This area is for discussion on ADHD/ADD as requested

Thanks Wendy.
It will be great to have some where to talk to people who are dealing with the same thing.

Still have to get DD assessed. Have to make a GP appointment, and then take her to see a pediatrician.

How is everyone else doing?

Absolutely fricking awful here tbh.
Disaster day has arrived.

Oh big hugs Eleanor.
If you need to vent, feel free

Still very early days here some good days and some not so good days I'm looking forward to chatting more with you.

PD I hope you get an appt soon it'll probably be next year now though, won't it I hope you get the answers you need

Not so good at our house this morning with the 5 year old who is swearing and my 8 year old who has his "mad uncle jack" hat on.

Some mornings he is just plain crazy like he wakes up totally manic as he is so, so loud, dancing around the house, causing problems with his younger brother. Spilling cereal all over the floor, trashes his room, argues about everying I say and ask him to do. All this in an hour from waking before we leave for school.

I count the minutes until his meds kick in, usually as we are jumping into the car and on the drive to school we start to have a bit of peace and sensible conversation but, not before he decides to argue black in blue with me that today was Wednesday.. and it was his turn in the front. Save me!

It takes every bit of my patience to deal with it calmly (which I don't do very well) some mornings.

When family come to stay they must feel very stressed at the noise volume in our house.... I have my sister coming on Friday with her quiet sweet 2 year old. I feel anxious already about my kids and their quirks and what she will think.

Oh my god why couldnt I not just have sweet, quiet children!

Awwwww Louise, sounds like you have your hands full.
Our world is made up of all kinds and you have been blessed, just with a different kind
I am sure your sister will understand. At least you will have another adult in the house to talk to and not feel like you are one step away from joining the mad house

Can I join in, as I have been blessed with 1 ADD DD ,
I can second the bit about waiting to the meds kick in, I was giving meds as soon as DD wakes up to try and make the morning better; but they were not lasting all day so I am now giving them a little bit later, (luck teacher!!!) On the weekend if the morning routine has been upset, I find myself getting annoyed by DD behaviour then suddenly remember that she does not have her meds on board and give them. We have been playing with meds for just over a year now and things are getting better but we still have up and down days.

thanks PD - it's less about the ADHD and more about the not eating for Nicholas.
A doctor has changed his mind yet again so won't help so now N has no chance of going to school - like ever.
So never mind.

to all the mummies joining in.. The mornings are the pits here too. Everything is just too hard for DS I usually end up dresssing him just to get us out the door on time. But yeah by the time we get to school his meds have well and truely kicked in and very cooperative This is only our 4th week on his meds so very early days but he seems pretty stable on his dose for the time being. I still can't get over how much he has changed in a few short weeks. My BP has never been as good as its been lately.

Eleanor with the non eating is it just lunch that N is uninterested. I'm finding that L is constantly skipping lunch he's never been an eater more of a nibble here and there kind of kid. But just these last few weeks he has been eating alot at dinner time. I'm going to mention it at his appt on friday and see what the spec thinks.

Has anyone here had the fragile X/molecular Karotype test done? Were currently waiting for the results

Hi Vicky Lee just wanted to comment on this, we used to wait to give Logan his meds so they would be working for school and hopefully get him through the school day. Unfortunately for us it meant the mornings were pure torture and I dreaded starting the day like that. We now leave a fast release tablet beside his bed with a drink of water and he takes it as soon as he wakes up. It means he is calmed down within 15mins or so and then we give him slow release at 8am. Might be something that could work for you, it took 18months of struggling in the mornings before a new Dr helped us out here.

LCM - Thanks but it's food in general N won't eat.
He literally survives on a total nutrition formula and that's about all keeping him here. We last tried cutting his 1.5 litres/day in half and he lost 1.5kg in 3 weeks, behaviour was a total nightmare, schoolwork disintergrated etc.
So way bigger prob

Hi LCM

The meds do suppress the apetite, that is one of the side effects.

My son eats his huge breakfast and wont touch his lunch. He gets home then around 4 he eats lunch because he is starving then eats constantly all evening until bed including dinner and snacks before bed. He takes onboard his calories at the end of the day.

Just the way it is. You just have to change things around a bit and have a big snack ready for after school or he can eat his lunch box lunch and then dinner a bit later.

I like the idea of the immediate release just after waking, we have some immediate release so might try that.

At the moment we are taking ours around 8.30. But it does make the mornings hard work.

I'm not a morning person and he is skipping around the house like tiger from poo bear talking a mile to the dozen and falling over everything. It drives me crazy.

Sorry - I got interrupted while writing. Yes, it's a well known prob with meds.

Nicholas had huge probs with methylphenidate suppressing his appetite but dexamphetamine doesn't have that effect on him - so there are other options if it becomes a big problem. Nicholas' issues are as a combo effect of reflux, reflux surgery, negative food associations and compounded by the meds. so a different kettle of fish - although trying to find incentives to eat with an ADHD kid is extremely 'challenging'!

My experience: DS was on Ritalin FA for a year and his appetite too was reduced so we just ensured he had a huge breakfast, which he does. After 9mths he got too "used" to the dosage and he expressed his concern of anxiety so is now on a Ritalin LA. It lasts him through school which was my main reason for medicating him. I try not to medicate in weekends if I can. He is nearly 8 now and knows why he needs his meds. He often reminds me. If it is school hols/weekends sometimes he may ask for it if he is feeling he needs it. The paed and myself really try and talk through feelings and so he can monitor his own need so to speak. Working for us.

