Opening a dialogue

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Well, we tried something that worked, so I thought I would share.

We'd gotten an email from DS's teacher. He's had only one meltdown since she's know him, and even though she's a great teacher and works with him really well, and is very accommodating - I don't think she really believes that DS is disabled (which he is less and less so, but there are still things he really struggles with.)

Apparently today he came back to the classroom from a music lesson to find other kids sitting at his desk. He reacted by taking a dry-erase marker and writing something like "KEEP OFF" all over it...and unfortunately, the marker stained his desk. She then asked him to write about being angry, and he wrote (and blacked out) some curse words. She sent me an email because he'd told her he had no control over himself and couldn't help using those words, and she was worried about that.

At any rate, we resolved to talk about it with DS, who spent the entire evening melting down, throwing things, yelling in anticipation. In a moment of inspiration, I created a blank document on my laptop, landscape style, and set the font to 48 point bold type.
I typed:
Dad and I know you had a bad day. and turned the laptop so he could see it
(nod)
We are trying really hard to help you.
(nod)
I understand. However, you can’t take your bad day out on us. It’s not right. OK?
(nod)
Just because we don’t know what to do doesn’t mean we aren’t trying our best.
(nod)
OK. That means you need to try your best, too.
We went on this way for almost an hour, saying nothing, he finally started speaking responses, and we'd type in a response (the large typeface meant we had to limit our words to just a few) and finally determined that he was really ashamed for having done, essentially, nothing wrong. We were able to reassure him and make it better and nobody lost their temper in the process!

Nice job!

We have used having him write what he needs, but never the reverse. That's great, I'll try it.

That is an awesome idea!

We tried tweeting back and forth, but we found that DS took in the information, but didn't communicate so well. I guess this is one of those receptive/expressive language things, so it may work in reverse for some people, and some may well need it both ways. I'm really pleased with the result of the conversation, though - we were able to talk through the whole school day without him getting upset.

Well I read about this in a article. About how and why text is so popular amongst young children and it's because text takes out tone of voice. So it's very effective in communication for the most part.

That is inspiring! Thanks for sharing!

I love this!
I've been texting my 12-yr-old Aspie. It's also my preferred way to communicate with her sisters. It is so easy to add in an "ILU" or a cute emoticon, which really makes her happy. And I find she is very pleasant and articulate in her written responses.

Thanks for this advice. I know my son does not communicate with me (dad) to an exasperating degree. It may be because he misunderstands responses; the other day his sister had to point out that I was defending him against actions by the school when he had thought I was attacking him. Very hard to understand.

I do know neither of our kids (the NT child when younger, the autistic always) liked mother and father (when mother was still with the family) sitting them down to discuss issues, perhaps because this only happened when they had done something wrong but I think more because two adults against one child was a bit heavy for them. So you have to factor in the emotional component.

It does seem a bit silly but perhaps my son and I could write out a dialogue to avoid him having to cope with direct one on one communication, as even where I try to soften things by referring to my mistakes etc, he still does not seem to be on the same wavelength.

(Sorry, a mis-post)

Well this is just common sense...trying to calm someone not on the spectrum, THAT'S the challenge. I don't see why he was ashamed though..is music his special interest?

No, but DS is a perfectionist, so any perceived "failure" tends to send him in a downward spiral.