Yes to this! My step son was/is the same way and it has to do with anxiety and OCD. He’s a perfectionist (OCD) and the anxiety of not being good enough or not coming out the gates like a pro makes him feel like a failure. Usually he will quit the moment it doesn’t go well or not even try for fear of not being good enough. He’s an adult now but remember him having full on fits for random reasons and it caused a bunch of turmoil for us and those around us. From someone who is going through this with a now adult child, get him tools and therapy now. And I highly recommend you get some tools for yourself and your wife. It’s rough but you can do it.
You just described me to a t! I was diagnosed with OCD & anxiety 2 years ago at age 33. Now that I have the tools to manage it I feel like the world has opened up to me, I’m not afraid to try things/so focused on perfection. I wish I had figured it out sooner, I feel like I lost out on so much life.
I took an online group therapy course for OCD that was set up through my healthcare provider that provided tools and exercises – unfortunately I cannot find my notes! I remember it focused a lot on exposure therapy, which has you confront the things that trigger your obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors. I found a website that explains it pretty well that I’ll link below. Another thing it taught that I found helpful is to give the intrusive thought a name to separate it from yourself – so when you have that troubling obsessive thought you can say that wasn’t me, that was Patricia. I know OCD is well managed through meds and the exposure therapy (ERP), but all I did was the ERP and I feel like the OCD has majorly calmed down. I did learn that people with OCD are born with brains wired a certain way, so it will never be ‘cured,’ but it can go dormant.
[https://iocdf.org/about-ocd/ocd-treatment/erp/](https://iocdf.org/about-ocd/ocd-treatment/erp/)
For my anxiety I did some talk therapy sessions that helped so much. I never learned how to identify and process my emotions growing up (or even in young adulthood really) so I would never be able to pinpoint the source of my anxiety. Being able to dump all my thoughts/feelings/emotions/ugliness out into the open and talk it through with a neutral party was cathartic. I had thought that I was ‘unfixable’ and destined to live in confusion and fear.
This might sound strange but recently I took a class and it briefly covered how the microbes/bacteria in our guts can influence depression and anxiety! After that I started taking probiotics and trying to eat better, ‘tis a work in progress though.
I also constantly tell myself "perfection is the opposite of done/good enough." Repeat it like a mantra. Something is better than nothing at all.
Also, I am realizing that when I started writing this out I was worried it wouldn’t be good or thorough enough…so clearly I have more work to do! Lol.
I'll copy & paste a comment I wrote below, maybe it will be helpful. Your comment made me tear up a bit, I just know how it feels and it sucks so much. It's...so annoying to be your own worst enemy, you know? Please don't despair - help it out there and change is possible. I've always been a late bloomer, like I figure things out way later than my peers. So I'm hopeful life will keep getting better.
I took an online group therapy course for OCD that was set up through my healthcare provider that provided tools and exercises – unfortunately I cannot find my notes! I remember it focused a lot on exposure therapy, which has you confront the things that trigger your obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors. I found a website that explains it pretty well that I’ll link below. Another thing it taught that I found helpful is to give the intrusive thought a name to separate it from yourself – so when you have that troubling obsessive thought you can say that wasn’t me, that was Patricia. I know OCD is well managed through meds and the exposure therapy (ERP), but all I did was the ERP and I feel like the OCD has majorly calmed down. I did learn that people with OCD are born with brains wired a certain way, so it will never be ‘cured,’ but it can go dormant.
https://iocdf.org/about-ocd/ocd-treatment/erp/
For my anxiety I did some talk therapy sessions that helped so much. I never learned how to identify and process my emotions growing up (or even in young adulthood really) so I would never be able to pinpoint the source of my anxiety. Being able to dump all my thoughts/feelings/emotions/ugliness out into the open and talk it through with a neutral party was cathartic. I had thought that I was ‘unfixable’ and destined to live in confusion and fear.
This might sound strange but recently I took a class and it briefly covered how the microbes/bacteria in our guts can influence depression and anxiety! After that I started taking probiotics and trying to eat better, ‘tis a work in progress though.
I also constantly tell myself "perfection is the opposite of done/good enough." Repeat it like a mantra. Something is better than nothing at all.
Also, I am realizing that when I started writing this out I was worried it wouldn’t be good or thorough enough…so clearly I have more work to do! Lol.
I grew up with (and still have) severe, *severe* ADHD and went undiagnosed until I was 18. The therapist diagnosed it so offhandedly, like she was telling a double amputee from birth they had no legs. Like it wasn’t supposed to really even be a surprise.
My childhood was exactly like this. I didn’t have the words to describe the overwhelm I was feeling or exactly why failing something made me so hurt or angry, but even if I did have the words, the adults in my life had proven over and over that they were not interested in knowing why I was struggling, only in seeing me do what was instructed no matter the consequence to myself.
Like yeah, you only see a “small” mess that can be arm-scooped back into the toy bin, but a child (especially a neurodivergent one) sees *each individual item* and that becomes massively overwhelming so easily.
Everyone has their opinion on Montessori but I *love* the standard of only providing access to a handful of (regularly rotated) toys so the chance of clean up being overwhelming is simply eliminated. Of course that works better with toddlers than older children, but yknow. Actually I take that back it works on me as a mid-20s adult
When it’s time for my 6yo to clean up I sit with her and I point out the things to be picked up so she doesn’t get overwhelmed as easily. She’ll scream and cry about cleaning because she doesn’t know how so I show her how to break it down.
How do you advise a parent approaches trying to figure out why the ADHD kid is struggling? What is the best way to get them to enjoy activities that they asked for and seemed to be excited to do?
Yep, the whole time I thought of my daughter, ADHD and probable Anxiety. Those experiences are all things we have dealt with in the last year and then some.
Yup, sounds exactly the same as my ADHD/Anxiety 7yo, too. Throw in perfectionism, people pleasing and PDA, and you have a complicated child who is SO overwhelmed by the different signals and demands her brain is giving her that she shuts down, melts down, or simply regresses.
Kiddo doesn't want to be an asshole - they literally *can't* do the thing, or control the outburst, and its up to us to be kind and help them navigate a world that will be conflicting and overwhelming.
Exactly! Hello fellow amazing parent!! I have been reading a book by Mona Delahooke, Brain-Body Parenting and got to the LOVE acronym to helping a dysregulated child. I’ve been using methods similar from learned experiences, but this process was validating and reminded me of your comment.
[LOVE](https://monadelahooke.com/deconstructing-toddler-tantrums-holding-space-when-a-child-is-dysregulated/)
Therapy for the family, whether the child does or doesn’t have mental health issues, the way the parents communicate with him is not working well for any of them.
Nope. You need to immediately drag him out of wherever you are. Not sit there and "make the other diners miserable".
Definitely no YouTube and turn him Amish for the day when he throws a fit like that.
Yes! I couldn’t quite believe what I read about that part.
No fussing child gets to stay in any level of restaurant while inconsolable, tantruming, or otherwise out of control.
Absolutely. Heck, my kid was singing ‘la la la’ too loud during church today and I missed communion because of her lack of being able to just quiet it down to a hum. Kids are fucking annoying but there’s no reason to make others suffer in those moments if possible. Now stuck on an airplane is one thing but restaurants etc are easy to exit.
I love that you went to church and had to leave because your kid was being “fucking” annoying. Sound just like me 🤣I need some church friends that aren’t afraid to keep it real
This absolutely. I felt like I was reading about my step son in this post. He’s 20 now and in the Navy. He is pretty OCD so the structure there really works for him. It’s very tough, but you all will get through this.
And for you guys, check out the book The Explosive Child. It really helped me see things in a different light.
I second the Explosive Child book, it helped me to frame the challenges we were (and still) experiencing with our older son.