Hi there

Do any of your children have difficulties with sleeping, winding down at night to sleep.

My son has problems falling off to sleep maybe 2 or 3 times a week.

The Pead recommended melintonin (excuse spelling) but it is really expensive because it is not subsidised in NZ.

Do any of you have experences using anything else?

Kids calm by kiwiherb I have used but that is $40 for a bottle as well.

Ive been reading a bit more on line today abut Tart Cherry Juice. Where can I get it in Auckland for a reasonable price?

I think I might give it a wirl.

most chemists and health food shops seem to sell tart cherry juice now. You only need to give them a tiny bit, so the bottle should last ages

Nicholas is on Clonidine at night to help wind down. It was prescribed by the paed as something just to help counter the ADHD at night time and it's worked wonders for him.

Anyone here got any experience on Straterra - ADHD med?
We're about to transition to that for Nicholas in the hopes it might make an appetite emerge even marginally or at least to rule out meds messing with his appetite?

Any experiences - good, bad, indifferent?

Louise, we trialled melatonin for several months with limited success so Logan has been started on clonidine, only been on it 2 days but works very well so far.

Melatonin is very expensive but seems to be the first thing they try, we were giving Logan 9mg (3 capsules) a night so $75 a month and he was still awake at 9.30pm each night.

Eleanor, re: strattera, haven't tried it but Logan's psychologist has mentioned possibly giving it a go. So hard when they lose their appetite isn't it. Logan only really eats breakfast (2 weetbix) and dinner (smallish plate), most of his calories are from Ensure, we give him 3 drinks a day made up with raw milk and heaped scoops so prob 2 cal/ml. Are you making your Ensure up with water or milk?

Callog - we have to make his Ensure with water as making it with milk got him so constipated he was crying in pain and wound up with a really nasty anal fissure, constantly wiping blood when he tried to go etc.
He's only just managing to stay regular on 30mls of lactulose anyway and I'm sure that's in part because of his crappy diet.

He's getting a total of 1.5 litres of Ensure a day and that's largely only holding his weight static. At the moment he hasn't eaten any solid food since breakfast on Sat when he ate 8 weetbix bites in a little milk.

He's lost 39 days this year simply in bed with blinding headaches and retching/vomiting due to his lack of eating - headaches always improve on drinking some Ensure so we know it's not a migraine etc.

Before his latest plunge into not eating he was having around 10 weetbix bites for breakfast, a good day was 1/4 bit of bread for lunch and averaging a mouthful or two of dinner - one night was 25 g of corn chips (we were having nachos) and a little lettuce.
So I'd say Logan's doing a heap better than Nicholas

Paed surgeon was talking NG tube trial for N but seems to have gone cold on it, paed today was asking how we felt about hospital for him for a good while but N's already had a year of weekly psych appts and they gave up.

N's Ensure volumes and lack of eating are actually stopping him from attending school now and we're seriously looking at needing to put him into Correspondence via Health School if things don't improve - and this has been going for 4 years and counting.

Yup - it sucks when they won't eat!

Hmmm, makes it tricky that you can't make it with milk, constipation creates a whole different set of issues for them. I really don't know what else you could do, if he doesn't have the internal motivation to eat what else is there to motivate them?

Have you done a trial off stimulants or is that too hideous to contemplate? I guess it becomes a decision around what is more important - appetite and food or behaviour and ability to self regulate behaviour. Would you give N a few days off his meds to see if his appetite comes back?

We're about to transition to Strattera which is non-stimulant and apparently doesn't affect appetite to help rule out that factor.

Without meds he's so chaotic that he doesn't focus long enough to eat, forgets he has food in his mouth etc.

We've also tried cutting the Ensure vols - last trial was in August where we restricted it to outside school hours and halved the vols. He lost 1.5kg in the 3 week trial and his behaviour and learning went completely down the toilet. It has to have been our hardest few weeks in a VERY long time and we were lucky he didn't seriously hurt himself or anyone else.

Appetite just seems to not be there and it's not just a med issue - we had issues post fundo of food sticking and hurting because he forgot to chew carefully regularly so kicked off all the old reflux-affected eating behaviour so now we have a food aversion - something like what they call 'post trumatic feeding disorder'.

It's a totally crap situation and the way he is at the moment even swimming lessons aren't sustainable because of lack of stamina but no one knows what to do for him - apart from looking at tubing overnight but surgeon doesn't want to, keeps saying he will but telling others he won't etc.
It's been going for 4 years and counting, they keep saying puberty will work some kind of magic with appetite but at nearly 11 he's showing absolutely no signs of that so we expect him to follow our steps and be around 14 when that happens - 7 years of non-eating magically resolving on it's own??? Don't think so!

.

How have you been going purple dragon?

3boys we have been referred there and are hoping to get an appointment soon. They have a whole field of specialists so can deal with the whole range of stuff from meds to therapy, councelling, support for the kids, classes and sessions for the kids too. A one stop shop. They also deal with mental health in children too ie depression.

We are yet to see all of this for ourselves though.

everyone
How has everyone been managing with the school holidays apon us?

Sorry I can't help with the Greenlane thing 3boys.

