child wants help to stop being annoying!

[Student Mommie]

My ds7 does not listen to people when they tell him to stop being annoying.  He gets caught up in the moment and doesn't remember to listen to the other person.  When he is having fun, he doesn't care if the other person is getting more and more mad that he is ignoring their feelings or more and more sad and even crying.  This has negative consequences in his friendships.  And his sister has actually started hitting him to push him away when he just won't quit.  With me, it shows up as him ignoring my direction when I'm trying to direct him to do something but he's just being silly.

 

He wants to stop this irritating behavior but doesn't know how.  He says he cannot remember in those moments.  Any ideas?  I told him very confidently that I would help him and we would solve this, but in reality I have no idea what to try!  I have been trying to "wake him up" for years on this!  It doesn't matter if you throw terrible consequences at him when he is in this mode (and enforce them immediately and consistently).  In this mode consequences have no meaning, no relevance, no reality.  It doesn't matter if you remind him about what a great friend he is and push it from the positive angle while pretending you know he wants to help the other person in some kind of reverse psychology attempt.  In the mode he doesn't care.  It doesn't matter if you remind him that it is in his own best interests to comply.  In the mode, the future doesn't exist.  It doesn't matter if we agree ahead of time on a secret signal to remind him.  In the mode, all that evaporates.

 

FYI, he has the fixated version of diagnosed ADHD.  The type that have a hard time with transitions.  So his brain really seems to get "stuck".

 

Heck, I have been trying to stop yelling at him, so I have my own "stuck" issues.  Still-- when someone reminds me in my moment of poor behavior, I can fairly easily snap out of it.  So I'm not sure I have experienced what he is going through.

[Heathermomster]

Hand signal or whistle, maybe?

[Student Mommie]

I forgot to mention-- he gave a hint for this puzzle.  He said that in those moments, he is bored.  That bugging his sister is a cure for his boredom.  So I'm thinking it's an ADHD thing where his brain is so desperate for stimulation that he gets "stuck" when he finds that stimulation he was lacking.  Perhaps this means I need to be pro-active to prevent his boredom by checking in with him and having him check in with *himself* to start to notice when he feels he needs more stimulation and solve it in a positive way before it gets so bad that he resorts to annoying others.  It's kind of confusing, because there aren't all that many positive outlets I can think of, and there will always be plenty of boring periods of the day that we can't spice up because I need his focus.

[Jean in Newcastle]

I would physically remove him from the situation.  Not as a punishment but as a way for him to disengage from the activity.  Then once his focus is broken, I would redirect him to a more positive interaction.  

[MerryAtHope]

I like the idea of being proactive. Another idea along those lines is to make sure he has PLENTY of outside play time. Important for all kids, but especially ADHD kids. They need the green as much as possible. Get him outside at least an hour per day if you can. And make lists of things to have him do. Keep his time a bit more structured with rotated activities (this can be things he likes to do, as well as chores, school, etc...), rather than large chunks of free time. 

 

I'd try role-playing the issues with his sister, and any others you are privy to. Role-play over and over until he can start to learn different responses. I did tons of role-playing with my kids. What could they do differently? and re-enacting it etc... When they couldn't figure out what to do differently, I modeled and then had them try it. It can take a lot of time to work through this, especially if impulse control is also part of his issues. 

 

Have you worked with foods and nutritional supplements? ie:

 

protein at every meal

no dyes, cut out artificial flavors etc...

swap out healthy things for high-sugar foods/snacks, multi-grain carbs for simple carbs, etc...

supplements like a multi-vitamin, Omega 3's, zinc, iron (one article I read said a high percentage of kids with ADHD are low iron--worth checking on), magnesium, B vitamins are worth looking into. ADDitude Magazine has some good articles with tips--here's one: http://www.additudemag.com/adhd/article/5774.html

 

Hang in there! Merry :-)

 

[geodob]

You wrote that: ' he has the fixated version of diagnosed ADHD.'

 

Where it might helpful to understand a bit about 'attention'?

Attention isn't a single thing, but is rather a complex.

Made of a heirachy with different levels, Primary, Secondary an Tertiary.

 

So that at any moment, we are maintaining multiple thoughts/ concerns at their appropriate level.

Which can up or down, or be discarded,

Time is a good example of this, when doing something that needs to be done by a certain time.

As we get closer to the completion time, our attention to time, moves to higher and higher levels.

 

With interactions with other people, we maintain a secondary level of attention.

That is used to intuitively read their body language, facial expressions and tone of voice.

 

With 'attention difficulties', the problem is not with lack of attention?

But rather with managing and maintaining multiple points of attention, across different levels.

So that in regard to his 'fixation'?

You might look at this in terms of being unable to maintain multiple points of attention.

Resulting in fixation.

 

Though their is ongoing research into this, that basically involves practicing maintaining multiple points of attention, at different levels.

