Very Touchy Subject.... | Autism PDD
Cell phones away for older kids is agreat idea. Our kids act bratty cause og the inlaws who spoil them both. We are stopping that now. They don't care for the stuff at all. Not for nothing, but the thread has gone on for a while and the originator asks that it be closed (I think understandably). Feel free to start a new thread on this subject if you like, but this one is closed for business I DO believe in spanking when necessary - Payne usually does NOT get spanked though b/c it usually is not necessary.
I have to admit...with my older one..I did spank, always on the butt and never with anything but my hand. I dont need to anymore because all i have to say is Kiara and she stops what she is doing...at least most of the time. With savannah....I dont because it doesnt work. She..doesnt make the connection between what she did and the smack on the butt. She doesnt...make the connection with Time out either. although...she still gets it when she needs it. I like this discussion, as, it makes me realize that i am not the only one who loses it sometimes.see...I was abused emotionally, never physically, but... was told that i was worthless and useless and would never amount to anything... and if anyone ever said those things to savannah I would be in jail because i would kill them. Spanking is one thing, Abuse is quite another, and believe me i have seen some severe effects of it, I was a foster parent for 3 yr and had 9 children in that time. Savannah is just like I was, and i can easily see how i could have driven my parents mad,but..abusing someone who cant defend themselves is just wrong.Amberwaves, My God I hope your brother has psychologically recovered from such a horrific ordeal with his dad.
I wonder why men like that are allowed to procreate.
I am pretty anti-spanking, but I have faltered and done it in the past. It doesn't work with my kids. My clue this summer that my 3 year old ds might be on the spectrum was that he laughed when he would get spanked. Last time my dd was spanked she said, "Why are you hurting me?" 
All this was before their dx. Not that I did it a lot before (maybe 10 times total with all the kids combined), but I won't do it now at all.
I have started going in my bathroom and locking the door for a few minutes when I do hit that frustration point. It helps gets me to a more rational place.
I understand what you are feeling too. With Mason it just seems that sometimes NOTHING works. I never spanked my 2 older boys, I guess I never got to that point. But there were a couple of times when I ended up losing it and whacked Mason on the butt. This was when he was a little younger. I only did it like 3 or 4 times total because for one it didn't even phase him. And for two, after the last time, he hit me back, and that sent the quick message that all I was doing was teaching him to hit when he got mad. Unfortunately now, we have a big agression problem with Mason...I am not blaming myself for the few spankings I did give him, but I know now that it isn't going to help.
I do timeouts, and believe me there are a lot of times they don't work! A lot of times they make the situation worse. That's telling me there is more to the situation that what I am seeing. I try really hard to get him to calm himself. I do squishy balls, and he has a beanbag, or I try to get him to ride his horse and listen to music. I do tight hugging when he starts getting really upset...and if that doesn't work or he is too much for me to hold on to, I put him in his room and hold the door closed. A lot of times he would get so upset that things started flying around, but he has gotten much better. For awhile I removed a lot of the things that were in there, because he would throw things. But now when we get to this extreme he goes in his room, and the screaming coming from there is horrible, but he is learning that he can't throw things...the consequences of losing his things from either them being broke or me taking them away has really sunk in now. We recently just put a fish tank in his room. We thought he might like the soothing sound of the filter and the blue light at night. He loves it, but I was soooo worried about him throwing something at it or even trying to push it off the dresser. So far it has been good for him. I really think he has learned to control that impulsiveness of throwing things in his room. Unfortunately it hasn't sunk in that it needs to be everywhere, but I will take what I can get for now!
It is an interesting topic. I was spanked too when I was younger. And when I was really bad, my Mom got out "the spoon!" A big wooden spoon for cooking (and spanking!) I don't think it was so bad that I have all of this built up anger and agression, because like I said, I don't hit my kids. I just don't think parent's were taught as many options when we were younger. They were spanked when they were younger, so they spanked us, makes sense, right? But now, you are right, if the wrong person saw you hit your child, the consequences could be horrible. So we as parents have had to brainstorm and come up with different forms of discipline. When we were growing up they didn't have to worry about those consequences, so why not just spank...it's quick and to the point! I don't have anything against a parent who does give the occasional spanking, I just can't use it because having Mason the consequences of teaching him to hit with his already growing agression is only going to make our situation worse.
Okay, to answer your questions... I'm not sure it was okay for our parents to do it. When my parents hit me, I deeply resented it and it just made me scared of them. They didn't do it often either - but they both did it in anger. Only on the butt too. I guess I don't want my kids to obey me because they are terrified of me. Let me just add that I love my parents dearly and have a fairly good relationship with them. I should also add that I was an "angel child" - according to several family members, including my parents. But my smart mouth got me into trouble (still does!).
When I hit my son the one time, I felt awful. He didn't understand - just that mommy hit him. Not that he had done anything - just that mommy had hit him - the one person he trusted in this world.
I am glad you don't think that you are going to "lose it" and hit her too hard. But, I still think it wouldn't hurt for you to go to a behavioral psych and get some ideas for discipline techniques SPECIFICALLY for your daughter. Some things work with my child that wouldn't work for others and visa versa. A beh psych can target specific techniques to use in your situation.
