Dealing with meltdowns

[saltedcaramelmuffin]

DS is undiagnosed but we suspect he has ASD. He is triggered for a meltdown tonight, I’ve just had a load of things thrown at me and he has been throwing things around his room. It’s been an out of routine week so I’m not surprised the meltdown is building, but I don’t know how to deal with it when he is on the edge but not fully triggered.

He is aggressive and rude, refusing to go to bed, very angry and wound up. I suspect it’s going to be a late night.

How do you cope with meltdown behaviour where they hurt you? I try to encourage him to be calm and we talk about it being ok to have his feelings but it’s not ok to hurt other people, but mid meltdown all that is lost to him.

How old is your ds? I have a feeling mine is probably younger but I quite often have to cope with meltdowns like you are describing.

Is there something that you know calms him? When my ds is getting anxious or wound up we give him an iPad or put on the TV and food or drink that calms him so that we can avoid a meltdown. Do you know what his triggers are, so you can avoid them? Sometimes it's helpful to keep an ABC chart, so that when possible you can avoid things that will set him off.

Once you've gone into full meltdown, there not a huge amount you can do. Although I have some success in the past getting my ds to throw noisy things like wooden blocks into a bucket or getting him to throw things downstairs (rather than at people).

I was told that it is really important after my ds's meltdowns, when he is calm, to help explain what happened ie 'you were angry' etc so that he can help label the emotion that he was feeling.

There is a book you might find helpful, published by the NAS and available from them or on Amazon. It’s called Autism: understanding and managing anger. It has a lot of information and strategies for how to avoid meltdowns and also how to deal with the ‘rumbling stage’ (which I think is what you’re describing), meltdown and afterwards. It’s presented very well, very easy to read.