surely this is just sneaky bad behaviour ?

[cheeryface]

ds2 has had problems since going to secondary school. before then he was fine at primary but difficult for me at home. he was managable though and i thought he was just difficult.
since then we have had big problems and one teacher (but not a very experienced one ) suggested he might have aspergers.

i am beginning to think hes just a badly behaved kid. maybe i have been a crap parent !

not so long ago he asked for facebook. i said no , not yet. then i found he had secretly joined facebook. when i confronted him with this he went berserk. not seeming to think he was wrong but that i had ruined his life. He had the most massive tantrum about it which went on for hours and then continued the next morning resulting in him even refusing to go to school.

a few days later , i went to de-activate the account (when i had finally got the password out of him) and found that he had been continuing to sneakily go on facebook.

so, i had taken his phone away which he had been using. telling him he would get it back when i thought i could trust him. had a big talk about trust etc etc

got his phone back yesterday...and...hes rejoined facebook. i have just discovered this from someone else.
i am so shocked after all the talking and the massive ding dong thats gone on over it.
this is just really naughty , right ?

aspergers had never entered my head until the teacher said it. he seemed to be having trouble maintaining friendships and he was traumatized after changing to the secondary . he couldnt hack it. stopped doing any work and was spending all his time alone.
i thought it was that particular school and that he had also had a real shock as he is quite sheltered compared to some and the primary was very small. It seemed there was bullying.
he spent 3 months at home , his behaviour had gone to pot , he was saying he wanted to be dead and allsorts. then he started a new school.

but, they now have concerns. behaviour , no effort and struggling with work. I had expected him to be friends with a few boys there as there were some friends from primary . but no, hes sort of friends with year 10's. it only took 2 weeks before hed fallen out with 3 or 4 yr 7's. I am really shocked that he has misbehaved at school as never before any teacher has had issues with behaviour and at primary he would have been mortified if he'd got in trouble.

he is still having terrible outbursts at home which i am struggling to cope with.

he is disorganized

he breaks rules over and over

he seems very immature especially with how he relates to people.

he lies

he has a bad memory

he cannot seem to make up a story , everything has to either come from the simpsons or copied from the internet . homework is a stress.
he is intense. if he wants dh to do something with him he will nag and nag and nag .

he is selfish. i.e you could explain you feel ill and will bake a cake with him tomorrow instead and he will kick off and say your unfair , your nasty etc etc

doesnt learn , give consequences to wrong behaviour and he does the same thing over again and again.

has really low self esteem , looks me in the eye but lots of people he doesnt.

fussy eater.

is sociable , was on primary school football team and does team events at karate but falls out with people easily and the other kids have said that he is a 'stress head' and i can see why.

i am awaiting his camhs appointment but i keep going from thinking hes behaving badly and has low self esteem problem to thinking there is truth in the aspergers suggestion.

the outbursts are bad , ive had him hanging himself out the window, taking a knife from the kitchen, punching doors etc etc

Cheery, I can't say what is going on with your ds, but he is at the age where social skills and networks are very important for survival and self-esteem.

If he is having trouble with his social skills I can understand why he is so desperate to have access to the tools that can make it easier.

I have to say that all of the year 7s that I know have Facebook accounts. Whether that is right given the age 13 limit but I know that they have their aunties and uncles on there as well.

I'll put my foot in it and ask a bit of a stupid question. What precisely was he doing on facebook? Did you look at it and see? Was it just silly harmless social stuff? If so, if this is a social outlet that allows him to remain on par with children his age, is it something you can say "look, I will allow you to have it, provided that I monitor it to make sure you are using it safely" and go from there? If he doesn't follow the rules, you can lock him out of the account by changing the password for a preset amount of time as punishment (effectively grounding him from it). And make sure that when he is on the computer it is in a common area of the house where he can't be accessing things he shouldn't be - basically somewhere that you can walk by and see that he is following the rules.

This doesn't mean you have to read everything over his shoulder, but it means you'll see if anyone inappropriate is on his friends list or if there are inappropriate groups or links. It also provides plenty of opportunities to discuss safety on the internet with him.

I would have thought facebook would almost be a good social tool for someone with AS/ASD, as rather than having to interpret facial cues along with discussion, they can read the chat and take a few minutes to formulate a measured reply, rather than having to think of something on the spot. Obviously those social skills still need to be developed as well, but just saying does that take some of the social pressure off? I could be wrong, it's just a thought.

Obviously there are more concerning issues than Facebook here but I would agree with the posters about Facebook not being a bad thing necessarily. Virtually all secondary age kids have it. Ok I did hold out to 13 with my son simply because he has learning difficulties as well as Asd but in actual fact it has been fab for him... he is interacting with the world from a safe place...home. He doesn't like to be with people very much but he loves being able to talk via chat and it's been great for his spelling etc too! I monitor it closely as he will add anyone (no social awareness whatsoever) but on balance it is a good tool for interaction.