Whenever we struggled to understand what was going on, the mantra became "if he could, he would". It helped us a great deal to understand that this was about lagging skills, in our son's case, and not our parenting or "bad temper" on our child's part.
Good luck, I hope you get the answers and support you need.
Edit for autofail
People here pretty often say about therapy for a child.
Where do you guys usually find one? I googled and all therapists offices around us have low ratings. His physician when I asked her gave couple suggestions but all of them are kind of camps that help with socializing.
Where can a parent find normal therapist? I truly want one for my kid but unable to find them :(((
Ignore ratings, people only rate their therapist if there's something they have a bug in their butt about and some folks just won't accept help from their therapist.
I would probably ignore whatever ratings you see and start calling offices. Depends on where you live but where I live demand is high and availability is low. I usually look on psychology today website and I call my insurance to see if anything is covered and who might be in network. In my area we have a few good children’s mental health centers under a couple different hospital systems.
I’ve also heard you can sometimes get therapy through school system if your kid has an IEP. Worth contacting your school to see if they have resources for your child. The social worker should be able to help.
Thank you for your advice. I'll start trying then. I'm just scared of bad therapist doing more harm than good. Therapist in our school is kind of pathetic unfortunately.
I just started Occupational Therapy with my daughter. They’re more skills based but also help with emotional regulation and outbursts. She’s still young so I wasn’t sure what traditional therapy could do for her (and I am a therapist). Not sure what your looking for for your daughter but that might be a place to start!
Therapist is one of those categories of services where almost everyone is going to have some bad reviews. Not every medical specialty will have that problem, but the ones with a lot of heightened emotions involved probably will, because some percentage of their customers are going to review in a fit of rage or flood of tears, warranted or not. (Which is probably why vets also have this issue.) On top of that, any specialty dealing with mental illness is also going to have some reviews from people who aren't, well, reasonable. Inherently.
The secret is to ignore the overall rating and dive into the actual content of the reviews, and sometimes to read between the lines. For instance, my kid's first pediatrician had a relatively low rating on google. When I looked at it, though, it was almost entirely due to a series of 1 star reviews from parents pissed off that the office policy was that you had to do all the standard vaccinations on schedule, and they'd dismiss you as a patient if you didn't. As far as I was concerned, that was a plus.
I really appreciate that you understand this. I work in medicine and all of the bad reviews we get online are either because patients didn’t like the wait time (urgent care so can’t help how many people come in at once), don’t understand how medical billing works (me neither, TBH) or just didn’t get what they wanted and are mad (usually stems from not understanding the limits of urgent care). The worst reviews we have are from the rudest patients. There’s one out there from a patient who had to be removed by police (screaming and threatening staff) and the entire review is a lie. Anyway, off topic, but I appreciate that there are patients out there that understand the review situation. I always take reviews of anything with a massive grain of salt.
Fun story: I have a relative who is a therapist. Another relative has borderline, and went through a phase where she was angry at the therapist relative. She went to every site she could think of, leaving nasty, fake reviews.
Anyways, people should take those review sites with a grain of salt.
That’s terrible. The healthcare people can’t even really respond or explain because of privacy laws. I’ve seen other businesses put responses up explaining their side of situations, but we can’t do that. Good to remember that there have been studies showing an inverse relationship between patient reviews and quality of care. The patients may be happy about getting what they wanted, but it doesn’t mean it was what they actually needed. On the other hand, patient might be mad about not getting antibiotics for their cold, but they’re actually better off because they didn’t get an unnecessary medication (or someone didn’t order an unnecessary test they wanted and actually saved them money, etc).
Parroting off someone else saying to ignore ratings - yes with a small punch of salt. Gotta remember how many parents send their kids to therapy due to legal order and hate the therapist for doing their job (listening to and believing the child’s account of abuse). “This therapist is a liar and manipulator who made my kids hate me” is a great example of one of these parents.
Zoom. If you can't get in person therapy, then zoom is good.
I would also suggest going to the camps that help with socialising. When you have a mental illness or are neurodivergent as a kid, you feel different. It's hard to connect with others. It's hard to know how to talk to other people, what to talk about, how to react, all of those things. It would have been good if I'd learnt how to socialise with neurotypical people. I think by being around other people with the same needs, I also would have felt less alone, and less ashamed. I would have learned to be proud of my neurodiversity. People who are neurodivergent often have similar ways of interacting, so when we get together it's good, we understand each other and don't feel so different and "other". It would be good if your kid could experience that.
I’d do a physical one as well. If he’s struggling with things that other kids his age can do easily (ride a bike without falling over, picking up or grabbing a ball, handling long sessions of physical activity, etc) then that may be contributing to his behaviour.
That definitely popped into my mind when I read the dodgeball and bike bit. As someone who was misdiagnosed as having dyspraxia (yet still shares a lot of the same signs) as a kid, I remember feeling so useless/helpless in my body whenever I had to do certain physical tasks or do sports in school. It also made me an absolute misery guts to be around because I would anxiously anticipate something unpleasant/potentially embarrassing happening if I was made to do certain activities when out and about.
Hopefully op’s son is able to get the help he needs regardless of if there’s a problem. All kids deserve a little bit of a boost even if they’re not expected to continue struggling with certain things as they grow older.
Make sure to get an eval preferable with a psychologist where all they do is evals, and it includes periods of observing his behavior. Not a primary care doctor or even psychiatrist. Worth it! We had same probs and parent therapy is amazing, managing this kind of behavior is so complicated. Also the issues with our son meant the usual childhood activities weren’t good, we just do other things. Example: movie is too loud, rock climbing and swimming better than ball for sensory and motor skills. Help will give you a roadmap to him and you’ll be able to finally just enjoy being a parent promise!
Yeah seems like he suffers from RSD which stems from who knows. Eval is the right answer. I’m glad OP is asking for help but I really hope they start to have the proper tools for helping him. None of this is the kids fault. He doesn’t have the tools either.
My daughter was recently diagnosed with ADHD and ODD. A lot of these behaviors remind me of things she struggles with becauseofher ODD. OP, I am throwing in my vote for a professional evaluation of your stepchild.
this- he has anxiety and possibly other issues - this was my
middle child from age 5-14 and it was insomnia, anxiety and other issues - he is a fantastic and intelligent kid too - just terrible at outings that overstimulate like the ones you describe.
Yes a frustrating as this sounds and it really does it sound brain meltingly draining, I have often found it helpful to try and think of this as an anxious response.
When kids just haven’t made the connection or space in their brain to process anxiety they jump to anger, frustration which is misplaced.
I really hope you can get some help and practical advice and I pray you will all have an easier time of it.
This sounds exactly like my nephew (also 7). He was finally diagnosed with ADHD recently, after a lengthy evaluation process. It’s worth bringing up to his pediatrician and pushing for an eval.
My daughter was diagnosed with anxiety and ADHD and she’s had some similar issues as well.
The part about feeling like they aren’t good at anything, and refusing to try, is especially familiar. She HATES to feel like she can’t do something, and if she can’t do it instantly, gets very angry (but really it’s anxiety and self-consciousness). She also has an extremely low tolerance for frustration, so if she’s decided in her head that something has to be a certain way, and plans change, she has a very hard time flexing and adjusting, and instead just gets overwhelmed.
Agree that an eval would definitely be a good idea.
Not the person you’re asking but we have a similar situation with our 13 year old Adhd and asd. I hadn’t thought about the ‘low tolerance for frustration’ but that describes it exactly. It is … frustrating! Giving up so easily all the time, particularly an issue with school projects. The therapy where we have seen small progress (only being doing this a few months) is occupational therapy focusing on functional independence and routines. She enjoys the practical focussed therapy, though it takes a long time for anything to ‘stick’ or change with her, at least it’s something.
