Struggling to cope violent child.

[Riverandrocks]

I'm a single mum to two children my 6 year old son has adhd and behaviour problems possibly asd. He is very violent toward myself and his 8 year old sister. He swears like a trooper and It's l 7ike walking through a mindfield everyday as you just don't know what will set him off. I'm hit, kicked, bitten and spat at daily. I dread each day before it has even began.

Getting him dressed, undressed, to eat or do as he's told is just such a battle. His tantrums can last for hours and nothing calms him down. I tried to walk away from him and he will follow me, I've tried putting him in his bedroom and holding the door but he trashed it and screams so loudly that next door complaint. I've tried reward charts but he rips them up. He wet himself daily mainly during a tantrum. I can't leave the house and he just runs off and won't listen so we are always stuck in the house. He can play in the garden but even now he's starting to climb the fence. I've just had enough I can't deal with him much longer.

I really feel for you River, that cant be easy. Unfortunately, I can’t really offer any advice as most normal parenting techniques don’t seem to work with sone children with ASD.

Could you ask @MNHQ to move your thread over to the Special Needs Section? You may get a few more responses in there

I am in exactly the same position, with children almost identical ages. We've had trashed rooms, holes bashed in walls and I'm regularly black and blue from being attacked, so you really have my sympathy. He too runs off and has tried escaping from the house/garden.

Have you ever consider PDA or looked at the PDA society website? It's a diagnosis which isn't recognised by the majority of local authorities but that doesn't mean you can't use the strategies at home. We too realised that 'normal' parenting strategies (timeouts, reward charts etc) don't work at all with our son, but we have had some success with the strategies suggested for PDA children.

We've found that the meltdowns are completely linked to anxiety, so trying to reduce situations that cause anxiety as much as possible has really helped. Once a meltdown starts, as you say, there really is no way to stop it until they 'burn out' so the key is trying to prevent the meltdowns before they start (easier said than done, I know). We are constantly on the look out for signs that he is on the verge of a meltdown, and then try and distract him before the fight or flight response is triggered. It's exhausting and completely soul destroying to cope with, so I really feel for you. I'd also recommend a book called My Daughter is Not Naughty by Jane Sherwin, which has lots of good tips and reassures you that this is not something that you have done that's causing the behaviour, but just the way their brains are wired.

My son is slightly older than yours and we have noticed that it is getting slightly easier to reason with him and explain to him why his actions are not acceptable. Between the ages of 5 1/2 and 7 he was incredibly difficult. Starting school definitely triggered a massive negative change in his behaviour. Having just turned 7, there does seem to have been a slight shift in his maturity, so hopefully it will gradually get easier as he gets older.

Have you tried Minecraft? My son finds it very therapeutic as he seems to use it as an escape when the real world is getting too much.