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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

ASD son's attitude

55 replies

ellie09 · 20/09/2025 20:38

Hi all

I have an 8 yo ASD son whose attitude is becoming really hard to deal with.

I have tried grounding - taking away devices, early bedtime.. It hasn't worked

He gets pocket money and we deduct money for every strike. He gets to £0 and he still doesnt care

We do lots of activities for his interests. He gets everything he could ever want. Yet I still get cheek, kick back and general attitude

What works for kids this age? I am at my wits end

OP posts:
ArseInTheCoOpWindow · 20/09/2025 22:07

Espressosummer · 20/09/2025 21:55

Or maybe sometimes he's just acting like a spoilt brat and having a tantrum. Asd kids can choose to be badly behaved at times, not everything is connected to their autism.

They’re still ND though. It doesn’t go away. And it’s often that that is driving behaviours. Everything is connected to their autism. They think and operate differently.

My dd was really difficult. But she also got distressed about it.

Hedgehogbrown · 20/09/2025 22:11

ellie09 · 20/09/2025 21:13

He does have an attitude! Even though he is ND, I know the difference.

He got right in my face today and said "what are you going to do about it?". I said I would put on the last strike so he has no pocket money, and he said "I don't give a shit"

I take his tablet, electronics away, and he decides to respond by telling me "he doesnt care".

It feels like I am parenting a teen rather than a young child at times.

Have you done any research about ASD? You are punishing him like a NT child. Sounds like you don't know the difference. You can carry on with punishments but it will do nothing. You need to research how to respond to his behaviour.

HellEvenDorisDay · 20/09/2025 22:15

My ASD son is similar and is also violent and abusive. He is 8. We give pocket money for him completing chores which contribute to the household such as putting his clothes away. The expectations were discussed in advance and written down for him to refer to. I have to remind him every day but he is motivated and we get to have fun going out to spend the money. We do not make a connection between rewards and his challenging behaviour. Rewards reinforce positive things that he understands are helping. He can still hit and hurt me and get his pocket money because he can control doing the positive things. He makes a decision to do them. He is much less able to control the violence and abusive behaviour which we deal with separately. We do use time outs occasionally which I know can be controversial in some circles but me and my other child are allowed to have some time when we are not being attacked. The timeouts are linked to him having space to calm down, not a punishment. We also try to use diversions and other techniques but these do not always work. When he is having a difficult time he is not thinking rationally.

If I took something away from him every time he was challenging, it would create fresh cycles of anger and rage and wouldn’t end.

User1839474 · 20/09/2025 22:30

Descriptive praise works well for my ND children. So when they do something nice praise them and be very specific. “it’s so lovely to see you and your brother playing nicely, well done” or “thank you for taking your plate away from the table” or “well done, you put your coat on the first time I asked you” it work so much better than telling them off when they don’t put their coat on until you’ve told them 3 times. Initially it’s an effort to find things to praise but it pays off.

gamerchick · 20/09/2025 22:36

ellie09 · 20/09/2025 21:17

What are your suggestions then?

PDA parenting. It will.go against every little bit of instinct you have but it'll work better than you're doing now.

ReplacementBusService · 20/09/2025 22:39

Praise the good things. Every single thing you describe is what you imagine to be punishment. He is telling you how it is - he doesn't care about money. Why would he? He is 8. He is ND. The pocket money is your construct and not his. You're taking away devices as punishment - your baseline assumption is he should have them, you take them away if he is bad. Go back to basics. Is your home happy? Is he ok? Does he like school? Does he see the point in it? Money and tech are not fundamental things.

SleeplessInWherever · 20/09/2025 22:45

Once a child has capacity to do so, chosen behaviour is different.

In our house, for example, I would never reprimand or ignore a meltdown. But we do not respond to tantrums.

If the reason he is yelling is because he’s mid crisis, fair enough, but I will not give in to being shouted at intentionally to get your own way. If I’m being bellowed at for a sandwich, I will still say “do you mean sandwich please?”

We do teach alternative strategies, but we cannot allow children to grow up thinking that shouting and being rude gets you what you want, or the world is going to kick them firmly up the rear.

We may pick our battles more than others, but no’s are absolute no’s, and we do not budge from them.

I firmly believe that SEN parents should still have boundaries.

OP - maybe try marbles in a jar, take them out for negatives and put them in for positives. More tangible and physically relevant.

Merryoldgoat · 20/09/2025 22:46

I may sanction how much he can spend per week - he currently has £10 which has £1 off for every strike (a strike is every huge meltdown and if he doesnt say sorry)

You’re punishing meltdowns, @ellie09 ?

ArseInTheCoOpWindow · 20/09/2025 22:52

SleeplessInWherever · 20/09/2025 22:45

Once a child has capacity to do so, chosen behaviour is different.