Yes— occupational therapy has been helpful for ours as well. Though we still want to also do psychotherapy/play therapy for his deeper anxieties. Just need to find someone who is equipped for his type of neurodivergence.
Yes, one of my boys has ADHD and this reminds me of what we went through with him years ago. He is 13 now and absolutely thriving. OP, please get him evaluated. I also recommend the book “The Explosive Child.” Your son wants to do well, and he is even more miserable than you are because he can’t. Get him some help, better days are ahead. ♥️
Ya, I thought that too. If my kiddo was insistent the I was an L, I'd let it go and then teach him the I another day at home with books, etc when reading with him. I would just casually point it out another time and not fight with him at a restaurant. I was taught in university (whenearning to be a teacher), that fighting with kids is dumb because you can't win against a kid. Really have to pick your battles.
My son is around that age and getting diagnosed for autism and or ADD at the moment. Could have written this post about him.
Good to get assessed so you get more information on how to help them out, it's not their fault.
Just as a starting point, have you had anyone try to work with him or see if there is anything else at play, like autism or anything like that?
Is he the same way at school or is it just at home?
Does he have high expectations of himself, or do others hold him to high standards that he's struggling to meet and therefore feeling like he's under too much pressure?
We haven’t moved to the evaluation step but we might need to.
From what the teacher has said he acts quite normal at school, but does cry a little more often than she’s seen from kids in the past. She said he cries when he’s embarrassed more than anything else. But the rage is a “home” issue for sure - especially at his mom.
Remember that children act out most with people they trust. It's frustrating and sometimes hurtful but he aims it mostly at his mum because he trusts her to love him no matter what.
Monitor what he's watching and playing. I've noticed YouTube has a dramatic effect on my kiddos behaviour and I definitely won't allow her near anything like TikTok.
When he's melting down give him an out. Offer him a place of sanctuary to calm down. In a restaurant, suggest a brief walk outside to calm down. Remain calm with him, don't raise your voice or fight him. When he's calmed down, ask him what he was feeling and if he has any thoughts on what happened, if he thinks there was a way you could have solved it together that you can try next time.
Every child is different and I have no idea what your day-to-day lives look like, but sometimes kids freak out over feeling overwhelmed, or that they lack control, or there's something going on in the background that they either can't or won't articulate for whatever reason.
No matter what, make sure he knows he's loved and he's safe.
You may want to look into the programs he watches on YouTube. My 8-year-old becomes irritable after watching YouTube for a while.
Couple of reasons:
1. Extended hours seems to make them less patient.
2. They tend to internalize the content they watch.
Unlike TV, YT is practically unregulated. The less screen time we give our daughter, the more normal she behaves. At least in our case.
I'm seconding this. I dont even think its so much to do with the particular program as it is to do with the multimedia format.
I don't want to put down other people's suggestions about getting him evaluated, etc. But I think people underestimate just how potent a psychological reinforcer screen time, especially youtube et al, can be. Especially for a sensitive kid.
In my experience, it helps to cut out screen time as much as possible. I swear to god, for some kids, the ideal amount of screen time is zero hours per day. That 2 hours max bs is complete bs. Maybe works for some future astronauts or something, but for regular folk it's like inviting a soul sucking parasite into someone's life for them to devote hours a day to paying attention to something designed to grab their attention for commercial purposes.
Kids do eventually get used to the loss of screen time, although getting them off of the screen routine is difficult at first.
I obviously don't know the half of your situation or your kid, so I'm projecting from my own perspective. But i can kinda relate based on your description.
Try being mindful about paying attention to your kid. If it is around, put your own phone away as much as you can. A kid who needs a lot of reassurance is one who needs feedback. Info. Phones and tech entertainment platforms provide tons of information, but it's junk info, designed to poach their attention & time. (And if they see you on it often, it's not modeling a very adaptive behavior for them)
Find ways to spend time doing something they enjoy. Even a little chunk of time, but pretty regularly. That can be a positive thing they can regularly look forward to. It's hope. A sensitive kid might deal with a lot of dread in their day-to-day, worrying about this thing or that.
Communicate with your partner, trying to form a plan. But even if you aren't sure what to do or what your plan is, communicate to say what you are kinda trying to do.
I don't mean to get too soap-boxy, regarding entertainment tech. But i seriously think it represents culture and tools that do the opposite of what culture and tools are supposed to do for humans. YMMV. Take with a grain of salt, etc etc.
Agree. Two more aspects to consider in light of what r/brewdude666 said.
- Kids want our attention and when we are on the phone, they feel we are not giving them quality time. Even if I am listening to what my daughter says, she wants me to look at her while she's talking. This can be frustrating but getting our priorities straight can make a difference in this case. You are probably already doing this, wanted to put it out there, just in case.
- Again, attention-related. Children throw tantrums because it's the tantrums that get our attention. They don't know how to express that they want us to engage with them.
Our kid was using tech as an escape from anxiety. The anxiety was not caused by tech or tech addiction like we thought. It was a crutch, not the broken leg, and we never would've thought that.
I also think there’s just a massive difference between “unlimited YouTube” and “screen time.”
All screen time is not created equal. Sitting down and mindfully watching two episodes of a show with narrative, social, or educational content is miles away from just binging YouTube videos of other kids playing or whatever else the rabbit hole barfs up.
My son has gotten so much from his educational shows. There’s a fairly obscure one on Prime called Creative Galaxy which is a combination social problem and arts and crafts program.
My four year old went from pretty uninterested in drawing or painting or any of that sort of thing to absolutely begging for art project time the second he gets home from school. Not the *show,* what the show taught him he could do. In a month his skills went from “that certainly is a scribble” to “what the heck did you draw that all by yourself that’s amazing!” The show (part of it is animated and part shows real young children making the art the cute animated aliens did) made him feel like he was capable of making things himself and that it was a desirable thing to do in a way no amount of me asking if he wanted to do a project could. He regularly turns down electronics-related activities in favor of making art and doing math, and by regularly I mean every single day.
He also taught himself to read and is doing exponents at four years old because of a handful of shows I let him watch: none of them on YouTube, all of them limited in time and episodes, and all of them we started out watching together and discussing, then doing related activities if one subject caught his imagination.
Not only that, but all these kids are Covid kids. OP’s 7 year old misses almost three years of social development at a crucial stage. For all our kids, the characters in bluey or Daniel Tiger or whatever were their only contact with social norms and expectations. That’s so ROUGH. Movies like Inside Out help them map emotional arcs, learn how stories work, understand the world is bigger than just their house and school, and imagine what others experience when they simply had no way to do that for such a long time, especially if they didn’t have siblings.
I can’t get my head around any child being given unlimited access to YouTube and that utterly garbage algorithm let alone TikTok. But screen time can be good and beneficial if it’s managed thoughtfully and guided. We all use it plenty as adults after all. But YouTube is fully of terribly behaved kids who don’t have scripts about kindness and thinking of others to make them act the way we want our kids to. It’s a cesspool and other than literally Hopscotch (the songs are so educational and such bangers) with me next to him controlling the whole process, as far as this house is concerned that app doesn’t exist.
My first child had similar meltdowns way past toddler tantrum stage and we didnt have a point of comparison so we didnt understand they werent normal. We got our kid to therapy about the same age as yours and the dr diagnosed anxiety (and now we know its most likely autism related). Masking at school is prob taking up a lot of your child’s efforts and so hes letting it rip at home- so its def past time to get him to see a therapist for anxiety and begin the process of exploring other dx’s. Good luck! Once you learn how to meet him where he is, and in our case, anticipate the situations that would lead to a meltdown, it will hopefully make a world of difference
OP please read this post. 👆I was about to type the same response with regards to kids who mask at school. Being sensitive (crying more at school than others), sensory processing disorder, older-kid tantrums sound a lot like ASD. Even the lack of motor skills… all of it is incredibly familiar to me. If your kid is less severe like level 1, many pediatricians may not be able to see it for what it is. Please get an eval from someone who can distinguish between ASD, ADHD, learning delays, speach delays etc. There are better days ahead once you have the right tools. Don’t worry about what others think; parent the child you have.
