Punishment Options

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I would think you would need a more proactive approach rather than just reactive. If you are at the end of your teather this is a very weak position.

I also agree there needs to be insight as to why. Why is he bored? I don't believe boredom is inevitable, when there are possibilities.
So there must be some other reason why, possibly low motivation due to depression or attention problems. I definitely think he needs sample more diverse interests, and to learn skills to support his interest on his own, However for the time being he does have that so someone will have to help him develop those interests.

His stuffed dinosaur and his legos are his calming activities. I would NEVER take those away.

Legos are important here too. My son even has some at school to help himself calm down when he needs to. He keeps them in a special autism room that's used for social skills classes and melt downs or quiet times as needed for the higher functioning kids. There are other rooms for kids who need even more help, as well.

Have you taken your child to a psychologist for a full workup? I took my younger two in this year because they were both having issues in school, nothing horrible but I wanted to see what was going on before it got to be a bigger problem. We made many interesting and important discoveries.

Has your son been tested or treated for ADHD? He might be having impulse control issues. Sometimes you have to try several medications to find one that works well without side effects, but it's worth it if it helps. Lots of Aspies also have ADHD.

I'm not sure if my girlfriend has taken him for a full workup or not. We are planning on taking him to a therapist who specializes in Aspie children, just in case something is going on that he doesn't want to share with us. Currently, he will share things with me that he won't tell his mom, but I'd imagine when he moves in with me, that will slow down a bit.

Yes, he does have ADHD and is on medication for it.

What time of day is his behaviour at its worst?

I still think he need to learn how to occupy himself in a more active way. Boredom isn't purely about environment, as two people will react differently in the same environment.

I am not suggesting that you don't address the issue. Obviously there is a problem that needs to be solved. Your son's teacher probably needs to learn when to back off, and your son needs to learn some effective ways to deal with people who are bothering him. Your son yelling and insulting people isn't a good thing and needs to be addressed. What I am saying is that you shouldn't go about solving this problem by making your child miserable until he complies. That just makes more stress, which makes the problems worse, which makes more stress, and the loop repeats. You aren't going to solve the problem by punishing your child into submission. My mother tried that on me and I can assure you it doesn't fix the problem.

You can better address this by talking with your son, explaining the problem, and then having him help to correct the issue. You could work with your child to find better ways to tell people to go away nicely. Perhaps he could have said something like, "Could you please not bother me right now, I need to be alone." Perhaps you could teach him good self regulation techniques to use when he is stressed out so he doesn't start yelling. You could also talk about the importance of paying attention in school and finishing his work so that he will learn something useful. Of course this is predicated on the hope that what he is being taught is useful, which is debatable with most schools.

But putting your child into an unpleasant, stressful situation (aka school) and then punishing him when he reacts to stress isn't going to fix the problem. The problem is only going to get fixed if you teach him how to deal with the situation and handle the stress effectively. And if he is to handle his stress he needs to have a way to relax and unwind which requires that you don't harass him and make him miserable all weekend. If you want to enforce the fact that yelling at the teacher isn't acceptable then a letter of apology seems entirely reasonable. But making your son miserable all weekend isn't going to fix anything.

Jimbeaux, I'm going to ask you some thought-provoking questions here. Does your son see the connection between his (mis)behavior at school and the punishments you give him at home? When he comes home from school and gets the punishment, does he know that it's for calling his teacher stupid? Or does he think he's getting a punishment "just because", or worse, because he somehow got the idea that you enjoy punishing him and using his actions at school as an excuse? Now, you might ask: "How dare you accuse me that? And where did you come up with it?" The answer is: from life experience. My parents punished me more times than I can count, in some pretty "creative" and over-the-top ways. So, over the years, I got the idea that they enjoyed doing it. Ironically, I saw it as perfectly normal; they were in charge, and this was just one of the ways they enjoyed their power.

The situation was compounded by my teacher's (grades 1 thru 4) constant contact with the parents. I swear, she spent her evenings on the phone, communicating with the parents. So, for every little thing I did in class, she blabbed it to my parents. As NTs put it, she had no life. Got a C? She called. Got sent to the principal? She called. Acted up slightly in the lunchroom because the food they served was nasty? She called. Then she had the audacity to complain to the parents about how difficult her job was. She had connections with the school board, and managed to sweet-talk my parents against me (yes, you read that correctly), so complaining about her was futile effort; they took her side no matter what.