How are things with the meds Elenor?

Thanks for asking after me Missmarch.
How are you doing? How has your son been?

I got a referral, but wanted to go private as I know the waiting list can be long from public. But financially we just can afford it at the moment. Be are struggling just to do christmas presents this year.
But it is something we still want to do for her in the new year.
I have also been looking in to other schools like Montessori and Rudolf Steiner schools. I really like the look of the Montessori ones.
I have an information pack being sent to me, so I am looking forward to reading about that one.

DD has mellowed out a bit with the school holidays but still has her flipping out moments too.
I find just getting the balance of a bit of exercise, but not too much seems to do her good too.
But over here, especially with summer kicking in, it is either 30 degrees, which makes you not want to do anything outside or it is raining. DH has the car for work, so if we go any where we have to walk. But oh well.

How do you all cope with the christmas day thing?
With all the excitement, and family around?

Interesting link, this might be helpful when explaining ADD/ADHD to others

adhd_children_pictures_slideshow

Just thought I would update while I had the chance and cos I am very proud

DS#2 has now turned 11 and even with all the upheavals in the past year he has come out on top

At his new school he has just won the Champion Year 6 Athlete last week and he has been started on an extended Maths and English programme(at high school level)

He said to me the other night - the cool thing here in Australia mum is no one knows about me having ADHD!! and they like me

Must admit I have found it appallingly easy to obtain his medications - went to GP TOLD him T was ADHD and what drug I wanted - I got a 4 month script fark me

that is so cool, 3MB!!! you both must be super stoked

A 4mth script god I wish.....

Certainly am



I know

Just went back as 4 months was up and man alive just got a five month script unreal and scary really

Wow 3MB a 5 mth script. They don't by the sound of it have tight controls over there. As much as it a costly exercise with time I can understand why they are so contolling of this drug. I'm finding that staying to just one pharmacy is a good idea as got questioned extensively at the last one i felt like a right crim on the way out. Our medical centre pulled a stunt on me last month I rang to make an appt with the dr to get another script and reception said that if it was just for a script i could just pick one up so thinking to myself that gosh that could save me a bit of time i went with that option. Only to find out that picking up a script costs $20 even for a 5 year old and the pharmacy beside them charge a fee of $5 So $25 for convenience so this month we'll be seeing the dr and taking up her time cause he's free till he's 6 and going back to the pharmacy close to home as its free cause he has a subsidy number.

An update on us.. This school year has been a breeze his new teacher is lovely and oh so much more organised compared to last years one. And L is really responding well to the class environment that they have set up and the routine structure of the day is kept to Only one small slip up with his meds he thought he would be sneaky and not take it one morning he pretended to swallow but actually he didn't even put it in his mouth and about 10am(on a school day) my mum found it (she looks after my youngest while i'm at work)school rang me at work and asked if he had had his Ritalin that morning to which I responded "yes"so it was presumed he was having a sidewards day. But when I rang mum she said she had just then found the pill on the bench (so glad C didn't see it firstlucky) so he was topped up at school and the day went on as usual. But other than that its been good.

I hope everyone else is going well

Ah yes, the fun of getting new scripts! A 4-5 month one would be lovely at times!

It's cool if your kid is under 6 and actually free but I've found the best option for us is to take up the doc's time with an appt too. Our health insurance pays for appts but not for script fees - stupid but that's what works for us.

LCM - the script should be free at any pharmacy if you have a subsidy number for the med. The doc is supposed to write the number on the script so any pharmacy can use it. You don't HAVE to go to the same one every time - but it helps because often you can clock up enough scripts over a year to get a special High Script card which means you don't pay the $3 dispensing fee each time.
I think it's 12 scripts per person or 25 per family before you get the card - it's issued by the Health Ministry but given to you by your chemist and it's easier to keep those records if you go to the same place.

We managed to clock up the required number of scripts for the family by about May last year as almost everyone in the family takes regular medication. We did get earlier than that way back in the mists of time when Thomas was on about 6 diff script meds/formula!

I find it disgusting how flippant they are over here with dispensing these four or five month scripts crazy as we are used to and happy with the stricter controls we are used to coming from nz - we can only pick up a month at a time from the pharmacy which is cool with me but it still amazes how easy (too easy) it was to get these prescribed and yet other things trivial things you have to jump through hoops for

Oh this is a good thread to find.

P has ODD, and ive just had her IQ tested and was going on to test other things, but have been told to go thought with a referral for ADD/ADHD.
She has been seeing a counsellor for the last year and the funding has fun out.
So we went private to get this IQ test done, as i needed a starting point, and the more paperwork backing me the better.

We now get CDA which is great, and also get career support days where she can go away for a night or weekend and they career is paid.

So we have just done the first lot of paper work for the assessment, oh the joys, as we already did this nearly 3 years ago

Have also just started her on fish oil, so will see how that goes, its just the kid one at the moment, as i don't know much info on giving her the full strength one.

hows everyone doing??

we just had a horrid weekend - sometimes we have great periods and sometimes they are awful; this one we had leaping on furniture and lots of backchat and 'having the last say' - sticking 2c in when he really shouldn't, winding his brothers up, etc etc. on the plus side he learned to ride a bike (finally!!) but that's overshadowed by all the crappy stuff. i HATE rudeness and disrespect so seeing it come out in one of my kids is like waving a red flag at a bull and i have no idea what to do about it - what to do about his behaviour in general OR what to do about my reaction.

we did fish oil for a while but i never really found it to make much difference, i have thought about going back to it though at a better strength for weekends etc to see if it will take the edge off on these bad ones - we were just using the kids one as well.

