How do we get professional behavioural help?

[GF01]

If anyone has gone about getting professional assistance please can you tell me how to get the ball rolling.

Our 3yo is the love of our lives, but we can't stop him being violent. If he can't get his way, or if we tell him off, he hits us. If we stop him, he becomes frustrated and fixated on hitting us.

Apparently there's no problem at nursery (not sure I believe them), but when we're out together with other children he's violent with the other children more often than not - pushing them over, hitting them, scratching them. Not all the time, but generally once he reaches a certain level of excitement.

We tell him off and he gets very upset and anxious. I mention this because it seems like he doesn't understand why we're angry with him. We say he must be more gentle so often that if we ask he will repeat it, but quite often will go back to rough play as soon as we put him down.

Thanks a lot for any help.

I'm sorry you;'re having this problem My first stop was the GP. You could try the GP or health visitor.

The GP sent me to a parenting group first - I went along, it was very helpful, partly for the advice and partly just to get a feel for how other kids of the same age behave and no they aren't all little cherubs! My DS was behaving very badly in school too so the GP referred us on to CAMHS right away and I did the parenting group while I was on the CAMHS waiting list. If your DS is fine at nursery then you might be asked to do a parenting group first, then see if things get better, and go back to the GP if they don't and then get referred on.

It's possible that your DS behaves well at nursery and not so well at home for a range of reasons. It may be to do with structure at nursery, or the way they communicate, or just that he saves it up! One temporary solution might be to keep events with other kids short so you can take him away for a rest before he gets over-excited. Or if you see the signs, take him away to calm down; and if he hits another child etc then he gets one time out and then if he does it again then it's game over, hometime. It may be that he's stays calmer and behaves better in the more structured play setting at nursery, and that there are enough breaks (snack time, story time, etc) so he doesn't get so over-excited there.

I hope things get better for you all.