In our house, for example, I would never reprimand or ignore a meltdown. But we do not respond to tantrums.

If the reason he is yelling is because he’s mid crisis, fair enough, but I will not give in to being shouted at intentionally to get your own way. If I’m being bellowed at for a sandwich, I will still say “do you mean sandwich please?”

We do teach alternative strategies, but we cannot allow children to grow up thinking that shouting and being rude gets you what you want, or the world is going to kick them firmly up the rear.

We may pick our battles more than others, but no’s are absolute no’s, and we do not budge from them.

I firmly believe that SEN parents should still have boundaries.

OP - maybe try marbles in a jar, take them out for negatives and put them in for positives. More tangible and physically relevant.

My AUDHD Dd hated these. Really stressed her out. She threw them all over the floor lots of times,

Shen we just had the ‘good’ jar she changed completely.

Dramatic · 20/09/2025 22:55

ArseInTheCoOpWindow · 20/09/2025 22:07

They’re still ND though. It doesn’t go away. And it’s often that that is driving behaviours. Everything is connected to their autism. They think and operate differently.

My dd was really difficult. But she also got distressed about it.

So what drives NT kids to give attitude?

SleeplessInWherever · 20/09/2025 22:57

ArseInTheCoOpWindow · 20/09/2025 22:52

My AUDHD Dd hated these. Really stressed her out. She threw them all over the floor lots of times,

Shen we just had the ‘good’ jar she changed completely.

I’m aware it won’t work for everyone, but I think where possible we should be teaching kids that actions have consequences.

It’s obviously harder to do when they either don’t understand that, don’t respond to them, or reject them.

But - if we’re trying to enable any form of independence, in life - actions do have consequences.

I am coming at that from the angle of our son, who has significant and complex needs. We need to start the foundations of that earlier, because it’ll take such a long time to learn.

Dramatic · 20/09/2025 23:00

SleeplessInWherever · 20/09/2025 22:57

I’m aware it won’t work for everyone, but I think where possible we should be teaching kids that actions have consequences.

It’s obviously harder to do when they either don’t understand that, don’t respond to them, or reject them.

But - if we’re trying to enable any form of independence, in life - actions do have consequences.

I am coming at that from the angle of our son, who has significant and complex needs. We need to start the foundations of that earlier, because it’ll take such a long time to learn.

Agree with this, it does no one any favours to pretend consequences don't exist. The hard truth is that autistic people do need to mask some of their behaviours if those behaviours are violent in nature, because if they don't then they could a) really hurt someone as they get older b) then have to face the consequences of seriously hurting someone.

SleeplessInWherever · 20/09/2025 23:06

Dramatic · 20/09/2025 23:00

Agree with this, it does no one any favours to pretend consequences don't exist. The hard truth is that autistic people do need to mask some of their behaviours if those behaviours are violent in nature, because if they don't then they could a) really hurt someone as they get older b) then have to face the consequences of seriously hurting someone.

They need to learn alternative ways to communicate or manage their frustrations.

Our son currently bites (only us). He’s in the process of learning not to do that, because he can’t go around biting people.

He kicked me in the face mid tantrum a few weeks back. He was absolutely told off, autism or no autism, that’s not an acceptable way to behave.

We do a lot of “it’s okay to be angry, but not to do that specific thing, here’s an alternative.”

JLou08 · 20/09/2025 23:23

Stop the punishments and praise any positive behaviour. Model the behaviour you want to see. When he is angry you stay calm and help him regulate.
What you're doing will not work with an autistic child, you're just causing more stress and anger and his behaviour will keep getting worse and worse.

Croakymccroakyvoice · 20/09/2025 23:27

You might find some of these ideas helpful. Not that your child necessarily has a PDA profile but I think a lot of ND children (and probably adults) can be demand avoidant to some extent and it is helpful to remember that it is driven by anxiety rather than by a desire to be obnoxious.

https://www.pdasociety.org.uk/what-helps-guides/parenting-a-pdaer/

https://hes-extraordinary.com/parenting-strategies-for-pathological-demand-avoidance

Also it may be worth considering if they could have ADHD alongside autism. That can also make for demand avoidant behaviour.

With my ND children I found having a calm conversation about why they shouldn't behave a certain way was far more effective than punishments. Where I did use consequences I preferred natural consequences. For example if they misused a toy I would take it away for a while because they couldn't be trusted with it. Or if they misbehaved walking by the road they would have to hold my hand to keep them safe.

It makes it easier for them to connect the consequence to the action that caused it rather than just imposing arbitrary sanctions where they become focused on you as the person handing out the sanction.

Illustration of a person with a backpack standing in front of several road signs pointing in different directions, symbolizing the challenges and choices faced by individuals with Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA).

