4 year old tantruming when iPad taken away

[greenpjs]

I know it's my fault, he had far too much screen time. He's autistic and if he's been on it for too long, his behaviour starts to worsen. I've taken it off him but the tantrums are unreal, how do I get him to calm down? He's very limited understanding so there's no talking him out of it or reassuring. It's been half an hour now and the tears and screaming is still happening.

I've tried to not give in or pay attention to his screaming but it's not working. What else can I do?

The ipad isn't hers, it's mine, and the only thing she has is the cbeebies app. She wasn't using it that often, and when I realised it was impacting her behaviour I took it away. Want to take off your judgy pants now?

Kids kindle has a timer you can set

DS is autistic, but is usually OK if things fit a routine. So me taking the table 'randomly' when he's had it to long didn't work & neither would daily time limits and he doesn't have the forward planning but needs it more in the evening, when he's tired and uses it to regulate.

We have the Google family app, but I changed the time of the overnight shutdown feature, to be 9am-3pm (he uses it school transport, but hands it in to the office when he arrives, so this replicates the time away from it during weekend or school holidays). He still has it for an hour or so in the morning while I sort breakfast and get ready for the day, then it locks for the day. Sometimes he wants it straight away at 3, but often by then we're either still out or he's happy doing some else, so doesn't think of it.

ND parent here, yep as others say, remove it otherwise you'll be on here posting exactly the same thing year after year. It won't get better. I allowed barely any screens when mine were young; they're teens now, and yes, one of them does spend far too much time on screens for my liking but they all know there are alternatives. There are many other things they love to do. Had they had unrestricted access to screens from a young age, that would have been the default and no, they wouldn't have developed other interests. I'm in no way against screens per day, but they do present issues for all children and even more so for ND kids whose attachments to things can be much stronger. Remove it now, it will only get harder.

Another ND parent and same. I have VERY strict timelines in place.

I did notice that the more screen time that my DC had when younger directly corresponded to how aggressive they would be.

Took away the screens and the difference was enormous.

I found that lots of walks out, the library or the swimming pool were our happy zones.

Now and next
Give warning

Agree with PPs who said to make expectations and countdowns very clear, and that visuals can help (learning our DC find transitions really hard was a big step as it meant we could finally understand why a lot of things are hard for them).

I found this article by Naomi Fisher (a psychologist who works with lots of ND people) really interesting (though more about older kids):

naomicfisher.substack.com/p/screens-screens-screens

Thinking about it, at this age DD didn’t have ipad but did have TV. I think that provided the same decompression but without quite the addictiveness of a tablet. Might be worth shifting?

This is the only thing that works. It's partly an addiction tantrum. You only sort addiction by removing the addictive substance permanently.

Every time you give your child a tablet they get a hit of serotonin, every time you take it away you take that hit away. It’s like a druggie being given a hit of heroine then suddenly going into withdrawals. Your child can’t control themselves. The use of tablet also has a massive impact on their melatonin levels.

I attended a meeting with a mental health nurse that worked with social media and the effects on a child’s brain.

There are studies that have shown that the hit from watching and playing devices can actually work better than being on methadone in army vets. You’d have to look up the source as I never remember specifics. I do remember coco melon was one of the worse things for kids to watch.

im not criticising anyone who lets their kids have tablets, I’d be the biggest hypocrite as all my DCs have free range of their devices.

Understanding its effects and not blaming your child’s reaction is key. Everyone is different, for us giving our DCs 15/10/5 min warnings helped them get ready for the device going off. We never took them out with us, occasionally they’d get to watch our phones, but otherwise no devices when out. It was little things like this that helped manage their usage. Once we had a better understanding of why our DCs reacted the way they did we found it easier as we understood they weren’t doing it on purpose.

Nope. You know screens are addictive so why start DC on it at 4? Now you'll find it hard to take it away.

