To be at the end of my tether with Ds and on occasion to be embarrassed for him (long sorry)

[Notalone]

DS is 8 and lately and I am finding him more and more infuriating. He talks incessantly which would be fine if everything he said made sense but he asks questions he already knows the answer to, talks constantly about computer games when he knows that not everyone had played these games or has any interest in them and often talks without having anything planned to say. For example a lot of his conversations start with "What if erm erm how about erm could I erm and erm well..." until he thinks of something to say. He has admitted he often makes up conversations as he goes along and asks silly questions because he likes to talk / likes attention.

He interrupts conversations constantly and I can never have a conversation with anyone without him butting in every minute or so. Most people are understanding and I always tell him to wait but he keeps doing it. If I bump into someone I know but he doesn't eg old work colleagues, he will still interrupt to ask them ridiculous questions like "Why is your hair red?" etc etc. He bombards them with talk when often it is obvious they are only after a quick conversation.

He NEVER listens and it has got so bad that I have been called into school to see his teacher twice about this. When people ask him a question he often ignores it because he is so intent on talking about things that he wants to talk about or just says "Yep" quickly before going back to HIS chosen topic of conversation

I am relatively new to where I live and a few months ago I met a new group of friends. Before I met them I was very lonely and I have been so much happier since I met them. Yesterday Ds and I went round to one of these friends houses and for no reason DS interrupts our conversation to say that I had been saying I was fed up with another of our mutual friends. The woman in question is probably the nicest out of all of them and I know 110% that I have never said anything of the sort. I got a stilted reply from the friend I was with and I am now terrified this is going to affect my friendship with this group of women. No matter how much I protest in the future that this was not said by me, they are probably not going to believe me and I do not want to be the lonely person I was last year. This is the final straw for me and I am seething at DS. He has lied for no reason other than to get a minute of attention yet this could affect me in a big way. I feel like screaming at him and I hate feeling like this.

Ds is an only child and I have always tried to give him the childhood I never had. I spend a lot of time with him, we have our special saturdays where we always do something nice together just me and him and I always encourage him to have friends over so he is not lonely. I have talked and talked with him about how he should talk about things that others are interested in too, how it is rude to interrupt and how he should think about what he is going to say before he says it. I have spent hours discussing how important listening skills are but he does not take a blind bit of notice. I often see him when he goes into school or comes out of school with the other kids and I can see that many of them are exasperated with him which makes my heart break for him. He is a lovely child at heart but he is not doing himself any favours and does not seem to realise the damage he is doing to himself and others around him.

Any ideas because yesterday I don't think I have ever been as mad at him as I was then

My 13 yo ds can be like this. If he really annoys me then he has to put his hand up if he wishes to join the conversation, and that works. I also have told him to count to ten and think about what he is going to say...if it will embarrass him or someone else, then he should tell me privately, not blurt it out in front of the whole world.

my ds is 11 and like your ds can talk for Britain, and he constsntly interrupts me when I'm talking to friends!!

dh and I are chatty so us combined has made him a non stop chatterer!!

ind you, I know a friend of his who cannot chat, has poor social skills, can't play/mix well with others and I'd rather have my chatty/outgoing ds anyday (just hope he shuts up soon )

But 8 is still tiny, no?
But then I can see it must be infuriating and you need to improve matters for the future.
DCs have a friend like tis and we lift share to an activity with her. Sometimes she is funny, but others I want to cut off her arms and put them in her mouth . What I have noticed as well is that DCs just stop talking when she's there, so there is in fact no conversation, just an audience. As they all get older there won't really be a 'friendship' will there?
I think all you can do iskeep repeating hpow annoying it is, how people ( not just you ) hate it, how it makes him look etc and keep offering praise whenever he doesn't do it.

8 is young but you can implement all or some of the advice on here.
I have told her to think about what she might be telling me, or anyone, and to think if I would really be interested in it and if not, tell someone who would. She didn't like it and I felt awful but I didn't want her to be 'the bore' of any group and we have had progress.
What I found was that I was switching off and tuning in and out of her monologue and when I missed something that was actually of interest and I had to ask her to repeat it, she accused me of not listening! She was right of course and now I have to say look I can't concentrate at the moment could you wait a minute please or I get her to help me with whatever I'm doing (chores) and miraculously she shuts up then!
She's gorgeous though and I feel highly intelligent so needs stimulation of the mind, get your dc to join the library. The people there are allowed to tell them to be quiet and she get all the stimulation she needs.

