Explosiveness, emotional outburst, taking it out on mom

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My 12-year-old HFA/Aspie son has had an awful year with anxiety. A lot of time it manifests in crying jags, and other times it is explosiveness. He has had a rough time in school and he is now starting a much smaller, private school that has some experience with HFA kids and kids that just don't do so well in the regular school setting. So far, he has been liking it, but he is still having a lot of anxiety. This is just for background. Also, he wasn't feeling great. Neither was I.

Today we went to Target. He wanted to get his sister a birthday present, and I was pretty sure she wasn't going to like this particular present because she had something about it previously. He got very upset. He wanted to get her this present, and he was sure she would like it and he started deteriorating right there in the store. I wasn't buying this particular present, but we were sure in a bad place for a meltdown. I had a cart full of other things and the store was big and crowded. I didn't have a lot of patience myself as I am not feeling well. I tried to tell him that when he calmed down, we would talk about it, and I started to walk away. He started pulling on the cart and becoming very upset. He then started pulling the cart and me who was holding onto it in a very aggressive and threatening way, in his body language and voice. He was trying to lead me to a more private place, I think to argue his point more but I didn't want to go there because I thought in his frame of mind that more arguing was only going to worsen the situation, although in hindsight maybe if I had all my horses with me, I could have talked him down. Things got worse and it wound up that he took the car keys and locked me out of the car by the time I got into the lot with my cart full of bags. I was so upset, that I started to walk away, towards our home which is withing walking distance. After a minute or two I calmed down and started walking back. He was still in the passenger side of the car, hysterically crying and had the seat belt around his neck like he wanted to kill himself. He let me in and there was a lot of crying and he said he was sorry, but wanted me to say I was wrong and being mean, which I don't feel that I was.

The questions I have about this situation are:
1. Would you discipline it and how?
2. Does this sound like a normal meltdown? He is very obsessive when he gets his mind set on things, and I know that he was locked into the gift idea for his sister.
3. He can be very explosive and emotional, as well as anxious. It is SO draining sometimes. I guess I am wondering if I am dealing with something more than ASD, maybe more like a bipolar disorder.
4. I know for a fact and he admitted after the fact that he would not do that to dad or a teacher in school. His dad has anger issues and can be very frightening when he is angry. It is something he has been to therapy for and has gotten a small amount better. My thought at this point is, if he is capable of controlling the meltdown sometimes, why am I getting the brunt of it? It is usually not this bad, but with all the transitions and changes and there has been a lot of instability lately here in our home, and has has been suffering from it. But he lays it all on me and I am starting to feel abused. He is always very sorry and when he is calm, he can talk about how or why he should do things differently.

Why is this so hard? : (

eta: He does take Clonidine for anxiety.

It is not so much that he is in control of the meltdown, it is that he has learned it is not safe to meltdown in that situation - so all that stress piles up and boils up when triggered in a situation where he does feel safe. I have no doubt his dad's anger issues add to his anxiety. And having so little space where he feels safe enough to melt down is going to just ratchet the pressure way up.

I am fifty-two years old. Although I have learned some strategies for avoiding the buildup of pressure that leads to a meltdown, I still can't control them. If I could, I would for my own sake alone. I always develop a very high fever when I melt down, and was so beaten down when I was younger that most of the force comes out at me. I pound on myself, bang into things without even noticing until later, and end up sick and sore and feeling as if I've been beaten up. I've destroyed things that meant so much to me that I mourn them decades later. So I desperately try to avoid them - but once things reach a certain point, there is no stopping them. At most, I can bottle it up for a short period of time, delaying it at the cost of making the eventual eruption worse, and that is a skill that took me years to learn.

It actually sounds to me like the poor kid did incredibly well, considering his age and situation. And keep in mind that the more you force him to "control" them, the more that force is going to explode back, inside himself. I speak from experience. And it would be kinder to shoot a kid than put them through that...

Edited to add: His dad's anger issues are a huge part of the problem. What you're dealing with is a kid with AS who has been severely damaged by an out-of-control father. And even if his father finally gets that under control, it will take your son years to learn to deal with all the damage that has already been done. I am still coming to understand just what effects my own father's anger had on me, and how it complicated the issues that AS would have raised in any case. But how do you take a kid who has that kind of struggle to begin with, put that much and that kind of pressure on him that he doesn't even feel safe at home, and not have big, nasty fallout? (I'm not saying his father can help it, either. Maybe he can't. I don't know what his issues are. But if he can't, well, then, how can his kid help being damaged. And blaming the kid for the damage is pretty unfair, at least from my perspective.)