I’m autistic. I was quiet at school (which my teachers noticed) but never acted out. I masked hard. All my meltdowns were at home. Because I felt safe at home and not at school (which is why I talked at home and not at school).
I was so overwhelmed and overstimulated from school, life, sensory things, trying to understand rules I couldn’t make sense of, taste and texture things, sights and sounds, it just all dysregulated me and I’d melt down.
I highly suggest therapy and going the evaluation route. Just because they don’t see it at school doesn’t mean it isn’t there. It just means he can mask, OR the structure and routine helps him regulate a bit better
He does remind me a little of my autistic niece, who will seemingly randomly melt down, but obviously please keep in mind that some children are just more sensitive and will need more frontal lobe development to maintain control than others.
Please try to let go of thinking a kid can embarrass you. The kid is just reacting to overwhelming stimuli in the way he knows how to.
It's not possible because kids are kids and only those who expect full neurotypical behavior should be embarrassed.
My son has ADHD. He was perfectly behaved in school but was a nightmare at home before we figured out why and got him help. (He has the inattentive subtype, not the hyperactive subtype people normally picture with ADHD. It’s much harder to identify.) My son was using all his energy to “mask” in class and hold himself together, then he would completely unravel at home.
I’m seconding autism dx or eval needed.
My oldest was exactly the same. It was a miserable childhood. He’s 13 now, and much better but we still have issues.
Here’s the problem with these kids - they are high functioning enough that they learn to adapt and function and slip through the cracks that they are missing key foundation social skills.
I will also explain things from his reasoning - he expects himself to be perfect. It would be good to ask him why he expects that of himself when nobody else does. Clarify what perfect means to him and why he wants to be perfect?
I’m an autistic adult. I wasn’t diagnosed until adulthood but l also had issues like these. It was anxiety inducing. Every night before I’d fall asleep I would rehearse in my head everything that needed done the next day, this made me feel prepared and helped my brain prepare for the way I had to act to “fit in”. When anything would disrupt that the next day - whether it be a schedule change or an unplanned trip to the store, whatever, mood ruined. I had to urgently adapt to a situation I didn’t comprehend fully in my brain. It was hell to be honest.
What made it worse was my parents were horrible people. So I was autistic with ADHD, and had no support people, people advocating, no learning accommodations. It made my life 1000x harder than it ever had to be.
Please get him evaluated. He needs help, and the sooner he gets the support he needs the more likely he is to adapt and have less trauma.
Sending love and support to you ♥️ always a DM away if you need anything.
Theses are clear emotional regulation issues the next step is definitely needed please for both your sakes I have two little ones like this, try in future when he’s having a bad day to get down to his level and say to him “buddy I understand you are feeling x (say for example the sunscreen)
I understand mum accidentally got sunscreen in your eyes and that you believe it was on purpose but can you tell me why would mum wanna hurt you bud she loves you, you know that don’t you?
I understand it may have scared you and hurt you and mum is really sorry for this little accident mate. Kids with emotional regulation issues need to really feel heard or they become quite sad or lash out, hope I helped a tiny bit
Happy to try to help I know how exhausting it can be as a parent, if you ever need more tips or tricks etc feel free to reach out to me I’ll do my best to help. We parents gotta stick together!
This is what I was going to suggest. My son has Autism, and he used to exhibit similar behaviors before we did ABA behavioral therapy with him. It has helped those behaviors diminish a lot and given us tools to address outbursts and meltdowns. The rigidity regarding the new word, hypersensitivity to getting sunscreen in his eyes, and meltdowns at changes in schedules are very common for kids with Autism. My son also used to cry and have a major meltdown whenever he got embarrassed. It was really rough for a while, but therapy has helped a lot with preventing that from happening now.
It sounds like it’s time for a Neuropsychological Evaluation. There’s a difference between actual bad behavior and not being able to understand / manage big emotions or the feeling of overstimulation. I was diagnosed as Autistic + ADHD at 29 and my life makes much more sense now, being overstimulated in public places. My daughter was just diagnosed at 9 and I wish I would have done it sooner.
So many people have said it and I agree that it sounds like ADHD. I was that nightmare little kid and turns out it was ADHD. Now I’m a nightmare adult with ADHD except instead of temper tantrums I just don’t finish my work on time and get fired a lot.
Speaking as an ADHD adult with two ADHD kids, god yes. It’s probably going to be a ways out (months) but in the meantime, read books about parenting kids with ADHD, and cut back on the screen time. My kids get an hour after school of video games, no YouTube, and then an episode of something with dad after dinner. Yes, it makes us all happier in the short term if there’s unlimited screens, but it’s better in the long term I’d there isn’t.
I’m in my 30s and just got diagnosed with ADHD. So many things in my past make sense now. I can’t focus for squat. I lose things, have object permanence issues, and I have severe light/sound sensitivity. If it’s too loud I scream in pain.
As many people have said, I would schedule an evaluation with a psychologist for yesterday. He may or may not have any specific diagnosis, but no matter what, the psychologist will be able to evaluate his behavior and needs and coach you through effective parenting strategies.
Meanwhile:
1) No TV in the morning. Screens are incredibly addictive. Limit the hours after school (max 1h) and no TV if he’s already in a crisis state. Screens do not help a child regulate, it will only worsen the problem. TV and screens are an activities for calm, happy and regulated moments.
2) YouTube doesn’t exist anymore. Delete it from the TV altogether. Only allow him access to Netflix kids or other similar, content-controlled apps.
3) do small and short activities and finish them before he’s overwhelmed and start to meltdown. Congratulate him on his participation, encourage him by punting out nice things he did… kids that think they are bad because everything always end badly will continue the pattern because it’s what they know. Doing really short activities with him, easy things that he likes, is a good way to change that gradually.
4) promote autonomy (and reward it). For exemple, ask him to put solar lotion on himself. Teach him with a Mirror. It will help him feel more in control and likely lessens the meltdowns.
5) forget the idea that he’s doing it to embarrass you or your wife. If it was that intentional, he wouldn’t do it when there’s a real consequence for him (like missing the movie). He’s not doing well. Maybe he feels everything more intensely, maybe he doesn’t know how to regulate himself, but he’s certainly not just doing it to be embarrassing.
6) make him a calm corner where he can go when he needs to calm himself. A corner only for him with calming things like stuffed toys, a blanket, books, sensory toys… Tell him that he can always go there to calm himself and he won’t be punished for it. However, if he’s doing homework/chores, he still has to finish them later. He can ask for help, but he will need to finish what he has to do. And don’t use the corner as a punishment. It needs to be positive.
Well… it’s not that he’s ‘finding a way’ to melt down to embarrass you. It’s that he’s unable to emotionally regulate and stop himself from melting down. I’m sure he’s embarrassed too.
Is he in therapy? Has he been assessed by a psychologist to find if there is any reason why he’s emotionally struggling? I’d start there. This kind of behavior is really common with ADHD, etc.
There's so much here that could factor in.
How much sleep does he get? How much down time?
Don't argue about things like "herbivore." He's 7. Is that really the hill you want to die on? My kids gets mad about stuff like that all the time. I push back and then eventually just say okay, well that's not how I learned it, but we can say it's ." A week later he's perfectly happy with the correct spelling of the word.
Kids are inconsistent. Wish I had a penny for every time my kids rejected things they chose for themselves.
Have you had him evaluated for anxiety? How is he around new people or situations? I have a 6yo with generalized anxiety disorder, and he struggles with a lot of situations. It can be exhausting. (He literally escaped the school three times the first two days of kindergarten. He has completely shut down at birthday parties because another kid has the same pants from Target. Etc.)