[PeterPan]

And in case I sound like I've got it nailed, let's just say I'm right where you are.   ;)  Here's the thread I started a few years ago.  See what responses people gave.  Do I *do* something about toddler hitting? - General ...

 

Now for where we're at a few years later.

 

It's not a fair solution, but I've found it's faster to call the OTHER child to me.  If that other child is willing to obey and will come quickly, it at least removes them from the problem.

 

And yes Houston, you have a problem.  You're going to have to step up your structure a LOT.  We have a LOT of that in our house and it means he needs a lot more supervision, more interaction.  Wear him out with more complex expectations.

 

Btw, there's tons of therapy stuff you can do at home for this.  It will wear him out and can help the brain as well. (not an exhaustive list)

 

-brain gym

-metronome work using Heathermomsters instructions (add digit spans!!!!)

-balavisx, neuronet, S'cool Moves

-play racing games where you work on impulsivity

-get him into sports where they work on self-control and impulsivity--the gymnastics program at the Y is affordable at the non-competitive levels and will, or karate, or...

-A Fistful of Coins (game, works on working memory)

-Simon Says

-PRACTICE OBEDIENCE.  Seriously, like just practice it.  Spend 15 minutes a day practicing with him coming every time you call him.  Like dog training.  

-Teach him to respond with "Yes, ma'am."  

-read books or stories about obedience as a theme study, make it a point of conversation throughout the week.  Don't go abstract.  Bible verses on obedience do NOTHING for my ds.  Try to use the books to build mental pictures of expected behavior in his mind.

-discuss expected vs. unexpected behavior

-get some of the books people have listed on social thinking to help you learn how to talk with him about how other people feel (when you do X, how does Suzy feel?)

-put your hand on his shoulder to initiate the desired response rather than expecting him to act on the verbal command.  Might be ideal that they just hear and respond, but that hand on the shoulder can really go a long way

 

I wouldn't allow the siblings to be together in unstructured, unsupervised ways.  In fact, if he fights/harms/afflicts his sibling in any way, I would apply it as a logical consequence.  Separate them, doing whatever is necessary to achieve that separation, for the rest of the day.  That's a short enough amount of time that he can figure it out and long enough to be unpleasant for him.  My ds is very, very attached to his sister, so to lose her company would be a noticeable natural consequence to him.  Not grounding but natural consequence.  "People who hurt people don't get to be with them."  Bam, natural consequence.  Enforce and be consistent.

 

Kinesthetic boys are NATURALLY going to act out every little thing in their mind physically.  It's just what they do.  You can step up your game with more physical.  Do you have kinesthetic things you do with him?  Even something as simple as rolling a ball while you do your memory work can help.  More physical stuff.  He's not gonna be some angelic girl, smiling and patting down hair.  A boy is not a girl just with dolls traded for frogs.  A boy is a miniature ninja fighter/warrrior/future dragon slayer held back by little things called laws and social expectations!  

 

I know it's hard.  You may have to step up your game plan a LOT to keep your other dc safe.  Create a back-up plan for where the ds goes when you're too tired to keep him supervised.  I have a MIL nearby, so frankly I send him there.  Because one mortal can't keep up with him all day every day, not this mortal.   ;)  You may need to hire someone.  Make a plan.

[PeterPan]

Wow, that's wild.  I'm rereading that thread and it's STILL something we have to watch.  That's shocking even me that he was like that at 18 months.  I had forgotten.  Wow.  Sigh.

 

And btw, one of the suggestions was try discipline (spanking).  He didn't FEEL the spanking and it really did communicate only hitting to him and confuse him.  He is turning out to have issues with inferences, auditory reasoning, I don't know what else.  I'm not anti-spanking in general, but I'm just saying that is a tool that didn't work out well at that age or for a long time.  Now he has more maturity.  

 

And you know it's funny but the responders said how unfair that would be to pull the victim.  It sounds unfair, but dd is finally to where she accepts it.  Ds is still a challenge, sigh, and he's big enough he can hit you (the parent).  She now does it for her *own* safety, even if it's not a fair thing.

 

We do know now that some of what he was doing was serious sensory seeking.  We finally got him into gymnastics, with lots of crashing and ramming and banging, and he feels SO good with that.  You can see his whole world just sort of come to.

 

Another way to approach this is to read Zones of Regulation.  You might find that his behavior is a reflection of going into yellow zone and losing control and self-regulation.  That's what it can be here.  If that's what is going on in that moment, then what you do is a bit different, trying to redirect him into an activity that gets him back to green zone and his peaceful spot.  Sometimes he'll let me redirect him with a book or the Yoga Pretzels cards.  

 

I'm laughing now as I continue to read.  I taught him the "Please Stop" rule (you MUST stop when the person says please stop) and when he's in the moment he NEVER complies.  Then when HE uses it the WHOLE WORLD MUST COMPLY because he's the arbitrary sheriff of such things, lol.  It never ends, lol.

