone, there are lots of supportive posters here on MN who have been in a similar boat. I hope the appointments come through soon, don't be afraid to chase them up often and let them know you're available to take any cancelled slots that come up - the squeaky wheel gets the grease.

Sympathy from me I used to have to restrain ds to a degree because he smashes my house up he has gone through three laptops and two switches losing his temper now he is older incan warn him break it I will not replace it or remove the stuff myself which makes him scream more but he equals my weight and height now there is nothing else I can do except remove the stuff his brother and the cats from him

I also minimise his triggers as much as I can but its tricky because one is school work he screams about doing homework I respond fine don't do it get a detention he tells me I will have to collect him I tell him no he gets an after school detention he is walking home he will scream at me about him hurting his legs walking and being in pain (he is hypermobile it will hurt) intell him do your homework you won't need to walk then will you.....its worked so far he did say he will get his dad to collect him I said that's on his dad but as he neither lives or works in our home town its going to be difficult

Have a look at Yvonne Newbold

yvonnenewbold.com/resources-on-send-vcb/violent-children-should-parents-ever-restrain-send-vcb-blog-6/

I think it is absolutely acceptable and necessary to restrain him in those situations. You are protecting him from himself.

Of course you need to restrain him. It’s for your benefit, his and anyone else he might hurt.

No advice, but I just wanted to say that that sounds really tough - it sounds like you are trying your best with the resources that you have