Are meltdowns the issue? Or is it just behaviors that you are trying to get her to stop doing and she won't listen?
I'm sorry if I came across harshly - but you do sound stressed. And, I am usually the last person in the world to ask for help - but I reached a point when my ds was about 4 and I just didn't know what to do anymore. So, we had a few appointments with a behavioral psychologist (not all of them are good - so ask around) and we were very happy with the results. I just don't want you to get to the point where you're pulling your hair out all the time. BTDT!
We use 1-2-3 Magic for our discipline since the boys were 3. In the beginning, when the kids were smaller (ages 3 - 4) it was always 1-2-3-timeout. Now that they are older, we often use 1-2-3-lose privlidge (i.e. lose gameboy, go to bed early, no trip to the park, leave the park immediately) as well as time out.
When the boys were little (ages 2 - 3) I occasionally spanked them with a light smack on the bottom. However, I only did this a handful of times each, and ONLY in situations where they were putting their lives in danger and/or putting themselves at risk for serious injury (e.g. running into the street, running away from me in a parking lot, touching a hot stove, climbing a bookcase). At those young ages I didn't think they were old enough to really understand the timeout concept and I felt I needed a strong way to get the message across in those dangerous situations.
I personally think spanking is a really bad choice for ASD kids given the sensory issues. The sensory seeking kids, like mine, might actually like it and the sensory defensive kids might be upset by it more than typical kids. Also, I think our kids are more likely to simply hit back. That's just my opinion for what it's worth.
I don't think one spank makes any person a child abuser. Personally we don't spank. I went to some child parenting classes by Rene Hackney, PhD a child psychologist. She also has great radio program btw! She said spanking teaches children that reacting physically is the way to resolve problem behavior. She said that spanking will deter that behavior around the person who spanks (usually parents) but then it doesn't deter that same behavior when parents are absent. So to her, it stops it for the moment for that time, when the child is around that person only.
I think timeouts may work better but, again, I was told to use timeouts only when absolutely necessary. Using timeout too much makes it less effective. And its only one minute per year of age. So three minutes for a three year old. For ASD children I personally think the time should be a little less because they understand less about their wrongdoing and it may be a little harder for them to make the connection between timeout as a consequence and their misbehavior. I personally don't use timeouts; explanations and reasoning a thousand times over again seem to work for my son. My son seems to think he knows better than parents. He tries to negotiate his way out of things. So we counter that by making sure our reasoning is better than his. Oftentimes we know we've got through to him when he reacts with silence.
It is very very very hard to control our emotions and sometimes I think it is our emotions that control some of our behavior. I feel really guilty when I yell at my son. I know it upsets him. But sometimes I just lose it after telling him 10 times not to do something and then he STILL does it again.I have to mention also that, almost a year later now, we no longer need the bedtime chart or the timer, we did that for so long and things just fell in place. Bedtime now is nice, no more aggression and no problems. Both boys often will grump and groan and say they don't want to go to bed ( which is probably very normal) but after a little coaxing they are fine. woodsman, I agree with you with how out of control society is these days and is it because of a lack of physical punishment, that being said I don't mean abuse.
gtto, I know what you mean, Abby does know sometimes when she is doing something wrong because right after she does she looks at me I look at her with a very stern look and she just takes off running. I know alot of people are also considering the fact that these kids we are talking about here are on the spectrum. But I do think Abby does get it. Just recently.
Wanted to add after going back and reading some new posts - ds also hit me after the one time I hit him and it got worse. This was not something I wanted to encourage. I have spanked my dd on occasion and noticed the same trend (she is 3 and NT). She hit a LOT more. Since I stopped (and this was recently), we have noticed a dramatic decrease in her hitting behavior.
Woodsman - that was interesting to read. Gives me a different perspective. But, I was also a little confused - do you think it would have been better for your parents to try to understand you and talk to you - or do you think that spanking was just what you needed? I thought you were for spanking until the end of your post...
I am sorry - I am really not trying to judge you Lacey. I'm just giving you my experiences. When it seems your child is not making the connection that her behavior is getting her spanked/hit - I don't think it's going to work. Time-outs won't work a lot at this age, but keep trying. It can get better with time. My ds is still resistant to actually going in to a time-out, but the threat of a time-out is usually enough to get him to settle down/change his behavior. Very rarely, he has gone up to his room by himself to "settle down" - without my telling him to do so. That is the point I would like him to get to - to recognize he needs to settle down and then do something about it. This is a skill he is improving on and we're working on - but again, he's 6! It's taken a lot of work to get to this point, but we're getting there!
snoopywoman, I don't evey mind asking for help. That does not bother me at all. I am thinking also she gets like this alot at night , maybe she is overtired , maybe an appointment would be a good idea and I am thinking maybe something to help calm her at night.Have you tried putting her to bed earlier? I know it sounds crazy, but seriously it worked awesome for both my kids! They go to bed at 7:00. I'm not saying to put her to bed that early - but maybe 10 minutes earlier every couple of nights until you get to an hour earlier? I was really worried my kids would then wake up earlier - but they didn't!
