I am having a bad day,I don't know what to do anymore.im at the end of my tether with both DC,and no one wants to help us.

[LiberteEgaliteFRIGGernite]

DD was supposed to be being assessed for spectrum disorders....6 months later....nothing.
She is getting harder to handle and I don't know what to do,I cannot cope with her.she is nearly four,and starting school in September.I can't wait.i worry for her,but equally can't wait to get her into school for 6hours a day.
I know how awful that sounds.

DS has a speech delay.he has made no progress in 6 months.i have had two paed appointments and a hearing rest,which is more than DD has had,but still,no actual help.

I don't know what to do.
I don't even know what I want from this thread.

And I'm bloody crying now.

Triggles,thankyou.
The luchbox Idea is utter genius,why haven't I thought of that before?!
It's perfect,it will keep her amused and feed her.
She does wake up hungry but doesn't often eat the concoctions she makes,although she did tell me this morning her 'yogurt' was the best yogurt in the whole world' - she had added butter < sick face.
She normally eats 3 breakfasts,so a starter breakfast is nothing unusual,but the lunchbox is brilliant,I can make her one up and leave it out,upstairs,she might not even try to go down then...thankyou!

She does respond better to positive reinforcement,if you attempt to tell her off she starts chanting,or screaming,covers her ears,sings,flaps her hands in front of her face,or throws her self on the floor,if you try to touch her at all,she goes stiff,then limp,so it is just impossible to talk to her...

I don't know what I'd do if I didn't have DP here at night,honestly,how on earth did you cope?
We are trying to get him Monday's off,but his boss isn't keen.im not allowed any days off,my boss went so far as to say if my DC were rushed to hospital on a weekend,and I went with them,I'd be sacked immediately.

Liberte- hope it helps. Honestly, I couldn't cope - I was literally falling apart!! Thankfully now, DS3 sleeps through the night, so even if DS2 wakes up, I can get through. It DOES get better!

As far as positive reinforcement, we've done some of the following:

• DS2 was jumping on his bed. Doesn't listen to "don't jump on the bed." So we put his mini trampoline in his bedroom, and remind him "trampolines are for jumping, beds are for sleeping."

• DS2 wanted to colour on the walls. Doesn't listen to "don't colour on the walls." So we taped a huge piece of paper (from paper roll) on the wall, and told him to colour on the paper. Other than occasional slips, he coloured on the paper. If he coloured on the wall after that, we took away the crayons for a short period of time (like 2-3 minutes), then asked him if he'd like to colour on the paper and if he said yes, then we gave him back the crayons. And just repeated as necessary.

Easiest way to change the behaviour (at least for DS2) is to provide an acceptable alternative that they CAN do. Then reinforce the acceptable alternative by praise when they do it. And we try to provide a short easy catchphrase for DS2 that he can say. Always in positive form, not a "don't" kind of thing, but something encouraging the acceptable alternative IYSWIM.

Oh... and I so agree with you on the butter and the sick face. eeewwww... my little sister used to eat a spoonful of butter when she was about 3 or 4yo. blech!!! < sick face here too

Right,acceptable alternatives,easy catchphrase...
those sound like they will work.

thankyou,all of you.
I'm so exsausted Im not thinking of the obvious things anymore.
all I can think is 'stop it,stop it stop it!'
Unfortunately,that doesn't go down to well...

That's just the exhaustion. It tends to drop "reason and sanity" out the back window. If you can manage to swing a few extra hours of sleep with your DH's help, it will make a load of difference.

i can relate to the tiredness. DD1 started sleeing through one month before DD2 was born. Then DD2 took 11 months before she started sleeping through. She would wake up every hour and then i had to get up at 7 with DD1. DD1 doesnt nap during the day so i couldnt catch up and i can remember being at breaking point.
DD1 also doesnt understand consequences and sometimes doesnt hear me (but somtimes i catch her smerking so i know she does)
DD2 constantly falls over banging her head (god knows how she isnt brain damaged). My two have little fights generally over toys but DD2 is an attention seeker according to my suport worker.
I couldnt do anything, she constantly cried and was always attatched to my leg. The only time she was quite was when she was in my arms.
She always up an down off my lap and follows me everywhere.
She has got better an i seeked help from a support worker who has taught me technics to cope with her demanding behaviour but she is still very demanding

We don't get DLA,we don't even have a DX,or know if there is even one to be had...maybe we're just cruddy parents,and surely you can't get DLA just because your cruddy parents,surely it's hard enough to get it if you have an actual condition to label the behaviour with?!

This morning went really well,I made her a luchbox full of snacks,and one for DS as she always wants to make him breakfast too.
She didn't climb the gate and all went well,I reckon she was awake for about 15mins before us.

DP went down with the DC and left me to doze.As I'd been up with DS a lot during the night (and tbf he does do most mornings as I still BF DS at night)

I woke up to him shouting,nearly screaming at DD.
Apparently,he had fallen asleep,and she had gone into the kitchen.and spilt orange juice and milk all over the dinning room rug.

So now I can't leave him alone either.great.

Frigg.

I have read your first two posts and the first thing that stands out is your frustration at not being able to verbally control her. I remember that feeling so well, but now that I have a diagnosis for my son, some of the frustrations lifted.

Here are some of the things that have helped me.

Fuck the stair gate. Kids like ours are just too clever for them. Get a deadbolt on the first downstairs door she comes across. Stop her accessing the kitchen full stop, and sleep with the key on a ribbon around your neck.

Take the stools away. Get rid of them if you don't have a shed.

Take the curtains down and replace with a blind that you can roll right up during the day.

Obtain some sort of computer game for her to play on.

