Finding this tricky at the moment. DS is aged four (HFA) and won't leave his 17mth old brother alone. He teases him mercilessly. Tonight he kept pulling and waggling his ears causing obvious distress to DS2 but he thought it was funny. Other times it can be poking or pulling at his hair. He's relentless, keeps on and on and can't easily be distracted away from it. I can't really ignore it as it's upsetting his younger brother but find resorting to time out rarely makes a difference.
I suppose the teasing thing is to do with the theory of mind business, he thinks it funny so assumes DS2 does too. However it goes beyond that when it's more than a joke and he will make unprovoked attacks on his brother for what reason I know not. Quite randomly he will hit him (usually not that hard) or push him over. He's forever snatching away whatever toy DS2 is playing with much to the frustration of DS2 who then has toddler hysterics and whacks his older brother back and my toddler has a good punch! Again have repeatedly tried to teach DS1 not to snatch toys away but too little avail. What is worse is that once he's taken the toy from DS2 he rapidly discards it and then removes whatever DS2 has moved onto. The teashing, hitting and snatching makes life at home stressful to say the least. Feel like I'm playing referee the whole time and it's frustrating as nothing I seem to do helps and I feel like I'm getting it all wrong.
My son swings between withdrawn passive ASD behaviour when he's generally a pleasant child and easy to manage and hyperactive impulsive behaviour that is wearing. We are in the latter phase at the momene and it's at these times that the teasing and aggression are at their worse. The thing is despite my description DS1 is generally not an aggressive child. With virutally every other child he is passive and the one likely to be picked on or have his toy taken off him by another child. At nursery a child he wants to be his friend has pinched him several times, DS never retaliates. This child also has a reputation for not sharing and I wonder if DS is copying him to a degree at home. I don't think this is the only reason for his behaviour but maybe it's not helping. I know too from talking to friends that brothers fight and maybe some of this is normal? Is this just normal sibling rivalry? DS is generally immature, is this him just exhibiting the behaviour of a younger child in an ASD socially inappropriate way?
Does anyone else have this sort of thing with their child? How do you deal with it, how do I teach my son that teasing is not funny even if he thinks so, how do I teach him to share with his brother and to not randomly attack him when the mood takes him. I do worry about the future that if he doesn't learn these sorts of lessons now he will have no friends of his own or I will end up bring up a psychopath.
Liz x