16 year old possible aspie harassing siblings

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I'd like to suggest the possiblilty that your son feels devalued, because his younger siblings came along. He may believe that he came first, therefore, he should get everything, and the younger ones get whatever leftovers he chooses to leave them. After spending a day out in the world of school or whatever, it is possible that he want to relax and be in control of his world and not have it wrecked by the youngster who may be inconvienceing him by using the computer when he want to use it or be getting first dibs at parrental attention.

I have no advice on how to resolve these problems, perhaps someone else does? (I would be interested to hear it, because this is happening in my family).

Just my $0.02.

What a discussion I started,lol . I love it though because it gives all sides of the argument and only by getting all sides can you find the help you need,right?

OK, so I must have seen the same Dr. Phil Show because we did the take everything away and had the same results as Earth did. He does get grounded ( although he never really goes anywhere),but that also means no phone, no computer, no video games depending on what he has done. I have tried the 123... Magic along with any idea that I read or see on TV that looks hopeful. We see a cognitive behavioral therapist regularly to try and help, but we have not done the whole family together......I will talk to the therapist about that, it sounds like it might help.

Right now the therapist tries to help him go back over the situation and think of different ways he could have handled it and tries to give him different tools to use to help him make the right decision next time. He has been with this therapist since September, but has only over the last three months or so really opened up to him.....maybe it just takes time. Some of the more violent episodes have lessened. He hasn't put a hole in my wall or destroyed his room in a while now.The hardest part and the therapist agrees is the absence of empathy that he has, which is usually needed to help them learn this lesson.

We work on this stuff all the time, but it's very hard to put the steps in motion when he is set off by sensory, which seems to be the bulk of the outbursts. These outbursts come out of nowhere and then all you can do is damage control. It wasn't until my 2 1/2 year old was dx'd with sensory and I began learning about it that I realized, OMG this is my oldest all over. I cried so hard thinking about how many years we have never understood what he was going through on a daily basis. Maybe this is why he has so much trouble now... I ask this all the time.

I do step in the minute it starts and I do hand out the punishments, but this doesn't seem to make him understand it any better. I always make sure when he is calm that we talk it out and he seems to "get it" at that time, but then it happens again. I use the rules of society as a gauge as well and try to help him understand. I think I am doing most of the right things now and have been for the past two years, but I will be the first to admit that I haven't always been as consistent as I should have been. If I knew then what I know now sort of thing. I am not saying that I allowed him or any of my others to run wild, I just wasn't as consistent as I could have been. I pay for that now and I know it.Maybe that was my little rebellion to being raised in a large family by a 20 year Army Master Seargent also known as Dad,lol.

I guess I went through a long time of feeling so sorry for him when he was young, seeing how different he was and knowing how hard he was trying to be good and how upset he would get when he knew he blew it. OK, maybe I'm a sucker, but I hurt so bad when my kids hurt and this not knowing why he reacts the way he does hurts him. Because of the oldest my younger ones have had the benefit of stricter rules and more consistency, but even in them I see alot of the similar problems.

So far after reading all the posts I think I am on the right track, cognitive behavioral therapist, better consistency, stricter routines and lots of understanding. Maybe I am seeing the start of a change since like I said the more violent outbursts are much less than before.

And Earth, yes I am still working on the new doctor, but we are in Va. and since she is connected with the colleges I think that anyone working in the mental health field is helping at Va. Tech. right now. God Bless those kids and thier families.

I agree, it sounds like a lot of aspies (being careful not to imply ALL as a collective group) have a lot of problems going out and getting all wound up in the "real world" and need to come home and decompress. Only when younger siblings are a foot, it can get really rather volatile quickly!

I don't think that with my son it is a "I'm first, they get the leftovers", I don't think birth order would have mattered much at all! That said, I know that the fact there are 8 years between my Aspie, and his closest sibling does not help. He just did not adjust to the change of not being the only child, granted, he wanted a sibling, and really loves his brother and sister, but he just can't understand why sharing the T.V. goes along with that package! (Or putting up with their noise!)

I think it is important to give one on one attention to these kids, make the time to let them know that they are special. We read stories to our younger kids, and tuck them in bed at night and give them a big hug or kiss, but when kids hit 10-14 years of age, usually parents "stop" that. Maybe with the aspie child, you shouldn't! They need to know that they count too.

Also, I think it is important to allow them time to decompress after hours of school or socialization, and to try and come up with solutions that allow them their space, or make the childish behaviors of their younger siblings less intrusive.