Just a thought...
I so appreciate your honesty in this area. I have had the same exact bedtime problems. I've been jumped on kicked punched had my hair pulled, near black eyes, and fat lips. When i was almost in tears or IN tears from pain and my son was still laughing i realized he just DOES not understand,
After several months of this and our bedtime routine becoming, my husband and myself being beat up, my son getting spanked for his behavior, and finally some sleep I decided that this just could NOT go on any further and i couldn't do this every night.
I wanted out bedtime routine to be nice for all of us, NOT hell so I made changes.
I started using a bedtime bell, set it for 15 minutes before bedtime and let everyone know they had 15 more minutes before bed. I started a bedtime chart, every morning i would ask if were went to bed nicely and every would or would not get a star. At the end of week would buy a small toy for our accomplishment.
I also started turning the lights down at 6:30, with it getting dark ealier i will start this again. I dim the lights with a dimmer switch so that everyone is adjusting their eyes for the night.
There are many other things you can try for a quiet bedtime routine and I encourage you to make changes now, although i'm not 100% opposed to spanking as we have our moments here, but as i said earlier it turns out to be a horrible bedtime routine.
The other thing i think about alot is, Am i spanking because he or she is being bad or am i spanking because i just don't know what else to do and out of my own frustration.
Snoopywoman my son is the same way if I can get him to sleep (I use melatonin) by 730 he will sleep until 6-6:30 just in time to get up for school. But if something delays that his sleep will be disordered. He'll get up, for the day between 2-4. Not good.
Before melatonin bed time was a nightmare for all of us. My son just could not settle. Exersice, epsom salt bath, lotions with that thing in it that I can not remember. I can't remember it all but even as a baby he did not sleep. Melatonin saved or sanity. Still even now he will sometimes get up in the middle of the night but it is only a few times a month now instead of nightly.
carolc, thanks for your helpful hints, I will def. keep them in mind. I get what you are saying and you def. have to keep that in mind when you are frustrated and at your wits end.I figured I probably should add that what we mainly do are time outs on a chair that is in a room without toys. Pretty much the SuperNanny technique.Hey, just flying in for a quick stop...didn't read other posts.
Your daughter is 3, and therefore in my opinion, is in the age range for an occasional FOREWARNED pop on the butt.
I think its a bad idea to just haul off and swat, even gently, without letting the child know ahead of time. One also needs to set ground rules for a swat - for me, it is safety related or pure meanness. If she is being completely belligerant, then that one is your call.
Here is how I do it, or did it, since this is an extremely rare event now that the boys are 4.5 and 7.
- clear, verbal reprimand - WE DO NOT RUN INTO THE STREET!!!!!!!
- "my job is to teach you to be safe until you know how. THIS IS A SPANKING"
- bend the child over your knee very deliberately, and slowly
- count s l o w l y to three for drama
- one hard swat on the buttocks
- repeat the verbal reprimand - WE DO NOT RUN INTO THE STREET.
And then the kid also gets a time out chair with zero consolation. When you tell the child s/he can get up, again say WE DO NOT RUN INTO THE STREET. I love you and want you to be safe from cars.
If you spank her unexpectedly, out of what appears to be anger, and then console her afterward, the message you are sending is extremely garbled and the child is never going to stop the activity that is inappropriate. This goes double for a kid who has communication issues anyway.
Look, there are times I'd love to sell my boys' raggedy little assets to the gypsies, believe me! They can seriously tick a parent off! But don't screw this up now, or you will be paying the price 100 fold for the rest of her childhood.
Swallow your anger, and pretend your child's teacher or therapist is watching you. You can do this the right way, you really can. Good luck, sugar!
amberwaves - wow, I'm sorry your brother went through that. I think that clearly shows the difference between abuse and spanking. What your bio dad did to your brother was abuse. Spanking is not usually abuse (although some do consider it so), in my opinion. I just don't think it usually works well with our kids.
I guess I feel like we're not coming up with too many suggestions as to what to DO here - we've got a lot of opinions on what NOT to do though (mine included
The bedtime routine was horrible at our house as well for a while. We did get a set of chore cards on-line - I'll try to remember where I found them. I put strings on them and hung them on his door. He had to do each one and then take the card off. They included, get undressed, take bath, brush teeth, put pjs on and pick out a book. He didn't need them after a few weeks and now doesn't complain. If he does, I get out the chore cards again for a few days. He also gets less time for stories if he complains!
Also, putting him to bed earlier has helped SO much. He wakes up around 6:00 am every morning (we don't need an alarm clock here!) REGARDLESS of what time we put him to bed. So, it made total sense for us to just put him to bed as early as possible. There are downsides to it in that we can't do as much as a family during the week (on week-ends we sometimes let him stay up until 7:30-8:00, but not terribly often). The up-side is that dh and I get more alone time and I can also go do things like support groups (although I'm usually late since they mostly start at 7:00).
