AIBU to feel at a loss with my son's behaviour?

[Django1988]

I have a 5 year old boy who has been a handful since 18 months old. He has a sister 2 years older.

He constantly craves attention and will do anything to get it. Our main issue is that he’s horrible to other kids, he pushes, takes their things, spits at them, doesn’t let them go down the slide at parks, throws their things, winds them up on purpose etc this can be my friends kids or strangers.

He will wind us up as a family, it could be 8am and we are already fed up. It could be hitting us, kicking, grabbing our faces, pulling hair, covering our eyes so we can’t see the tv and won’t stop after being asked repeatedly. If we move away he will follow.

I’ve just been to the park with 2 friends and their 4 kids. He upset 4/5 of the kids. He pushed one kid and he fell in to another, he took a toy off 2 of the girls and ran away with it then threw it in to a bush, he jumped on top of one of the other girls and wouldn’t get off when she we shouting and another girl was trying to pull him off. He was leaning against my friends tent and she asked him not to, he carried on doing it until she had to get firm with him and then I had to intervene (I was taking my daughter to the toilet at the time) I told him every time he was unkind to his friends I would throw away one of his treats in his lunch box, I ended up throwing 2 away. He then pulled everything about of the bin (this was my bad, he is motivated by food and I didn’t know what else to do at the time, I was at my wits end) I took him home and left his sister there with my friend. It won’t teach him though, we always have words before we go anywhere, he knows if he’s unkind to anyone we will come home and we always do. I don’t know what else I can do. I don’t think it’s fair on other kids and people to have their day ruined by my child who can’t play nicely. I’ve even caught him jumping on a baby at a soft play, again we came home.

He just wants to wind everyone up and he’s spiteful at times. There isn’t a trigger as far as I can see. He was upset the other day as my daughter and my friends kids didn’t want to play with him because he’s mean and honestly, I didn’t know what to tell him, he is mean. But at the same time I don’t want him to be excluded.

He’s horrible to animals, he will throw sticks or stones at dogs, cats, ducks etc. We looked after my friend’s kittens for a week in February and it was pure hell. He wouldn’t leave them alone, he’d pull their tails, drag them by their legs, a lot of the time he would just want to cuddle them but wouldn’t stop when I said they had had enough. I couldn’t wait for them to go home.

He has friends at school luckily and there’s been a few incidents where he has been rough or grabbed their faces/squeezed them etc but he is getting a lot better and didn’t have any incidents last term. He’s doing well at school academically and meeting all his targets, he has patience and is great at persevering with things. He also loves a cuddle and can be very loving at times, but a cuddle nearly always ends up in someone being hurt/irritated.

We have sent 2 referrals for an EHCP at school as they think he may have Autism/ADHD. These have both been rejected. We are putting a third one in, in November time and he has been referred to speech and language for social interaction/communication, he is already under SALT for speech sounds. Sometimes I can see that he may be neurodivergent but other days I can’t.

We have done 2 parenting courses, a 4 week one and a 10 week one. Both were brilliant and gave us some great strategies which we use. One of them is 10 minutes play every day to make sure he has enough attention. We do a marble jar, positive reinforcements, praise for being/praise for doing, we try not to use negative language like no, stop etc and say hands are not for hitting etc

We’ve tried time out (though the parenting courses advise against this)
We take his Yoto player away, say no to pudding (I know we shouldn’t but I don’t know what else to try)

I can handle him at home as it’s just us he’s terrorising but I feel like every time I go anywhere with him he’s always unkind, my heart sinks when I see other kids coming to the park.

I know he’s looking for a connection or dopamine hit, I just wish we could find a way to help him get this in a different way. It’s the start of the summer holidays and I’ve already been in tears.

Apologies this ended up longer than I intended!

If anyone got this far and has any advice, I’d really appreciate it.

This sounds incredibly hard. One thing that stands out though is that although you believe you are consistent, you aren't. You say that you prep him before saying you'll come home if he hits/pushes/throws etc., but then say he managed to upset virtually everyone and what you actually did was throw food away. That is not consistent.

I did come home but wanted to give him a chance to rectify his behaviour first. I can see that’s not consistent though, you’re right. But if I came home straight away I would have been there 5 minutes 🤦‍♀️

Well that was the consequence you told him before you set out.

