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Aspergers and siblings...Help & advice needed!!!

5 replies

Shellywelly1973 · 03/03/2012 23:48

Advice needed!!!
My son is 7 he has a dx of Aspergers & ADHD. I also have a DD 10 & DS3. When the children are seperate they are fine...but together its awful!!
They physically fight,really horrible in the way they speak to each other and generally torment each other. IF my DD & DS3 are together they are ok, just usual sibling bickering etc. Ive tried so many different approaches, ignoring, time out etc but its very difficult to apply one rule to 3 children with such different levels of understanding. I've resorted to seperating all 3 by lots of after school activities and organising the weekends like a military operation!!! But its exhausting and not a long term solution. I was hoping other parents might have some good tactics and approaches you could share. Thanks

OP posts:
Ineedalife · 04/03/2012 09:47

No advice, sorry shelly. I have exactly the same problem.

I have 3 Dd's age 23, 16 and 9. It is my 9 year old who has ASD.

The older ones have zero tolerance for the youngest. They make no effort to understand her needs or wishes.

I thought telling them about the ASD would help them to understand but if anything they are worse.

Dd1 has left home so just does her own thing.

I have recently resorted to fining Dd2 everytime she is spiteful to Dd3 or deliberately winds her up.

I punish Dd3 accordingly when she is being a pain but of course the older ones never see that and just tell me she is spoilt.

Sorry to rant, i too am sick of the sibling stuff.

At least you are not aloneSad

moosemama · 04/03/2012 13:28

I have 3dcs, ds1 is 9 - almost 10 and has AS and ds2 is 7 - almost 8 and is nt and dd is 3 and also nt.

There is A LOT of discord between them. Ds2 is a sweetheart and for years has stolidy put up with being railroaded and bullied, ranted at and criticised by ds1. He has recently reached the end of his tether though, unfortunately and there are now almost constant fights. He refuses to respond to ds1's constant nagging and demands to do things his way and will just ignore him, this makes ds1 really mad and things escalate from there. Ds2 invariably refuses to play with ds1 these days as well, because the game always has to run to ds1's rules and be driven and controlled by him.

Dd struggles to understand why ds1 breaks all the social rules that she is learning and is constantly in her face and hugging her etc when she doesn't want him to. She also gets upset when he doesn't make allowances for her being so much younger and expects her to live to his rules.

There is rarely any peace at the moment as one or either pair of them - or worse, all three are generally fighting about something. Hmm

I sat with ds2 yesterday and had a long talk with him about ds1's dx and what it actually means. He said he didn't want to go to the shop with dh and ds1, because ds1 is always buzzing around being irritated and getting in the way and its embarrassing. So I talked to him about disabilities and hidden disabilities and ask him if he had a brother who was in a wheelchair that was cumbersome and got in his way would he say unkind things about his brother being a pain and embarrassing then. He said of course not and I went on to explain that ds1's disabilities are just as valid and deserving of respect and understanding as a child who has an obvious physical disability. We then had a long talk, again, about what Aspergers is and how it affects ds1's behaviour and us as a family and eventually ds2 started coming up of his own volition, with ways that ds1's AS can be a good thing and how clever he is etc.

I told him how proud I was of how much patience he has had with ds1 over the years and how I understand that AS can try the patience of a saint and I wouldn't expect him to be superhuman and always be that patient, but I do expect him to try. We discussed how hard it is on the whole family when one member has a disability of any sort, but how being a family, we are the very people that should love and support that person unconditionally and how we would rather have ds1 with AS than not have him at all. I also explained how he is maturing faster than and actually overtaking ds1 emotionally now and that's why things seem harder, but that ds1 will continue to develop and mature, just more slowly.

By this time ds1 was home and we all sat together and decided to come up with some strategies together that he felt would help deal with some of the conflict flashpoints such as choosing a game to play - who goes first - who's rules etc.

What we came up with was sometimes agreeing to play X amount of time of ds1's game and then the same amount of ds2's - or X amount playing by ds1's rules and then having a go at ds2's and seeing which worked best. We also came up with using highest number on a dice or coin flipping for deciding who starts a game and also for resolving black/white conflicts about what to do.

Not sure how much any of these will help, but at least they're willing to give it a try.

As for house rules, they are the same for all three dcs. We may have to use judgement in how we respond to them breaking the rules occasionally, but the fundamental rules - no hitting, no rude words, no spinning in the house, no ball games in the house etc are the same for all three.

Being deliberately tormenting or teasing is a one warning then ten minutes screen time lost deal for all three of them and then if it happens again, they lose screen time for that day.

I think if you keep the basic rules very simple and make the consequences clear, then all three should be able to understand the rule and the consequence - so eg, any hitting, you will get no warning and lose your computer/screen time for that day. If you hit again after that you will lose screen time for X amount of days.

Not sure if any of that is any help.

As Ineed said, I am also sick of all the sibling squabbles and constant bickering as well and this weekend we've really hit the wall with it. All we can do is keep talking openly with all three dcs and try and agree some strategies to try, that we're all happy with.

Sorry you are going through it too - I think its very common in families where there is AS.

mariasalome · 04/03/2012 21:45

DD wants to be re-homed, or (her first choice) for ds1 to live far away.

mariasalome · 04/03/2012 21:46

Mind you, she wants rid of ds2 as well and (so far anyway) it's only ds1 with a dx.

moosemama · 04/03/2012 22:01

Ah maria, sibling love - you've gotta admire it! Grin

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