Dc2 is 7yo and has some issues although no official diagnosis yet. School working on the assumption he has adhd and/or asd. He’s incredibly volatile, always has been. He’s the sweetest, funniest, kindest little boy 99% of the time but that 1% of the time he’s awful. If something’s not how he wants it/ expects it to be rather than verbalising what the issue is he just screams and growls. If you try and approach him he hits and scratches himself and anyone who goes near him.
Because of this it’s obviously been hard for him to make friends. The parents of his classmates are a really, really lovely bunch though and always try and include him, although I always make sure I’m present so that I can handle him if he does explode. About a dozen of us were having a picnic in the park this afternoon and he was happily playing football with a few of the other boys.
I went to buy a coffee from the hut right next to the playground, I was never more than 15m away. I hear him start to scream and one of the other mums runs over as ds is heading towards her ds looking like he wants to hit him. The mum stands in between the two and he pushes straight into her, knocking the metal drinks bottle into her face and cutting her lip. I run over and try and hold him still but he’s absolutely wild - he punched me twice in the nose really hard, pulled my hair, scratched his face until it bled and was just howling like an animal the whole time. I genuinely cannot hold him still as he’s so out of control and a couple of runners come over to help me. It took 4 of us to carry him, pretty much one on each limb, into the car. I’m sobbing, ds is still screaming and thrashing around in his car seat.
I’m absolutely mortified. Everyone looked absolutely appalled. I’ve told them about his meltdowns but I’m normally pretty good at sensing when they’re coming on and minimising them/ removing him before it gets too bad. This is the worst one he’s ever had though, in front of half his class and parents and it’s hours later and I still can’t stop crying. All the other mums have been lovely about it in the WhatsApp group, even the poor lady who he whacked with the drink bottle.
Im on my own with him and dc1 (10) and this is the first time that I’ve realised I cannot physically restrain him on my own anymore. I hadn’t even let him out of my sight and it had still happened. I’m so frightened that he’ll do it again and there won’t be people around to help me or he’ll do it by a road or somewhere else dangerous where he could bolt and get himself seriously hurt. I keep going into look at him asleep and he’s got livid scratch marks all over his face and red marks on his arms from where I was trying to carry him to the car.
I don’t know what to do. I think it’s suddenly struck me that this isn’t a phase he’s going to grow out of. It is some kind of proper disorder and I’ve minimised it for so long thinking he’s just over emotional/ likes things a certain way. For a good 20 minutes today the boy that I know simply wasn’t in there, it was just a boy shaped ball of fury and terror. He was so angry and so frightened and so incapable of being able to listen to anything or reason in any way. I don’t know what to do.