DS is constantly losing his temper - really bad now

[GeorgiaMay]

Hi everyone,

I have a 9yo DS and also 2 DDs and a DH. I consider us to be a stable and loving family, but, the behaviour of DS is really getting us all down. This is not a new issue, but I guess that I thought/hoped he would grow out of a lot of the behaviour with maturity. I'll try to summarise.

He loses his temper, many times every day. We said he had tantrums when he was younger, but we can't really call it that anymore. It can be over something like his sister getting the first turn at something, or me asking him to bring his plate to the kitchen. He cries and shouts insults at everyone when he's angry. He has threatened me with a baseball bat in his anger, and several times run away for hours. I have tried teaching him strategies for calming himself down, but nothing has helped so far. We have talked about respect and said that we insist on it. I have also read lots of books, including "The Explosive Child", but I felt that it said there is nothing much you can do except accept the child is like that and alter the environment to make life easier for them. We do that to a certain extent, but I don't want to walk on egg shells around him and feel that he needs to learn to compromise in life.

He controls himself better at school, but must need to "release" when he comes home as homework is a massive problem. He does now (after years of struggles) start to do it, but within minutes is shouting at me and saying he hates me for making him do it. His teacher says he is easily able to do the work, but doesn't want to engage with anything in school unless he decides it's interesting for him (mostly he thinks it's not). Together we have decided on a system of rewards for getting it done without losing his temper - playing outside, tv etc, but in the week before the holidays he didn't once get tv or outside time as he had several meltdowns every day. So it doesn't seem to be working.

DH and I are calm and consistent parents, don't get it right all the time of course, but I feel we are failing in our parenting of DS. I would very much appreciate your thoughts on this!

I don't know the first thing about your DS but it sounds like there may be something else at work here. Is there the slightest chance he might have a mild form of Autism or something like Aspergers? As I say, I am only saying as I could see you've had no responses on here, maybe its worth re-posting in Special needs and asking for some advice there?
HTH

I honestly don't think he does. School have never mentioned anything like that either. But he obviously has huge problems controlling his emotions.

He just gets so worked up over what seems like silly things to everyone else. He gets up in the morning and immediately starts ranting about what's for breakfast or which cup has has. Other kids have started to make comments about his outbursts, so I'm wondering if he might take more notice of that because he certainly takes no notice of me. I make him follw my rules and boundaries, but the temper has not improved at all over the years.

I would research possible as or dyspraxia, sometimes we run in emulator mode and let it all out where we feel secure.

Our son is exactly the same only he is 21 years old. He has always been difficult and explosive. The smallest of thing set him off and when he is home from uni we all walk on egg shells. I have no idea where you should go for advise but hopefully someone here will have a much greater knowledge than me. I hope you can find someone to help as trying to force an adult to the doctors to explain their problems is near impossible. I guess we have to just keep loving them . like you our other children are laid back but stressed by their brothers behaviour but we don't know how to help him

My ds is the same, runs away, explodes all the time at home and is totally different to his siblings who appear like other children. Like your DS they are over the slightest thing and I think he really thinks everyone is unreasonable and mean to him for no reason. We have never found any threat that would work to prevent the behaviour, he will not show that any thing bothers him ie such as loss of treat/day out for running away.

We thought possible AS and he had intital assessment on NHS but they saw no signs of it and school told them "he was just like everyone else!" He was very cooperative in all the assessments and scored above top 1% in IQ tests so they saw no issues and decided it was parenting! This is despite grandparents, relatives, friends having the same issues as us.

DS is generally fine on his own with an adult but he struggles socially with friends, other parents dislike him and he is at his worst when we have to get him to do something to a timescale. Fantastically busy now with no tantrums as have not asked him to have breakfast or get dressed! We dont know if there are other medical issues such as food intolerances that are causing pain that add to his anger issues.

He explodes as he comes out of school as he finds it such a strain to conform there and there is no doubt frustrated as his knowledge is years ahead yet his work is not reflecting this especially his writing. Whilst school told psychologist there was no issue his school reports did not support this saying he refused to write. They admit that like your DS he only wants to do things he is interested in and this never seems to coincide. He has had obessions with space, volcanoes etc but always years before they have covered them as their school topic.

Many of the traits of gifted can be similar to Aspergers according to the NAGC website with the obesssions and difficulties with changing task etc due to being absorbed.

Things that work best for us:-
We still use a timer for everything to give a warning/count down.
Follow very very strict routines for everything ie bedtime/getting ready for school etc
Complex reward systems that he has an input in creating and change regularly for new interest.
Time out whenever there is a tantrum after 1,2,3 warning - to diffuse the situation - it does not actually work to stop outbursts but it gets him out of the room and away from siblings to calm down.