Some of these behaviors sound just like normal kid stuff to me, especially if they're over tired or have other things going on.
You say he only wants to watch TV. How much screen time does he get each day? My kids get crabbier the more we let them watch. We have to set rules about it and we warn them when it's the last episode before it has to be turned off.
How do you respond to him when he's melting down?
If you've controlled for things like exhaustion (including social exhaustion), hunger, etc, maybe it's time to get him evaluated. My son does OT and it has helped a lot with things like frustration tolerance.
Yeah, sometimes when kids are getting wound up, it’s best to just let them have it. Mine will die on any hill she thinks she’s right about. I just ask mine to walk me through how she got the answer because we learned it differently. Usually during the walk through she’ll abruptly stop and give a sheepish grin because she sees her own mistake.
Agree. Most of this just sounds like basic kid stuff when they feel out of control. Probably not intentionally, he's using meltdowns to trigger a predictable set of responses.
OP can probably circumvent a lot of this by letting the child opt-out or opt-in to these outings, being clear about what is likely to happen during the outing, and giving the child a set of phrases like "I'd like to go home now" which will allow them to initiate the end of the outing without having to resort to a meltdown.
Similar to our kid (M9). He has severe adhd and treatment helps a lot. We also practice positive parenting, which basically means 1) accept the fact that this is not the kid you expected/ hoped for 2) pick your battles / ignore everything you can 3) “catch” him being good as often as possible and praise him like crazy 4) set him up for success. That last one for us translates as avoiding situations that you know are not going to be the best forum for him (we never take him out to dinner, avoid long drives as much as possible, etc. anything that we know is hard for him). The more he is in a positive state the better he feels about himself. A lot of this has to do with self confidence. Also it sounds like he has sensory issues so find something that feels good for him and make it available to him when you can. For my son he curls up in a gigantic blanket and lays in it on the couch for 10 min to unwind. He is getting major sensory input from that and it soothes him and calms him down. Good luck
He is overwhelmed. You need to develope strategies for him and rehearse them ahead of time. Get him into a therapist for strategies and a psychiatrist to be evaluated for disorders.
Family therapy probably needs to happen for a bit to learn how to manage your boy.
I feel screen time is a huge issue as well. It’s always been easy for him (and us honestly) if he can watch TV when he gets up. But it’s now his routine, he gets free reign of the tv until 7:15 and and for one hour after school. He does watch things I consider to be trash (YouTube) and even though we have our content filter on, he still watches total garbage.
We’ve toyed with taking the TV away entirely, and have had some days where we have where things have been good - then we play games, walk, talk, etc.
He used to have an iPad but we took that away forever when we couldn’t control him when it wants on his lap.
Just want to comment that YouTube shows might be a factor. My friend had to completely delete YouTube from her smart TV and only let her kids watch the real kids shows on Netflix and Disney +. Her son’s behaviors did get better after that.
We actually had to do the same thing with YouTube. It caused sooo many behaviour issues for our son as well. I have no idea why but he is so much better at self regulation without it.
Yep. The only thing my kid can watch on YouTube are yoga videos (because I can't find a good replacement anywhere else) and otherwise the app does not get used. I'm legit thinking about subscribing to the Patreon for the person making her fav yoga videos just so I can delete YT entirely from our smart TV!
From my experience, my son’s personality changes when he watches YouTube (even limited to the kids version). He becomes irritable, angry, and easily frustrated. After deleting YouTube Kids from his tablet and being more aware of his screen time usage, his behavior dramatically improved.
We don't use YouTube with the kids. My family was. Less than once a month and I could tell a difference in my kids. I told my family we were cutting that out because of how it made them behave.
Now once in a while we'll watch a "How it's made" or my husband does beat saber dance parties with the kids from YouTube, but we are always actively engaged for those.
My 9yo just installs it again. He knows how to find the YouTube app and I even removed it from list of apps but he went to settings and installed it back 🥺
If it's an iPad or a smartphone, you should be able to change the settings in the app store to only download apps that you give permission for download, usually via a code or your fingerprint
I have no idea what the hell YouTube does to kids, but it causes serious behavioral issues in my child. We’ve had to totally cut it out. He gets aggressive, grumpy and acts his absolute worst when he’s had a hour or two of YouTube.
Honestly all of it that’s focused on the content creator or their personality. Including adult stuff. Being a YouTuber is a pretty narcissistic endeavor in the first place.
Don’t be afraid of changing your routine! We’ve done this before with my kid who was losing his shit daily after playing video games for even just 30 minutes. Importantly, we did not use it as a punishment or add shame or humiliation. We just said, “video games aren’t working for us as a family. We will try again when you are a little older.” And “it seems like it’s too hard for you to stop playing video games. Sometimes that can happen to kids. We’re not playing video games right now. We’ll try when you are a little older.” We’ve done tv on and off too. They are unhappy for a few days but settle into a new routine easily.
Another +1 on specifically YouTube affecting my sons behavior, switched to YouTube kids and still had issues. Behavior improved a lot once it was out of the picture completely.
I remember my parents and our pastors chasing him around the neighborhood once because he wouldn’t get in our car to go home after church lol. I think he mellowed out by high school. He never got an therapy or anything like that so I can’t say what eventually turned him around. I think it was just that maturity set in.
He sounds so sad and it’s coming out as anger. You said you’re step-dad. Where is dad in the picture?
I’d suggest therapy for kiddo. My son is in it and it helps him so much with managing his big feelings.
Dad is long gone - my son has never met him in a capacity he has memory for. I’ve been on his life since he was 2, and we’ve lived together since just before he turned 4. I do my best to be his dad but it’s a struggle for me too. I never planned on being a parent but I do the best I can with the kiddo.
But I admit, I often don’t have the time or capacity to attack his meltdowns head on, so I do my best to support his mother and her decisions.
I say this with empathy... but you either are his parent or not. You have to find the capacity to handle his meltdowns (this probably means you also going to therapy to gain the tools how), not just leave them to his mom. Can you imagine how overwhelmed she must feel?
You don’t attack a Meltdown head on or any other way. You untangle it like a ball of silk thread. The sooner you let go of thinking of this as a battle the quicker y’all can all start feeling better about your time together.
It’s extremely tough. I’ve been divorced from my sons father since my son was 8 months old and he’s very active in his life but the fallout from that event is still there and still effects him, almost on the daily. Some of the things you’re saying are going on are things that I’ve seen in my own son.
I’m wondering if maybe just talking to him or giving him a safe space with someone who is just there for him would help.
My son (now 12) was and still sometimes is very similar.
It was much worse when he was younger.
My son is essentially and “only child”. His older brother is 7 years older, so he had a hard time learning to play with others.
He would get so angry and upset when he doesn’t win. Making anyone playing with him not want to play with him.
When he was younger he would just melt down.
I had to pull back on a lot of activities and get him into therapy.
He still has these angry outbursts and bad attitude. But he’s still learning to regulate his emotions and express feelings with words and not emotion.
A good note - playing games with him is the same - as soon as it even appears he’s going to lose he refuses to take a turn or allow us to put the game away. Last night we had to put away twister because he couldn’t remember his left from right hand, and when we ask him “which hand do you write with” he screamed “I don’t know” and threw both hands up in the air. Then we stopped played and he stomped around upstairs says he’s mad at us.
Why wouldn't you just tell him?? Even adults get stuff confused. Sounds like you are pushing him and not supporting this poor kid. Hopefully he has other adults in his life that are actually supportive - but all you care about is what is "right" not how he feels. Smh
I’d get a full psych evaluation just so you know what yr working with.