Edit II: I just noticed another point I'd glossed over, because I tend to take it for granted. If I'm reading your post correctly, your son wasn't feeling well. The one, absolutely hundred percent guaranteed situation where I will have a meltdown (unless life goes perfectly in every detail... ) is when I am getting sick. In fact, it is often my first clue I'm coming down with something. If I have a meltdown, find myself wondering afterward where that came from, and why, I suspect I'm coming down with something. And so far, for over two decades (since I noticed the connection), that suspicion has been correct every single time. I think some of us react at different times; others may be more likely to melt down after they know they're sick. But this seems to be a situation where meltdowns are even more inevitable and less manageable than any other time.

Last edited by theWanderer on 01 Dec 2011, 5:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Oh, dear!

My son is almost 10, and I am concerned that as he gets older I might also have to deal with situations like the one you describe. He has been on a waiting list for CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services) for ages and it seems that the end of the waiting list is still far away. We can go to a "drop-in" session though and I discussed this last week with his class teacher. She agrees that it would be a good idea, even though my son, like yours, is more able to exercise self-control in school. My ex-husband does have massive problems, which he denies, with anger and I really worry that my son will copy him. I don't really know how he is when with his father because I'm not there but I think he does behave differently with me. He does say that I understand him better than anyone, and his teacher is the next person who understands him.

Sorry, I'm rambling. I think it's possible that your son behaves as he does with you because you provide a safe space. Maybe.

As for disciplining him. You say he can discuss such things calmly and thoughtfully after the event, so my suggestion is that you talk to him about it all and ask him whether he believes some of his actions, particularly locking you out the car, should result in discipline and what form that discipline should take.

I also think that you should seek help for him in managing his anger and emotions.

I'm sorry you both had such a bad time. We all have bad days, and when you're not feeling great then it's so much easier for things to slide away like this.

No, discipline should be applied when a child has done something they know is wrong and they have control over whether or not it happens again. This sounds like a meltdown situation over which your son has little ir no control. What you can do is talk to him about the triggers that led to the meltdown and both of you try to avoid them in the future. If that means just choosing not to go to Target with him to buy a present when you and he are both not feeling well then that is what you do. A question I try to keep in mind is "How important is it?"


Sounds like a typical meltdown for us anyway. My DS also can get very fixated on things and unable to let go when that is not what is going to happen.


What they call co-morbid conditions do commonly go along with ASD so it is not out of hte realm of possibility that there is something else going on with him that you may be able to address with certian treatments. If you suspect something else, definitely find a doc you trust to evaluate.


This is tricky because the relationship he has with other people is so different from the one he has with you. For example, he probably doesn't very often get into situations with his teacher that are nearly as emotionally charged as the one you described above. And as for his father, well, the general thought is that when autistics are in meltdown mode, they are operating with only the basic instinct part of their brain, the fight, flight or freeze part. Possibly his fear of his father's anger might override his instinct to loose it emotionally. Others have described how with extreme threats, for example the police being called, kids this age have "magically" obtained the ability to get control of themselves. I don't know that seems like fighting fire with fire to me. Do what you can to identify triggers, avoid them when possible and try to get yourself unstuck when you get into an unavoidable situation. Perhaps, as you seem to have thought yourself, taking him to the side and trying to calm him down would have worked?

Thanks so much. It's been a rough day. The thing is, I didn't even see this meltdown coming until it did. He seemed to be in a pretty good mood, although he did complain of a little stomach upset in the morning.

Wanderer, I am curious at what, if anything, I can do to help him when he is in meltdown. I seriously was starting to worry someone was going to call security on us. He is a very tall, big-boned boy for his age and he looks threatening when he is frantic like that. I do know that when he is in meltdown, he feels like no one is listening to him and he says the same thing over and over, and I do listen to him. He doesn't even seem to remember it when we talk about it again.

I wound up not punishing him. We were both too drained. My usual punishment is no electronics, but for him that is what calms him down and we needed that more than punishment.

Did you read this thread yet?

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt180194.html

My mom still has scars from where I would attack her physicaly during a meltdown. All the doctors and phycologist people told her the same thing. That she was the only one I felt safe enough around to let my gaurd down. I would just bite and pinch so it wasn't like I was attempting to push her down the stairs or anything. I think I had more than just autism. I definatly would have been diagonsed with bi polar if I were a kid today. I also suspect I had fetal alchol syndrome but I was never given the diagnosis because the stupid social worker took my biological mother's word on it when she said she did not drink. She hung out all the time in a bar and that's where she met my biological father.

I have two suggestions:



First, the thread SC_2010 linked to has some excellent points in it. If you're worried about security or the police being called if you're in public, you might want to find an understanding medical professional, get a letter from them stating that your son has autism, and spelling out these points, that you could show to the police if they were called. They might not listen but it would be worth a try.

Second, bear with me for a minute. I don't think any of us want to melt down. Even those who don't tend to wreck themselves as badly as I do still feel miserable afterward, and "pure psychological torture" (from the linked thread) is an excellent description of what that state feels like. It is not just a "fight or flight" reaction. I've experienced the fight, flight, or freeze reaction more than once, and it is far simpler than a meltdown.