It's really hard because I get you want to get out and see people too. But if that's the line you draw you have got to stick to it. If you aren't willing to, even if it's only thirty secs after arriving, don't say it. Could you change it to be that he has to stop playing and come and sit next to you for five mins? You may have to be prepared to physically hold him with you though. I wouldn't use food as a weapon, that has the potential to cause all sorts of issues. It does sound like he needs extra help so well done for pushing for it. His behaviour around animals is particularly concerning, can you flag that angle to try and push the referral?

Sounds very difficult to manage OP and to live with every day. Very wearing on the nerves. Have you tried social stories with him?

Hi OP,

i work with neurodivergent children and their families, have you considered seeking 1:1 parenting support with a psychologist? You can do this virtually after the kids are all in bed with some people? I know it’s expensive but I don’t think seeking answers on mumsnet is going to get you very far, you need to speak over time with someone highly skilled and experienced with parenting ND children.

Thee we reason I say this is cause you’ve found the courses helpful, but now it sounds like you need a bit more individualised support to meet your child’s needs and in knowing and managing a consistent family response. It sounds like you knew that throwing the pudding away would escalate things but didn’t know what else to do so did it anyway, which sounds like something they could think about with you- even at the point of your parenting beliefs and how we’ve been taught we should respond to children (which is generally that children ‘need to learn’ and the way to do that is through bribery, threats, taking things away for bad behaviour or giving for good), but actually those things are pretty outdated now and there are other ways to meet children where they are at. Things don’t usually work at first, it’s the consistency over time that makes strategies work, even when they appear to do nothing.

If school are recommending an EHCP then his needs must be significantly greater than other children his age.

It looks like he struggles with social communication, emotional regulation and sensory issues. Is he on a waiting list to be assessed for ASD/ADHD? If not, see your GP and ask about right to choose (this isn’t available in some areas). A diagnosis will help with your EHCP application. He might be a bit young at the moment for ADHD investigation.

Front line treatment for ADHD (and it sounds like your DS is perhaps a severe case) is medication, which has been life-changing for my eldest DS.

I’m not being rude but 10 minutes play a day with your children is nothing, surely you don’t need a course to say you need to be doing that if not more

You need to refer to camhs for an assessment if he has adhd or autism. It’s nothing to do with an EHCP. I would follow the advice you have been given on your parenting courses and be very consistent with it. I’m sure they didn’t tell you to throw his snacks one by one into the bin. It takes time to turn behavioural patterns around and if he can’t go on outings with other children right now you might need to accept that. The more positive attention and time you spend doing structured things with him the more positive his behaviour will become regardless of neurodiversity. You should also reach out to social services as they may be able to give some family support sessions.

Sounds just like my son at that age.

Are you actually on the autism assessment pathway? My son is ADHD and Autism and presented the same way.

My suggestion would be, read some books on autism (try how to raise a happy autistic child) and try for a while to use the approaches and techniques you would if he was autistic. He may not be autistic, but the behaviour management strategies which work for autistic children are generally useful for other 'spirited' children for whom conventional discipline doesn't work.

I'd say the first thing is to level-set that what you're doing now isn't working. Punishments aren't helping, so that's obviously not a model which works for him. It's hard to accept (and it was for me!) when consequences work for most kids. Most being the key word. They don't for all.

For autistic kids the approach is more around planning and looking at what patterns of behaviour are. Only you can do this, and it takes properly sitting down and trying to find patterns in when this behaviour occurs. I would say my son was pretty similar - it was any time we were at parties or in the playground etc. What I realised was it was that big social situations with lots of kids and noise were overwhelming for my son, but he was only 5 so couldn't explain it (now he's older he can). The noise put him on edge so he was grumpy, and all the kids playing their games he'd want to be included but couldn't work out how to be part of the game so instead he'd trash the game to get some attention. Totally counterproductive but little kids aren't always logical!