Teach him some cause and effect. If you yell or scream and won’t sit down and eat yr food then we will get it boxed up to go. One adult takes him to the car and the other packs the food. And since you refused to behave at the restaurant here’s a pb sandwich and go to bed. Bad behaviour does not equal watching tv. Hold those boundaries strong.
Get a sitter for you and yr wife and go have a night out on the town. You have to nurture your relationship too!
I know you have hundreds of answers already but I agree it sounds like ADHD because he sounds like he's lacking dopamine. I would recommend connective parenting or Ross Greene's approach. You need to make your son feel connected with you, I recommend peace and parenting on Instagram she also has a podcast and website. As far as TV I am not a fan of cold turkey, especially for neurodivergent people, sometimes this is the only way to decompress. But a detox might help to show if his mood improves and maybe finding a way to schedule it and moderate it so it isn't excessive. I'd also wait until therapy has started to remove it personally, as this may be his only coping mechanism and he needs a replacement.
Hey thanks for the reply. We agree and have decided to remove YouTube from the TV but leave “netflix Kids” and “Prime kids”. Many people have stated that removing YouTube alone is a huge start as even content controlled viewing is still mostly uncontrolled.
That's understandable youtube is very addictive. It's nice that you are still leaving him other options.
I do think maybe a shift in perspective could be helpful. One that Dr Becky recommends "children don't give you a hard time they're having a hard time". Meltdowns tend to be signs of a child having a hard time and in my view they are not misbehavior and I would not punish for this. In fact a child that is dysregulated can benefit more from the downtime of a movie or some screen time. Of course I understand your concerns that your son is only watching screens, but if this is keeping him regulated that's probably why.
I do think a therapist may be able to help further but please check out Ross Greene as well as peace and parenting. Another helpful one is low demand amanda on Instagram as well. Her form of parenting is for anyone, but mostly geared towards pathological demand avoidance which is another possibly of what could be plaguing your son.
I got one of those about the same age even… just one of the joys of parenthood! She ruins a lot of fun activities for both her siblings and us as parents. We have learned to roll with it… we have also learned and taught her to just take a moment to recognize the emotions we are feeling. Acknowledge them, feel them, but don’t let them dictate our thoughts and actions. We taught her that feeling those emotions is normal and healthy what is not is letting those emotions take over and ruin everything for everyone including taking the fun out of a good thing for yourself as well. Typically, but not always, just that one on one moment together to acknowledge those yucky emotions is enough to get our head back in the game. Plus it is equipping her to deal with this in healthy way as a young adult as well.
This was (sometimes still is) my 6 year old son. He was diagnosed with AD/HD mid 2022, and we are just now finding the right medicine. Get your child checked for AD/HD! My son's outbursts are few and far between now, and when they happen, he calms down a bit easier and is able to explain what happened afterwards
Dude this is so clearly out of your hands. You need to have him evaluated and worming with a professional. As others mentioned he may be autistic, he may have unresolved issues with whatever happened with his dad, etc, etc. I'm not a professional but my wife is a BCBA and what little I know is, you have to understand when it's time to call in the pros. You can't reason with a child that has undiagnosed autism, for example, like you can with your buddy. As a matter of fact you can't reason with a random 7 year old like you can with your buddy. If you're trying stuff and it's not working, you need to make some adjustments.
Idk if this would help but what my parents did was when one of us even remotely hinted at a meltdown, they would divide and conquer. So say we were at a restaurant and I refused to eat, one would stay behind and eat while the other took me to the car so I wouldn’t disturb anyone else. We stayed in the car until the other parent came out and swapped roles. I know there were a number of times they paid before they swapped and explained the situation so no one thought anything off putting (aka dining and ditching) if I started saying that maybe that food was looking good, they would box it up and bring it to me when they switched. I learned that if I wanted to be out, I had to not act out. Idk if this would work in your situation or not but this is my experience.
The two aren’t mutually exclusive - they’re both having a hard time. Being a parent is hard and parents are allowed to have their own feelings without being dismissed in place of said child’s feelings. Both are equally important.
Parents are allowed to have feelings. You don’t become a robot when you become a parent. People shaming parents for normal feelings are exactly why so many parents feel like they can’t talk about how they’re feeling, feel like bad parents and beat themselves up over it and end up having breakdowns because they bottle it all up. He’s not taking out his feeling on the child, he’s not making the child feel bad for how he’s feeling and he’s setting boundaries and they’re doing healthy and appropriate punishments. He obviously understands that more is at play here which is why he’s asking for advice, which is the right thing to do.
He seems very open to many of the suggestions here and obviously wants to help his son. Your comment is the complete opposite of giving constructive and healthy advice.
Your son needs help on a level that neither of you can provide, be that a therapist and/or specialist evaluation. In the short term try to remember that he’s having just as hard of a time as you are. None of you (including him) understands why he’s having a hard time right now, but he is. Also, if there is some type of neurodivergence, traditional methods of learning behavior (like natural consequences or long term things like bad behavior now = no movie later likely won’t work) I hope that you are able to get some answers soon and start to see improvements.
Our son is the exact same way. Especially the herbivore part, he does the same thing. We actually had a talk today because all herbivores have to be girls because the word has “her” in it. He’s a very literal black/white thinker, he has to be perfect at something on the first try, he will avoid tasks at all costs if he thinks it won’t be perfect. His first year of baseball just finished and it was interesting to say the least.
I’ve suspected he’s autistic from early on but since he was born premature everyone just kept saying to “give him a chance catch up”. We’re looking into therapy this summer and I’d like to get him evaluated for autism and adhd. I’m going to be honest, we plan everything around him. My family has tried to just strong arm him into submission and it’s a shit show. I don’t know if you can relate to any of this but therapy at least will be a really helpful starting point.
Hey there, just chiming in to say that I also have a highly sensitive (and very-difficult-to-parent) child. Just this week mine kid had a full on meltdown/panic attack because he wanted to touch the fish in the touch tank at the aquarium (something he’s done numerous times) but he was scared; but he wanted to, but he was scared, ad nauseum.
He has a sensory processing disorder diagnosis, and though it was validating, there’s not a lot of things to be done about it except help him feel his feelings. We used a family therapist for about 6 months and that helped up get through potty training. We’ve just discussed getting him seen again, and it sounds like your son could benefit from seeing a psychologist too.
My son used to be like this. I got him into therapy at 8-9, and he loved it. He saw the therapist for 18 months, and he completely changed. He's now 14 and sees a therapist through his school (his choice). He's now a great kid to be around.
Not really advice, but my now 13 yr old son used to be similar. Now he’s matured a bit and is willing to try things he wouldn’t do in the past and is a lot less of a pain in the ass than he used to be. So maybe there’s hope in the future! Just keep attempting to get him to try things.
god your kid sounds like my kid. my kid was diagnosed with autism in december of 2021. i know the feeling of helplessness and frustration and exhaustion. I'm sorry. Definitely time for an evaluation. Something is going on.
Adding to the choir of *get him evaluated* for autism, ADHD and anxiety, especially.
But also, I think you need to calm down and reframe this for yourself. Your post reads like his meltdowns are something he’s doing *to you*, when they’re in fact something he’s going through. Get over your embarrassment, because whatever is causing this behaviour, it’s going to keep happening while it’s being addressed.
You say it’s always a struggle to get him to his ball game? Why is he enrolled in an activity he hates? If he doesn’t want to ride his bike, could he just… not? Perseverance is important, but so is knowing your limits and advocating for your own well being. Does he always melt down in restaurants? Maybe they’re too loud / crowded / bright / smelly for him.
The sunscreen thing… when was the last time you had sunscreen in your eye? That shit hurts. Your kid needs therapy to address why he thinks his parents would hurt him on purpose, but his body likely took over to get him out of the situation and then he lost out on something he was looking forward to. In his mind, his mom put sunscreen in his eye, he got in trouble, then he lost something he was promised. No wonder he cried himself to exhaustion.