Needless to say, by age 9, I already had thoughts of suicide and ideas of how I wanted my funeral to be. Now that I poured out my soul into the netherworld of the internet, let's get back to you. Have you considered the possibility that any aspie child, not just myself, can be driven to those thoughts? The stress your son is going through doesn't happen to full-grown men in basic training (OK, maybe in the Marines). In the military, punishments are severe, but short, specific, and one-time. For example, if you forgot your hat during the morning run, you have to do 30 push-ups, but you know what for, and you don't do them again for the same offense; when you've "served" the punishment, you rejoin the group. Speaking of which, have you seen Full Metal Jacket? I'm seeing a lot of Pvt. Pyle in him, except he has three milder versions of Sgt. Hartman in his life (you, your girlfriend, and your son's teacher) instead of just severe one.

Obviously, with all that said, you should discipline him at least somehow, but you really got to make the connection very clear between his actions and the punishment. And please, "it's just as unpleasant to us and it is to you" will not sound plausible to an aspie child; they're too smart for it. When my parents told me that, I thought they were just laughing at me being punished. Find out what types of punishments the school gives for demerits, and realize that whatever is it, perhaps your son is being punished enough, without you adding to it. If a drill sergeant can do without punishing a private twice for the same offense, you can do the same for your son.

I have some good news for you.

You're not his dad.

As long as he spends the week with his grandmother, you're just his mother's boyfriend. You're not responsible for how he turns out. That's good, because worrying about whether he'll grow up to be a "burden to society" is something you don't have to do, so that's one less source of stress you have to add to your already stressful job.

Now, you are the guy whose home he spends weekends in. Since it's your home, you get to make the rules there. You can legitimately have a rule that he's not to use the computer before noon, or at all, if you want. You can give him your Age of Conan character slot if you want. You don't get to "punish" him for bad grades in school, though - it's not any of your business what grades he gets, or anything else he does outside of your home, except perhaps as a confidante to his mother.

If you feel for him and would like to see him brought up better, there is something that you can do. You can try to encourage the grownups who do have charge of him to do a better job bringing him up. Specifically, since you're his mother's boyfriend, you could try to get his mother to use better parenting techniques - or try to get her to get her mother to use better grandparenting techniques. You have to work through his actual parents and grandparents, though - you can't just do it yourself.

Now, if you were his dad, you would need to realize that your primary influence on him would be as a role model, not a disciplinarian. For example, just trying to relax on weekends from your stressful weekday job would teach him to just try to relax on weekends from his stressful weekday school. To get him to accept a connection between weekend punishment and his weekday school performance would require you to have a job that gave you weekend punishment for your weekday job performance.

Fortunately for you, you're not his dad.

Him and his mom are moving in with me in three weeks, and we are getting married next year.
I will be his dad.

We remind him constantly every time he complains about it. He'll scream that he has nothing to do and demands to use the computer, and I say "And why aren't you allowed?" And his response ranges from "Because I freaked out at the teacher and called her stupid" to "Quit being negative!! !"

In three weeks, when they move in with me, the punishments will start being, like you said, immediate.

Some more advice for you...

My husband got to know my kids really well before we got married. He didn't move in with us until after the wedding, for a variety of reasons. Even so, that first year all together was a huge adjustment for us all. My husband had never married or had kids and was in his mid 40s, talk about a glutton for punishment.

For that first year he tried to really keep out of the punishment thing. When he saw stuff he didn't like he'd come to me privately and we'd discuss things and make decisions. He'd then enforce whatever punishment we'd agree upon, or I would, whatever was appropriate and convenient. In cases where he slipped and handed out a punishment I didn't agree with I'd talk to him privately and then if necessary make whatever adjustment to the terms of the penalty we agreed upon and visa versa. We made a huge effort not to contradict each other and to always show support even if we didn't agree. If we had to change a punishment we'd go to the children and say that after thinking things over we'd decided on X instead of Y and maybe give a reason. We'd NEVER say that one of us was wrong and the other corrected them. The kids figured out pretty quickly that there was no way they could divide us. I think that has actually helped the kids feel more secure and loved, even if it's sometimes meant they lost priveledges they might not have otherwise. It's also given them a good model of proper adult behavior.

