6yo so negative about himself and life in general

[Kalodi]

I'd love some advice on how to help DS with his self esteem and to focus on the positive more. Of course negative experiences should be validated still, I'm not trying to dismiss them, but I do think he heavily focuses on those.

This asking for help has been triggered by what I've caught him saying about himself. Yesterday, he asked to borrow the camera and make short films (he loves making films, usually I do the filming but he wanted a go himself for the first time, he is brilliant at acting, inventing stories and animation too).

Anyway, he made loads but a few have caught my eye. He created vlog style videos (interesting as he doesn't watch these ever etc), they were like a little diary and they broke my heart. He was saying really negative things about himself as he went about doing his general life to life things.

I was aware he has low self esteem, he does often question us that he feels different to his peers. I have tried varies books with him but those style of books don't interest him. We also have a family thing at dinner time where we share something positive about our day and at bedtime we do a recap of the day. I have always thought I give him a good amount of and varied praise but I don't think I'm doing this right for him.

What else can I do?

Speak to school. They might have a perspective on him that you hadn’t considered.

DS1 can tend towards this and he is ASD/ADHD. I’m very positive with him too, but he is very sensitive to any negativity whatsoever (and I get cross sometimes!).

My DD is like this; we do the recap of the positives at the end of the day which I hope helps. She also started a club that she is good at and that’s been of the big boosts for her. I also notice that she has a friend is very competitive and never says well done etc and it started coming out in how DD talks to her brother so we have lots of talks about how everyone should encourage each other on and it doesn’t make you any better at something to criticise someone.
I also try to think about what I model to her as I can be quite negative about myself

Thank you both.

DS is diagnosed autistic and he does pick up he is different to his peers, e.g. he often comments on how he doesn't like his monotoned voice and struggles to understand other people's reactions to things. So perhaps that doesn't help.

We have recently spoken to the school about this, got the usual "he is just settling into Year 2, it's all common etc".

The modelling behaviour could be a good idea. I don't think we speak negatively about ourselves but perhaps we need to speak actively positively?

@Kalodi

I think autistic children struggle to know where they end and other people begin, which knocks their self-esteem. They also experience lots of points during the day when they are ‘chivvied’ along, so they feel hurried and pressured to keep up with others. Basically, life is at the ‘wrong’ pace for many of them. Add to that people’s expectations that they should just ‘know’ what to do in any given situation, and they must feel like they can’t meet expectations. I know DS1 feels this a lot.

School should put something in place for him and other anxious children, in liaison with the communication and interaction team from your LEA. We run groups like this at secondary.