"I can't help it"

[lollipoprainbow]

At what point do you stop letting your sn child use their autism as an excuse for horrible behaviour.?! My 8 year old has suspected autism and every time she does anything wrong and I tell her off I get "I can't help it" said back to me. I am patient most of the time but she is displaying some really horrible behaviour at the moment calling me names and being difficult. My mum is poorly right now and I'm feeling very fragile, I'm worried about my dd's future and her becoming a teenager In fact I'm dreading it.

I think you need to start by sorting out what she genuinely cant help from what she can and look for triggers. With my son, a lot of bad behaviour was down to anxiety and when his anxiety was triggered a torrent of poor behaviour was unleashed. So working out what was likely to trigger anxiety and working with him to come up with strategies to deal with it went a long way. Of course there were times when we fluffed it and ended up shouting, or other times where he just was being bolshy and unpleasant but life is much, much calmer now.