Inability to take perspective is out of control!

[PrincessAriel]

nt

[MamaSheep]

Dd 10 was diagnosed PDD-NOS and GAD last spring. Also somewhat dev. delayed She is on sertraline and guanfacine. She does see a psychologist every few weeks who is working mostly on the anxiety at this time.

However, dd's inability to take another's perspective is becoming a huge problem with life in general around our home. I need to know how to handle it or where to look for resources or solutions on how to get through to her.

 

For example, the new neighbor girl has an ATV at age 9. We have told our kids they cannot go on it due to safety reasons (no helmets, etc.) DD says we are spoiling her fun. No understanding of why this is not safe.

 

Her art projects keep growing around the house and expanding the given space she insisted she needs for them. I have three huge rubbermaid containers full of sketches she refuses to part with plus a huge assortment of things she collects like paper clips, screws, odds and ends. She also took all of dh's sockets and built things with them and could NOT understand why he wanted them back. We got her a set of her own but that did not help.

 

Today, she hauled 5 cans of paint out of the garage and began painting the playset outside, on a damp rainy day, of course, wearing her brand new spring jacket. This all happened in about a half an hour while I was finishing school with ds. Again, cannot for the life of her understand why she should have asked. When we said , "Why did you do that?" she said she knows we would have said no so she just went ahead and did it anyhow. No concern that this was wrong.

 

None of my 4 older kids would ever have done this. My dh thought it was funny at first but I am not amused. I am the end of my rope. I feel like I cannot let her out of my sight right now! She is sneaky and I cannot trust her.:confused:

 

First, :grouphug:. I'm sorry. It IS hard to cope with sometimes.

 

Second, I want to just gently point out that there is a big difference between "sneaky" and "developmentally delayed". You would not think anything of having to keep a close watch over a 1 or 2 year-old who kept getting into things and doing things without thinking them through first. It's just how little ones ARE. They don't UNDERSTAND safety concerns, they don't UNDERSTAND about keeping their clothes nice or always asking permission. They are still trying to comprehend what right and wrong are, and understand the general outlines of why things are either right or wrong, let alone the subtle stuff. This is the same thing. I know it doesn't seem like it because she's probably more advanced in other areas, but an understanding of right and wrong is HARD for these kids, as is perspective-taking. It's not that she's "sneaky" and "untrustworthy" it's just that in this area of development she's very, very "young". Yes, you might need to keep a close eye on her and help her think things through, but not because she's "bad", just because she "needs help". If she doesn't understand about safety, it's irresponsible to leave her unsupervised. If she doesn't understand about asking permission before using other people's things, you need to watch her like you would a toddler. She's not being intentionally rude or intrusive or careless. The reason none of your other kids did this is because your other kids are physiologically DIFFERENT from her. She has a disability. Or more like multiple disabilities. It's not fair to expect her to be able to perform at the level your other kids did at that age. It's like expecting a child to be able to run as well as your other kids when he was born without a leg. It just doesn't work. You will always be angry and frustrated that your expectations are not being met, and she will always be demoralized because no matter how hard she tries she can't do what you want of her, so why try? It's REALLY important for you to shift your expectations to more closely match her abilities.

 

This sounds like something it would be helpful to discuss with the therapist. You might be able to get some good suggestions for things you can do at home that would help. One thing that comes to mind is to always explain things in great detail, even (or especially) things you think SHOULD be obvious. For example, instead of just saying, "It's not safe!" Explain all the reasons it's not safe, the things you are concerned could happen. Something else that might help is to practice redirecting her. You probably do need to keep a close watch on her, and if you are, then when you notice she's trying to do something she shouldn't, you can swoop in and suggest something she CAN do that would be just as fun. "Oh honey, we don't play with Daddy's sockets. How about you look in your collection of paperclips, bottle caps, etc. and see what you can build with those instead?" Maybe you could even specify four or five things she's allowed to use anytime she wants, and just make it a rule that if she wants to use ANYTHING else she has to ask first. Or just get her in the habit of asking first for everything. Give her a reward when she remembers to ask permission. She might start doing it more than is necessary, but keep rewarding her and remind yourself that it's a good thing. :)

 

But again, there's a big difference between a child being "sneaky" and "untrustworthy" and a child just not being able to know what is ok and what isn't.

 

And more :grouphug:

Edited March 22, 2012 by MamaSheep

[Barbara H]

I know it doesn't seem like it because she's probably more advanced in other areas, but an understanding of right and wrong is HARD for these kids, as is perspective-taking. It's not that she's "sneaky" and "untrustworthy" it's just that in this area of development she's very, very "young". Yes, you might need to keep a close eye on her and help her think things through, but not because she's "bad", just because she "needs help". .

 

This is a helpful post and I agree with what you are saying. Kids who have really different ways of thinking may not just pick up on the rules that came so naturally to your earlier kids. In addition to not understanding, even when she reaches the point of understanding she may also still lack the impulse control you'd expect to see in a typically developing child of her age.

 

It can be a difficult thing to keep in your brain that a kid with developmental delays may really be "younger" in certain areas. Even if you know that remembering it in the moment isn't always easy, but it is a really important idea to keep in mind.

 

Also, I the idea of the baskets from Ross Greene's Explosive Child may be helpful. http://www.livesinthebalance.org/ There is a lot of good information on his site. One of the main ideas I've found helpful was the idea of the baskets. There are some issues on which you need to be totally firm. These are the safety type issues like the ATV. Other issues, you probably need to try to let go for a while. It is impossible to work on everything all at the same time. Bit by bit she will learn, it'll be more slowly than is desirable but it will happen if you keep trying.