Just some thoughts! I'm very sorry if I came across as accusatory or judgmental before. I think we all try our best with the situations we are in. No one knows what we go through at home, except us. Some days are really awful and I have been there! I hope it gets better soon for you Lacey!
[QUOTE=carolc8632]Kd, how do you keep your carpet so clean????? btw your kids are cute
[/QUOTE]It's new.
We bought this house in March and changed out all the flooring. We purposely bought dark carpet because we have the kids and 3 dogs.We also use the 1.2.3. magic with dd. Spanking does not work with her. When she was a toddler I would spank her hand if she went for something she was not suppose to have and had been told no. She laughed. I started to use the 1.2.3 method and if I got to 3 would physically remove her from whatever nondesirable thing she was doing and would redirect her. This has worked very well so far. Now that she is a little older (4.6) we are starting to use the loss of priviledge.
We did spank our older three nt daughters when they were younger but only after being warned what the consequence would be. Spanking being on the bottom with hand only. This worked for them. Also as they got older we turned to time out and then loss of priviledge. None of them resent us for doing this and understand why we don't use it with youngest daughter.
dd with asd is such a concrete thinker that it is hard to distinguish between "we don't hit people" and spanking as a punishment.
For our olders: (who we no longer need to spank, though I have been known to squeeze that shoulder hard when they think they can get sassy)
We spanked (two or three swats) for disobedience, defiance, diserspect. We were not consistent with the oldest...felt quilty
.........very consistent with the next two from about 2--6 years old, and then after that they only needed the occasional squeeze as a reminder.
With our little one, I plan the same, only when she can understand. She is only just now beginning to understand things that two year olds understand. So, yes, she will get to the point of needing some swats.
All children need boundries. The feel safe when they know they can't go 'over the line'. They thrive in it. You just can't see the good effects until they are teenagers and actually pleasant to be around for the most part!
Spanking is nothing like abuse. Spanking is done for love, abuse is done out of a heart full of hatred.
To me a toddler getting a light swat on his diapered butt for running in the street is ok. Using a belt, any object, or pulling down the pants of an older child and whacking him is child abuse. You can get into serious trouble these days, and I'm glad. Also, if a child has autism, I think it's doubly cruel. Also, like some have observed, if you got spanked as a child (or beaten) your first inclination when you have your own children may be to slap or hit or even cross the obvious line that everyone agrees is abuse. I didn't get spanked so it doesn't seem natural to do it. There are better ways to discipline children.
Well, spanking is very effective--when used approperiately. There are "wrong" ways to spank a child. It worked wonderful in my older kids. Spanked once/twice---never did the offense again! Now--my HFA son---it didn't work. We had been very consistent for months---it didn't matter. This was all way before we ever knew anything was wrong with him. Time-outs--nope--didn't work. 1-2-3 magic--didn't work. Taken things away---didn't work. Rewards for good behavior--didn't work. By then----we thought that maybe something was wrong with this child!
Finally at about age 6, we are able to discipline him by taking privedges away anjd it works wonderfully!
For some people--it's a stage you just have to get through.
Oh yeh---we had many times of just restraining him hours until calm---just to be able to talk to him. By then---he's forgotten what happened in the first place!
[QUOTE=sunflowers]Amberwaves, My God I hope your brother has psychologically recovered from such a horrific ordeal with his dad.I wonder why men like that are allowed to procreate.
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I know he is a jerk
. He does have audio processing disorder and something is wrong with him. I tried telling people but no one would listen to me. The cops refused to listen,child abuse photos are not good enough in state IN? They didn't listen to me until he was put in foster care at age 17 yr old. I was too poor at the time to take him out of foster care, I was 21 and in a different state. but that was 6 yrs ago.My brother had counseling. He is not aggressive at all.
[Quote]Spanking is nothing like abuse. Spanking is done for love, abuse is done out of a heart full of hatred.[/Quote]
I don't think I've ever heard it said better...I'm so glad your brother recovered from that ordeal he suffered as a kid. Every time I hear something like that, I wish I could adopt that child, wrap him up in a blanket, scoop him up, and heal him with love. But I know that's naive. These kids sometimes needs lots of psychological or psychiatric counseling to recover from things like that.
The brutality of it most definitely damages self esteem and damages some part of the psyche of most children. If those people who hurt children can see inside a young child's developing brain to understand that they often don't understand their wrongdoing yet, I wonder if they would stop. I don't think so though. I think their hitting is more a reaction to their instantaneous and immediate frustration and emotion, sort of a knee jerk reaction, than a justification that it actually positively shapes and molds self esteem and good behavior. They want some misbehavior to stop quickly and immediately and they don't want to spend the time using a safer or gentler disciplining strategy because...frankly...it takes too long for them.
I wish your brother the best...
How do smacks teach accountabilty/problem solveing skills though?Beware some places spanking is elegal! Here I say do this or else you will not get _____. Daniel loves getting rewards. To me smacks teach agression even more! I was one who at 9 could careless less about spankings. I did rebellion at 18 what I couldn't as a child. My kids dad did what we wanted regardless of the punishment as a kid. No wonder our kids are rebellious we both were.
