Tantrums, tantrums, and more tantrums!!! Of all 3 of our children Marco is the only one who is really struggling with massive tantrums and ongoing meltdowns so far. These meltdowns started in a very early age and we just thought it was part of the “terrible twos”, but when they didn’t stop and escalated into hourly long kicking and screaming we knew that it was more than just a farce or a developmental stage. We noticed that he would get very upset when he was around 18 months old and his temper would escalate from 0 to 100 in a second. Sometimes for a good reason, but most of the times for absolutely no reason that we could think off. I took him to see a psychologist to get some ideas on how to handle these tantrums. I thought it was a farce he was going through and so did the psychologist. I was told it would pass by itself and that we should just ignore them when they occurred. They escalated when he was in his 2’s and they changed from mostly occurring just at home to also occurring when we had to change unexpected directions in the car. If I decided to go a different way than what Marco was expecting he would start screaming and kicking and this would not stop. Sometimes it lasted the whole trip and sometimes I was lucky to be able to redirect him to a better state of mind. These types of tantrums got me really concerned as I knew that one of the characteristics of autism was the intolerance of change in the routine. A red flag went up, but I didn’t really take it seriously enough. A year later I took him to see the psychologist who advised me to use time out for when the tantrums occurred. I started that the same day, but after using this technique for a while nothing changed. In fact his anxiety for being left alone grew and nothing good came out of that. I stopped it. However when the meltdowns were so severe that no one could tolerate the screaming we continued to take him to his room to settle down. It could take up to 2 hours for him to be able to settle, which could be so draining and exhausting for him as well as the rest of the family. You wouldn’t think that Marco was a child troubled and hunted by these meltdowns when you see him. He seems so happy and content at most stages. Even at school he is polite and calm and keeps it all together. But it’s when he comes home and lets it all go that the red beast (as we call it) comes out. Some days he can have meltdowns over a pair of shoes not being available for him to wear. Sometimes it’s the jacket’s that is not correctly buttoned and sometimes he just absolutely melts down, if his dad’s goes somewhere without him. It can be anything and you just never know when and why these come on. They can occur early in the morning when he just wakes up or in the afternoon when he gets home from school. Most of the times they do occur in the afternoon as he is tired and exhausted after a long day. I have found out that letting Marco go outside straight away when we get home reduces the chances of a meltdown quite a bit. When he goes outside he has a chance to really run and breathe the fresh air, dig in some dirt or ride his bike. Things that he really truly loves and puts him in a good place. Most days this is enough for him to be settled and regulated to have a great afternoon and evening. But then there are just those days when he gets home and nothing just works. He will be irritable and very short and angry. He will hit or kick and sometimes he bites. These days creates a lot of stress for the rest of the house hold. Michael knows to stay away most of the times or he is trying to comfort him, which is very cute. But Daniel is still too little to understand the consequences of interfering with him. It is very hard to handle these days, juggle all 3 kids at the same time and try to stay sane. Sometimes I succeed but trust me, sometimes I don’t!!!!! It can be so hard not to take his yelling and offensive and heart breaking sentences personally and jump on board the band wagon and start yelling yourself. It is SO hard when you are tired and you are being pushed to your limits. But I just keep reminding myself that it is not Marco who is talking. It is his autism and he can’t control it. There are days I have to ring my husband and ask him to come home, because the roof of the house is about to blow off. These days you just want to run and stay away until the crisis is over because they are so intense and so draining. Luckily we have just started to work with a new psychologist who previously has worked with both Michael and Daniel. She quickly put in place some great strategies for our family on how to deal with Marco and his meltdowns and what we could do to reduce and handle them when they occurred. So far we have had great success. In just over 1 and half months we have only had 2 major meltdowns……..big improvements as we went through a stage where they would occurred every 2 – 3 days, so the fact that we have only had 2 in such a long period of time is a true testament to the ABA therapy and its potential.
Posted on: Mon, 24 Jun 2013 10:04:14 +0000
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