It's interesting to see the narrative changing regarding children with a disability like autism and the use of screens. I so often read and hear it almost as a script that screens help children with certain disabilities emotionally regulate, and therefore, screen time is often at best not to be questioned. For many children screens are a necessity for communication and i can definitely see why screens are a welcome tool for giving a child some brain down time but I do think it's almost like an expected mantra that it helps regulation when often it has the opposite effect as others have said on this thread.
We've so far managed to avoid any personal screens for 8 yr old daughter. I do see the effect tv has on her and that has alerted me to how she may be with for example an ipad. She can zone out to whatever tv programme is currently on a loop and last year coco melon came on her radar and it was so obviously addictive. Likewise paw ptrol as it just keeps going. We generally are in the room with her when watching but the temptation to also zone out and scroll on your phone and let the tv session run on for a couple of hours is huge. It's currently Paul o grady and battersea. Not as addictive but still on an eternal repetitive loop if left to it! Even with the tv there's a constant internal battle with me thinking ah she's having brain downtime versus me thinking, actually she's disconnecting and it's harder to reconnect her to real world again. An ipad would just intensify this disconnection for her I feel.
I will move forward with tech for her at some point but she's not ready yet.

My son is autistic and also very attached to his iPad he’s 7 so slightly older. We found when giving the iPad we give a time frame so that they know when times up it’s up then stick too it. A visual timer maybe useful for them. Maybe one of those with the sand in so that they can see how long they have left. Hope this helps.

if he’s taking it to regulate why can’t he have it?

I’m so glad I found this thread ! My child has massive meltdowns about the IPad. I refuse to feel guilty in letting her have it I’m a working mum, it’s been a god send at times but the evening tantrums are out of hand and all round behaviour is awful. I’ve just done the down time setting ! Detox starts tomorrow! ( please do not feel bad for giving your child an iPad !!!! ) x

Solidarity to you all!
We have the iPad demands too :(
I feel guilty because obviously I haven't set firm enough boundaries.... but it's so hard when your plate is already full isn't it :(

You should be able to set screen time settings. My son is autistic and we tell in advance he can have it for X amount of time. We try to keep to a routine and if there is going to be any change we tell in advance. Also in our case instead of taking it straight away from him without warning I will say it's to be switched off in 5 minutes. Even an egg timer for that might help. I also try to look at it from the point of view of how would I feel if someone came and switched the TV off without warning while I'm in the middle of watching something.

The one thing that works best with mine (5yo ASD but very articulate) is sitting with them and helping them transition back to the real world. So asking them questions about what they're watching, or getting them to give me a tour of their Minecraft castle etc. And then usually after 5-10 minutes I've "got them back" and we can move quite easily into another activity together.

(so for example, mine might start explaining to me about the different pokemon in the cartoon they're watching, so I'll give them a few minutes to chat about it, and then I might say "hey, why don't we try drawing our own pokemon?!" etc. I can see this might not be so straightforward with a less chatty child, but maybe you could sit down next to them and just start doing your own drawing/lego/action figures, or whatever it is your child likes to play, and it might just be enough to divert their interest away from the screen in a very low-demand way)

In what world would you give any 4 year old an iPad or anything similar
how Will any child learn to play if everyone keeps shoving them in front of screens

We have a timer on my son’s iPad under the screentime setting. It should be on there somewhere if you’ve set up a child’s profile.

will distraction techniques work to help bring him out of the tantrum/meltdown? Or a gradual change in routine to lessen the iPad or always have something planned for after the iPad that he enjoys as part of the routine if you need it in there for downtime?

Oie. Shitty but cold Turkey, full take away. Deal with the withdrawals.

such a handful but you need to find other entertainment.

My kids are NT but we barely ever let them even go on the desktop when they were under 11. None of them get a phone until 14. An ipad for a 4 year old sounds like a terrible idea. My youngest son would be a zombie if we had allowed that as a kid. Instead he plays a lot of sports and a musical instrument with plenty of social skills.
We all know handing over a screen is so much easier. But teens with an internet addiction are often disconnected and not learning any social skills. I have witnessed one boy with Tech Neck (curvature of the spine) from so much gaming.

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/ipad/ipad02e876e6/ipados

parental controls, restricting Apps, and times etc is possible

My friend had a similar problem but she got some sort of tablet that locks it down after so long and she simply tells her kids that the internet has run out for the day.
They accept that far better than just being told to get off because in their minds it wasn’t mums order, but rather the iPads.

Our nearly four year old autistic child also loves his iPad. It’s very regulating for him and the equivalent of a comfort blanket for an NT child. The established routine we have for ending a session is ‘Last one, iPad finished’ repeated a couple of times and then letting the episode or game finish (he only has BabyTV or BBC children’s programmes or specific toddler letter and number game apps). He now hands it over happily once the ‘last one’ has ended. If you try this you will still get the meltdowns for a while, but if you and anyone else who looks after him are consistent he will probably accept it as his routine for iPad eventually.