beat up by 7 yr old

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my 7yr old ds has recently decided to react in a totally out of caracter way by beating me up when he doesnt get his own way. he throws things at me...anything! and verbal abuse although not swearing...and hits, kicks, bites, slaps, punches...he even got ontop of my car today...shouted out the window 'i hate my mum' has totally trashed his room twice and am totally bemused by this behaviour...it is not as a result of anything different at home, school or elsewhere...he seems happy when he comes out of school. i have tried all the useual things i can think of to try and work out why this behaviour has started and therefore how to overcome it...we now have removed everything from his room and initiated a reward chart to get things back in his room and also to reward good behaviour by allowing him to choose an appropriate activity at the weekends...please ...i need to have some support and wise words of experience (or just wise words!)...from a bruised and battered mum who loves her ds dearly and wants him to feel the same...

You've got to instigate martial law and zero tolerance on this I think. Do you have a partner? I ask because if you do you need to agree a joint and consistent approach and he needs to back you up.

I'd suggest:

Rules, typed on the wall. Only 4 or so but one of them is 'violence is unacceptable'
Tell him these apply to EVERYONE in the house, adults included
He needs to know what will happen if he's violent. You might decide to take something away/tell his teacher/lock yourself in a room away from him/write it down/film him on your camera (my ds could switch it off LIKE THAT if dh filmed him having a tantrum) whatever it is you need to tell him these are the rules and you need to ruthlessly and consistently follow through.

You also need to be calm and loving and he needs to know that you have rules for a reason. Notice him being good, reward him for it. You might only have to do it for long enough to get him out of a cycle of bad behaviour.

Make sure he eats healthily. Try no sugar/e numbers. Make sure he gets plenty of sleep and exercise.

Good luck, these are my random thoughts in random order. My ds used to be violent sometimes and we tried a bad behaviour book (where we wrote everything down and then after 3 things written down something was taken away) in conjunction with a star chart and rules. It worked. He can be badly behaved now, as can all children but we don't really have violence any more, he knows it's completely unacceptable and we won't tolerate it.

Best of luck. Hang in there.

My ds is 9 btw.

thanx www...yes have dh...very supportive as always...seem to have covered most of hat you sugested...good to know we seem to be doing the right kinda thing