So your son has immense motivation to control them as much as he can. What I suggest is that you try working with him. Help him learn to identify signs of an impending meltdown. Do your best to notice signs yourself. (And, remember what I said. Not feeling good is a huge sign in itself, because if our physical bodies are 'out of tune' even a bit, that means our emotions are more likely to be volatile. Work with him to learn strategies to calm things down, and learn yourself what might help to defuse one or at least minimise it. (I understand you weren't feeling well, and that will make things harder. But if you're more aware of the problem, it at least improves your odds.) If you think a meltdown might be imminent, or he does, try to get home or someplace reasonably private, where he can blow his cool without people staring. That does not help. At least, I know that on some level, I was always aware of the finger pointing and snickering and so on, and it just made things a lot worse. I have learned to choke it down (Edited to add: this is not true control - a lot of people can delay vomiting until they reach a toilet or sink, but they can't "control" it, and holding off a meltdown feels similar to that, and takes a lot more work and practice to pull off at all) until I'm not in public, at least. Only people who know me well ever see me melt down now - although I'd never put that to any stronger a test than I could help. The goal is not to see how far things can be pushed, but to avoid pushing them when possible.

How you handle it depends on the issue. If he's that set on buying something, if it isn't too expensive to absorb in your budget, it might be better to just buy it, then discuss it when you get home. You could always return it. (I understand there are times, and issues, when you can't give in. But he wasn't feeling good. As I noted, that's a huge warning sign right there, so that's a time to smooth over whatever you can.) Figure out other things that calm him down. Try diverting him with those. There are good sensory inputs as well as bad ones. I don't know what his are, but I know mine, and I use them.

Yes, there are parents who would call that "giving in". In that case, when their oil light comes on, they shouldn't 'give in' to their car and put more oil in, they should just keep on driving it until the engine seizes. We work the way that we do. We didn't ask to work that way any more than you asked for it. (Not accusing you of any of this, just explaining my take on the folks who do think this way.)

On the issue of his getting 'set' on a certain idea, and refusing to budge, that is an indicator, in itself, that he might be heading toward a meltdown. That happens to me, and it is always one of two things. Very rarely, it is something I really could not budge on, no matter what, because it is that important to me. But most of the time, I get stuck in my thinking because things are already going badly and I am incapable of unsticking my mind. Think of the way a car may balk or hesitate before it breaks down completely. Sometimes, it is an issue that straddles that line; for example, in my case, a bedrock issue is that although I am good at math and similar subjects, I cannot work on that type of thing for too long. It feels 'wrong' to me (I'm a writer, numbers are too inflexible, too rigid, I need words), and if someone were to try to force me to spend too long dealing with that sort of thing, I'd melt down. But if I were already close to a meltdown, even a suggestion that I needed to do anything math related might push me over the edge...

So, as much as you can, you need to understand the signs of an imminent meltdown. He needs to as well. You will both have your own different perspectives on this. You and he need to work out what issues might trigger one. You and he need to find strategies that 'replenish the oil' as much as possible. And I suggest that it might be helpful to develop your own version of 'threat level' coding, so you can signal each other if one of you thinks there's going to be a problem. This might start to help, but it isn't going to make a huge difference very quickly. It is not easy. And, remember, a twelve year old is struggling with all sorts of emotional turmoil. That's only going to get worse for a while. So every gain you and he make may well be counterbalanced by adolescent stresses made much, much worse by autism. But if you don't make those gains, it will be that much worse.

I'm sorry I can't offer you better advice than that. I wish I had a magic bullet I could point you toward. I do wish it for your sake as well, but I hope you won't be offended if I say I wish it even more so for your son's sake. I know something of what he's going through. But I've never even managed to find one for myself. There is a chance, if you ask the right question, it might help me to think through some parts of this more clearly. So, please, feel free to ask me anything you think I might be able to give you even a tiny bit of help or insight on.

Wanderer, you are awesome for typing that all out! Thank you so much! It really does help so much. I have been thinking about this so much and I wonder if I might not have some tendencies myself to get stuck, because as much as I've read and learned, there are times, especially when I'm not feeling well (which is too often) when I just can't get myself back to the place that I know I need to be to help him manage his meltdowns better. I think I'm going to print out what you said and carry it with me at all times!

Also, that thread is amazingly helpful, thanks so much for the links to it.

Well I dont want to but in.......but when I was 12 I never quite had any episodes that bad but I did lose control sometimes when I would be too overwhelmed, but yeah if i got punished for it that did not usually help because I was not aware I was actually doing anything wrong I was just upset and had a lack of control over it....so it made me feel like I was being singled out for something I could not control.

So I don't know that it is the best idea to punish a kid for having a meltdown......