Randomly shouting out in supermarkets

[Autumnbutstillhot]

Dd, just turned 4…just wanted to check this and other behaviours are for want of a better word, normal.
She will just randomly shout out or fo some silly noises, she does them at home also and often repeats what she’s saying. She gets very excited and finds it v difficult to calm down. She’s v impatient and often shouts and gets upset. When I ask her why she just shouted out, out of nowhere, she says she doesn’t know why.
She loves music videos but wants to watch the same again and again and gets annoyed if we can’t. She’s so hyper at times and takes ages to get to sleep.
Love her so much but the way she acts is so difficult at times, Dh especially has no patience for the noises she makes etc and says she’s being silly, I’m worried in case it’s something else.

@Autumnbutstillhot I wonder if there's any local free education courses in your area, most places will have a community learning fund. I did an autism awareness course for work via one of these platforms and something similar would answer a lot of your questions around sensory seeking, why the behaviours come and go etc. It was a 2 hour zoom session of an evening so nothing particularly strenuous.

@KickAssAngel What age was she diagnosed? What age did you start to notice things, did it get harder with age? I’m finding this all really difficult

This also really helped my husband understand our sons needs and tolerance

www.edpsyched.co.uk/blog/autism-spoon-theory

@OhRiRi Thank you 🙏

Would a child be so hyperactive with ASD? I feel that some days (most days) she literally doesn’t stop, even in bed at night before sleeping, she’s fidgeting around

Yep all rings true here too, he needs me to help regulate him in the midst of a meltdown and needs cuddles but it's often hard for him to accept.

He is getting much better, and I can often nip it in the bud with a bit of humour now.
He'll often say to me 'mummy I'm full of wiggles/I'm muddled/I need to run, jump, climb'. He's very sensory seeking when in these throws. He wants to cuddle me hard, touch and pinch skin, poke, prod. I stop that and offer gentle skin contact, his cheek on my chest for example. It does calm him down. We have fidgets, stress balls and so on.

This is not all the time though, he is very loving, empathetic and kind most of the time, only when he's maxed our does all this come out. He's had one difficult morning at school since the start of term but has done beautifully the rest of the time. He ses to be really thriving with short bursts of activities during the school day and I've had several glowing feed back from his teacher.

He never stops talking though, contant chatter from dawn till dusk and ocasionally in his sleep. If he's tired it gets more intense and he's a ball of fizzing wiggles, unable to sit still, falling over, walking into stuff, knocking food and drinks everywhere. Swimming lessons make it worse but a very big warm bath calms him down, he will lie in woth just his face sticking out like a floatation tank 😁, I often think I need one of those for me some evenings!

He did used to lash out a fair bit in his meltdowns, anyone near by, mostly me, but sometimes his friends or teachers at Preschool, then he'd hold a lot of shame about it. Lots of 'I don't know why mummy', very upsetting and difficult for everyone invovled. I've done lots of work with him in naming and acknowledging his feelings.

It's worth mentioning we left a very verbally and emotionally abusive home two years ago, my exH, his Dad being the culprit. DS only sees him in supervised contact sessions now. ExH could not cope with family life at all and placed all blame onto DS and me often in explosive tempers. I know that played a big part in how DS showed his emotions and how he saw himself, he mirrored what he saw from exH in his actions and his hateful words used against us. I dont think its caused his 'wiggles' but it's exasperated it.

I've spent the past two years undoing all of that and building up DS's confidence and pride in himself. He's finally got some sessions of Play-therapy too.

This is hopefully not your sotuation at all but I'm trying to use lots of aspects of Therputic Parenting with DS and its brilliant, specially PACE to difuse situations. It's worth a Google.

@WankBadger5000 Is be worse being in water/the pool? I’ve noticed that when Dd plays near the waves at the beach, she loves it but can’t then calm herself down and just runs in and out constantly, it just looks v different to the other children, just very hyper like a Duracell bunny. When she was smaller she’d crawl fast for ages down the beach and then when she started walking, she’d just run off down the beach with us after her 🙈
Shes always been like that, but the meltdowns etc weren’t really there like now and the noises and so on when in the supermarket or splashing around in the water

@WankBadger5000 Glad you were able to escape your previous situation, you sound like a lovely mum and doing everything right, it’s so hard at the moment as we need more patience really, her behaviour can be really testing

@WankBadger5000 I’m wondering if the music etc does make her worse, she often says at bedtime she has this song or other and can’t get it out of her head.
She just needs to calm everything down really. Would you ever give medication?
I just worry for her and hate the thought of her being confused and overwhelmed

He's worse in the pool because it's busy and loud and there are ten other kids I the class, probably six other classes going on too. He just pogo's up and down and can't wait his turn, I think it's the distractions, noise and excitement as he LOVES being in the water. Not just him though as there are a couple of others who struggle to follow the teacher too. He's different if swimming somewhere quieter with just me, much calmer.

That's true of most situations really, just me and him, no problems, outside distractions not so good. He's a bugger if I'm talking to someone else or on the phone though, he'll get increasing attention seeking 😬

The real danger zone is soft play, it's his absolute best thing ever. We often do a very early Sunday morning slot with one of his equally high energy friends. He will run and climb and jump for two hours none stop. Our kids are similar so we both manage the exit well. The problem arises with parties at soft play when there is a whole class full there and he gets so hyped up and deregulated that it always ends in an absolute crying, sweating, thrashing meltdown. I can never catch that right!

DS loves his music too, he likes to play, listen, dance but it has to be managed so he doesn't get too overestimated in the evening. We'll often have a little dance after tea, we do kids dance clips on YouTube but I try and dial it down to a bit of yoga type stuff nearing bedtime. We've just started doing some drawing or puzzles before bed to reconnect too which is nice.

We always do the same bedtime routine and I lie down with him for a book in his bed. He's got a sensory fitted sheet on his bed which he says feels like a big hug. He has a grow clock too and colour changing night light. If he's particularly wiggly he might get out of bed once but he gets a very dull, calm return to bed.

I've realised that any kind of frustration, demands to hurry up or threats from me just result in ramping him up to fever pitch. I'm sure from an outside perspective I probably look like I'm totally passive but it's the only thing that helps him calm himself. It's bloody hard work and I don't always manage it but I do try.

If I can't make him laugh just before a melt down I can sometime divert him by changing the subject rapidly 'oh my goodness look at thay giant pigeon/tractor/whatever', 'do you need a biscuit?'....the more silly the better normally.

I do wonder if there is something environmental in effect with children who have these 'busy' issues. DS had CMPA as a baby and toddler, he's grown out of that now but has developed a nut allergy and quite problematic hay-fever/ tree pollen allergy in the last 12 months.