Reposting from chat. Please help!

[Faverolles]

Ds2 is 8, being assessed for possible ASD. He's fine at school, but violent and aggressive at home.
We have some times when things are relatively calm, and we feel that we know what we're doing, then we have weeks like this week, which are absolute hell on earth, and drive us to near breaking point.
I don't know if it's a normal back to school thing, but every evening this week, we've (all the rest of the family - me, dh, ds1, dd and ds3) been threatened, punched, slapped, bitten, spat at, sworn at, insulted constantly.
I can't cope. I know he'll calm down a bit at some point, we'll still have this behaviour, but not as intensely. But for now, the whole family is struggling.
We've explained to the older dc (13 and 11) that they need to back off from ds2, when he's feeling angry, he needs space.
Ds1 in particular seems to think that we are favouring ds2 because he gets more time with us, but this week he has only had more time because he has been wound up to the point of being a danger to himself and the others, and one of us has to help him calm down (he usually ends up sobbing that we should just kill him) and basically supervise him.
Ds1 cannot resist winding him up, he doesn't seem able to back off, so we have more outbursts than we should probably have.
I don't want ds1 and dd to feel responsible, but I want them to understand that how they react to him makes a huge difference to the severity of ds2's behaviour - is this unreasonable of me to expect this? (Really, I genuinely want to know!)

Dh and I are relatively new to this, it's only been a few months that we have allowed ourselves to see that there is a problem, and not a naughty child/crap parent situation.
There isn't really anyone in RL who gets what's going on, mostly they think we're soft on him(we're not), or suggest that we get really cross with him (like we don't do that already, but it doesn't work and makes the situation worse)
He has been referred to CAMHS, but that could take months.

We have noticed that we can do practical things that have helped - putting a tent over his bed, giving him opportunities to tell us how he's feeling, and do something calm with him if he's feeling angry, not taking him to the supermarket etc.

This week is off the wall though. Please, please tell me what else I can do to help him. He's such a lovely little boy when he's not angry.


^ I posted the above in chat, I had a thread in here a while ago, but I've lost it.
I really need practical advice. I feel like our family could break up over this, and I don't want that to happen.

[Faverolles]

He's been assessed at school by a behavioural therapist, but showed no outward signs at all of being stressed.
I'm not sure if the autism outreach (who the SENCO is trying to get involved) will spot anything different.

The school have strategies for autistic dc when they see signs of stress, but ds doesn't show any signs of stress at all, and comes out of school angry but mostly not knowing why.

Ds is unwilling to let anyone at school know if he's feeling stressed at all, as he thinks it will mark him as different.
I'll talk to the SENCO again and see if we can come up with other ideas.

[Faverolles]

I've put the book on my Amazon wish list.
Ds has the Asperger's children's toolkit (or something like that), which he really likes and tries out some of the things it suggests, although only when he's in a calm, reasonable mood :)

We were seeing CAMHS for our older two dc (anxiety), but have been signed off now. They know about the situation with ds2, and have written a letter to his GP to say that if we continue to struggle, they will fast track him in rather than having a 6 month wait.

I had a chat with the lady at CAMHS and she was very helpful and explained why ds has so many violent thoughts (which dh and I have been very worried about!), she said it was because ds is too immature to know how he's feeling, so when he's feeling bad, he swears, says he's going to kill himself/others, because that's the only way he can get across how awful he's feeling.

Having a tricky day today, have been out and they've all fought, they want to go somewhere this afternoon, but I'm putting it off as I can't face fights, swearing and inevitable head shakes at what a crap parent I am today. So I'm holed up in the bathroom, pretending to be on the loo, while I have 5 minutes peace :o

[Faverolles]

Dd has another book in that series - what to do when you worry too much. She had a session with either dh or me every evening, so I imagine it's a bit like that?

[Faverolles]

No! not patronising at all :)

[Faverolles]

I've written a letter to ds's paediatrician to ask for something in writing about our appointment. Hopefully we can get autism outreach involved at school - I don't know what happens, or what hey will do, but we're really struggling with him at the moment.

Here is the letter:-

"Following our appointment on the 23rd January 2014, the SENCO at Xxx's school is asking for involvement from Autism Outreach to hopefully put some support in place for Xxx at school. Over the next couple of years he will have a few transitions that we feel he will find stressful and exacerbate his behaviour at home.

In order for this to go ahead, Autism Outreach have asked for the outcome of the appointment in writing.

