my "spirited" DS

[~Heavenly~]

hi just wondering if anyone has any ideas what may be the issue with my DS

he is 4.5 turning 5 has slight speech problems and saw a speech therapist when younger,it seems like the only time he behaves and is quiet is when he is in fornt of the tv...he runs around the house alot and is always jumping of tables etc and has been a climber since he could walk.....

whenever he knows were asleep/not looking he is a total pita climbs in the kitchn and grabs things he knows he shouldnt..just in the last week he good some smelly body mouisteriser and put it all over his room and got the pepper cracker and put that all over his room, ripped all the fluff out off a pillow so i had to sit at his door to make sure he cleaned it or he wouldnt,i put the vacuum in there and told him he could do it when he finished picking up the rubish(ripped paper from books /cardboard) and i go to the loo to find him standing there vacuuming weeing on the floor...

this is not th first time i have caught him weeing on the floor either he will just walk out the room and pee in his room or dining room on the floor or he will do poo on his floor and play with his toys in it.

he has broken 3 single bed frames because he always takes the matress off,even tried tieing it on, and turns them over and jumps on it and he ripped his last matress to shreds and put more fluff everywhere.....again today found some car cleaner and put that all over his bedroom wall and window sill

the other day he broke the old wooden fense (pretty crappy anyways) and took the dog for a walk without telling anyine...he quite often will just run away at shops home etc and not come when called

when he was younger at the old place he boke his bedroom windows,used to climb on the top of a 2m high cupoard and ended up breaking the back panel off,walked out at 2am and got in my car and rolled it into a pole

the list goes on of him doing things he actually knows he shouldnt but the thing is he is very emotional,sweet and loving...he loves to help and can be very good when he wants to although doesnt listen and help how you want sometimes...im just at my wits end we have tried time out taking toys smacking i even did PPP it only seems to work for a week or two then hes over it

has anyone had a similar child or know of a similar child and a good way to deal with it or what may be wrong......

he has even started at kindy and got sent to the principals office but has actually been really good then all the sudden he doesnt want to go and well run to the gate climb and open it and run back to the car and will just kep running back saying he want me and hes shy and i feel bad leaving his teachers to deal with him coz i know he will not listen for the rest of the day for them

sorry this is so long and thanx for any advice i really need the help

[littlelara]

I have no advice, but I wish you well; it must be so hard day to day for you
Hugs

[Inertia]

Oh honey, this all sounds so awful, but I can relate. Sam was "spirited" too. There was one point there where he only slept 4 hours in every 24 and someone HAD to be there or the results could have been utterly catastrophic.

Sam has a sensory integration disorder - specifically vestibular hyposensitivites. It was fairly easy for them to diagnose. He could spin around on the spot for hours on end and never get dizzy. Heights don't frighten him, but it sure as hell scare the living crap out of me when I found him running around on the roof!!!

We bought a trampoline and moved onto food control measures. No bad additives at all, and the majority of our food is fresh prepared. Obviously the whole lot of us had to move onto this diet too, and I might just add that DH and I have never felt better and DH who had been fighting his weight for a few years actually started losing it. (Believe it or not, he let himself go during his MLC).

Sam has been much easier to deal with, and what really surprised me with it was we went from a kid who wet his bed every night to one that only has the ocassional accident. I am not sure if it has helped reintegrate his vestibular senses yet, but it has helped I think to have stuff that he can do in a physcally active manner. Like the Wii - what a godsend that thing was. He really works up a sweat playing it, and loves the wiifit. He is causing no trouble while doing it and is running out some of that excess energy he has.

hope some of this helps.
Good Luck!

[teachmum]

Wow it sounds like he's a real handful. I know how hard it is when your child just can't be good and do what you ask. My DD wasn't quite as extreme as your son but she did whatever she could to be a pita. Basically she wanted attention,more than the usual amount.

You just need to be really clear and calm. Set the rules and stick by the consequences. Make it clear that it is his behaviour that you don't like not him. Try to catch him being good (so hard sometimes I know).

I would also seek assistance rom some professionals just in case there are some underlying issues that may be causing his behaviour, the school should be able to give you advice about this. Work with the teacher to find a good drop off routine. Kids love to know what is going to happen. Don't worry about leaving the teacher with him, that's their job and they don't mind. Lots of kids do this.

Lastly don't beat yourself up. it is hard to have a child with challenging behaviour but from my experience if you can set the boundaries at this age then it makes it a little easier when they become teenagers! My daughter can still make our lives interesting but I can take comfort in the fact that one day she will have her own little cherub to deal with

[Lulu]

Originally Posted by ~Heavenly~

.im just at my wits end we have tried time out taking toys smacking i even did PPP it only seems to work for a week or two then hes over it

ok, on the PPP thing only working for awhile....it doesn't matter that he is over it, YOU have to continue with it, come hell or high water. It may appear to work in the early stages, but then he will miss all the negative attention he is used to getting and will up the ante in the naughtiness stakes. Then you fall in a heap because its harder than it was before. This is the stage you have to push through and its tough
If you stand strong continually, stand by the boundaries (I find timeouts aren't always the right remedy myself) you set regardless of what is going on it WILL soak in.

One on one time is very, very valuable (I know its tricky with 3 kids around), but try to incorporate it into everyday life. My DS is AWESOME at peeling carrots, he is the carrot peeling King Of The Universe. Even if dinner doesn't call for carrots, it is his job to peel one for me. He stands on a chair whilst I do the prep peeling the carrot into a thin sliver happily chatting away. I explain every little thing I am doing because that holds his attention. Every so often he graduates to stirring something etc. I speak in a low voice and chase the others out of the kitchen because "M is my cooking helper" - so I'm turning the neg attention into pos.
At bedtime I thank him for his help with dinner and again point out what a good job he did with stirring the stock or whatever.