A really great discussion!! Brings lots of information to think about. I think that how we parent depends alot on how we were parented and if we were parented bad, how well we learn different ways. Learning different ways can be hard work too.
We are all human. Parents have emotions too, regardless of how much we try to suppress them. Few books, or seminars really address how we feel as parents and what we are doing to take care of ourselves so that we can parent our children without all the emotional baggage that goes with it.
My parents were ragers. They didn't want children. I was told that many times and I thought it was a totally acceptable thing to say. Because i didn't know differently. Lots of therapy later i know that was not something to say to kids and I also know my mom wasn't parented well either.
My husband would have faired better if he had been raised by wolves. At age 5 his much older brother would cook dinner sometimes on a camp stove b/c mom was out drinking and the electirity was shut off again. Dad-the ex-husband couldn't be bothered with kids, he was too busy working.
Interestingly, my parents generally kept their hands and belts to themselves and I was only wacked good a couple times. I don't hate my parents for that. I didn't act up worse b/c of that. I did learn to try not to make them angry b/c they would rage.
His father, the absent one, was heavy into physical disipline. He still thinks a good belt works wonders. Dh still seems to like his father. Like I said, I think dh would have been better off with wolves.
I don't know if spanking works. I think it is a personal parenting decision. I don't believe it is abuse, except in the case of my fil. I have spanked my kids-I've done it the better way, you know explain before hand, warn before hand, etc. And I've spanked out of utter and complete frustration. My kids still have chronic behavior problems. Its my nature to problem solve after an issue to find a better way of handling a situation. In my house even problem solving doesn't help too much.
I think though, after the bedtime experience you had, I don't think any harm resulted by surprising your child with a swat. I would say that was a pretty human reaction on your part.
[QUOTE=snoopywoman]Wanted to add after going back and reading some new posts - ds also hit me after the one time I hit him and it got worse. This was not something I wanted to encourage. I have spanked my dd on occasion and noticed the same trend (she is 3 and NT). She hit a LOT more. Since I stopped (and this was recently), we have noticed a dramatic decrease in her hitting behavior.
Woodsman - that was interesting to read. Gives me a different perspective. But, I was also a little confused - do you think it would have been better for your parents to try to understand you and talk to you - or do you think that spanking was just what you needed? I thought you were for spanking until the end of your post...
I am sorry - I am really not trying to judge you Lacey. I'm just giving you my experiences. When it seems your child is not making the connection that her behavior is getting her spanked/hit - I don't think it's going to work. Time-outs won't work a lot at this age, but keep trying. It can get better with time. My ds is still resistant to actually going in to a time-out, but the threat of a time-out is usually enough to get him to settle down/change his behavior. Very rarely, he has gone up to his room by himself to "settle down" - without my telling him to do so. That is the point I would like him to get to - to recognize he needs to settle down and then do something about it. This is a skill he is improving on and we're working on - but again, he's 6! It's taken a lot of work to get to this point, but we're getting there!
[/QUOTE]sorry for not clairifying, i was passed my bed time when i wrote it, heh. Anyways while i think as a last case scinario a spanking could be used, i also think that back then my parents always avoided just sittin down with me and having a serious discusion. I feel that long ago they, well... i dont have a good term, so ill say gave up, on trying to have a serious conversation with me for whatever reason, ill admit i was quite difficult for years, so if the punishment did not work, then they assumed if they spanked me or gave me a swift kick I would understand i did wrong. I think although I got the message, sometimes I did not, and instead of miss behaving because that would lead to
I instead did not miss behave because I feared them (especally dad) for quite some time.
I feel I was not that bad, i mean, i deserved it occasionally, but also feel had they tryed to sit me down and really talk, get thru to me not only would spanking not be nessissary but their words would perhapse stick with me next time I thought about being bad.
I hope I clarified. I know when I have kids while my parents did a great job in the end, i would do things differently, a little bit anyways.
I am all for spanking (and not kicking, that was really bad) but thats when desperate. They must have thought that was the only way to get thru to me, and it was not, talking would have been better. I love my parents, and they love me, but i dont think they knew quite how to deal with me always, like parents know how to deal better today. They never abused me, but I think were to quick to kick. heh, rhyme!!Thanks hpcmagic, I appreciate your response. This has been a really long post with alot of different opinions. I guess it comes down to whatever works for each individual child. Regardless of whatever form of discipline is I am sure at least from this board, all the children here are receiving plenty of hugs and TLC.
[QUOTE=gtto][quote]IF the kids have the reasoning to understand why they are getting spanked, then they should have the reasoning to only need verbal discipline.[/quote]
That doesn't make sense to me.
It seems to be saying that having good reasoning skills requires good receptive language. Which I know not to be the case.
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Exactly - doesn't make sense to me either....someone was talking about making sure their kids understood why they were being spanked and I don't think they can.