Hugs TC - if it's any consolation N's not doing that quite so often - :crossfingers: he's just maturing a little. He's got worse recently too but there's a huge amount going on for him atm - and finally getting a few extra calories into him he's got energy to create havoc like he hasn't had for a while!

Fish oil never helped N either.

I think actually the last bout of jumping off furniture was in Nov last year and that was when he was in hosp and hadn't been medicated for over 24 hours - he was climbing shelving and jumping off it, ran around, jumped onto a seat, overshot and burnt his fingers on a heater, speaking so fast others couldn't understand him etc...

Hang in there!

Hi,

We're in the process of getting our son diagnosed. I am still uncertain if he has ADHD or not. The testing consisted of a computer activity which I wasn't present for and some flip cards where DS had to choose the correct answer from four pictures. There were three other tests as well which he hadn't got to before the hour and a half was up. They test for issues with reading, maths and something else and I told them not to bother as we already know there are issues there and we'd follow that up with an educational psychologist. Does this sound like your other kids' tests?

Anyway the tester was a bit relaxed with DS and Ds gave him a good run for his money showing all his avoidance tactics and general lack of cooperation with anything to do with hard work. I sort of feel that if the psychologist had been a bit stricter with DS he would have completed more of the testing. It's a bit annoying.

I'm really not certain if medication will help DS or not. I'd love a magic bullet that helped with getting into trouble less at school and helped him maintain his friendships. But I'm realistic too. They (the psychologists) seem to think a lot of his academic issues will clear up once he's on meds. I think he might have auditory processing disorder and dyslexic stuff as well. Not sure meds will help those issues iykwim.

I will admit that DS shows a lot of hyperactivity issues. He jiggles a lot, gets up and down a lot (goes to the loo during class time a fair bit), exits the couch by jumping from the arm of the couch, has to be told 1000 times and counting to get off the back of the couch, forgets he's eating and wanders away from the table, irritates his brothers for no good reason (actually that might just be a brother thing), climbs stuff, runs away from us when we're out, explores inappropriately and without thought of consequences, and is extremely impulsive. I guess because he's a reasonably bright kid (although that doesn't translate academically) he tends to fly under the radar a bit. I'm pretty sure the current teacher doesn't think it's ADHD at all but more that he's lazy, doesn't listen properly, won't apply himself, is self centred, competitive and attention seeking (she'd be right in the last two things).

Apparently before anything else happens we have to see the paed and there is a six week wait I'm hacked off about the wait. It's already the second term and we'll be nearly at the third before they do anything so it's a bit of a waste of a year for DS. In the meantime I'm going to follow up the other stuff.

Anyway if you've got to the end of my novel well done. I'm sure I'm going to have lots of other questions along the way. I'm a regular on here but just going for a little anonymity in case of IRL lurkers. It's amazing how negative RL people are towards this sort of diagnosis and the recommended treatment

oh wow cacao, you could have written about my son!

our test was different - conners (sp?) rating form, it was a few years ago now, i thought it was - for want of a better term - kind of lame, even ds's teacher thought it was, there were times when he would do something but not ALWAYS so answers that we couldn't accurately answer etc. paed looked at it and went 'oh yes ADHD' but i always thought there was something else there as well, or it wasn't a full picture IYKWIM. in year 2 he was reading jr journals in class, ones that he had been reading in the middle of yr 1 and he literally did NOTHING in class, his teacher also described him as lazy, couldn't be bothered etc. i asked her to challenge him in reading esp and she refused and i read something online.. gifted kids vs gifted ADHD kids; he got bugger all on the gifted kids list of characteristics but on gifted ADHD he got almost all of them. we had him tested by an ed psych and he came out in the gifted spectrum with a few other issues, and the psych also confirmed that he was 'classic ADHD'. then he was tested again at the start of the year and also tested as dyslexic.. talk about a bag of issues haha. i look at year 2 as a complete write off, one where he went to school to eat his lunch, he had a teacher who was hopeless at doing anything for him and by the time we got everything sorted the year was over. then again - after having him re-assessed in the first week of term 1 so we could set an IEP etc etc and get things sussed at the start of the year, i have, believe it or not, STILL not got the report back from the psych. beyond frustrated doesn't even start to describe it.

meds definitely won't 'fix' a learning or APD problem but they would make them easier to deal with IYKWIM? make things easier to focus on; sometimes i kind of think of ds as trying to focus on ONE thing in the middle of a giant room filled with people and shiny things and a million noises and things like that - almost impossible.



yeah, this is what we are struggling with at the moment, esp the inappropriate for age behaviour and impulsive stuff. everything seems to go in one ear and out the other and it drives me crazy! and poor listening skills which i can't stand.. when i talk to him he hops from foot to foot and leaps around and makes faces and fiddles with things.. gaaahhh! and getting him to DO anything, like clean his room, is something that takes allllll day, or even several days, and lots of yelling and screaming on my part, etc etc (even though i could clean it myself in ten minutes).


eleanor, how old is N now? i can't wait until we start coming out the other side of this i mean in hindsight i don't think M's issues ever disappear i think they just manifest in different ways, things se are struggling with now weren't an issue a year ago but then things that we were struggling with 18 months ago have been overcome.. sometimes i can be positive about it (yaye! look what we don't deal with any more!!) but then other times i feel like it's some kind of treadmill where we don't move.. everything else does and there is always something new and bigger coming. boo hiss!