It did take awhile for him to really listen, but constantly speaking in a low, smiling voice helped him tune in to me.

I did PPP with dp, and what I learned was the consistency makes the difference. Do what you say you will do. Hold the boundaries, whatever they are, whatever the circumstance.
Dp is NOT consistent, always falls back into yelling and the result? The house is nuts and dp seems to have no control whatsoever.
I can handle DS fine. We have our 'thang', he's my boy and I always find ways to praise him for his ingenuity (even if it's nearly destroyed something!), then find a way he can do the same thing but in the backyard. Even breaking stuff. Hell, it's FUN, but you can't trash the house can you? Sometimes I give DS a couple of eggs so he can break, mangle, squash them in a bucket in the backyard
Everything he could bugger up (or use as a weapon) is waaaay out of his reach. This means I have to pull boxes down from high places often, but the house survives better this way

He really tires me out some days (yay for kinder!), but he KNOWS, I will follow through. He gets one warning "hit your sister again and no sweets". He stops straight away because I mean it - he went without sweets for nearly 2 weeks this month. If his dad says it he doesn't really care because dad gives in to the tears.....

Anyhoo - that's what works in this house. It's tiring sometimes, but if I make sure I can give him even 15 mins of undivided attention 2x times a day it makes the difference. He can have me to himself and not have to fight for it.

good luck! xoxoxoxo

[~Heavenly~]

thanx everyone

i think i will give the PPP another go i just have been sooo frustrated lately that i always end up yelling and what not so i will have to kickk it up a notch and have a talk with him and tell him that if i ask once and he doesnt do it its time out and set some house rules...

i guess aswell coz he used to stash things in his room before time out he would climb on top of the cupboard and find like a screwdriver and put it in his room then in time out stab the window sill with it.....they are actually down to those lil fold out couches for beds now and there sheets thats it,no furniture or draws or clothes coz it gets broken and goes everywhere and he used to pee on them

i have also found my son running on the roof too he can be a big pain iin the bottom
he shares a room with his sister and now because they hate their door being locked thy go straight to sleep but they tend to both end up in our room in the middle of the night and he still wets the bed probly every night so still have nappies on him but i think he might be alil young yet and me and dh both had afew issues with that when younger

and i think the trampoline would be a great idea so will have to get one when we have spare money

thanx girls....

[Lulu]

Keep an eye of Freecycle or the Trading Post, even your local paper for a tramp.

Week 3 (in my experience) of any sort of change is always the hardest. When dp and I decided to pull a BIG united front it was haaard. We had to really jump on ds and it felt like every 15 minutes, but he was just making sure we were serious

In any case now he knows I'M serious, he is still a cyclone but he is learning to control his impulses s l o w l y.....

[~Heavenly~]

i am gettiong so annoyed with him now,dh is woring next doo with our landlord and he keeps escaping and running up there(building a concrete block shed...now i know hes excited bout seeing them work and stuff but hes escaping out the bathroom window and just runs up there and i dont want him thinking its ok coz its just next door...and he will get told off and come home then do it 2 minutes later.....

i have wanted to start the PPP again with him but dont have any idea of how to start with him coz he just doesnt seem to listen to anything...so if anyone has good PPP ideas to help start me off again that would be great

[christy]

Sorry I missed this.

He sounds so much like M at times... then again Lulu's M and my M are twins separated prior to birth I'm pretty sure.....

Its really hard, the times I start to relax are the ones when I'm tearing my hair out over her behaviour. So I can understand that.

Food can also play a huge part in behaviour as well.

Matilda has multiple food allergies, she has something called Sensory Processing Disorder (you may want to have a read on that one) and is an extremely strong willed individual.

My advice for today *just breath* in* out* in* out....

[~Heavenly~]

is there someone you go to see to check for allergies and things like that?

[christy]

If you google Sue Dengate or Failsafe Diet you will find some resources. Its all about how preservatives and chemicals can affect behaviours.

Also if you look into Sensory Processing issues... or "Out of Sync Child" you may find some interesting things... Matilda feels as though she's floating all of the time & its most uncomfortable when she tries to sit down or lay down. We use OT exercises to help her feel more "grounded". Sometimes things get mistaken for bad behaviour when its not something in their control.

[~Heavenly~]

thanx for that im not sure if its a sp issue as he can sit for a whole day watching his fav movies if u let him.....i think one of the problems may be that he is quite smart,probly not in school subjects but escaping and those kinds of things coz it feels like no matter what we do he always comes up with ways from when he was 2 and stacking his blankets piloows and matresses to now he will climb out the window coz weve locked all the doors and then he figures out how to break the fence to get out....he also loves climbing so i think maybe its a bordem thing but coz he wrecks alot its hard to get him thing kwim? i dont know,deff gonna look into these diets etc though

[misty]

I am watching this thread with interest. My 1.5yr old is already doing many of the things that you describe and is driving me batty. One of my younger sisters was like this and had ADHD - although my parents (and myself, now that I'm a mother) didn't want to go down the path of drugs, but rather things like diet and exercises to help control and direct behaviour.

[misty]

Just thought I would add (and I say this as the biggest hippocrite in the world as I love to use my TV as a babysitter) that I have heard that to much TV time can actually make these issues worse and change the brainwaves of young children which cause them to be overstimulated when not watching TV, resulting in the kind of behaviour you are describing.

[christy]

ah I can't get Matilda to sit down to watch a movie... But there are quite a few issues with SP as well. She thrives off of a trampoline, she started climbing 6 foot fences at 18 months. Now she walks on the top of them

Lulu did the fail safe diet and I did the RPA Friendly Food allergy diet as well as see an allergy doctor.