I think IMHO that spanking is a way for me to convey to Payne that cause and effect...to make him remembering something scary with whatever he just did (they will relate them) so he won't want to do it again. For the most part - when we have spanked he hasn't repeated the offense. It's not something that you can (with our kid anyway) let any time lapse in between to decide - it must be immediate so the event and the spanking are in the same time frame to be related. You just have to be careful. My son didn't see the difference between negative and positive attention-it was just attention! He ran into the street, and I got so upset, thus beginning an entire summer of 'watch mom freak out when I suddenly run into the street!' Sometimes, you have to stay calm-very calm. Just thought I'd put that out there."If the kids have the reasoning to understand why they are getting spanked, then they should have the reasoning to only need verbal discipline."What I thought you were saying was if kids understood why they were being spanked then they can understand verbal discipline , so why don't people just verbally discipline them instead of spanking them.
If this is the case , sometimes verbal discipline for some of our kids holds no effect whatsoever , I am not saying so that means go directly to Physical discipline.
Also, some of our kids may understand right and wrong or why they are be disciplined. Every child is different here.Verbal discipline in ASD kids--just doesn't work if the child has receptive language delays. They don't understand the words you are saying or can't process the info right. Something that is physcially down to them--MAY be better. Whether it's a spanking or time out, or removing them from the situation. Even then---they still may not know what was going on. But for dangerous situations-----a quick, shocking swat on the bum would catch their attention fast. Daniel likes any attention regardless of the type same with our daughter. Spanking teaches nothing at all. I tell our kids you do this or else you will not get what you want from MOM or Dad. Kids need to learn to earn their stuff in life. Thanks for your replies. I hope this did not give anybody the wrong impression. As i said in my first notation my parents to use hitting as a means to correct us. I loved my parents i did not resent them at all . They did not abuse it. That method of putting a child in their room and shutting the door and holding the doorknob we already do it. Time outs don't work for her.
Snoopywoman, I understand your concern that I smacked Abby when I was angry can maybe lead to something that will be traumatic. I am stressed out a little , It was stressing last night going on 10:00 at night still trying to get Abby to sleep. Yes , it did make me mad, so the smack did come from anger. I don't think that means I am going to loose it one day and seriously hurt one of my kids. The general point of the conversation was to see if anyone else does do this , how does it make them feel and why was it ok for our parents to use this form of discipline.
Back when I grew up, a good 2 decades ago, or less, their was not nearly as much understanding of autism as their is today. I must say my parents were very loving, they loved me, and I loved them. I was very difficult to get thru to sometimes, I was very bad, or acted out. Simply taking away toys, or yelling at me, or time outs did nothing, i tended to just escalate the problems by being bad when being punished, increasing the punishment did nothing, apparently as I got a little bigger (7-8-9) my parents had a new solution. My bahavior was getting worse and they wanted to convey the message and enshure i never did it again. On rair occasion, I would be spanked, or even at most severe I would get kicked, right in the bottom
.
I suppose I had it comming, i deserved it, and feel even tho at the time i may not have understood as much as they wanted me to, it did the trick!! Perhapse i am a better person now then i woulda been had my parents not been able or willing to do that.
I also feel that autism obvioulsy hampers childrens understanding of consiquence, and some may not put 2 and 2 together, and feel they were just 'hit' and did nothing to deserve it. COme to think of it sometimes I think i did have much resentment towards them back then for hitting me, i just wonder if some of these kids (and im talking about ones we hear about on the news, not on here) may be suffering from a lack of physical punishment, you never heard of kids doing things kids do now days, its sad, i wonder if that may be a factor.
If I was a parent, i think i would use spanking, but not kicking, and would convey why I spanked just prior to making them serve their punishment so i knew they understood instead of like my parents just spanking or kicking me after catching me do something.
I think had they had more understanding of autism when i was little they would be more willing to accept me as i was or sit me down and talk to me more, instead of flipping and leaving a red mark, heh.My parents (and babysitters) learned pretty fast that smacking simply didn't work on me. In order for it to work, the child has to be capable of (a) knowing what they did wrong, and (b) connecting the smack in some kind of cause-and-effect way to what they were doing wrong. Because I didn't know those things, all that happened was I'd start screaming and crying and then try to protect my butt at all times because I experienced the smacking as random and therefore likely to recur at any time.
Spankings are not for older kids. They are for young---2-4y range. After that---other things work better. Actually---if a form of discipline is used consistently and effectively, after the age of about 4y-----you really shouldn't need to spank anymore. My oldest never had a spanking after 3.5y--and I didn't spank her until 2.5y. Does she remember? Nope. I ask my older girls if they ever remembered me spanking them.
It really totally doesn't matter what kind of discipline is used-----same rules apply. Be consistent and follow thru.
Of course none of this applies to a special needs child!!
I am a former spanker, so i will add my 2 cents...Korban was 2 in may, so he is what...29 months. at 2 i started using very specific, consistent timeouts that have worked wonders.
This began when the only result i got from spanking was a heartbroken, confused little boy. I also realized that the majority of the time, it was a result at my frustration more than a desciplinary tactic.
So, this is what we do.
example...
Me,"Korban, pick up your truck so we can eat lunch."