To be honest I think you have probably over reacted there and set up a chain of behaviour.. you went nuts at him therefore he has no option but to be sneaky about it... maybe compromise is a way forward?

His other issues don't scream Aspergers at me necessarily but they do scream 'unhappy child' especially given that the problem is really developed at secondary school.. and whatever the cause it sounds as tho he does need help.. if his self esteem is rock bottom and he is struggling to cope with his peers and school.. them school and CAHMS need to be working together to get to the bottom of it. If he does have ASD the same still applies as he needs coping strategies.

I would go to the appointment and very clearly state all the difficulties without trying to guess the 'why' and see what they come up with. On and maybe reinstate facebook with some ground rules.....:)

tbh its not the joining of facebook i have a problem with , i had initially said no as he was falling out with people at school left right and centre and i thought facebook might make things worse. but, i had sort of thought i would let him on soon as he was so desperate for it. But then when he did it anyway i felt i had to make the point and de-activate the account.
my problem is that he has lied and been so sneaky about it, not once but 3 times . He has used his phone for it ( i wondered why his credit was running out so quick !) and the last time i took the phone away.
Hes had it back for 2 days and hes done it again !
what should the consequence be ?
obviously taking the phone doesnt work.
im sure when i was his age i just wouldnt have dared chance it again , i am astounded that he has !

I don't know. It's obviously very important to him. I'd be inclined to maybe say "look this is obviously something important to you. It's not the facebook I mind, it's the way you went behind my back. So let's start again on this. I'll allow the facebook, but there must be certain rules and you MUST follow them." Then lay them out and set up a specific consequence, so he's very clear on it. Just a suggestion.

Hi. I dont know if your ds has ASD, but in some respects, he is like my ds.
My ds is now 15yrs, and academically able, and also has Aspergers. He managed Primary school fairly well, until things went very wrong in P7, when he was 11yrs. His behaviour, that had previously been mostly very difficult at home, spilled over into school, leading to a specialist placement for Secondary school.
Some dc on the Spectrum, can manage well at a Primary school, if it is small, and fairly structured. Also, it helps, that all the teachers know the pupils fairly well.
Secondary school is a different ball game! They are big, the dc move frequently from class to class, the teachers dont know the pupils well, and the dc are surrounded by noise, lots of people at breaks and lunch-time.

My ds was/is socially and emotionally immature compared to his peers. He is also very driven, and when he wants something,it is like he is on a mission, regardless of what else is going on around him. Even now, at 15, he still doesnt "get" action and consequences, which cause some almighty outbursts, when he feels thwarted. He will also do the same thing more th an once, even if we have spoken to him, and said no, cause of xyz.
It doesnt seem to me, that your ds is being badly behaved as such. Perhaps he is "driven" or obsessed with Facebook at present. Maybe let him have it with very clear boundaries.
It might help you and your ds until he has been assessed by CAMHS, to consider that he does have an as yet undx condition, and work from that premise. That is not to say you ignore breaking of rules, but try and understand where that behaviour is coming from. Also, dc on the Spectrum, are best with clear ideas of what is expected of them. Not, lots of talking, and reasoning, but, if you do A then B will happen.
Insist the school put in some support for him and dont wait until he gets to CAMHS. Is there a Base at school where dc with additional support needs, can go at break and lunch? Your ds may feel less stressed if he was able to do this. HTH.

thankyou bigpants , yes they do sound similar ! what age was he diagnosed with aspergers ? what / how did they come to the diagnosis ? every teacher has said ds2 is making little effort , has been insolent and does not complete his work.
we now have an appointment with an autism social worker on 17th may to see if she thinks he does indeed need the asd team as things seem different now than at the initial appointment.
i will be asking to see someone at school before then though. Do you have any idea what i should be saying or asking the school to do at this point ?
sorry to be picking your brains so much , hope you dont mind

Cheery your DS sounds quite like my DD1 who is 14 and was diagnosed with AS after everything fell to pieces when she started high school. Nobody had any idea that she was anything but shy and sensitive before that.

It's hard to look at a list on MN and say whether it fits an AS child or not because the circumstances behind each behaviour are so important and every child with an ASD is different.

I would recommend buying Tony Attwood's 'The Complete Guide to Asperger's Syndrome' and having a really good read about it. Then think about your DS's behaviour and see if the difficulties described in the book could explain your DS's behaviour.

A child could be sneaking onto FB because he is spoilt and manipulative or it could be that this is the first time in his life that he can feel part of a social activity as an equal because all the non-verbal communication he normally misses out on is not used on FB.

School could do some observations on his social interactions and they could also give him someone he can go to when he needs help getting organised as this may well be causing him a great deal of anxiety.

If he does have AS he's probably worked very hard to hide his difficulties in the past and now it's all too much. This would mean that he finds school very stressful which would explain why his behaviour has become harder to manage. If he has AS punishing him for being disorganised or rude will just make matters worse so try to prevent school from taking that tack for now.

HTH