Parenting a PDAer - PDA Society

Parenting a child or adult with Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA) requires flexibility, patience, and being willing to try different approaches. PDAers can

https://www.pdasociety.org.uk/what-helps-guides/parenting-a-pdaer

ArseInTheCoOpWindow · 20/09/2025 23:29

Dramatic · 20/09/2025 22:55

So what drives NT kids to give attitude?

Anxiety and fear of losing control.

tellmesomethingtrue · 20/09/2025 23:42

Your approach is completely unsuitable for a child with ASD. Please do some reading and go for a nurturing, gentle approach with firm boundaries.

BertieBotts · 20/09/2025 23:56

The consequence is too big, and most likely also the gap between your child's current behaviour and your behaviour expectation - as evidenced by the fact that you keep running out of consequences and have nothing else to take away. This will render it totally demotivating because he has nothing to behave for. Five chances per week is ludicrous - everyone makes more than five mistakes a week, and he's a child with a neurodevelopmental disorder.

Some "attitude" is likely literal thinking and/or a stress response and/or not understanding social cues. Some autistic children also don't "see" hierarchy and will find it inherently unfair when adults expect children to defer to them. They expect to have the same rules for everybody - which I do think is fair TBH, although sometimes there are good reasons for different rules (e.g. earlier bedtime for children). But certainly often adult tone towards children can be quite directive in a way which is not considered acceptable from children to parents. Autistic children sometimes do not understand this and will model or mirror that tone. It can be worth bearing this in mind.

By having really big consequences that you are intending to hold over him as a threat, it is likely priming him to respond as though he is experiencing threat, which is why you get the defensive "What are you going to do?/I don't care" response.

It helps to get really specific about what behaviours you want to change (and try to go to the root rather than the reaction, so e.g. if you are getting "attitude" when you ask him to come off electronics, then coming off electronics is the behaviour to address, not the attitude).

Use very small minor token consequences. Like take 10p off him instead of £1. Don't have a tipping point where it all goes. Consequences don't change behaviour on their own anyway, and the effect of a small consequence is just as impactful as a larger one, the only benefit of an extreme consequence is that if the child is genuinely afraid of it, you are more likely to get compliance in the moment. But aside from the two obvious problems with this - if you're going with fear, that's dangerous in terms of where you end up, and the other problem, if the child is behaving in a way they can't control (e.g. meltdown) then it won't work anyway. And even if it does seem to gain compliance in the moment, it still doesn't help with long term patterns of behaviour change (according to research).

Since using fear is a risky and not very effective approach, the main purpose of a consequence in the moment is to give parents something to do to replace emotionally driven behaviour responses such as shouting, threatening, intimidating body language etc, all of which will just escalate a child. Whether or not it's related doesn't actually matter, whether or not it helps you to stay calm and unemotional is what matters. Trying to keep everything related might mean deciding in the moment, which is likely to conflict with the calm/unemotional/reasonable aim, and can also be unpredictable which can be confusing and upsetting for autistic children who will probably perceive it as unfair if a behaviour gains X consequence one time but another time is ignored or receives Y consequence. Unless you can decide a specific consequence for a specific behaviour in advance and have this as a stated, consistent rule (e.g. coming off game time with rudeness means reduced or lost game time tomorrow). But this can become complicated.

For all children, but particularly autistic children, it helps if the behaviour expectations are clear. So you should know what the behaviour is that you are trying to change and what your expectation is. To use the example of coming off electronics when time is up, the expected behaviour might be that when the time is up (and there should be a clear way to communicate this), DS will find an appropriate point to save and close down the game ASAP without complaining or shouting about it.

If the behaviour expectation is clear, it makes it much easier to notice and reward (e.g. praise) when you see this behaviour, which is much more effective in changing behaviour anyway.

If the behaviour is not moving towards the expectation, the instinct is often to increase the severity of the consequence - but it's actually more effective to keep the consequence very minor and instead add stepping stones between the current behaviour and the expected behaviour. If there is still no progress, reduce the distance between the stepping stones rather than increase the consequence.

For example a child who struggles to come off a game and becomes violent and makes rude comments and shouts might need this breaking down, so you ignore the verbal stuff for now and only address the physical. Once the physical violence is under control then it makes sense to address the verbal aspect and this might also have to happen in stages, e.g. if your child is screaming I fucking hate you, I am going to put you in the bin, you might want to address individual words first and then the violent intent of the phrases and then the volume and tone only last of all. Or volume then threats - depends what you consider more of an issue. But if you have decided to address violence and then your child mutters "I hate you, why are you always so MEAN" then it is counterproductive to address that kind of verbal outburst when this is a vast improvement over being violent, and it may have taken them considerable effort to make that improvement. The stepping stones and recognising success are hugely important. There is a very good free course on Coursera called ABCs of Everyday Parenting which goes over reward vs punishment, scaffolding and so on. It's designed for use with "challenging behaviour" which includes ND conditions although obviously bear in mind you can't discipline autism away. It does also help to learn as much about autism as possible to understand some of the behaviours.

