Upset my DC is the mean kid

[impossibleimposter]

My youngest DS is 6. I think he is probably on the spectrum or has ADHD (it’s in the family).

He hasn’t formed any proper close friendships at school, although I know he is rarely on his own and plays his classmates. He’s the same at parties. Teacher not worried in that sense, I’ve raised my concern about lack of friendships before but to them I suppose they always see him playing with others.

He can be so mean though. I know enough about neurodiversity to know it’s not as simple as him being mean for no reason, it’s no doubt a reaction to being overwhelmed, or feeling rejected (his rejection sensitivity is high - he is terrified of being told off) and he’s always struggled with his emotions, he goes from 0 to 60 instantly.

He is so reactive so if a classmate pushes him, or says something he doesn’t like, he’ll hit them. No number of conversations about telling the teacher are enough. He will also tell other kids off, in quite a mean way. He doesn’t speak to his peers nicely a lot of the time. It’s a shame because he is often so sweet to us and so kind to his little baby cousins.

I just don’t know how to help him here. I’d made my peace with him not having a big group of friends but to be actively disliked by so many children and their parents (many aren’t subtle at all!) is really hard, especially when I know that he is upsetting others, so their dislike is warranted. It makes me feel really hopeless. And I feel frustrated myself when some things I witness would irritate me too (a child putting his ketchup covered hands in my child’s face at a party!) but because it’s consistently my DS who reacts so angrily, he’s always the bad guy.

Teacher hasn’t been very helpful. Some days he’s absolutely fine and happy, and can brush things off. So I think they think he’s probably just being difficult. They’ve offered group ELSA to help with his anger as the teacher does acknowledge he can be really volatile, but from experience with my other child it’s a non starter.

@JjaneEeyre good point about it not being pre planned, it’s definitely not. It’s very reactive.

Thank you so much for sharing.

What makes me really sad is my DS is a sweet, loving, kind boy at home. And his teacher says he can be really caring at school, helping classmates if they’re upset or have lost something. And when he’s in a good mood I know he’s great fun. Children do want to play with him at school a lot of the time. But he’s just so reactive.

This isn’t a version of ASD or ADHD behaviour I’ve come across and my real feeling is that it’s personality and upbringing rather than disability. That said it’s fairly common for children with autism to behave differently at school than at home so it’s possible that he is responding to stress at school or with less comfortable relationships by behaving in ways you as his parent wouldn’t recognise.
When did the behaviour start? Is it just at school or does it happen with all relationships outside of his siblings/home? Have you ever witnessed it? What have you done when he is unkind and what happens if others are unkind to him?

Similar story here. They are actually very kind and loving kids, and they absolutely know it is wrong to do this, before and after the event. But in the second that it happens, emotions become overwhelming. There's no malice or forethought behind it, just a base reaction. I hope in time your son gets past it. Once you get to the double figures ages this should be easier. In the meantime the judgement and isolation are very difficult to live with.

You’ve hit the nail on the head @JjaneEeyre

What I do find disappointing is how blatant some of the parents are with their disapproval, at the school gates! And it tends to be the parents of other children who I know aren’t the best behaved, there are of course some nice non judgemental parents.

I'd like to offer an explanation for those judgemental parents, based on your earlier comments about your DS only lashing out when provoked.

We used to be friends with a couple whose son who had similar issues to yours. He was diagnosed with ASD and ADHD when he was twelve and by all accounts is doing much better now he's well into his teens. But for most of his primary years he was extremely violent towards other children, including mine. Would punch faces, stomachs, heads, would kick legs karate-style. We had huge sympathy for his parents, we could see they were struggling with him, but what we couldn't square was their constant victim blaming. Whenever he attacked another child and that child's parent complained, their immediate response was "what did your kid say to him then" or "they must've done something to set him off". It was never their son's fault, in other words. They even blamed the teacher when he attacked her! The thing is, that huge sympathy we had wore thin when our DC was told for the umpteenth it was their fault they got punched in the face, kicked in the back. In the end we cut ties for our child's sake. It became too hard not to react when they were sobbing and hurt and our former friends were basically saying they'd asked for it. We weren't the only ones and their son became isolated because of it, unfortunately.