Hiya

Can I put another perspective over. When did this start? My son is approaching five and I am waiting for the point when a full clinical diagnosis can be made but it is almost certain he has adhd. The signs of it are

an inability to stop moving or talking, even at innapropriate times

making personal remarks totally innappropriately

Apparently poor listening skills

Sometimes appearing to live in own world.

Can concentrate on things he enjoys but repetitive or boring tasks are not possible

Random or impulsive behaviour for no reason at all.

Jumps from activity to activity often trying to do more then one thing at any one time.

This must be shown across more then one environment and have been going on since early childhood to be adhd but it does sound like your son tbh. If so punishment for this is not a great idea as he really cant control it. Perhaps speaking to the school or gp about an assessment if you are genuinly concerned would be an idea to rule it out.

p.s I am frequently embarrassed by my son. Yesterday for no reason at all he threw a shoe at a dog from the blue cross and ate two soft play balls. I try to remember that out of a 24 hour day these actions took 6 minutes in total and the rest of the time he was trying really hard to be good. Short term rewards are good, as are very clear instructions which you have to make them repeat back to you.

op, did you get a chance to explain to the mum you met, that ds was lying?

This is probably of no help, but I wonder if the comment your son made about your friend has it's roots in something slightly different to the on-going issue of his inability to listen etc?

You indicated that though his behaviour is often annoying , he isn't usually a liar . The comment about your friend was untrue, and therefore a bit out of character for him, if his usual interruption would have been something along the lines of, "Did you know that swans have black skin?".

I remember being really really resentful of a friend of my (very dedicated SAHM) mother when a friend of hers was going through a divorce.

My mother probably only went out in the evening to see her three times in as many months, but because she never went out, this was highly unusual and I was very aware that this was happening.

I took a strong - and verbal - dislike to this woman, calling her "Stinky Cordelia" and being huffy whenever she was mentioned.

Looking back, it is clear that I felt panicked and threatened by the concept that I wasn't always absolutely the sole focus of my mother's attention, but lacking the maturity or rational thought processes to analyse or articulate this, my response was to "dislike" the friend and try to make it difficult for my mother to see her.

The fact that your son chose the very woman that you like the most, from a friendship group that has made you immeasurably happier recently could indicate some feelings of concern on his part that he is now less important to you, that he is being replaced and he is trying to sabotage it?

I'm not suggesting this is malicious or even conscious on his part. I'm just saying that understandably you are very very angry with him about this incident (as opposed to exasperation about the usual stuff) and maybe thinking about reasons why he might have said it would help you calm down and feel less unhappy with him?

Perhaps a conversation about why mummy needs friends in the same way that he does but he will always be your favourite and your best?

Please do ignore if this is totally irrelevant. It was just a thought.

What a great post, notanumber.

I do this! It's something that has worried me all my life. I'm 30 now.

I always start a sentence with 'Did you...' 'I think...' 'Are you...' and then either just draw a total blank or just do the whole stream on consciousness stuff. Sometimes I either totally forget what I wanted to say or I find myself talking when I made no conscious decision to. I think of it as a verbal tic and I know it was routed in anxiety from a very early age.

My dp gets frustrated and annoyed with me too because it is exasperating and embarrassing. Your son does have to learn that his mum can get angry and frustrated - these are emotions that all of us have to deal with in life - but you sound like you have a good balance so don't beat yourself up for reacting, anyone would.

Wow - I really do have some food for thought on here. there are some really insightful and thoughtful replies on here.

I know someone who's Ds has ADHD and actually Ds and he do get on remarkably well depsite the fact that Ds is closer in age to his elder sibling. Another poster suggested I check for aspergers and Ds does have some aspergers traits too. However he is quite young for his age and my gut feeling is that he is just quite immature and needs to learn some self awareness on how his behaviour affects himself and others. I will certainly keep an eye out for these in the future though.

Notamumber - your post made me think too. As I mentioned previously, I am not from the area I live in and before I became more settled here most of my friends lived in my old home town. Whenever I went to visit my friends it would be like an adventure which Ds was very much a part of. We would go down together on the train and as most of my friends there have kids it would be like one huge family with lots of adults and kids just mucking in together. However, now when I see my new friends more often than not DS isn't included because we go out for meals / drinks / cinema in the evening. I have never considered it from his point of view but you may well be right in relation to the lie he came out with. I think we will need to have a conversation very much along the lines of what you suggested. Thank you!