De-escalation can help if you have a child who is easily escalated, which a lot of children with ASD are, in effect if you are getting heated emotionally in response to their escalation, which BTW is a totally natural, instinctive response and it is very hard to avoid this (which is why you do all the prep for what to do in the moment instead of exploding) - you are "co-regulating up" which is the opposite of what you want, you want to co-regulate them down to a calmer, more reasonable place. NVR is good for de-escalation techniques, and I have heard great things about the books by Linda K. Murphy.

If you're also thinking about which behaviours to address in advance then you can try to also look at the problem from the child's point of view, which often helps reduce conflict and "attitude" drastically. Ross Greene (e.g. The Explosive Child) is fantastic for this with a whole framework for how to have conversations and get their perspective about what's difficult. To borrow the game example again, for example a child may be able to tell you that it's hard to come off the game because it feels like the time warning comes out of nowhere and they can't believe it's been a whole hour. In that scenario, something like a visual timer so they can see what time they have left might help, more than trying to punish their expression of their feelings about this sudden intrusion.

Or they may get several short gaming sessions per week but feel that this is frustrating because as soon as they get into something, it's time to stop playing. In that scenario, it might make sense to consolidate all gaming sessions into a longer session e.g. at the weekend.

If you tried to solve for problem A and the child is actually having problem B or vice versa, the solution probably isn't going to work very well, which is why it's important to actually talk to them or try to gain their perspective another way.

Woahtherehoney · 21/09/2025 00:16

This is why I hate asking for advice - OP came to ask for advice, she explained what she’s doing and that it isn’t working and most of the comments are “well don’t do that, it won’t work” - that is WHY OP asked for help!

ArseInTheCoOpWindow · 21/09/2025 00:24

Woahtherehoney · 21/09/2025 00:16

This is why I hate asking for advice - OP came to ask for advice, she explained what she’s doing and that it isn’t working and most of the comments are “well don’t do that, it won’t work” - that is WHY OP asked for help!

No, most of the comments are telling her what to do.

Cel77 · 21/09/2025 07:58

ellie09 · 20/09/2025 21:16

We so this already - we have a whiteboard with his strikes noted but once he knows its nearly gone, ge doesnt care anymore.

Once his.pocket money is gone, we sanction his electronic time etc. He still doesnt care. If he continues, he goes to bed, but he still gets up/down etc.

Its a nightmare.

I may sanction how much he can spend per week - he currently has £10 which has £1 off for every strike (a strike is every huge meltdown and if he doesnt say sorry)

He has £0 for this week, as if it falls more than 5+ strikes, his pocket money is £0

A meltdown is very different from a "tantrum". He's losing it because he doesn't know how to handle the overwhelm around him or inside him. My ASD son has had frightening meltdowns over the years (shouting, swearing, throwing things,slamming doors etc...).
You need to stay with him or give him space, (you know your child best) and then talk to him.once he's calmed down. Not making him.feel guilty for his big feelings, and definitely not punish him for it. He's probably feeling embarrassed enough already. You punishing him will only make him grow up thinking he can't talk to you, you don't have his back and you don't try to understand him. You need to work on your relationship now, before he becomes a teenager.

ChattyGeePeaTea · 21/09/2025 10:04

If you read nothing else @ellie09 then at least read @BertieBotts post - she really does know her onions on this topic. Good luck.

ETA: I know this because I have taken her advice when I've been here asking what in the merry hell to do with my own AuDHD child under previous usernames. She has always had stellar suggestions which have worked.

Skybluepinky · 21/09/2025 10:38

Giving him everything he wants is your issue, he thinks he is in control, get yourself some parenting lessons so you know how to be a parent.

SleeplessInWherever · 21/09/2025 10:44

Skybluepinky · 21/09/2025 10:38

Giving him everything he wants is your issue, he thinks he is in control, get yourself some parenting lessons so you know how to be a parent.

There’s no need to be rude.

WasThatACorner · 21/09/2025 10:49

gamerchick · 20/09/2025 22:36

PDA parenting. It will.go against every little bit of instinct you have but it'll work better than you're doing now.

I agree with this.

Threats, sanctions and pu ishmebta don't work at all with my DS.

What does work ( it can take a week or so to turn around from a really bad time ) is praise. He doesn't need things or rewards, he needs to be spoken to in a positive way and hear how well he has done things. This sounds really basic but is incredibly hard when you actually are really exhausted and worn down. It's hard to balance with the needs of the rest of the family. It's sometimes hard to see a positive to start from where you're in the middle of it.

It really does work, the more positive we put in, the more positive he gives out. He then seeks out opportunities to do good things or say kind things because he wants more of the praise.

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