N is 11 yrs 3 months. Honestly - some of it's due to all his other crap going on. Having said some of the physical stuff wasn't happening, put him back on higher cal intake and bingo - manic monkey territory again...

Cacao - that sounds like a crazy assessment!
We did the Connors, N's teacher did the Connors, they observed N at home, at school and at the clinic several times before we came to a diagnosis.
Stupid teacher thought they had to exhibit all ADHD behaviours at all times and so seriously screwed her Connors form. Then she happened to go to a training day on all sorts of things incl ADHD and realised! Thankfully we were still going through the assessment period so she contacted the psychs and asked to re-do it in light of actually having a clue!

Some of N's stuff is also stress related - life's v up in the air here.

Whoops, I should have been clearer. We did the Connors right at the beginning before we'd had the first appointment. We had his teacher from last year fill it out (and he scored 90s for lots of ADHD behaviours) and the teacher from this year (half way through first term she scored him in the 60s and 70s ITMS). Our responses were more in line with last year's teacher (in the 70's, 80's and 90's).They also did an initial assessment then we went back to talk with them without DS and then we did the other testing (which apparently is also meant to rule out other stuff? autism etc?).




See this is where I start to doubt. I read the above quote and think yep that's classic ADHD (from what I've read). BUT DS can stand still, in fact he can sit very still when he's watching telly or playing computer games. If he's asked to clean his room ... well we can't even get him in the room - he just won't go. He has all sorts of avoidance tactics for stuff he doesn't want to do. He is more oppositional and disobedient than anything else. He doesn't follow instructions, won't do what he's ask etc. I don't think he's getting distracted from task. More that he simply will not do the task. But I felt the psychologists thought this was classic adhd I guess if he suddenly gets all compliant on meds we'll have an answer???? I don't know, my brain is struggling with it all.

And a lot of boys are loud and impulsive. But on the other hand I have another boy and he's nothing like DS - sensible, would complete the tests in the designated time, able to calm down when asked (from making racket and running around like a mad thing), able to follow instructions, and wears his shoes home from school EVERYDAY!!!!!

Ahhh, thanks for letting me have a bit of a rant. It's good to get it out of my head.

oh yeah - my 8yo will sit for hours on a computer and loves to read, so can spend hours lying on his bed reading - in fact one of the thigns that EVERYONE seems to say is 'oh i wouldn't have thought he was ADHD.. he can read so long?' etc etc.

i kind of think of it like, i don't have any problems concentrating on things that i LIKE to do, either. but things that i don't like to do i have to really force myself and it's hard to stay on track and sometimes i find myself reading the same page four times because i know i'm getting distracted and nothing is sinking in - i figure that for him it must be ten times harder than that to force himself to do things he doesn't want to - coupled with age, you know, he lacks that maturity to go 'oh i should just do it and get it over with rather than dragging it out all day' IYKWIM?

i've got three boys and it's been really interesting; my oldest is loud but introverted, my middle kid is loud and extroverted, so i see some of their differences as personality; but in saying that, i can tell my middle kid not to do something and he will GET IT, he will slip up sometimes and repeat the behaviour but overall he knows that we don't do that in the house. i've told my oldest kid every day since he was about three not to jump on the furniture and.. i am still telling him. he KNOWS the rules but he just doesn't think about them before he does them. my middle kid is obstinate and stubborn and can be oppositional at times; but he also has that filter that allows him to think about his actions a split second before he does anything, my oldest kid, his brain seems to run about three seconds later than his actions IYKWIM?

okay - another terrible weekend. discipline ideas for ADHD kids please? i just feel like we are getting nowhere with ds, and quite frankly, i spend all my time telling him how horrid his behaviour is (which i know is terrible and i HATE it but i am at that point, you know, NOTHING is working and i can't find anything constructive to do about it so i just rant and rave) and i am too ashamed of his behaviour to take him anywhere.

this morning - we have a rule, you eat brekky and get dressed and THEN you watch tv. this morning we had to take dh to work so got up, kids had been up a while, ds was watching tv, i got everything and everyone ready (incl telling him to dress himself so we can leave) and as we are walking out the door he says 'oh i haven't had breakfast, i will have it before we go'. i say, no, you should have had it, we are leaving now. cue him screaming and stomping about how he is going to have it NOW and we can't stop him and bla bla bla. got him out the door (no brekky) and dropped dh at work, while we are there he wants a biscuit (there are none) and some bread - dh says no, it's a week old, could make him sick. ds whinges and moans about how he wants food and he is STARVING!! etc, lots of stomping and huffing and yelling when we say no. i tell him that i was going to stop at the bakery on the way home to get a bun (i haven't eaten either) and if he is good i will get one for him too; so he starts demanding that i HAVE to get him one with cream etc etc. on the way there i point out that things with cream are treat things not breakfast things so he can have a plain bun - when he gets there he picks the BIGGEST bun in the cabinet and i downsize it so it is the same as everyone elses bun, he has this MASSIVE screamy cry fit in the middle of the bakery because i didn't get him the big bun - so i tell him he can't have it at ALL until he has earned it.