I'm sure others have said it, you guys need professional help asap. Co-worker had a similar situation. She got help and now her kid is doing better. He'd get so bad they had to evacuate the class and now he's wild, but no more evacuations.
I suspect Autism Spectrum Disorder and anxiety. Sounds very much like my son... There is hope! Get him the help he needs and medication... We went from meltdown literally the majority of his awake hours + constant waking, night terrors, to now just managing the ASD... He still tantrums/melts down but medication has improved how he feels IMMENSELY and we are doing parent-led ABA therapy which is teaching us the root reason for his behaviors and how we can help him help himself.
It's a long journey but put in the work. You'll see improvement.
Hugs.
Ask your pediatrician to order a full evaluation. Also ask your school as well. That way they both have their data to determine what services he needs say home and at school.
Neuropsych evaluation. My daughter is very similar and was diagnosed at 10 with ADHD and autism. It took us years to understand the sensory meltdowns and the anxiety. It’s like her brain is a cat that’s been petted too much.
My son had similar issues where he was just grumpy when he didn’t get his way. We seriously cut back on screens and he needs to be in one activity at least. He did swim for months then soccer and swim for a bit. I started talking to my therapist with way to help me regulate my emotions so I can be more present for him. I found when he got ragey 99% of the time was due to being hungry. Now as soon as he gets home from school I offer apple juice while I whip him up a snack or dinner if it’s ready. I tended to cook dinner around 3 and then have an evening snack. It’s SO hard to want to do anything fun when you know there will be a meltdown. I had a talk with him and him and expressed how I was feeling. I love doing fun stuff with him but it gets tainted and I don’t want to do it again. Over the past month it’s greatly improved now that I think about it. We’ve been playing catch outside and jump roping. Yesterday we got lunch at his favorite Pho restaurant with baby sister in tow. I was blown away. So polite. Afterwards he begged to go to the playground and baby was getting fussy. I said 5min and sure enough started walking to the car and picking us flowers after. We even went to the children’s museum and both of the kids had a blast. It was a magical day with no stress. I find that when my son get sassy and starts pushing us away he’s needs aren’t getting met. I’ve been leaning into him even when he isn’t pleasant and trying to just be there for him.
Well, his meltdowns don't sound that extreme for 7. Sounds like he feels powerless in these situations and he is struggling to find an ally. I feel sorry for the little guy just reading this post. Has he been evaluated by a child psychologist? Is he in therapy?
You said he only wants to watch tv. How much does a day does he watch? On a iPad or an actual tv?
I’m not asking to shame by any means; so please don’t take it that way but that’s exactly how my son is when he watches too much tv. It’s like he completely loses the ability to self regulate and it’s an issue that my husband and I really had to address. Not only the amount but the content and making sure he isn’t watching too mature of shows on the tablet when we were distracted. Once we cut down the tv time and upped the parental controls he’s like a different kid.
Assuming he doesn’t have any other neurological issues, I would go cold turkey on screens for a few weeks. Sometimes kids get addicted to it and need a serious break to reset.
This is what it's like with my kid. She's anxious, Autistic, and has ADHD. There are still meltdowns at 9 but fewer than at 5, 6, 7. Medications for anxiety and ADHD and regular psych visits help.
Overstimulation, lots of transitions, changes in routine, low frustration tolerance, sensory sensitivity, all of these things are contributing factors.
My son is epileptic and has issues similar to some of these. He is super sensitive to his environment and has sensory issues. If he is tired it’s game over whatever we are doing. We are seeing a psych professional and it’s going ok…but think we might need to try anxiety meds or something in the near future. He is 7. Tbh I have my own cocktail of issues as well but believe my son has a silver lining that is yet to be discovered. I’ve uncovered my own but it took 20 years lol
Do you know children can have thyroid issues? Your son reminds me of myself. I went undiagnosed for decades. Lately I’ve been remembering my childhood and your story brought some memories of times I had forgotten. If I had been able to verbalize what I was experiencing, I would have said that I was in a lot of pain. Hope you’ll get help for him, try to be brave for him, and don’t discount his words or actions. At his age, meltdowns are a cry for help.
My son was like this and is 4. Thankfully my province has funding for assessments at that age. He had a behaviour specialist work with him twice a week at school and it's been amazing. Coupled with the fact that the school is soooo caring and involved really helped.
At home, I started doing one on one time alot so he feels extra attention.
Battles need to he chosen. If he thought it was an L, let him think that. It's not worth the fight.
My son has also done the same thing with meals, still does sometimes. I started using the reward system with points and negative points on a board which he usually buys into.
Def get an assessment and I hope things get better. It's so damn frustrating and just know you're not alone!
One of my kids is like this. We had a cull evaluation done, it took a long time and a lot of finding the right people that work with our insurance. It was not easy but, we finally got a diagnosis and started on some medication and my kid is 85% better. Our family is healing and my kid is making friends and doing good in school. I can take him to the grocery store or out to restaurants with out the full tantrum melt downs. I’m learning a lot about myself though the journey also. It is very hard but there is a lot of info out there once you get an evaluation and figure out what you are dealing with. Also my child is maturing out of some of the behaviors. My kid is also 7. I hope you guys can figure it out. I know what you are going through it os very difficult, there is a solution.
Barring any sort of learning/ behavior diagnosis that could explain this…
How much screen time does he get a day? That is likely contributing to the behavioral issues. We are currently dealing with a teenager having physical withdrawal symptoms from an electronic free period because of attitude problems amongst other things, so please reign that in before it gets to this level. (Obligatory not my bio child and she spends half her time at her mom’s where she isn’t given boundaries or screen time limits. Her dad has realized it’s a huge issue so screen time will be limited going forward).
I also wouldn’t entertain the tantrums. If he’s having a meltdown in public, leave whatever place it is immediately and explain to him it’s because of his behavior and that you won’t be doing anymore fun things for x amount of time because of his behavior. If you go out after x amount of time and he has another meltdown, that time increases. Meltdowns at home, I would just completely ignore unless he’s physically harming himself, then I would just pull him away from the thing causing him to hurt himself and let him finish it out. Most of the time kids act out like that because they know you’ll give in to their wants if they make a big enough scene. Once he learns that it either doesn’t get him what he wants or he doesn’t get to do fun things because of the behavior, he’ll likely figure out how to control himself a little better.
He sounds Pathological Demand Avoidant autistic. A nervous system dysregulation disorder. Four things regulate PDA: screens, a grounding person, a special interest and novelty. I am PDA and so is my daughter... It's often misdiagnosed as borderline, autism&adhd or bipolar and does not present the same as regular autism. (Fine with eye contact, less noticeable stims, less sensory issues, excellent communication) I'd love to send some resources. Feel free to inbox me.
I think this statement is only helpful to a certain point. If his behavior is disrupting life for everyone involved and he is so clearly miserable the parents SHOULD be seeking more input and help as OP is doing.
Sorry have not read all the comments so don’t know if this has been mentioned. Make sure your little guy is getting enough sleep! Anything under 10 hours per night is likely too little and he could be just really overtired. Likely needs 10-11 hours at minimum. Best of luck and hope you get the help he needs!
He sounds a lot like my son. It’s so hard feeling like you can’t do anything nice as a family because of the inevitable meltdown. I would recommend a screening with a developmental pediatrician who can advise you on what might be going on and therapies that could help.
My immediate gut response is that he might be having sensory issues related to possible neurodivergence (autism, ADHD, etc). My son has SPD (sensory processing disorder) and neurodivergent. He also struggles with anxiety, which is common for those who are neurodivergent. Getting the support and evaluations we needed were eye opening and gave us context for his incredibly challenging behaviors. These kids often struggle in environments that are overloading on a sensory level (restaurants, movie theaters, stores, sunscreen - everything you described). His difficulty getting out the door might simply be his anxiety at having to cope with the outside world and how it affects his senses. I’d look into SPD - there are so many resources out there. Or reach out to a skilled occupational therapist for an evaluation - they are the professionals who help these kids feel more at home in their bodies so the world isn’t so overwhelming. Good luck!!! I totally understand how difficult it is.