Korban doesn't do it and i know he heard me
"Korban, pick up truck so we can eat lunch. Korban, that's 1"
still doesn't do it.
"Korban, pick up truck so we can eat lunch, Korban, that's 2, next time, timeout.
and if he still doesn't do it...
"Korban pick up truck or time out! Thats 3, timeout.
The key is consistancy and lack of emotion or excitement (yelling and drama is very stimulating for my little sensory kid). Be firm, but not overly excited.
I pick him up and place him in a booster in the kitchen in front of the microwave timer, buckle him in, set the timer to 3 minutes, then reiterate...you didn't pick up truck, timeout.
then i ignore him, and instruct his big sissy to do the same. When the timer beeps, i unbuckle him and say, tell mommy sorry that you didn't pick up. He tells me, and i say "i forgive you" No hugs yet, no rewards for timeouts. Then i get him down and say "go pick up truck or timeout."
At this point, the timeout would be immidiate if he didn't obey.
The hugs and praise come when he finally listens, and only then.
This is the same process I follow every single time, and teach everyone else that is around him. The only exceptions are these:
hitting or harm to others
throwing
telling me no to be obstinate
He gets immidiate timeouts for those 3 things...the biggies in our house.
I journaled when i changed to this discipline tactic to look back and see if it was effective. I learned it from his DT. The first 3 days, he had 15-18 timeouts. then he got it. now, we are down to one or 2 on a good day, sometimes as many as 6 on a chaotic one. The majority of the time he stops at 1, the 2nd warning.
I know other moms of auties that use the same one with great results like we have had.
I think the key ingrediants are to stay unemotional and to be consistent.
Hope i helped and didn't bore everyone!
Hugs and good luck!
Kristi
I used to be a former 1-2-3 Magic person, but now we use positive discipline. It can take the form of empathy, natural consequences, praise, rewards, redirection, etc...but with our technique there are no timeouts. Sometimes it takes longer than 1-2-3 or timeouts but we found the result was a happier, less aggressive, and more self-aware little boy.
Because I think children lack the ability to completely and fully understand their own misbehavior, I try to use the least forceful or physical method of disciplining. My son has alot of sensory issues. He used to touch everything he was not supposed to - glass objects, dump his hands in his glass, etc...We did timeouts for two months for these things and then felt pretty stupid and awful when we realized he was doing it because he had some neurological issues, and not because he wanted to behave badly. This is not to say 1-2-3 or timeouts did not work. They worked to get us the desired behavioral result quickly. But I felt that it was affecting him emotionally and psychologically even though he would never be able to articulate that to me. Positive discipline seems to take longer but it didn't seem to take anything away from him such as self-esteem away.
IF the kids have the reasoning to understand why they are getting spanked, then they should have the reasoning to only need verbal discipline. If they don't get it - then it's just terrifying and not effective. My parents spanked me but I would never do it to my dd because of how it made me feel about myself.
Don't mean to sound judgemental, everyone has different circumstances, I just won't do it.
I am not sure whether I would personally spank a child if I had one. (I am not likely to have one for a long time if ever.) It didn't work on me, but I can see the point of for instance if you're trying to really quickly get a kid to not touch a hot stove or something else dangerous like that, associating a bad sensation with that could be a good thing especially before the child had language for anything else.One thing to note is that as my particular sort of autistic person, I found spanking frightening and bewildering, but what really really made me lose it was being held down. Or held down and yelled at. That made me completely and uncontrollably terrified in a way that spanking didn't. (And I didn't learn from that either, if anyone's wondering. I just learned that the world could be scary and unpredictable.)
I say, "come to mama, Jaden"
and she would run off or stay put.
I say, "come to Mama, Jaden, or I will need to give you a swat" and clap my hands once.
She ran off or stayed put.
I would go to get her, swat her once on the bottom, and say, "when Mama calls you, you need to come" and then walk her back to where i was when I called her in the first place. I only had to do this for about a week, but (important) *VerY* consistently. Now, about 80 percent of the time, she comes when I call her. A lot of times she smiles at me when I call her the first time. With perfect eye contact.
I tell you the truth, it makes children happy.
I didn't swat (or any discipline) the first time around and we still struggle with the oldest in many ways, at 19. The next two give me a sass about once a month. I am not joking.
I promise, swats for certain infractions and consistency, along with lots of hugs, kisses and words of life, make for sweet children
Holly Wa is VERY right. You need to start disiplining early, and they don't understand much but a quick smack on the bottom until 3-4. You can eliminate a lot of problems if you start early. I didn't need to do it with my daughter past the age of 4, and she didn't like being sent to her room at all. That became the new punishment for awhile.
That only works for NT kids though. My son didn't understand spanking at all, but he didn't need much disipline. Redirrection and natural consequences work best-if you run for the street, we are going in the house. Time outs sometimes work, but like gtto said, you don't want to hold them in one spot.
Whatever form of disipline you use, it should always be consisant. That's most important. I always say what I WILL do. No empty threats- or Santa won't bring you any toys for Christmas- I can't stand that one!