did i mention that i asked him to clean his room so i could change the sheets, and that i wanted him to pick his dirty clothes basket up and put it in the laundry? i asked him before we left home. the room wasn't even MESSY, just what i would call untidy - a 10 min job. i told him that when we got home and everyone else was enjoying their buns, he could have weetbix, and then he could clean his room - this was at 10am. at 4pm, he still wasn't done cleaning it - he didn't start until 2pm. every time we walk past he's playing with lego or reading - when we say 'hey, how about cleaning?' he jumps up and screams like - oh, you know those hysterical fainting victorian women? they sort of shriek and hold the back of their hands to their foreheads and collapse in a heap? THAT is what he sounds like. so we have been over rude behaviour, and inappropriate responses, and now we are covering 'doing what you say you will'; because EVERY time this happens he says 'oh i PROMISE that THIS TIME i will do it!!' and then of course he never does. he doesn't even TRY; i swear, i would have so much more patience if he made an EFFORT but he does not even bother to get that far.

i try and keep the smaller kids away from him but i can't always - his room is off one of our main rooms so somewhere that they're in and out of. i am CONSTANTLY telling him to leave them alone - in an hour, this afternoon, while my mum was here, i had to tell him no less than four times to GET OFF HIS BROTHER; my middle kid was just sitting on his bed reading - ds could have cleaned around him, but no, every ten minutes, he's lying on top of him, or chinese burning his arm, or behind him, pinning his arms to his sides - we say 'what the hell are you doing?!' and he goes 'oh i am trying to get something off him?' etc etc. he has NO concept of personal space and he cannot read cues at ALL, so whereas dh can play a rough and tumble game with the smaller kids and call it off when they get worked up, ds will work them up and then i will say 'stop it, you can tell they are getting worked up because of X Y Z cues they are giving you' and he will ignore me and keep going.. and then come crying to me when he gets hit or bitten. and then ten minutes later he is doing it AGAIN, it drives me frigging crazy; it drives my smaller kids crazy, and honestly, i would hate to think he is treating OTHER peoples smaller kids like that because it would totally look like bullying.

in the end, i took ALL of his reading time (he gets an hour a night) off him this week, we also have to take something to his cousins house tomorrow and he has to sit in the car - this hit home pretty hard at the time but i doubt it will have much impact on his actual behaviour.

we had to go out tonight and he was just... GRRR. i told him NO computer, his behaviour didn't warrant a treat like computer, that he had to take a book and read it. first thing, he caused a fight with one of his brothers, so dh put him in the hallway and gave him a book - so he screeched for half an hour about how he didn't want to be there and oh he wanted to have the other book and oh it was so unfairrr etc etc. then he sprawled in the middle of the hall - not where he'd originally been told to sit - one of the other kids tripped over him and that caused another ruckus. at the dinner table he ate okay but then when we asked him to stay at the table and wait for pudding - and usually i wouldn't but as one plate was being taken away another was being put down IYKWIM so not like he had to wait - he got off his chair and rolled on the floor and caused ANOTHER ruckus getting in one of the other kids personal space etc etc while we were telling him to sit down - no pudding. and then the screaming about how UNFAIR it was yada yada.

and THEN!! we come home and i tell him to get straight into bed. he goes to the loo and after a while comes out and tells me that he managed to get the brush part of the scrubber STUCK DOWN THE TOILET because while he was going he was 'looking for something to do'. FARK! talk about the last straw, i just want to go and bang my head against something.

and then theres all the backchat we're getting lately, and the HAVING to throw his 2c in on EVERY. LITTLE. THING, and it is driving dh and i UP THE WALL. we feel like we have tried everything; taking things away and punishments and praise and using positive language and spending lots of time with him etc etc but we feel like we are stuck in this negative rut. he is almost 9 so not cute and funny any more like it was when he was, you know, 3 or 4; people now look at him and go 'what the hell is wrong with that kid?' etc. he doesn't appear to have any kind of currency at all, even reading - i mean, it is more of a punishment for

i just don't know what to DO. i grew up in a house where my parents yelled all the time and i didn't want to be like that with my kids.... and i felt like they were always praising and doing nice things with/for my brother while i was always in trouble and i didn't want to repeat that either - and yet i find myself doing both because NOTHING i have tried seems to have any kind of lasting effect on him. i am terrified that i will raise a child who will turn out to be this rude, selfish, bullying person who doesn't listen to anyone else. i mean, he is a great kid, really - under all the irritating stuff he is kind and sweet and funny and very, very smart - but like i told him this afternoon, you can be the smartest person on the planet but if you can't listen and follow basic rules and be nice to people... no one cares. we have the same rules for everyone in our house... why should he be exempt?

I TOTALLY relate to this TC, oh my goodness, the nights I go to bed feeling soooo guilty and tearful because I feel like I am damaging the poor wee soul... it is heartbreaking, I understand how you feel. As much as we remind ourselves that they can't help their behaviour it still doesn't take away the fact that their behaviour is so bloody irritating, frustrating and destructive to the family unit.