I understand that the waiting time for assessment is two years, but I'm hoping that in the meantime Autism Outreach can help Xxx in school and go some way to preventing the constant meltdowns at home."

I'm crap at wording stuff, does this look ok, or should I add anything/take anything out?
Thank you x

[Faverolles]

Polter, that's brilliant, thank you :)

[Faverolles]

Having a tricky week (for a change )
Two nights raging over golden time, his class are now changing it so instead of losing time for bad behaviour, time is accrued for good behaviour (hooray!)
Last night he was kicking off because there was a last minute change to a painting afternoon at school. He enjoyed what they did instead, but couldnt understand why he was angry - I think it must have been the sudden change? He was angry on his way out of school and it went downhill from there.
He also blew up because I washed his sheets . Is that normal? He said he was never going to be comfortable in bed again.

Had a letter back from the paediatrician today. Hopefully it'll help to get some support in school for ds. It was quite difficult seeing it written down in black and white.

[Faverolles]

So he's not unusual then :)

The HT has the letter now and hopes it'll be enough to get a Autism Outreach involved.
She has suggested that we start looking at secondary schools now so there is plenty of time to make an informed decision about where he will go in two years time.

Thank you for your help writing the letter

[Faverolles]

I bought a book a couple of weeks ago (I think you might have recommended it on another thread Polter?) Learning to Live with high functioning Autism.
It arrived today, and one passage has made my day.
I want to take a photo of it and put it on Facebook, but I'm too much of a coward :o
"Because children with high functioning autism often perfect a public persona which crumbles in the safety of their home environment it is often only the parents who witness their autistic behaviour."
I have a few people in mind to show it to!

[Faverolles]

I have a close family member who I think keeps trying to suggest munchhausens (but without actually saying it).
I had a conversation with her yesterday with her saying that he wasn't autistic as he doesn't look autistic
He's just going through a phase.
He needs to do more sport.
He doesn't have any social issues as he knows to hold it together at school etc.
I'd post the photo from the book, but I think it would be seen as passive aggressive and fixing for a fight.
But on the other hand, it might save me from getting defensive every time I open my mouth to certain people!

[Faverolles]

Autocorrect completely cocked up the spelling of Munchausen's there

[Faverolles]

DH and I are having a major wobble tonight :(
The last week has been awful, constant meltdowns. We've been punched, sworn at, spat at.
I've read in the learning to live...... book that secondary school is often the difficult time for dc with autism
We can barely cope now, and he's 8. What the hell do we do if he's still having violent meltdowns when he's a teenager?
How do we teach him not to lash out? When he's calm he understands, when he's angry everything goes out of the window :(

[Faverolles]

We kept a diary for a while for the behavioural support but stopped when we saw the paediatrician.
How far do we go with a diary - do we write down what he's eaten as well as triggers etc?

Haven't looked at sensory strategies I don't think. What are sensory strategies?

[Faverolles]

Hang on, sensory strategies like ear muffs to block out too much sound, things like that?

He has ear muffs (he doesn't like it when ds3 cries), but will only wear them when he's calm.
We don't take him to the supermarket any more.

When he has a meltdown, I try to get him out for a walk or upstairs to his room. In his room he buries himself under duvets or does handstands and calms down.

I have noticed that staying very quiet myself and herding him upstairs helps. Dh struggles a bit. The first sign of a meltdown is swearing. Dh tries to tell him off which escalates the situation, but as neither of us know what we're doing, and the other dc resent him hugely for "getting away" with really bad behaviour.

This last week, I have had a bad back so haven't been able to physically get him upstairs, so I think meltdowns have got more vicious partly because of that.

[Faverolles]

He mostly has meltdowns after school, we'll sometimes hear snippets and can sometimes work out what's going on.

I was told about another school locally that apparently is very good for dc with SN. However, is it a case of better the devil you know?
He has some really good friends at school. I don't want to uproot him and make things worse. And every school has the potential to hire a crap teacher at some point.

I'm worried about choosing the right secondary school.
On one hand, the school my older dc go to is fairly small, encouraging, has short days, teachers who know every pupil.
There's another school that has a very good reputation for SN, but it's huge, has long days (including a long bus journey either end), but has a SN department so presumably would have teachers more aware of the needs of someone with as?

Sorry for the epic rambling posting this morning. Very aware that the choices we make for him now will affect how happy he is now and when he's older. Quite a responsibility.

I bought school a copy of the learning to live book. It gives more insight than any other book I've read, so may be useful for his teacher to read.