[quote]IF the kids have the reasoning to understand why they are getting spanked, then they should have the reasoning to only need verbal discipline.[/quote]That doesn't make sense to me.
It seems to be saying that having good reasoning skills requires good receptive language. Which I know not to be the case.
Thank you to everyone's response in this matter. I appreciate everybody's point of view and helpful hints. Although after reading every single post I still am not completely against a spank here and there under the right circumstances. Again it was a form of discipline that my parents used and I thought of them as the greatest. I will say however I do prefer to use redirection and other ways like placing them in their rooms and keeping the door shut etc... One thing I noticed alot of people specified was that it was okay to spank a child on the butt every once in a while as long as that child was not of special need. I don't know if I fully agree with this. What if This happened, it is just an example,(I would never do this) If Abby and all her Nt cousins just took off and ran across a busy street without holding our hands I can only smack the bottom of the Nt child and not the ASD one. I know there are some kids on the spectrum that have trouble understanding purpose and reason , Abby was one of them and still is not completely there yet.
All and All , I think people make a good point about consistency however method you choose. Bottom line is I love my children with all my heart and I only want what is best for both of them.
When my son acts up, he gets to the point where he can't control his behavior. I tell him "Calm down", and cart him right up to his room, and close the door. Sometimes I have to stand on the outside, and literally hold the door closed because he will try to come out. When he stops screaming and throwing things, I let him out.
Although his verbal skills are significantly delayed, I know he understands much more than he can say, so I explain to him why he was in there in the first place.
It will be interesting to hear others opinions.
nakama
Done properly I don't consider it child abuse but I can't do it. My dad used physical punishmet my Mom couldn't and wouldn't do it. It caused a lot of resentment in my for my dad that lasts to this day. A lot of times I had no Idea what I was being hit for and when I did it seemed unfair or I felt misunderstood.
No it's not for me.
I gave my oldest a smack a few times when she direly needed it but like you I felt like crap afterwards..
My mom was a belt, switch, hand..ect~ whacker person!
Sarah got a pop on the butt and then looked at me so hurt and confused and told me " Mama we dont hit people remember? Dont do it again because thats hurts my bottom!
I do time outs now when bribes and consequences don't work:)
Well, I think you kind of answered your own question. "Smacking" doesn't phase her - it isn't working. With our kids, they often don't connect a "smack" with what they have done. It just doesn't connect. Same with time-outs (although you may have to do that in order to just get them to calm down - eventually, a lot of kids can do time-outs and make the connection, but after a LONG time).
I do not hit my kids. I'm not saying I never have. One time, ds hauled off and smacked me hard in the face and my immediate reaction was to slap him. That day, I vowed not to do it again. He was devastated but did not get at ALL why mommy hit him.
We do time-outs, and taking away privileges - but ds is 6. At 3, it is much more difficult. Rarely, I "hold" my son tightly - which he does not like, but sometimes he needs to get control and so do I. I have only done this twice in the last year - both times ds was under a ton of stress.
I hope others have some good suggestions for you. I have found that re-directing and praise work best with my kids. Catching them being good. But, that doesn't help when you are in a situation where your child is hitting you.
I strongly advise you to get her in to see a behavioral psychologist to get ideas on discipline techniques. If you are hitting her when losing it, that is not good. You don't want to lose control some day and hurt her badly. I have read that if you are going to spank, you should never do it in anger - which it sounds like you are doing. I understand you are trying to get her to stop whatever she is doing, but that isn't working. You need a different technique. I do want to caution you that yes, some people might take this as child abuse. I still think you should get her in to see someone and get some help in discipline for you both.
Now, if my son did something extremely dangerous (like run into the street), I might spank him. But, I still don't think he would get the connection. Actually, I think my yelling (which I am working super-hard on reserving for serious situations only, but I'm not there yet!) would be more than enough discipline as he HATES when I yell. But, if I yelled all the time (which, trust me - I used to!) he wouldn't have that same reaction. If I yell, he generally knows it's serious.
I'm sorry you're having such a hard time - three is a VERY difficult age for all kids, but I had a particularly hard time with my son at this age. Two years was NOTHING compared to three years old! Please get some help before you do something you will regret...
Everyone needs help at different points in their lives. This is one of them for you and your daughter. You don't have the tools you need to get her to do what you want - and someone else might be able to help. Ask around to other parents to see who a good person to see would be. If there is a support group in your area, get a referral from several parents there - parents are usually the best judge of who is a good psych to see!
I read some other posts and we too, have put him in his room and held the doorknob. This was recommended by a behavioral psych. Once in a great while we have to do it now - but back then, we had to do it several times DAILY. It got worse before it got better - just warning you!
You sound very stressed and maybe you can take a "mommy time-out" if you feel like hitting. I have only done this once. I thought for sure the kids would have the house torn down when I came out of my room - but they stood by my door, knocking on it - asking me what was wrong, telling me they'd be good. I had two little angels for about an hour after that! They were so shocked that they didn't know what to do! I don't know if it will work again - but if you use it sparingly, it seemed to be a very effective technique which I have also heard from other parents as well.
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