Trying to understand my sons behaviour

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Please can I have some advice!
My lo is 6- in yr1 at primary. He has been with us for 5 years. He has always been high energy, constantly moving, needs a lit of physical activity. There are days when he can watch tv and relax thankgoodness! Through school it is becoming more apparent he is finding it really hard to concentrate and this is now causing problems with his behaviour. He is impulsive, stubborn and over emotional. I think he is emotionally delayed by a couple of years. I am trying to figure a way forward as it's really starting to cause problems. I am thinking it might be adhd. It could be anything due to the emotional damage she would have had in the womb and obviously being adopted. I dont know. We try hard with consistency,clear boundaries and love. Please please please any words of ways to deal with this.
Thanks x

Do you know if there is any evidence or suspicion of alcohol exposure during pregnancy? I'm an adoptive parent of 2 children diagnosed with FASD (foetal alcohol spectrum disorder) and can relate to much of the behaviour you've described. It has similar symptoms to autism and ADHD. Not wanting to concern you but might be something else to consider.

Agree with @tldr re getting post adoption support team / worker to go in to school. It was when I took the SW along that they started to really ‘believe’ that this lovely quiet compliant child they had at school was having complete and utter meltdowns and physical violence at home (and to be fair they were already being pretty supportive just had had no experience really of the situation so struggled to understand just how bad things were at home)

Oh poppy, that was exactly our situation too, exactly!

I don't know if there was alcohol /substance abuse during pregnancy- I wouldn't be surprised atall. There was a significant amount of stress.
He doesn't show any classic signs physically of FAS- am I being naive?
It's the inability to sit still. Always, always moving, fidgeting.

I'm sorry to intrude, but my DS school is a special school and one of its specialities is attachment difficulties. I know they do PACE model in the classriom and they offer training to mainstream schools. It might be your school can tap into a specialist outreach service.

Sorry, im not trying to say you child has attachment issues. Just that it means there are a lot of adopted children at the school and they all benefit from this method.

The sentinel facial features only occur in about 10% of people with FASD. Neither of my two children can sit still for long and are very sensory seeking, always climbing and touching, and bumping into and falling off things!

The NHS website is a good starting point for info with further links

www.nhs.uk/conditions/foetal-alcohol-syndrome/

Also this list is quite comprehensive of the difficulties that people with FASD can have.

From what I understand, the mother has to have drink alcohol when those features are developing on the foetus otherwise they won't be affected. Also there is currently no way to accurately link the amount of alcohol consumed and when it was consumed to the various other symptoms of FASD.

You say he can't hear/follow specific instructions like sit down from his teacher. Has hyper vigilance ever been mentioned? My AD3.5 has it. The plus side is that she has an amazing memory, learns really quickly and is extremely curious about the world around her. The downside is that she struggles in unfamiliar environments or when she doesn't feel safe because there's too much going on around her and she can't process it all. She is too busy keeping herself safe and looking for potential threats. Unlike other children she can't switch this off and filter out distractions.

She also struggles with transition/change because she feels safe where she is and doesn't want to lose that.

Thanks for all your thoughts. I really appreciate it. It's quite a lonely place sometimes trying to find a way though. He had some good days this week so I agreed to take his bike to school. He went off to a busy road so quickly. I'd explained to him to stay with me and he was off like a rocket. I'm so upset. He did it a couple of weeks ago and I've not let him have it since. He knows right from wrong but i"m just white noise shouting at him to come back. There were lots if other parents there shouting at him as he was so close to the road. I hate the thought of people thinking hes a "naughty boy" he's impulsive. I know a lot of children do things like that but by now he should know we have the conversation so many times. He can do it i know he can. School also informed yesterday they have been trying lots of strategies - news to me!!!! Hoping I the meeting at school next weds is productive. I am going to sit down on sunday night when I have some headspace and start researching your suggestions xx

Did you have the meeting and did AUK come back to you? I have been through this, ie my dc was similar at a similar age - though he had come on a long way by then - and I am going to set out all the things which together worked for us, some based on my experience of having been adopted myself, in case it helps, and I apologise in advance that this is so long:

• you are the person who knows him best - decide for yourself, with any help from any professional you need, what you think would be best for your dc and then push it through at the school in an effective way. I found that writing a really comprehensive note (my first one was 4 sides of A4...) listing out past difficulties, current difficulties, flash points and for each issue, the strategies that you find work best at home, for example, keeping him calm in any particular situation so that he then focuses and concentrates better - and then have a meeting with his teacher and the SN teacher or equivalent, and go through it all with them. I had to be very, very assertive about this at first (though not challenging the teachers as I could see their point of view too) but I found that when the teachers started to see positive changes for themselves after following what I had said, the then worked with me far better going forward, made things easier.

NB this is assuming that your strategies work at home and he is able to get calm with you most of the time - if he is going into fight/flight frequently then I would say get a psychologist involved now

• volunteer to help with his class as watching the interactions between kids and between teacher and kids for yourself will be invaluable to help you work out best plan of action. NB You will almost certainly find that in fact your dc is not alone and that you are not alone either, there will be other parents who will understand, including those who who have been through it and whose children are now doing fine - these issues can affect G&T children, SN for whatever reason, trauma - not just adoption related, as well as neglect/abuse.

• go for long walks every weekend - ie around 3 hours at least - it makes a huge HUGE difference to balance out emotions and help with emotions during week. Lots of fun and exploring while on the walks. I found this helped enormously with concentration and confidence and general happiness levels.

• the better the child knows themselves, the easier it is for them to seek out like-minded friends which also helps a lot at school, the easier they find it to communicate their needs to teachers and the better you know their innermost thoughts and feelings the happier they will be. When out and about if you talk about what you see, and what his opinion is about things - if necessary easy things - like which car he likes best, does he prefer apples or raspberries, comparing speeds of a bird and a plane, looking at things far away and talking about them, and then things close and talking about them, talking about basic science like about plants etc, whatever he will find it interesting and easy to offer an opinion about. I feel this might come across as trite or obvious but actually in my experience it can be a key thing which is missing when children are struggling, and some children would find it hard to tell you their opinion or favourite things - and by slowly getting used to it, it comes - from talking, talking, talking. Sometimes adopters say "our children lie" and my feeling is that it would be resolved in a similar way. Slowly the child (ime) builds up strength of thought and self awareness vs world awareness and so on which feeds into confidence and self control and identity.

• doing a lot of things he finds really fun at weekends helps general levels of happiness which also helps with behaviour at school.Eg the bike - at a safe place!

• buy a book on social skills aimed at kids and go through it with him frequently - some are brilliant - this will give him confidence as he will be very clear what expectations are. It will also give you both the language you need to talking bout what things that happen at school. Also talk to him about what has happened during the day as soon as you pick up - ask for at least one good thing and one not good thing to start with.

• I am not sure whether this applies to your dc, but the lapses in concentration can mean dc do not take in school work properly and this then feeds into loss of confidence and then worsened concentration. By doing very small things with your dc regularly, this can help enormously - eg read one sentence or do a couple of sums in bed before you read to him what he wants, if something small is done every night then it can bring about quite dramatic improvements over months.

• I agree with others who say move school if you really cannot see it working. If teachers cannot take on board what is needed with your dc it is also likely that the other children will also be being handled badly meaning they are running amok and this can also very hard for a traumatised child to deal with.

• I would get psych input into starting life story asap if his history if very difficult.

You may have already found this but here is a beacon house resource recommended by pp, about healing trauma/working with schools

Hi there everyone. My lo has had a great week!!!! After the meeting with a senior manager she has implemented some of my suggestions. My son hasn't stayed in at break all week (which seemed to be happening a lot by the look of it) which means there is incomplete work in his school books (that's fine for now!). His rewards have been far more consistent and his teacher is delighted! A real shame it's gone on for so long.
He has been referred to Elsa- do any of you have experience if this? And he has seen the senco- waiting for the report.