Things we did which worked:

• Totally stopped going to the playground for a few years. Instead went to places without other kids. Country walks, forests for climbing trees.
• Stopped going to class birthday parties where he would always get overwhelmed and smack people... wasn't fun for him (which he was communicating with his behaviour) or for us... no point.
• Stripped social group right back to just a few trusted friends.
• For a few years until he was under control he was pretty much 1:1 with one parent the whole time, we didn't do drop off playdates or anything and didn't have one parent with both kids as he'd lash out.
• Totally stopped punishments. If he lashed out we'd remove him from the situation entirely (not a time out, literally, going home) and talk about it after.
• At home low-level attention seeking bad behaviour we ignored as it was his form of wanting to get validation. But massively over-praising 'being good'. The 'being good' baseline at first was super-low, it was like 'oh wow you played with the lego nicely for 2 minutes by yourself! YAYYYYYY you're the BEST!!!'. Took a while but the horrible behaviour stopped pretty much
• Speech and language therapy can be great - they taught my son how to recognise when the 'bad feelings' are coming and how to step away from a situation.

Remember this isn't forever. Whatever is going on neurodiversity wise, he's obviously developed social skills in a delayed way. He can learn, he'll just learn differently. I tend to think, some people learn to write later than others, or only catch on with maths later. Some people also develop impulse control later. He will get there.

I find it really frustrating on here when a child is deemed neurodiverse because they have horrible behavioural traits. Professionals have said he is not neurodiverse.

That means it's down to your parenting. You need to be more consistent and firm, it sounds like he has no fear of any consequences.

Being refused EHCP doesn’t mean they aren’t ND.

It also doesn't mean every nasty trait can be down to AU/ADHD

ND children do need extremely firm boundaries, however, your comment isn’t helping OP, because her child’s behaviour is clearly ‘different’ to other children, as identified by school staff. If teachers thought it was simply behavioural, they wouldn’t be recommending an EHCP.

Hate to say it but I think that’s exactly what you need to do, 2-3 times and he’ll stop.

Sounds like you need to sharpen up your parenting tbh .
hes only 5 … get a grip on how you do this before he gets much older and out of control.

I have an nd child.

firstly don’t volunteer to look after other people’s animals and if he can’t do kind hands (and clearly he can’t) keep him away from animals.

secondly he sounds like he has a lot of energy and it needs to be got out away from other kids. We found a trampoline in the garden helpful.

agree with a pp about lots of walks in country woodland with no-one else around. He can mess with twigs, run around etc sbd it doesn’t annoy anyone outside of his own family.

if you go the park sound like he needs 1:1 parenting at all times.

Whether he is or is not ND, his behavior obviously does not mean it's all down to parenting. This isn't a binary thing: difficult behavior doesn't come down to an Either/Or Neurodiversity/Parenting as cause. If only life were that simple 🙄

What happens when you get home with him - is it back to normal? Does he want to come home perhaps? If it's purely for attention then you don't give it, that doesnt mean ignore though.

I will never understand why people do this. Imagine if it was the same on other threads.

"Does anyone have any advice about this specific relationship situation?"
"Sounds like you just need to get better at relationships."

But surely a part of it is parenting.

the kind hands strategy is stupid. Time out does work. When they do something unpleasant then they themselves should feel what it’s like. My son was like this when he was 3. All the advice from the nursery didn’t work. What worked was time out & being told firmly it’s not ok. I got to a soft play and I literally paid and before he took his shoes off he had hit another child. I had an elder child and I picked him up & took him straight out. My eldest was bereft. But for compensation we went straight into b&m where I bought her a colouring book and new pens & then went through a McDonald’s drive thru and boat her a McFlurry. He got nothing. But when he did behave he’d be rewarded with praise and a treat. I made such a song and dance over him being good. He was soon being so good at home. Though when he started school it escalated and the school was having issues with him running out of class. They’d distract him by giving him an iPad. I told them to stop rewarding him. That I would do that at home if he behaves at school. They argued against me but did as I asked and guess what. Within weeks the conceded I was right. Being firm and harsh doesn’t equate to being mean

It might be a part of it but that's absolutely not what your original post implies.

If he already has form for this, why were you even still at the park after the first push? You need to follow through with what you say.

@Django1988 it sounds utterly exhausting and I’m so sorry you’re having to deal with that.
I’m also sorry for the less than kind replies you’ve had from some people. To me, you sound like a great mum - you are trying your absolute best in a very tough situation.

I have a “tricky” son, albeit in a different way to yours. He is now 12 and we went through some very hard times, still do at points but he’s maturing in lots of ways. I think the post by @MyKindHiker is excellent and encapsulates some great advice.

We found the books “playful parenting” and “how to talk so kids will listen” very helpful. Wishing you lots of luck x