I have talked to my husband, we are going to get my son a pair of headphones for the T.V. / gaming, so that he can "filter out" the very loud and obnoxious play that his siblings engage in. That said, we are not going to let him know they are "his" headphones, they will be "family" headphones, so if someone else needs them, he won't have the right to get possessive or nasty, or melt! I'll let everyone know how that goes!

Have you tried a low dose of an SSRI like Zoloft for the sensory issues? It helps me and many others.

The cognitive approach is the best approach since the aspie strong point is thinking and being rational. There is a big disconnect between the emotional and rational in AS. One the emotions surface, it is rather like only seeing a single tree in the forest (the shirnks call it central coherence). It is like the rational brain is blocked until the nasty emotions play out. You have to learn to deal with the emotion before it takes over using rational thought. That's a very hard thing for aspies to learn.

I'm sure your oldest child has a lot of emotional baggage from being misunderstood. Don't beat yourself up over it, it is best just to move on with understanding, acceptance and love.

Carol,

You can't beat yourself up now. What's done is done and it's understandable. Your dad sounds like my mom. Maybe she secretly took the Master Sargeant's class to raising your kids? LOL One of my brothers did just what you did in reaction, relaxed the rules a little. Hey, it happens.

Anyway, how about trying this... I get the sensory thing although mine is not triggered as strongly by sound (I used to get sent to relatives over the smells of sauerkraut being fermented. EWWWW Still makes me sick to think of it.), but it did make me think about the sensory and how my reaction was way out of line with what everyone else smelled. So maybe if you start by talking to him about sensory issues and ask him if he can describe to you how that feels to him. Just say, I know you hear them differently than I do. Why don't you tell me what it's like for you so I can understand. The reason I say that is because it will help validate that you believe he really does hear it differently and that he's not crazy or you don't think he's making it up. Sometimes it helps just to hear this. Just the fact that my parents did send me away when they canned, butchered and made Sauerkraut made me feel better because I knew they understood I really did have an issue with it even if they didn't. It made me know they didn't think it was stupid.

Once you do that, it should open the door for you to say, Okay, I understand how it makes you feel like that and why you feel like you want to react as you do, but we have to figure out another way for you to handle it since you can't just yell and hit your siblings. So let's look at what else you can do when that happens. If he's having a trigger effect, you need something there to divert him the second it happens. Let him help you come up with another way. Does he need ear plugs when she plays (maybe she can bring them to him so they work it out together) or does he needs something like Zoloft to help. Whatever the solution, if sound is his issue, it's probably happening at school as well, at least between classes because kids are noisy. So you might want to put that connection in his mind now so he doesn't go off there and yell or hurt someone. I think sound has to be one of the worst ones because the few sounds that do it to me sound like a piercing siren in my head and make me want to scream.

And if you want to get to empathy, relate to him and something he understands. You'll probably have to do it verbally because if he can't read faces, eyes and other non-verbal well, he won't pick up on the signals to understand. Also, when that sensory stuff starts, it is so overwhelming and you think everyone hears it so you are sure they are doing it intentionally. When you have your talk about you not hearing it that way and how he hears it, emphasize that his sister does not hear this way and has no way to know he does. Rationally he can understand that. Then I would bring up something where he sees things one way and is yelled at for it. A case where he has been misunderstood. Ask him to remember how it felt when that happened. Did he feel hurt? Puzzled? Angry? Sad? Try to get at what that made him feel. If he can't verbalize it at all, go back to, Well, it didn't make you feel good, did it? Get him to the point where he recognizes that other misunderstanding him and yelling at him did not feel good. Then say, because you heard your sister differently than she heard herself, she doesn't know why you reacted that way and it made her feel (whatever he said) as well. She felt just as misunderstood. Relate that back to him directly. You just have to talk through these things instead. At least for me that's how it is. I don't pick up on any of the non-verbal. (On the eye test, I guessed two right and those were guesses. There were 30+ pairs of eyes. They all looked alike to me.)

This is something my husband has always done with me and it works well so it would be worth a try with your son. My husband is like the most calm, rational person on the planet so he's good at that when I'm completely overwhelmed by something. Anway, it would be worth a try.

Hope that helped! You can only do what you can do. Your son might not hold on to things like that. I don't. I'm more of a what's done is done and now it's over. He might be like that. I wouldn't keep yourself awake over it. You're doing the best you can. Good luck!

This empathy stuff is overrated anyway. You can teach the child to have sympathy. The empathy thing is supposed to be an emotional shift in perspective whereas sympathy is done with imagination - which we do have! Some aspies have a very hard time with emotions and it is best to relate to them on a cognitive level. Perspective taking can be taught. It is just not natural for us.