Autistic child being extremely unkind

[unkindness]

Is this a development stage ? I don’t know what to do.

dd is 5, diagnosed at 3. In the last month (since starting school) has started being extremely unkind to her siblings and us . It’s not things to our knowledge she has ever been exposed to as we are kind and gentle parent etc. She is coming out with awful things and then is visibly ecstatic when she upsets or hurts someone?

Is this some kind of emotion test? Some kind of way to see people’s reactions? Has she seen or heard unkindness at school and is just copying? I don’t know how to deal with it. I have been saying it’s not nice to make other people sad but she just asks ‘why?’ And if I explain it further she just stares like she doesn’t understand at all she just wants the reaction ?

My AuDHD DS, also diagnosed at 3, is like this. He can be cruel and taunting to other children even though it’s not behaviour he has learned from us. Autism is primarily a social and communication disorder, I suppose. I know it’s a cliche, but DS’ empathy “chip” doesn’t seem to work, or at least gives that impression.

Sorry that’s not much help, but I know exactly what you are going through.

It almost feels as if she’s acting something out and happy that she’s made an action that has what she thinks is the correct reaction? I’m wondering if she’s been observing other children disagreeing and is just practicing these social situations? But I don’t want her to be unkind and she’s made her brother cry today 😞

I have been saying it’s not nice to make other people sad but she just asks ‘why?’ And if I explain it further she just stares like she doesn’t understand

Patience, repetition, consistency for the next few years. Sometimes it's easier to frame it as "would you like it if X did y to you." It could be quite a while before it registers.

All you can do is make a fuss of DS, so she learns it's not worth it?

Is there a consequence OP when she does this? Time out or losing a treat or something?

No these methods would not work for her. Each time we initially comfort the person who has been upset and we have then explained that it isn’t kind, that’s it’s not nice and not good behaviour to make other people hurt or upset. We then offer an opportunity to do something kind to the person who she has upset to make them happy and give praise when she does that .

Yes we have been making sure to not give her attention for this and to give the attention to whoever is upset. We are trying to give her huge praise for kind actions.

Keep going. Make sure your explanations are not too longwinded. Short, to the point, the same each time for the next couple of years

She probably does just want the reaction and doesn’t really understand. Her brain doesn’t produce the same feelings of guilt or sadness or whatever when she upsets another child. My (now lovely, polite) ds was similar and as he got older he was able to explain that he never understood why other children seemed to get so upset. It was because nothing he did was behaviour that would have bothered him if he’d been on the receiving end of it. It genuinely wouldn’t have upset him, which made it a lot harder for him to learn and understand that it was unacceptable and a lot harder for me or his teachers to teach him! All you can do is be consistent in your message that unkindness will not be tolerated and there will be consequences when it happens. It’s not easy but your dd is still very little and there’s still time for her to learn the social skills she needs.

Its complete (scientifically proven) bollocks that Autistic people can not be empathetic. Read up on the Double Empathy problem.
Try not to attribute everything "bad" to Autistic though too. My neurotypical kids are cruel at times too, its human nature. Keep redirecting her as you are, you are doing the right thing. And look up Ausome Trainers in Cork, Ireland. They are all Autistic themselves and have great, reasonably priced online courses about parenting Autistic kids.

She seems happy in the same way as when she gets a puzzle piece right for example so I’m wondering if it’s just a way to try out ‘cause and effect’ somehow ? And that she feels she’s doing it right to get the reaction she expects after seeing it elsewhere ? I just want to redirect her to do this with kind actions to cause happiness and make that more rewarding to her as she doesn’t understand in a typical way good/bad if that makes sense

OP no real advice but you seem like a really good, caring, thoughtful parent.

Have you tried Social Stories? Idk if that technique would work here.

Do you give plenty of positive attention at the times when she is not being mean? I'd spend less time on long verbal explanations (which she might not follow) and more time on supporting her when she does something right.