[PrincessAriel]

Thank you for your responses. I do appreciate your ideas.

[mamatohaleybug]

I truly do understand. My daughter has similar issues and it's just exhausting. Her abilities cover such a huge range. I'm often frustrated and feel at a loss with how to deal with her. In some ways she's 4 or 5 and in some ways she's like a 9 or 10 year old.

 

I think some of these disabilities really are VERY hard to handle. And it's especially hard when the child seems typical in many ways. You tend to "forget" that some of the negative behaviors aren't a choice. I wish my kiddo had come with an owner's manual! :)

 

No real advice. Just commiseration. :grouphug:

[MamaSheep]

Thank you for your responses. I do appreciate your ideas.

The psychologist has said she is more like a 7 yr old in some areas but in others, like her egocentricity, maybe 4-5 yr old. At the same time she has an average IQ which makes it kind of confusing to me on how to handle things at times.

 

I also get confused with what in her behavior is from the autism and what is from the dev. delay and where to look for resources for ideas to try. Of course, there is no "box" she fits into!

 

We have carefully gone over safety and other everyday things but so far we haven't gotten very far. She considers her behavior to be our problem. I was not exactly saying that I expect her to act like her older siblings but that because I haven't had to deal with some of this, that I don't have the experience to fall back on. I know I cannot expect the same of her as I did with them. I don't expect as much of her and I get blamed all the time by the older ones that the younger ones are not expected to do as much. She is just really a puzzle at times!

I guess I am just exhausted right now.

 

Barbara, thank you for the links. Is there a good explanation of the "baskets" in The Explosive Child book? It sounds like it might be helpful here.

 

I hear ya. It IS confusing. There's just no instruction manual for these kids. I remember how completely frustrating and confusing it was when ds was about 5 and he was reading at a 3rd grade level, knew all his addition and subtraction facts and was starting in on multiplication, had memorized the names of all the bones in the human skeleton just for kicks, and yet seemed to be completely oblivious about potty issues. The boy would just "go" wherever he happened to be, and sit in the puddle until a rainbow formed over him and act as if it were the most normal thing in the world. He KNEW how to use the dang toilet, and he KNEW he was supposed to do it every time, and we'd tried sticker charts and rewards and all kinds of things to get him toilet trained, but he just genuinely did not care. And he wouldn't say hello or goodbye to other people to save his life because he just didn't see any point in it. "Mom, they already know I'm here or they wouldn't have said hello to me. It's stupid for me to say hello back." Among other things.

 

I sometimes think the disconnect between skills in one area and skills in another is the most confusing, exhausting part of the whole autism "thing". It would be so much easier if their skills were just reasonably consistent across the board, and you could just treat them like they were three years, or six years, or whatever younger than their chronological age. But that's not how it is. They can be all OVER the place, and you never know from one minute to the next if you're dealing with a four year-old or a twenty-six year-old in that ten year-old's body today. Or this minute...lol. They'll explain all about atomic structure, and then throw a tantrum because they have to wear pants. GAAAH!

 

The sibling issue is a tricky one too. Our ds9 is in many ways at about the same level as ds14 when it comes to things like behavior expectations and chores and things. (Though he's MUCH more advanced academically, and she's WAAAAY ahead of him socially.) Pretty soon we're going to start having to have her do things that are more than what we expect of him, and I can see that THAT will be quite the party around here. We've had a lot of discussions over the years about how everyone's brain is built differently, and we all have different abilities and challenges, and ds's set fits with the description of "autism" and dd's fit with the description of "ADHD" and Mom and Dad have their own "stuff" too, and everyone gets assigned tasks that fit with their abilities and aren't age-based. But I think I'm going to have to sit down with just dd one of these days and explain that it might seem like her brother is getting off "easier" than her in some ways, but he really isn't. It's just that he has to work harder just to be able to accomplish some things that come more easily to her than they do to him, and we try to even out how hard people are working instead of asking for the same amount of output. And then I might have to have a chat with ds about how it's ok that his little sister can do some things better than he can. There are lots of things he's good at too, they just don't happen to be the same things. And it's not fair for us to hold her back just because he can't keep up with her in those areas. I dunno....it's a HARD thing to keep everyone friends and not have anyone walking around feeling jealous or resentful.

 

And it can definitely be confusing and exhausting!

 

I find that it's less frustrating if I keep in mind that it's usually not personal, it's just how ds is built. With your daughter, it's probably not that she considers her behavior to be your problem, it's more likely that she has great difficulty "considering" her behavior at all, and she trusts you to help with that and to keep her safe. It's HARD, though, because you just never quite know what they're going to do, or what might be going through their heads (or might NOT be that should be). So there they are, trusting you to be the Rational Adult Who Knows All, and obliviously going along in their own little world, and there YOU are, frantically trying to figure out WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON!!!

 

For what it's worth, it's gotten a LOT better as the years have gone by. Looking back I'd say that THE most important thing is having a good relationship with her. Make sure you notice and point out the good things, forgive her weird errors in judgment and let her know everyone makes mistakes, love her every way you can. The closer you are, the more she'll trust you, the more she'll notice how her behavior affects you, and the more you'll be able to see and celebrate that amazing little person trying to live among all the "static" in her head.