I'm not suggesting that's what you're doing every time, but if you're even doing it occasionally (based on your earlier comments) it could be why those parents are reacting as they are.

Tricky. (Speaking as a primary teacher and parent of autistic DC.)

Whether ND or not, 6 is very young. I always encourage parents not to 'wait and see' when concerns are raised about developmental or cognitive issues, but to get organised and proactive. This is because one could be 'watching and waiting' for a very long time, while things deteriorate for the child. It sounds like you are on the front foot already, OP, which is great.

You're walking a precarious line as, if ND, there is a likelihood that your DS experiences social and communication developmental differences and delay. I see many ND children who, with time and consistent and ongoing support such as ELSA (working on Zones of Regulation, for instance) really seem to BOTH develop strategies to manage rejection sensitivity and strong emotions AND just benefit from the passing of time, allowing social and communication development to 'catch up' a bit (but it would be a really grave mistake to rely on this alone).

However, that time can come at a cost, as your DS is likely to experience lots of adverse social interactions in the meantime and possibly begin to internalise these and form a negative self-image based on the negative feedback he is getting.

As a teacher, I would be very aware of this and pull out all the stops to ensure there are things in place for your DS to avoid getting into situations where he's likely to find himself responding aggressively or meanly and as a result attracting negative feedback. For the last few years, I've had pupils in my class who have experienced challenges similar to those of your DS (I teach older children at the end of KS2). I make sure they are able to recognise and avoid activities which might give rise to situations which can feel overwhelming and a bit 'out of control' (lunchtime football games are an obvious example) where things could easily spiral, and instead offer alternatives (within a range of what is achievable for me, of course): playtime and lunchtime 'clubs' in the peace and calm of my classroom (I always work through the breaks anyway) where the pupil/s in question can come together with one or two friends to do much calmer, mainly seated activities (to avoid accidental bumping etc) on different days: crafting, play board games, lego, helping and tidying (!), listen to an audio book etc. We occasionally do more physical things like dance videos or indoor hopscotch, but don't run into difficulty as there are just a few children in the room. This, albeit tying me or another staff member to the classroom, has always been really helpful. It also minimises transitions between environments, which has been great.

Socially, at parties etc, I found I had to pick and choose really carefully for my DC who, although not reactive, would crumple with overwhelm in busy social situations. Set your DS up to succeed socially with small, short social activities on your own terms (one friend at a time, at your house, in the park, in the woods etc, where -should things start to feel jangly- you can quickly re-direct or just wrap it up. Surround DS with people and situations in which he will feel good about himself: slightly older cousins or similar who will be patient and enjoy his company, relatives and family friends who can affirm the positives you describe in your OP. He really needs this.

Best of luck to you and your DS.

@SuperTrooper14 that’s not what I’ve ever done. I have never once blamed another child. I feel frustrated every time because I know my DS 9/10 is reacting, but not once have I outwardly shown this. So really your story is completely irrelevant, and I do know of parents like the ones you’re talking about - a boy at my son’s football is the same.

In this academic year so far, my son has pushed another child once, hit another child after they pushed him, and been involved in rough play twice. So we are not talking every day or even every week, more like a small number of occurrences a term. I’m not excusing it, my other DC have never laid a finger on others even when hit in the first instance. But my DS’ his reactive nature is the explanation.

His unkind words are more frequent and I know he says things like leave me alone, go away etc once children get too into his space or if he’s finding them too overwhelming.

It’s tough, OP. My DS is not quite as reactive or violent, but we have had to do a lot of work on emotional regulation.

Do you have a ‘zones of regulation’ card? We talk about moods solely in terms of this now, and model it ourselves. So ‘I can feel myself moving into the red zone so I am going to take 3 deep breaths and go into a different room to move back into the green zone’ etc. Sounds silly, but is more productive than ‘calm down’ etc.