I’m wondering if it’s some kind of scripted behaviour, almost like echolalia but for social situations. Makes me cringe how awful kids can be even in reception - it really opened my eyes recently going into a primary school. My little boy thankfully hasn’t started copying but I do worry about what he’s being exposed to as he doesn’t have a bad bone in his body.

It is a theory, an opinion, not 'proof'. Social science hypotheses are notoriously difficult to prove

This was my thought, it's some type of gestalt script that has probably been seen somewhere.

Define empathy
Seriously, what’s your definition of empathy?

Why wouldn’t consequences wouldn’t work for your DD? Not meaning to sound accusatory but curious. My DS is 3 and might be autistic but we still give consequences for bad behaviour (i.e. a time out) because we can’t verbally reason with him and a timeout usually seems to calm him down.

In my son’s case, certain things will always be more interesting to him than lots of praise from me (like seeing what happens if he throws or hits something) and I’m not sure he’d stop those behaviours unless there was a direct negative consequence from doing them.

My autistic 10yo was a bit like this when he was younger. I think for him there is an element of all reactions being rewarding, so occasionally we would have problems where he would act out in order to provoke a reaction. He has sort of grown out of it - he does still do it sometimes and can be very unkind when upset, but is also at times my more reasonable child despite the other one not having a known neurodivergence issue

@Nosleepforthismum dc2 couldn’t care less. Neither about punishments, nor about rewards.
I guess they simply didn’t make sense to him, probably because they were disconnected to whatever event they were linked to.

When my son was 4 we got banned from all our local toddler groups. I was mortified- the reason was because my son would grab children's hair and pull them to the ground. His hands would be so tight round the hair even 3 or 4 people couldn't prise his hands open. Once we got his hands off one child within 2 seconds he would be at another. No amount of no or discipline or even pulling his hair back worked. I was hated he was hated- it happened at nursery too do he was allocated a 1-1 but only for an hour a day. I ended up giving up work and taking him out of nursery - reception was the same and he was on a reduced timetable - when ever he saw hair he just went for it - of course we know it was sensory and he was seeking out the feeling of the hair in his hands but he also loved the reaction from all the adults. From the 2nd Sept in year 1 when there was proper learning
at a sit down table with structure it stopped and he never ever did it again.

So sometimes however much you try and say no or teach them to stop it doesn't work. I lost a lot of friends because of his behaviour and it was just a phase but I so sympathise with you as it is horrible being held responsible for such behaviour and trying your best but not able to change it.

I’m not sure how to explain but I just don’t think she has the understanding and it would cause so much confusion to her to have something unrelated to what she’s done but negative towards her as a punishment and she doesn’t even understand the concept yet of good or bad behaviour she just acts on her feelings. In some ways if she’s behaving how she is after witnessing it and trying to copy it may actually be the development of more understanding. I’m just trying to explain to her as well as I can that it’s not kind and to then offer an opportunity to be kind where she then gets positive attention.

What sort of behaviour are you talking about?
Is it something as ‘simple’ as hitting his sibling or more complex, closer to taunting fir example?

I think with hitting a NO can be enough.
Taunting needs an explanation which is harder.

Just stop the dodgy stuff as much as you can - explanations aren’t a priority, the other child is.

Move onto the explanations when it’s safe to do so.

Don’t be embarrassed about sweeping in, removing DD to eg the bathroom and shut the door. Leave for 5 min.

Doesn’t have to be a drama but speed and silence can get the message across as well
as defusing the awkwardness.

Can you give an example of the behaviour? With my autistic children, I found that their behaviour was often logical, even if it was hurtful. Understanding the logic gave the solution.

9/10 taunting. Saying things that aren’t typical phrases we use eg one was a very harsh repeated shouting in ds face angrily ‘your wellies are yucky dinosaur ones’ (he hasn’t got any!) and ‘I hate your black hair’ (his is blond) and also things that could apply to him such as ‘I hate you so much’ and threatening to push and then actually pushing