That first year was not easy, but with patience and communication we got through it. We will soon have our third anniversary and things are really good.

Have you talked to him about 'being his Dad"? How does he feel about this? I'm assuming he has said he wants you to be his Dad, and has expressed that he wants to call you by that name?

Aspies can often be very anxious and stressed out about change - even minor change - so when you say they are moving in with you in 3 weeks and you will 'be his Dad', that strikes me as a HUGE amount of change even for an NT child, let alone one on the spectrum.

Have you considered the possibility that he is stressed and acting out at school because he is anxious about all these monumental changes in his home life?

Have you considered not being the one to dish out consequences until you have all lived together for a good amount of time and had time to adjust and settle in?

When I asked her parents permission, I also asked his. His response was an enthusiastic "Oh HECK yeah!". The very first time I met he told his mom that I would make a great dad for him. In our wedding, the pastor is going to ask Billy if he tales me to be his dad.

Mom is the one who hands out to disciplin. I only advise her and she is at a loss.

The move may be stressing him out, but he really seems to look forward to it. I hope this is only a phase he is going through.

I don't know why I didn't suggest this earlier but there is a great book that might help. It's called 123 Magic. I've seen it advertised here. Our psychiatrist and psychologist both recommend it. It's also used in military family counceling centers. It's a very practical guide for disciplining any child although it was first developed to help classroom teachers deal with kids who have ADHD. It does not recommend spanking at all, and I personally think that spanking can occasionally be useful in moderation. You might need to make some adjustments to the system to take into account your son's AS, but if you and your wife both do it consistantly it'll probably help. It's widely used in schools which is really great because if the school, mom and dad are all consistantly using it kids are getting the same message all the time and do really well.

It's nothing all that radical. The first time a child breaks a known rule they get one, the second time they get two, the third time they get the predetermined punishment. I like that the child gets a second chance because kids do tend to forget and make mistakes and need reminders to learn. After all our goal is to teach the child correct behavior not to punish. For really big stuff like violence there is no second chance. The parent is supposed to be very matter of fact and show no emotion. Anger is very counterproductive to the learning process so kids will catch on more quickly when things are calm. The counting clock is reset frequently with the duration depending on the age of the child. Parents should also look for opportunities for positive reinforcement of good behavior. If the child can get focused on doing the right thing and enjoy that there are fewer opportunities for misbehavior, and they aren't tempted to misbehave to get attention.

Jim, I think it is wonderful that you are all becoming a family! Even though you can be strict, I get the sense from your posts that your step son may fight it, but doesn't really resent it, which would mean that at least a part of him has accepted that you do things because you do care. As long as that message is getting through and accepted, you've crossed the biggest hurdle.

Interesting queries on how the changes may be affecting your step son. You know what it reminds me of? My son and his pending birthdays when he was younger. He would get so excited, and anticipate it all so much, that it would totally consume his thoughts for the time leading up, and he would have behavior problems everywhere else because, well, everything else was just "waiting." And then when the big day got there he would have so overly invested energy into it that it could never live up to expectations and he melted down. It is easy to forget that our children can have just as much trouble handling the good things as they do the bad things, because all of it is off-routine. We've handled that by managing expectations better and trying to even things out more, but it remains an on-going process.

As for consequences - I've started to realize that I'm not all that convinced it makes a huge difference what the consequence is, as long as it isn't one you live to regret issuing. Even when a child blows off a consequence as not that bad, they get the message that they did wrong, and there was a consequence for it. As long as 2 + 2 = 4 on a consistent basis, learning happens. Most important is meaning what you say and saying what you mean. Keep the clarity in communication and expectation. And that is stuff you seem to be good at, so maybe the next step is just patience. Don't worry that just because the message isn't getting through today or this year, that it never will. I've noticed with my son that at some point all messages DO get through, and do affect his behavior, and that is the goal, right?