 

I think I'm saying for us looking for the reason underlying the behavior has gotten us farther than treating it as a discipline problem.  You have to stop it, have to have consequence, have to get his attention, have to be consistent (the discipline side of it), yes.  But you still have to find the SN issue that is going on and work on it.  And wrack your brains.  And eat chocolate.

[PeterPan]

Wow, did you get my "He doesn't say much particularly" comment at the end of that thread?  How surreal is that?  Just a few months later we got his verbal apraxia diagnosis.

[Heathermomster]

Amen to what everyone has stated above.

 

Has your DS been tested yet?  I curious to know what an NP would say.

[PeterPan]

Just to follow up Heather's comment, I'll say it would be highly appropriate to get an OT eval for sensory, etc. if you haven't done that yet.  

 

Impulsivity is in the EF portion of the brain, so you want to find lots of ways to work on EF.  They'll call it "inhibition."  So anything where he has to inhibit a wrong response and pause and think.  Processing speed can also affect his ability to change.

 

I don't know, just right there with you, not criticizing.

[Paige]

I've never heard of a fixated version of ADHD. Are you sure it's not OCD? OCD is not just washing hands over and over but is pretty much the brain getting stuck on a thought to such an extent that it causes significant problems. It manifests in different ways and sometimes you can see compulsions like hand washing or light clicking, but sometimes you can't see the compulsions because it is just a thought circling in their heads. My first clue that DS was OCD (that I missed at the time) was that he would nag for something for an extremely long time- like weeks! He could not let go of the thought. My DS was misdiagnosed with ADD when really the issue was OCD. OCD is closely related to anxiety and ADD meds can aggravate anxiety and OCD symptoms. My DS is older and can articulate his experiences well and said that he sometimes acts ADD(extreme silly) because he's trying to distract himself from the OCD thoughts in his head. If any of that sounds true for you, please look into it because stimulants with OCD/anxiety are tricky.

 

With that out of the way- I would recommend role playing games with your DS when he's not with others. You can pretend to be the annoying person and he can try to politely get you to calm down, and then you can switch roles. Give him words to use and a script to follow when he's in situations where he gets a little too silly. With practice, he'll be more likely to remember. If it's just your own family and you notice a situation that you have role played, you could intervene and help walk him through what you had practiced. I would watch for his microbehaviors that may be upsetting people. Is he standing to closely to people, not answering questions but pursuing his own thoughts in conversation, or is he making too many obnoxious action noises (zooming and shooting sounds)? People aren't annoying- behaviors are. I would focus on the behaviors in isolation rather than telling him that he's being annoying. You could work on one behavior at a time or maybe two, but not everything. He'll see improved reactions from others with each behavior that he changes. 

 

It's great that he wants to work on this and has come to you. I think it shows a lot of maturity and is a good sign that he will be able to make this work. 

[kbutton]

My son can be like this. He has ADHD as well as ASD, but probably not OCD. I am guessing that the source of the behavior could be ADHD, OCD, sensory, or bits of all of them. Just to give more data in case you are considering meds. Anxiety is big with ASD, and other than a MINOR episode the first day (or with a dosage change), we've not had a bad reaction at all with stimulants. I would definitely keep OCD in mind, but realize that several exceptionalities can all claim this symptom under their respective umbrellas. It's not terribly cut and dry, and of course, he could have more than one thing going on.

 

 

[HS Mom in NC]

Every kid, especially socially challenged ones, could benefit from this book because it does such a great job explaining different personality types, different annoying behaviors and has lots of practical, helpful examples and suggestions for parents and their children.

 

http://www.amazon.com/The-Unwritten-Rules-Friendship-Strategies/dp/0316917303/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1411253835&sr=8-1&keywords=rules+of+friendship

[Storygirl]

I agree with kbutton. The description in the OP sounds very much like my son, who does not have OCD but does have ADHD and SPD and NVLD (lots of alphabet letters). The persistence and pestering, and the inability to reign in one's actions even when one wants to are very ADHDish behaviors.

 

To be honest, the only thing that has made a significant difference here is medication. We do have lots of structure and at that age my son spent very little time where he was not supervised directly by me or my husband. Meaning he was either in the same room with me or  he was doing something that I knew he could do while managing his own behavior (such as watching a DVD). Unsupervised time always ended up with trouble. For a long time DH and I said our watchwords were "constant vigilance." We had to provide the boundaries for his behavior that he could not provide for himself. Now that he is 10 (and medicated), he definitely spends more time playing in other areas of the house or outside without my constant oversight, but it has been a long haul getting to this point. And it is still not all smooth sailing.

[kbutton]

Texasmama just gave a definition of OCD in another thread on APD evaluations. You might check it out if you think it applies.