However he is still exhausting even when he is not having a tantrum he is always absolutely hyper with his latest project. These are always very complex ambitious ideas that create huge chaos and great stress if they are not workable or if have to be paused to eat, dress, sleep or go to school. He cant leave a project unfinished and they can be huge tasks.

When he is out with my husband and I am left with the siblings it feels like a holiday it is so easy. I always think I could manage 10 like my others more easily than DS.

I have not ruled out home educating once his siblings are all at school as he would happily self teach and as long as we did not follow set curriculum there would be no tantrums and perhaps that would reduce the frustrations from school. We are also investigating medical issues in case they are causing pain and hence adding to anger. My biggest concern is the impact on siblings and all we do there is ensure they all get individual quality time with parents and grandparents.

OMG my ds(6) is exactly the same. Both me and my daughter have dyspraxia. He also controls himself at school although does cry sometimes if he can't do something perfectly or if some one eg. dares to sit in a chair he was going to sit on. At home thogh he loses his temper over any little thing, bing asked to stop playing a game because it's tea time / dd turn ; dd touching him ( which she does quite alot due to dyspraxia); nto being able to do something right; me not getting him dressed when he wants me to. I just don't know how to cope with it as when he gets upset it makes me and dd upset.

He also loses it when asked to do something quickly bacuse it's time to go.

I realise this is an old thread but came on MN looking for advice about my ds who is also 9 and sounds alot like your ds Georgiamay. He is well behaved in school and around other adults but cannot make friends amongst his peers and is very aggressive at home to the point that he gets scary. The slightest thing sets him off and everything is wrong. I do get cross as I feel he is spoilt and has no idea how lucky he is yet seems to think he has the worse life ever. He is th eldest of our three and it is really hard to love h
im like I lovethe other two. I know that is an awful thing to say but I am at the end of my tether.

lack of control over emotions and over emotional responses are oten part o the dyspraxia symprom (see dyspraxia foundation and see if you recognise anything there)

Also, you might expect to see this kind of exaggerated emotional behaviour if a great deal of the rest of a childs life was a struggle, conditions usually unrelated to emotional outbursts, for example dyslexia (and your mention of homework issues makes this something worth looking into.

It is very common for the dyslexic to remain hidden until they are about 9 years old as the symptoms may only become noticeable when their coping mechanisms finally start to fall short of what is expected of them.

I am not saying that your ds has any of the same issues as mine but the behaviour is very, very similar. My ds has ASD, dyslexia and we have just had a dyspraxia diagnosis.

We are at the moment trying a positive parenting approach of trying to fill the emotional bank as he has been in a very bad cycle.

With the anger, we have explained that anger is fine, shouting and screaming is fine, getting out anger physically is fine but none NONE is to be directed at other people. We use time out I guess you would call it but it is not a punishment it is an opportunity to regain his status quo. I used to try to ride it out with him but tbh it is dangerous for me to do this so now he goes into a quiet space on his own and stays there until he is in control. I have tried to teach ds calming down techniques like breathing, punching a pillow and so forth but when he is in meltdown he can't access them. I try to reassure him that I am there but I don't put myself in harms way. My ds doesn't go into calm down space willingly when he has lost the plot but it quite ok about the concept when we have talked about it when he is calm.

My ds is very cup half empty and high attention needs....it is very, very wearying. I have reduced the tantrums lately with the positive approach but it has been very intensive and there are loads of other behaviours that haven't improved but small steps and all that. I also look back and think that in general even in a bad patch, ds is starting to connect his behaviour with the real world a little more...he seems to come out of meltdowns sooner and is more able to re enter family life when a meltdown is over now than he used to be.

I am not sure any of this is useful and as I say my ds has some developmental challenges to his behaviour which may not be relevant to your situation.

please dont ignore this

a really good start for you would be to have a meeting with ds over the break and make a new homework plan - there was a thread on here recently about this

whatever happens in school, you dont want any problems there to spill over into your relationship. so choose a reasonable amount of time for school homework (maybe ask other mums how long it takes or ask the teacher) - then agree with ds you will be fully available for that amount of time from when he starts his work (eg 20 or 30 minutes) to help him. And that any work that is left unfinished after that he can leave or finish as he wishes. Thats it.

You could talk to the teacher to explain your plan if you like.

my ds has a temper and we have struggled over the years

I really can't post a long post aboutn it now, but I have in the last couple of months posted long posts for people about some of the things that we have tried and worked and not worked etc

Please do a search to read some of them

One key is the home/school distinction. My ds is well behaved at school, which shows me he can have control. This gives me enormous hope that he will learn to control at home too.