I also went into the school and we wrote an ISP together for all staff. You don’t need a diagnosis for this and it has helped a lot.

it also helped to be very sympathetic whilst being very black and white about natural consequences. So ‘it must have been so frustrating when Josh said that to you! It would have made me go into the red zone, too. But then I would get in trouble and the other children would be scared of me, so I would have no one to play with at break time’ etc

Lots and lots and lots of praise for kindness and emotional self-regulation, plus building our whole daily lives around him feeling safe has also worked quite well. By that I mean him always knowing what is happening, what the rules and expectations are (of others around him, too!),
opportunities designed to let him be the lovely, funny, kind side of himself to build his self esteem.

He has settled a lot more now, plus I have found that actively focusing on and talking about his beautiful side really helps us both - and the perception of him that other people have.

We do have a very strict ‘no violence’ rule at home, which includes throwing things. I have given him other strategies for processing that frustration/rage/overwhelm like jumping in the trampoline or squeezing a pillow or whatever.

It’s not perfect, but it’s getting much better. Good luck to you and sending a hug x

You're right, it sounds nothing like our situation. This kid really was constantly violent.

If it's only a couple of times a term your DS is lashing out and his words are more of an issue, can't the school find him a special quiet place to go and deregulate when he's feeling overwhelmed? That's one good thing they did do at our primary – they created a little reading nook right outside the classroom. Because there was CCTV in the corridors this boy could be left for short amount of times and the teacher or TA would pop their head round the door to check on them.

@YouWereGr8InLittleMenstruators your playtime approach is brilliant, proactive and preventative. My DS didn’t struggle with the playtimes at nursery and I think it was because there was plenty of play equipment, climbing frames, trikes. He’s good at taking turns (used to it with older siblings no doubt!) so never had any issues relinquishing a trike when he’d had his turn. But since YR it’s a free for all on the big yard and there are a few rough, provocative kids in his class - I get the impression he’s better now in Y1 than in YR, but as it’s lunchtime supervisors again this doesn’t go as well as it would if his teacher was on the yard. He is more likely to trust his teacher and tell on another child rather than retaliating, he doesn’t have this same trust when it’s a different supervisor every time.

One thing which is tricky is he might get upset, tearful rather than angry, but then when his classmates are no doubt staring (because that’s what kids do) he gets angry that people are looking and will shout.

Neurodiversity literally doesn’t work like this. My autistic kid you can tell him a billion time and a billion consequences and he will never learn. That’s literally why it’s a diagnosable condition. If he could learn from normal consequences he’d just be a regular a—hole, not a person with a condition.

The way you manage neurodiverse kids behaviour is figuring out what the triggers are and helping with them.

To the OP yes you could ask teacher for help. They can do a diary of ABC - action, behavior, consequence, ie: what led up to it, what did your son do, what happened after.

you’ll likely see correlation in what the triggers were (weirdly i found my sons were loud noises, strong smells and generally getting confused) and you can work on those.

I don’t think saying things like “go away” is awful at all. Why is it a problem? What would you prefer him to say? What would school prefer?

Neurodivergent or not you should be teaching your child not to hit that's your job as a parent not the teachers job, way to many excuses made these days instead of parenting properly.

@Ohthatsabitshit i think it’s the way he says it more! Like, angrily. And probably without reason. It’s one thing if he says go away when someone is being unkind to him, but I think he sometimes just gets sick of the other kids, or of the game they’re playing, so tells them to go away/leave him alone.

Perhaps have a chat with the teacher and suggest a phrase he could use that would be acceptable and how he could disengage when overwhelmed?

Really?? I've found the exact opposite. A diagnosis for my son (who sounds similar to yours) has opened so many doors to support, and now he's so happy and able to manage his emotions much better. A lot or his behaviour before seems to be down to anxiety (not that this was obvious at the time). You do have to fight for support though (and medication too). Not sure why you automatically think your son wouldn't be offered medication if he does have ADHD - mine started medication a couple of months ago.

