I feel like i've lost her again. This is torture

[makemineaquadruple]

I can't believe things can be so up and down with regards to my DD(4)

She can seem "fine" for weeks at a time. Her social skills are much better, her speech is improved, no tantrums what so ever. Then all of a sudden out of the blue, it's as if a little switch has gone off and she's like a different child.

The last 3 or 4 days i've just felt completely on the edge. She never stops. She's always in a little fantasy land, which is usually a disney princess film and she acts out every little bit. The actions, the script, the expressions everything is identicle. I find it exhausting and not just because it's so repetative, it's because I just can't get through to her.

When she's like this everything that she does is fantasy. There's no sincerity there atall. Even when she says sorry for doing something wrong it's in different voice, which is more than likely from something she's seen on T.V. She comes out with these random comments and I find myself snapping at her that she's not making any sense, which I know is the wrong thing to do. She also wont stop bouncing everywhere. She'll just run backwards and forwards across the living room. I feel like i'm going insane!!!

What's really scaring me and confusing me is how different she can be, as I explained at the begining of the post. Is this something that will just get worse and worse and eventually i'll just lose that other side of her altogether?! That thought is almost like a physical pain.

Any feedback will be much appreciated. Feeling completely useless right now.

Been through this with my DS at a similar age. The telly talk decreased vastly as his language improved, he would go through bad patches with it when tired or unwell. Might be worth getting her a little indoor trampoline to channel the bounciness. Try not to panic too much, it's distressing to listen to but I think it's her way of relaxing/chilling out. Might be worth looking at diet etc just to check whether there are any triggers for these bad spells.

I find this with my girls, there is normally a trigger, too much sun, too out of routine, return to school, too much sugar any number of thing :( keep going it does get easier. Try and work out her triggers if you can. When she gets like this, can you go right back to basics eg PECS, following her lead, copying her movements to reach her?

TotalChaos, we are actually getting her assessed by a SALT any day now hopefully so I really hope that that will help with her general behaviour. Her diet is generally good. It's not brilliant, but she isn't allowed sweets, unless it's a really special occasion. She has an average diet I suppose. Sometimes she has more processed foods than I would want, but overall I think it's ok. About 18 months ago we were advised to start a diet diary by the HV and there was no link what so ever. She could have days where it was a special occasion perhaps and she would eat a lot of junk and be absolutely fine. Then another day she could have an abolutely perfect and balanced diet and she'd fly off the walls. There's never really been a link with her behaviour changing. The only time it changes usually is when she's coming down with something. I might look into the idea of a trampoline. She loves the one her cousin has outside.

lisad I wasn't sure what you mean when you said "copying her movements to reach her". Could you explain? Is this something that you do with your dd's? And what did you mean by PECS? sorry, i'm still quite new to all this.

Oh no I wasn't getting at it being junk food or anything, just to see if behaviour worsens with lots of dairy/white bread, anything like that.

not to speak for Lisa, but what I think lisa means is if say your DD is crawling around, she might like it if you copied what she was doing, it might help get her attention iyswim. PECs is short for picture exchange system - used alongside speech in some cases for language delay.

sorry, whenDD2 got a little lost in her world, if shes sitting rocking, we do it too, if she lays on the floor we lay there too, if she jumps around we do too. Havent had to do it often and now shes slightly older we dont have to do it at all, buti know her SN school do it with children too.
PECS is picture exchange communication.

Hey, I was trying to read my 4yo son a story tonight, he just wanted to repeat a car insurance advert to me 30 times + (including their 11 digit contact number)
feels like there's no getting through, and no real interaction, it's difficult :/

This sounds exactly like my DD. She is 4.5 and went through a 'Wizard of OZ' obsession. My God if I heard 'Ding Dong the witch is dead' one more bloody time I think I would scream. She also can repeat word for word all sketches in Gigglebiz. We are going to see ABA specialists today so am going to ask their advice on this one but what we have been doing is just interrupting her when she comes out with her random comments and I say "we are not talking about that we are talking about................." and then I steer her back to the topic of conversation and reward her for continuing the conversation nicely. This has definitely cut down on the randomness but I know it won't work for everyone and might sound a bit harsh. DD even corrects me now "Mummy we aren't talking about that we are talking about this......." lol.

Totally agree with the trampoline idea we got an outside one and DD loves it keeping her away from the tv altogether when the weather is nice is brill.

totalandlisa, thanks for clearing that up. I think I understood what you meant the first time, but just wanted to make sure. You know how it is. You'll try anything!

Gigglebizmizz, understanding your name a little more now. Please don't judge me on mine.

It's a difficult balance with the t.v isn't it. I was actually discussing with dp last night whether or not to just stop her watching it altogether. Sounds a little extremem I know, but I really wondered if the t.v was doing her more harm than good. Obviously some of it is very educational and I don't want her to be the only one in her class who doesn't know who a certain cbeebies character is. She's separated enough as it is, but i'm wondering if maybe it just doesn't suit her. For example, we were just watching Toy Story 3(forgetting I cried like a baby!!) and because she'd seen it before with her dad she acted everything out 1 or 2 seconds before it happened. For 10 minutes you can cope, but for nearly 2 hours let's just say it's draining. It finished 3 hours ago and she's still running up and down the living room pretending to be jessie. Sometimes you can see the funny side to it, or rather you have to, but days like yesterday and a few days before that I was just sat there like a zombie trying to block everything out. The thing is you can't be in that state when you're looking after a child. Not to mention a child with( more than likely) special needs.

Has anybody got any success stories regarding SALT? I'm still waiting for an appointment to be made, but was just wondering what the general concensus was.

Thanks again for your replies.
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re:SALT. don't set your expectations too high, it's not a quick fix, and they are likely to be more involved in assessing her language/communication, pinpoiting problems areas, looking at realisticc next steps, and advising you how to work with her than doing lots of hand on therapy themselves. My DS has come on massively - wouldn't say he's exactly normal (tho no autism diagnosis) but went from being severely lang delayed at 3 to bottom end of normal range by 5.5, and at 7 it's more his social use of language than actual languagae ability himself that's concerning me

It's helpful with kids with this sort of screwy language development to try and limit TV watching to 1/2 hour sessions. But obv sometimes life with an SN kid is hard and it's the only way to get anything done is to let the telly go on! if you do cut down on telly tho you might find there's lots of repetition of books etc instead...