I find discipline with Logan reasonably difficult, consequences need to be immediate with him - we did the removing bedtime story thing with him too as it was his absolute favourite thing to have in a day but it was just too far away so wasn't effective. We have tried working on one problem behaviour at a time and doing a reward chart for it - some of them have been for using gentle hands, using kind words, talking not yelling. They work for a while but then the behaviour creeps in quite quickly again.

I have suggested this several times on this site, removing all toys, DVD's etc. I found the boys had so much stuff they couldn't find a way to entertain themselves, fighting was all the time, no cooperation, just loads of bored niggling at each other (mainly Logan to Callum), taking the toys away meant they had to play with each other, find ways of entertaining themselves and honestly, the behaviour from both of them improved almost immediately. It was over a year before we returned their toys to them... we threaten every now and again to do it!

I remember you had issues with your ExDH re: medication didn't you, are you still at a stalemate there or have you started stimulant meds? I honestly couldn't cope with Logan off meds, those first years of his life was so, so hard and now most of the time we see the Logan as he is meant to be, not the hyperactive, loud, dramatic child he is off meds! In saying that though, it is far from perfect, I still find him difficult to parent, he always has been and I think always will be harder to manage than the average child.

Oh, and Logan does the screaming, dropping to the floor thing too, drives me completely INSANE!!! At age 8 I am still telling him to 'use his words' and 'if you need help come and ask', how hard can that be, can't believe how he still chooses that sort of behaviour over asking rationally

Huge hugs to you, I know how hard it is

i've taken HEAPS of his stuff away; lego is now in the lounge instead of his room; biffed out lots of toys and things, his room basically has books and a few small toys in it, very boring and he STILL can't clean it up i mean i don't want it perfect but if something is broken because he stands on it then everyone else has to pay for it in whinging for the next few weeks and then he wants another one... want want want want want but no giving back IYKWIM. i really struggle as well because i feel like if i take all his things away then he just goes and plays with his brothers things and if i say 'you can't go in their rooms' then it punishes them as well because they can't play with him.

we;ve been doing immediate time out in the hall but it doesn't seem to have ANY effect at all, i am really struggling to find something that works.

i do this thing with dh, where if i think he is wrong i will talk and talk and talk at him until i can rationalise him into seeing that i am right, and i do it to ds too, i can't help myself. all i want to see when i talk at him is that flicker of understanding and of course, i never see it, i just talk and talk and talk and i get to a point where i know that it is pointless and he has long ago zoned out and I CAN'T STOP. somewhere along the way i have convinced myself that if i can jut find the magic combination of words that all of a sudden what i am trying to say will become clear to people and so i just tend to keep talking in the hopes that i will find it haha. hasn't worked yet

Hi Teacup I can so relate to you. DD has been in her room all morning after having ipod touch, computer time band because she has been talking back disrespectful and wanting to cleaning her room. Her 4 year old brother went in to help her clean her room "Go figure". The Room is "clean" have not done a check yet, I have been having time out in the garden. The only way the room get clean correctly is if I am there and tell her to do A, B , C. If I tell her to clean her room it is just an overload and she can't cope or work out were to start. Simple A B C instructions are the only way things work in our house.
I have just clicked that she has not had her meds this morning and that is why things are not coming together today "Bad mum" I can always tell if meds are forgotten.

TC - honestly finding currency doesn't work with these kids. They live in the moment and that's all that matters to them. I've found I've got to keep telling myself that it's not deliberate, he's not malicious, we put up with and accomodated William's autistic needs and Nicholas is no different.

Best best thing we ever found with Nicholas was very brief time-outs. If you keep him in for 10 mins or whatever for their age they've forgotten why they are there and the whole exercise is pointless - they've moved on finding something else fun to do - living in the moment again.

So when we decide a certain behaviour is really rising to the fore again and we need to stop it - or totally outrageous, never tolerated behaviour - we'll select the behaviour, find a time when everyone's happy and settled and explain that this issue is a problem and we're all working together to stop it - we're a team. N will freely agree he doesn't like getting into trouble all the time! So we're a team working to reduce that.
We explain to him that every. single. time. he does the behaviour then he will instantly wind up in time out. It's a time out of about a minute. Not long enough for him to work himself up totally, not long enough to go oh well you suck, I'll just do this instead - but long enough to be a pita for him and break the cycle.

It's a total pita for all concerned but after a certain number of times N usually realises when he'd done it again and it's almost a joke - leave the room, count to 60, come back again.
But it breaks their play and gives a chance to re-set the dynamics. It does work - we've extinguished his charming habit of climbing up the higher than waist height benches and jumping off onto a tiled floor in socks, a screaming/squealing habit and a couple of other charming things along the way.
We're talking weeks of consistent time out and it will drive you mental but so long as it's no drama, no pack drill, just "You did x, you're out" and no going over it when they come back, talky talky at them - just come back and play. Then it really does seem to work, with N anyway. Essentially I think it gets annoying enough to make the rule stick in his mind!

It does help that N's medicated though because you have the quiet, teachable moments to talk, explain the approach and why you are doing what you are doing.

Hugs - so BTDT!

Oh ! Us too! DH and I have been discussing and mulling over DS and how best to discipline him as well. He has been in his room since we arrived back from our outing and had an early bedtime. He has also lost his computer time this week - but I made a cardinal mistake there because I probably won't stick to it although my resolve is strong after this afternoon.

I also find that immediate timeout for DS is the most effective. For him longer time outs seem more effective. As soon as we let up on the discipline he slips back into old habits.