I do sympathise, OP. My youngest (adopted, huge attachment issues, undiagnosed but I'd lay money on ADHD) has had huge problems with emotional regulation. She wasn't mean at school - in fact, is consistently warm and kind with other children, but at home? Oof, she used to attack her sister all the time, and often me too.

It was partly about her emotional immaturity and poor self control, but it was also I think her way of finding a resolution for all the big feelings that had been building up all day. Hitting her sister guaranteed my attention, and she didn't care whether it was positive or negative.

It was so awful, and got worse as my then dp descended ever further into mental illness. We were not a happy house and I was in despair. In the end, a few things really helped: I lost my job and then covid, so I finally had all the time for her she needed. I split with dp, which was awful but actually a net benefit was the new calmness. And I leaned heavily into therapeutic parenting techniques.

Obviously, I did everything I could to protect my other dd, including putting a lock on her bedroom door. We moved to a two bed house during this time, and I sleep in the living room so each of the girls has their necessary own space.

With school, I have had to be a very demanding advocate for my dd but also very understanding of what the teachers are resourced to deliver, and I always back them up on their discipline decisions. It's so important for teachers and other parents to see that we understand the boundaries.

My dd has also really benefitted from specialist therapy. But perhaps what has helped most of all is all the teachers who were willing to be a 'special person' for dd to go to at school if she felt unsafe. They don't need to actually do anything, but she's aware of her network and that gives her confidence.

Even unregulated kids can and do mature and learn the coping skills to get them through life. My dd is now coming up to 16 and she is really lovely - hasn't twatted her sister or me in years. But I've aged about 1000 years thanks to all the exhausting years navigating her through elephant traps like social exclusion, school exclusion, hanging out with the rough crowd etc.

I've written a lot and it may not seem that relevant to you. But actually there's lots of resources for adoptive parents that you might find useful, even though I think your ds is your birth child. Have a look at the Adoption UK website, and best of luck.

In my experience other kids will be deliberately winding him up so he lashes out and gets told off. It’s no coincidence it’s the other not well behaved kids who are involved. They have figured out he will react. Teachers are usually hopeless at spotting this even though most ND adults will say they were badly bullied at school. You need to seek advice from an autism specialist in private sector as you won’t get anyone who can help teach these sort of social / life skills / regulation skills in mainstream. There needs to be more adult supervision and he probably needs breaks during the day. Break time is not a break for ND kids as figuring out NT social skills is harder work than being in class often they need some downtime after being expected to socially interact. Does the school run any structured break clubs eg Lego. Does he have to do the whole of break or can he have some quiet chill time.

YourPeppyWriter, one of the useful things I learned in adoption training was about how pointless it is to try to engage with a child about their behaviour when they are emotionally aroused. I was taught to calm them first, re-establish emotional connection and only then deal with the behaviour.
Trouble is, the other parent trying to comfort/protect their wailing child (for example) wants to see the behaviour being tackled head on and straight away, so I developed some lines to use as I was removing my child from the situation, something like, "I'm so sorry, please know that I am taking this very seriously and I am taking my child away to deal with the consequences now". And I would apologise directly to the child too.

I'm so glad those days have passed!

@surreygirl1987 my middle child is medicated (finally), and it was an 18 month wait for medication. That’s post diagnosis! And they are text book ADHD, my DS isn’t (other than the emotional regulation). It’s great hear your access to medication was more straightforward!

@Ketzele thank you for your thoughtful post, your DDs are so lucky to have you.

@grumpyoldeyeore yes absolutely I agree with you. It will be the same children he tends to have these scuffles with. And on the yard, it’s not the classroom teacher who maybe knows the personalities better. The school aren’t great at separating children with problematic dynamics, especially as the excuse will be that sometimes they play together nicely.