Clean one room per day. Try really hard to clear the living room of everything before you go to bed. But other than that, fuck the housework off. You don't have time for it. Buy some pasta and buy some jars of sauce and buy some frozen peas. That's dinner.

If at all possible, get a dishwasher. It has made a massive difference to my kitchen. I cannot stand in my kitchen for forty five minutes at a time, washing up, I have to supervise, and it seemed like the washing up never ever got done.

If you want more detail on how I got through the fucking godawful years before ds had a diagnosois, pm me. I'm happy to share tips!

I have an Argos door alarm fitted to my sons bedroom door. I know when he is up and about now, it's about as loud as a fire alarm, and it's a good deterrent too, as he dislikes the noise of it.

colditz I absolutely luff you.

Just one thing though.
There are no doors.
It's a Victorian terrace with a galley kitchen,the kitchen was extended slightly into the dinningroom,so theres no door,or even door frame,and the stairs open out directly onto his space.

theres a door to the DC's 'end' of the corridor (not as grand as it sounds,it's an attic convertion and as theres no door to DDs attic room,there has to be on at the bottom of her stairs (fire regs),but there is about a square foot of 'hall' in front of DS's bedroom,before'her door) so if we close that door,we section him off too,and I have to get up for him at about 3am to bring him into ours...so,are the alarms easy to switch on and off,so I can have it on,then turn it off to go I to him (maybe 4times a night,and finally at 3am) and then put it back on again?

Yes, the alarms switch on and off really easily.

They stick onto the door and the door frame with sticky pads, and when the door is opened, they go off loudly. However, you place them on YOUR side of the door, so if you want to open the door without the alarm going off, you can just switch it off.

Place it at the top of the door, as once she realises its that making that hateful, mummy-summoning noise, she will try to demolish it.

www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/7003419.htm

Thankyou I'll get one of those.
Off to work,late because dd decided to jump off the toy box and hit her head,again,just as I was leaving,obviously.
Gawd I love going to work.
It's a shite job but it is so frigging EASY!

Dog gates are bigger than stair gates so on tiptoe she might not reach the mechanism with enough force to work it.

We use plastic plates nearly all the time, the dc used to keep busy 'helping' to wash up (floor splashes substituted for washing it, tbh the amount of water meant bath-dodging didn't matter much either

Download the cerebra guide to claiming dla: aim for higher rate care for dd. if she generally needs a buggy/ carrying for safety you'll get mobility too. You don't need a diagnosis, its about care needs not about disease labels.

The first decision is usually a 'no', but when you appeal they give a staff member long enough to read the claim. Then they say 'yes'.

My friend applied for dla with no diagnosis. She got higher rate care.

I think you need to make an appointment every week or so at the doctor until you get a referral, then pester the living day lights out of the paed. She needs an assessment and you needs that too.

Look up mobility / sensor alarms. There are loads of different kinds - ones which attach to the side of the bed or a wall and have a beam which when crossed goes off. Floor mats which go off when you step on them.
But social services / DLA should pay for these.
You can get DLA without a diagnosis. We applied before the diagnosis came through. If you can get a letter from paed to say are awaiting formal assessment for ASC
There is a bit of the form which you need another person to fill in to confirm problems - our HV let us fill it in and she signed it; but you don't need to fill it in you can tick the box asking for a Dr to come and do an assessment.

Look at Cerebra guide to getting DLA, it has lots of examples and explains how often you have to be up in the night to get the high rate. You may also have a local carers charity or CAB who will help fill in the forms. They are exhausting to fill in though, but worth it.

You are right a lot of DLA applications get refused without a diagnosis - but this is just the govt trying to save money - you ask for a review. Often they are just trying it on.

If positive behaviour strategies work try tackling one thing at a time, if you can use a token / reward system great. But you can start by just frankly bribing. For e.g. DS used to strip off his clothes and hate having his hair cut. We now use tokens but we started by just giving him chocolate buttons when he kept his clothes on / let us cut his hair. So at intervals we just kept praising him for still having his clothes on and gave him a tiny bit of chocolate and fairly quickly he left them on and we were able to just keep praising him verbally and fade out the chocolate. You can also use a visual timetable to show we put clothes on in the morning and take them off at night. I know its hard but try not to go give lots of attention when she takes them off, but I would make her put the original ones on and tidy up, then go back to reinforcing the keeping the clothes on.

DS is quite rule driven / rigid so once he learns a rule he does tend to stick to it.

Argos sell a bigger dog stairgate apparently. You can also get some room divider type stair gates so perhaps you could fence off part of her room where she sleeps? We thought about this with DS if we could divide the room in half to a bed bit and a play/storage bit.

The family fund may consider you for a grant for the safety equipment and a dishwasher.

If I were you I would cosleep with Ds to maximise sleep as much as possible. Could DH sleep on the sofa to intercept dd? Or evenin her room?

Family fund link

You might find that your local council or children's centre do a service where they provide you with the equipment either for free or for v little money.

sayjay we are just fazing out the co-sleeping,so some nights he does spend all night with us,the reason we are fazing it out is because he wakes more often,as hes after milk,if I don't let him he wakes properly and screams if I do let him,he will feed for hours on end,so,despite me being asleep,I still wake up knackered from feeding him all night!
DP used to sleep in DD's room for this very reason,and because she woke so often in the night,it made more sence to just be in there.but,honestly,what little scraps of an adult relationship we had left dwindled and we very nearly slip up.

She's driving me mad this afternoon,shouting at me,refusing to go to the dinner table,spitting shouting "No!" at absolutely everything I say.
Days like this I just think she's naughty,and I'm a genuinely shit parent.
I'm not worth your sympathys.
I think she'd be better off with someone else.i can't do this.

Err,sorry bout that dramatic moan...have pulled myself together now...