Same. Also grew up in a shouty house. Also repeating the cycle. Also scared my child will grow up rude, selfish, bully. We just need the "real" DS to be the one we see more often instead of all this other crappy behaviour.

Same again. Some days his behaviour is so bad and I feel like our family is coming apart at the seams because of it. I know he can't help it but he also can't be left to do it either. It's all so frustrating and difficult.

Teacup, thank you for your reply to my last post. It helped to put some stuff into perspective for me.

thanks everyone

i did sit down last night and make a list of the areas that we wanted to see improvement in.. there are so many little things!

also made a list of incentives (getting to choose dinner which is a biggie for him as he eats almost NOTHING that the rest of the family eats so dinner is a constant battle; if he is good for a whole day then he gets a sticker or token that is equal to $1 and when he has 20 i will take him to the book shop; 15 mins extra reading time etc) and some consequences (ladder of certain doom which has worked in the past, i just need to make sure i actually follow it through; no going to friends houses/friends coming here, loss of reading/computer time etc). have also upped our expectation of what he is to do at home; so he has jobs to do every night and has to keep his room clean then on the weekends he is here he has to clean/vacuum his room and strip his bed/take clothes to laundry one day, and then the next day he has to do a cleaning job of my choice around the house and bake something for lunches for the next week. everything will be timed - he hates this, but it is the only way i can see that we will get around taking 6 hours to clean up a 10 min mess IYKWIM - i always go 'oh i will just leave him till it is done' but when i see him faffing about i can't help but go in and shout at him IYKWIM. this way i can go 'do this, you have half an hour, if you don't do it, consequence is X' and then i can follow through - no angry. am hoping that it works.

cacao, i love what you said..

YES!! there are so many lovely things about my ds - he is the kindest kid i know, he is quirky, and funny, and smart, and he has a great imagination - but all of those things are overshadowed by his crappy behaviour. i really want to be able to see the GOOD kid more often and i want other people to see it as well.

I have found with DD that she needs A, B , C instructions. breakdown simplify your instructions so he knows what is expected for each short task. This is very time consuming but seems to be the only way that my DD responds to been told to do something. It is very hard because you want to teach these kids to be independent and cope in the big word but it is soooo much easier just to do it yourself instead of having to deal with World War 3 each time an instruction is given.
Good luck I hope that the new structure works for you.

even if i give my ds one step instructions half the time he gets distracted before he finishes or when he is cleaning his room, he will be screeching away about how hard it is and how he can't doooo ittttttt and i will say 'pick your clothes up and then come to me and i will tell you what to do next' and instead of doing it he will sit there and wail about it for an hour before he actually makes a move to do anything

thought i would come back and update; we have had a pretty good, quiet week. we went over what he has to do in the morning - no TV at all and he is not allowed in the lounge if the small kids have it on - if he sees a moving picture he just zones and it is all over rover. by the time he has done everything he can read or it is time to walk out the door. he still needs prompting but it is getting better.

we decided to work on appropriate reactions first because the shriek/flail/drop thing really gets on my nerves and is totally inappropriate for his age; as well as a bunch of other stuff he does which is just silly. for every warning/inappropriate action he does he loses ten minutes of his bed time; he goes to bed at 7.30 and reads for an hour, so if he loses 10 mins he goes to bed at 7.20 and only reads for 50 mins. last night he went to bed at 6.30 for me the hard thing is remembering and following through, if i do it, it works, if i just take time off him but don't send him to bed early then it doesn't. he also asked twice if he could go to a friends house and i reminded him no, and why (bad weekend behaviour so no going anywhere this week) which i felt bad about - usually i say yes as he only has one friend, but not this time.

i've also upped what i expect him to do around the house, so he has been cleaning up more, unloading dishes etc etc. takes FOREVER and OMG so painful to watch as i know i could do it faster but have to make him do it as he needs to learn that he needs to pitch in.

i think the biggest thing is that now that *I* have a plan i feel more in control so i don't yell as much. i've gone over how we're going to do things now and if he slips up then i remind him without screaming my head off, and things get done.. it isn't perfect yet but it is much MUCH better than it was over the weekend. and i've learned not to be 'nice' - i mean, i am nice, but earlier in the week i thought i would let him watch tv when we came home and THEN do homework, as a kind of treat, but then when it came to homework time he was whiny and dragged it out and i got grumpy and he got grumpy etc etc - so i am kind of seeing that even though i have good intentions at times like that, that they're actually detrimental in a way, we should stick to our 'plan' where we both know what happens in what order, and THEN there should be a treat.. no one gets grumpy that way.

Well done it sound as if you have got a good plan and everyone knows what is expected and what need to be done. It is hard following through all the time but you need to for these kids they need to know that this is what is happening and this is how it is going to be. It can be painful and it takes more energy than just doing it yourself but in the long term everyone wins.
It is not going to be plan sailing so do not get upset if old patterns come back or if he tries to push all your buttons that is normal behaviour just deal with it the best that you can and start over again. I sometimes think that letting go of the bad behaviour and focusing on the future can be hard but you just need to start each day a fresh and not hold to the negative things that are said in the heat of the moment. Good on you for being strong and setting the boundaries one week down give yourself a pat on the back or better still treat yourself to something for you after all you hard work.
I'm glad that you are back in control keep up the good work