I haven't mentioned to the other mum that DS was lying. I think in this case it will be very much a case of the more I protest the bigger liar I may look. Most people tend to think that kids just repeat what they say so it will just look like I am trying to dig myself out of a hole. I am just hoping it will be forgotten about

Sorry - I mean't to say kids repeat what they hear. not what they say

have to say this - i hope im not out of line cos i could be completely and utterly wrong but he sounds exactly like my DS did and he was dx with aspergers.
its used to infuriate me until i understood what was going on. he used to bombard people with questions and never listen for the answer - he was too busy formulating his next question!
good thing is he has grown out of it! he is 17 now and is doing great.

like i said i may be barking totally up the wrong tree, but your OP just stuck a massive chord with me!
x

Do you think you are trying so hard to be a good mum and not mistakes that your parents made that you are not being quite firm enough with your boundries? If he interrupts, I would say a firm 'no' and carry on talking. Once you start to say 'no because mummy doesn't like it', or 'no because it is rude' you are giving him more attention and making it worth his while to interrupt.

I would also call your friend after he is in bed (and can't interrupt!) and say what you have said here.

I agree with botty, you need to call her and explain. Say that you were going to leave it as you know if you had heard someone else's son say that you'd be thinking that he simply couldn't have made it up as kids generally don't, and if you denied it it would just make things worse. Tell her that you have no idea where he got this from, you think he may be jealous and you are trying to work through some issues you are having with him, perhaps ask her if she's noticed his interrupting tendencies and if she has any advice.

Can I suggest praising him when he is polite. Even if he only lets you speak for a minute to someone else, say thankyou for not interupting me. You can gradually eek out the length of time. Consequences are a great way of dealing with negative behaviour, but remember he needs to know consequences of postive behaviour too, so when he is polite, mum will be happy with me. It's like the pasta jar thing but I most definatly would put pasta in for being good. It's more important, and will have a greater impact than removing pasta for bad behaviour. Children LOVE to be in your good books. That's why they do it, they want your attention.

It's all very well as an adult, saying he doesn't get rewarded for good manners, because he should have good manners anyway. You are a grown up and have learnt that but we are talking about a child who has not learned this skill yet.

I would tell him once, firmly, when he is being rude, then ignore the babble. As soon as he behaves the way you want, give your attention back. He will learn that the way to get your attention and approval is through being polite, not rude. It's a really difficult skill for some parents (and suprisingly easy for others) but you need to learn to switch off from the crap, and single out his good behaviour.

I'm doing this with DS at the moment and it's working. He asks HURNDREDS of questions and minute (usually the SAME question!). He's only three, is it going to last until he's eight?! If I answer once, then ignore all the repeatition, he stops much quicker.

I think in relation to Botty's post, I find it hard to be consistent in these situations because my friends are quite laid back and will humour him. If he interrupts I will tell him I am talking and not to interrupt, but more often than not my friends will say "Oh thats ok" and then he gets to say his piece. Maybe I need to be firmer with my friends too and say "actually, no, its not ok" and explain my battle with DS. DP has often said I am too soft on him and this probably has a lot to do with how my parents were with me so I do need to stand my ground more.

Nothing has been said since regarding DS's comment to my friend. I haven't seen any of them but I have had texts so I am reluctant to bring it up in case it really has been forgotten.

I spent ages yesterday reading up about aspergers and although Ds does have some asperger traits, he does not fit the main traits listed. I have worked with adults with aspergers and Ds to me does not seem as though he has this. I am going to closely monitor the situation though and will keep it in the back of my head in case it gets worse.

Today DS is trying hard so I have praised the good behaviour. He seems to forget not to act in a certain way after an hour or so, so I think we have a long road ahead....

Sounds like you're doing exactly the right thing, notalone . Good for you; it's a toughie isn't it, but your son is clearly responding to praise for good behaviour. Just take it one step at a time.

As for the issue with your friends, I do understand your reluctance to bring it up in the event that it has been forgotten, but in all honestly I would be surprised if this were the case.

I know if it were me who had heard your son's comment I would certainly have processed it and thought about it afterwards (though possibly not passed it on to the others, but of course I can only speak for myself and not your friend).

That being the case, I think it's well worth doing what others have suggested and explaining to her - exactly as you've done here - your struggles with some of your son's behaviour.

Apart from anything else, I think you should tell them because they are your friends . Don't dwell too much on the particular comment about your friend, but talk to them about the wider issues you have with him.

If they are really your friends - and it sounds like they are - they will understand and want to support you. They may even have ideas and suggestions on how to approach the issue, and can certainly back you up with a firm "no interrupting" stance when your son is present.

Good luck notalone , and keep up the good work!