please, some advice about a violent teen.

[NoMoreLies]

Ncd for this as its so distressing.

my child has terrible behaviour problems.

child is 14. had problems since birth, has a number of disabilities, father (not around) was violent (is serving a long sentence in jail) so child has some dna traits.plus father was very abusive to both of us.

child bought up by me but not a badly brought up child.brought up in a solid fair Christian household.

but

1- cant seem to forget the abuse as a baby. in fact memories sharper as child is growing up.

2- teenage hormones.

3- other mental disabilities and learning difficulties (will not disclose other problems as may out me, suffice to say they are mainly mental problems).

is now home taught as schools could/would not cope with violent behaviour.

CAMHS and other services completely useless and will not help with child-anger management and learning to cope with the outbursts.theyve all dismissed child and not given any other options.

child is like Jeckyl and Hide, one minute sweet as a nut and the next.....

is punching and hitting me, half an hour ago kicked me in the stomach. outbursts just happen, no triggers sometimes.

child has been sent to room to calm down but I cant think of any other stratergies.

called police once after a beating from child, they said does it happen often? what can I say?

child is well brought up, not a badly dragged up thug/thugette (will not disclose gender) it is their medical condition mainly that makes them violent.

child does not watch anything innapropriate on tv/movies, does not listen to anything innapropriate, nothing remotely scary/violent playstation games, nothing.

Im scared child will really injure me as they get older, its bad enough now and no one will help. got no other family.

police said if it happens again either a young offenders place (child is NOT an offender) or a mental hospital.

cant bear the prospect of that, I think it would make child worse.

id better go and see to child, will log on later. hope we get some good advice.

Is there a learning difficulties service that your DS could be referred to? In the CAMHS I work for we can refer to learning disability nurses for help with behaviour problems. Might be worth pushing with CAMHS?
Sadly many CAMHS are completely un-resourced for working with LD, but there may be other services in your area that may be able to help.

Also do you have any parent forums in your area? They can be very good for support and for pointing people in the direction of resources / support.
Finally what about the Children with Disabilities team (children's services) - may be worth seeing if DS could be referred there.
Really sorry you are going through this.

thanks.

no, CAMHS where I am were completely dismissive, and the disabilities team were /are useless too.

and no ongoing options/referrals.

its a case of ''your child, your responsibilty'' even though they know the full story and also know Im completely on my own.

Sorry to hear that. I know that many CAMHS services are not set up or commissioned to provide a service for behaviour problems though; I know mine isn't. It does leave a huge gap in services though.
If all else fails I would consider contacting children's services - they can offer family support and may be able to put you in touch with other organisations in your area.

Also Parent Partnership may be able to help.

thanks.

child is statemented. (has AS amonst other things)was in special schools supposed to deal with childs condition and they couldn't. tried 3 different schools.

home teaching is no problem at all, child much calmer with this arrangement.

I have a PWP who is supportive (when I can get hold of them!)and also agrees this is best solution for child. as do the education board.

police sent report to SS and Camhs AND GP to no avail.police were lovely and said its all theycan do as 'power' taken out of their hands by the SS who don't help at all.

child can tolerate if we go out and needs to see GP or whoever (was brilliant at the opticians the other day, very chatty and responsive) and has a couple of friends (although needs total supervision as can suddenly react and lash out).

I have tried every avenue going and would appreciate any strategies you with 'difficult' teens apply, in your home, by you.

thank you for replying (I have this is SN children site too, didn't know there was a teen site!)

SS IS childrens services and really truly are hopeless.

NoMoreLies, I am so sorry to hear about what you are going through. My 16-year-old DS has dyspraxia and features of Asperger's. We have had several violent episodes recently and two weeks ago I called the police when he attacked me. They were fantastic - certainly didn't mention a young offender's unit or hospital. They reassured me that I was entitled to call them out and that he had committed an assault, and they gave me options - in the end I decided that I wanted them to talk to him but not arrest him. They said they have flagged up my name and number for the next 3 months and this means that if I need to call them out again they will be there within 5 minutes. They also, with my agreement, put a call through to social services and got someone from the Disabled Children's Unit to contact me. A CAF (Common Assessment Framework) is being completed by the school (but I think a GP can do it too) and I'm waiting to see where we go from there. My DS shows no remorse - far from it - but he is mainly avoiding me and is getting on with revision for his exams, so I suppose it could be worse. I still feel devastated though.

I suppose the reason I'm telling you this is simply to say that you're not alone, and also that I think you're getting a really raw deal from social services. Is it worth going to your GP and asking for an urgent referral to a psychiatrist? Clearly there are so many issues with abuse from childhood, and medication is not going to solve those.

Other people on MN have recommended a book called The Explosive Child - aimed at younger children but still has some good strategies (I thought I'd cracked it with the help of the book until DS's latest episode ...).

Several people have said to me that problems such as ASD are hugely magnified by teenage hormones and that we will eventually come out the other side. I think and hope they're right, but I want us to get out of it relatively unscathed, and that's the hardest bit, isn't it?

thanks cinnamon. yes the police were very good and one eventually calmed child down and spoke to them.
they told me to keep phoning them if it happens again and that they could see child is no thug/thugette.

I may go down the gP route for a physchiatrist, but they normally recommend camhs again. told GP last time about camhs and gp was very angry and said shed send a letter to them of complaint.

im going back to my regular nn now so thanks all, ill still lurk on this thread if theres any more posts.

thank you for all imput.

Do update if there's any positive news, nomorelies - or if things get scary again and you need to talk. Really hope you can turn a corner soon.