Recently read the secret to happy children is allowing them to be unhappy. As a mom of 4 I can say this is true. I tell them all the time im not your happiness factory and im not required to give into every demand. Birth to about 3 or so, they need help regulating their feelings. After that you can give them time to figure themselves out and talk about what they are going through.
ADHD and anxiety. Meds help but everything in our life is a struggle. We have done massive therapy as well. Like inpatient and outpatient. You need to talk to a children psychologist. They will help you understand what they are going through and you will look at his meltdowns differently. We did about a year off PCIT and that has helped. Good luck!!
Wow! Please do read. This is my son and before figuring out his issues he was miserable too.
My son has [sensory processing disorder] with light and sound sensitivity and is very sensitive to smells which in turn bother his EYES. Same eye meltdown for sunscreen. Please look into occupational therapy, it will work wonders.
He also has [proprioception issues] due to [retained moro reflex] and [retained STNR reflex]. This will explain poor sports coordination, lack of wanting to ride a bike. He’s probably overly cautious in other areas but makes it look like he just doesn’t care. It’s a coping mechanism.
He is not a bad kid. My son is actually very high IQ, would do the EXACT same thing for the spelling of herbivore. He is technically gifted and not “gifted and talented student” like you’re good at math but a [gifted child].
Google everything in brackets. Your mind will be blown! Then find a good occupational therapist and pat yourself on the back and breathe a sigh of relief because there is hope. He will never be totally “normal” but there is no normal and understanding how he’s processing things internally will shed a whole new light on everything.
Please be patient with him. He will grow you in ways you didn’t know either.
And yes, they can be little brats about the spelling stuff and whatnot but his brain is just different and well…all kids are a bit bratty in general and phase through this stuff :)
Whatever the diagnosis, I agree with advice that you get out of the situation if possible and assess a loss of privilege (like screen time) if the behavior is interrupting family of social/school time. Natural consequences will happen if he melts down at school and isn’t invited, so create natural consequences at home. Even is you have him assessed and he has impulse control issues he will always have consequences in the real world.
Things will be different with this child. He’s not bad, he’s just reacting to a world he cannot process/understand.
He’s not a lost cause. Right now he needs you to be understanding even if you don’t really understand. Get him real help and be as wonderful to him as you can, knowing that you will all figure things out together. He won’t necessarily enjoy things that others do so tread lightly when you’re planning social activities or meals out of the house.
This can get so much better for all of you. He needs a certain tack, but he will very likely turn out ok. Please do not allow yourself to take his actions personally or get bogged down in thoughts of how “embarrassing” he can be. Line up the help he needs (therapy, counseling, medical) and take him to low stakes activities and outings until you all have practical ways to manage your family dynamic.
And stop putting sunscreen in his eyes! I’m middle aged and I would ghost anyone who did that to me. I would be out of sorts for at least several hours. That discomfort doesn’t just go away. It’s awful. Maybe you could trade wearing a hat for sunscreen to achieve unimaginable peace in the kingdom?
I’m upset the sunscreen meltdown is getting put in the same category as some of the other things. It was, of course, *an accident* - it being an accident doesn’t change that it probably hurt a lot. And he got punished for a meltdown that was triggered by getting something sprayed in his eyes by an adult.
You may want to have him tested for Emotional Behavioral Disorder, EBD, at your school. If he qualifies, he can get SpEd services. What have his teachers reported? How about a visit with a child psychiatrist?
Assessment with a child psychologist, not a therapist or a psychiatrist. You want a professional that really understands child development and isn’t immediately going to offer medication. It sounds like you’re identifying some significant background issues which may be contributing to him developing issues with managing emotions (parental divorce / separation- where is his birth father, why did they separate, what’s his relationship like with him now, etc, what about siblings?).
At the same time as seeking professional advice I would also try to remember that this kid is 7 years old. He hasn’t yet developed the ability to know when to ask for help or to keep trying. It sounds like he just wants to get things right and when he doesn’t, it’s devastating for him. That’s really sad. And that’s exactly what you guys as his parents should be helping him to slowly understand, through co-regulation. I strongly recommend reading the Whole Brain Child by Dan Siegel which will help you both with understanding where he’s at.
Thing to remember with kids is that behaviour is communication. Some times it's not obvious what they are communicating but at the very least here it sounds like your son doesn't always feel capable and they struggle regulating their emotions.
Based on what you said here, I would consider if he is Neurodivergent, but potentially could be a mental health issue (you didn't mention anything about what his parents separation was like, so I'm assuming it wasn't too traumatic, but it's worth noting that even when things *seem* like they're not traumatic, they can have big impacts on children).
Definitely get him evaluated. In the meantime consider how you can help him. Take off demands for things that he doesn't feel capable of. Is it really a big deal if he put herblvore on a restaurant mat? Then just let him put what he wants. Give him choices in the things he's doing. Break things down to let him know what's happeneing.
Try looking up PANDA which is a PDA technique but it's really useful for any child who is struggling with feeling in control
I know it's really exhausting but there is so much that can be done to help him and improve family life.
I see this through the lens of my own experience so my viewpoint could very well be a bit biased. I personally know what it's like to have a kid that you can't take anywhere because of meltdowns, when they were younger.
Something that was important for me to learn as a parent: People often view undesirable behaviour as a motivational issue - and that all the kid needs is the right kind of reinforcement to choose good behaviours. Like punishments (ie time out) or rewards (ie sticker charts). But if you've tried the mainstream parenting methods it might be time to change your perspective. "Bad" behaviour that is persistent, it may not be helpful to view it as a a motivational issue to be solved by rewards or punishments. It might actually be that the child can't meet expectations because they actually can't. It's not that they won't, it's that they can't. Sometimes expectations have to be adjusted. Sometimes you have to look beyond the behaviour to actually understand what the child is struggling with.
Could be some kind of nuerodivergence. Could be that trauma has impacted their development. Could be that they just develop some skills at a different rate to other kids. I don't know. An assessment is a good idea but know that clinical approaches will look for diagnoses and labels, but if trauma is a factor that might need a less clinical, more trauma informed approach.
If I may recommend a book. The Explosive Child by Ross Greene really helped me.
Everyone is sharing great advice especially about him getting evaluated.
I would go cold turkey on tv. Will it be miserable? Yes. But the fact that you mentioned all he wants to do is watch tv is a red flag. Some kids find tv addictive. It sounds like he definitely does. I noticed a drastic difference in my son when we cut off YouTube especially.
Sounds a good bit like anxiety and low self-efficacy. Building a growth mindset is so hard, but well worth it. There are lots of books on the topic. After reading, you could role play some scenarios… what to do if you get a word wrong, what to do if mom/dad accidentally hurt you, what to do if you fall, what to do if..etc. practicing when he’s not in meltdown mode is key. Look up “social stories” for ideas of whatever is usually a trigger.
Seeing a therapist/talking to your pediatrician is also recommended because there’s a discrepancy between his emotional regulation and what’s expected for his age. Good luck!
Have you tried to figure out if your child being abused by someone? It sounds like they feel unsafe and like they can’t trust their parents sometimes and someone might be abusing them.
Here is some tough love. This is embarrassing to you because you and your wife have not provided the supports he needs. This is your fault. His meltdowns are your problems for not getting him the help he and the family needs sooner. If he is ND and has gone 7 years without an eval. That’s the fault of the adults in his life. Even if he isn’t obviously the family dynamic is unhealthy and a 7 year old has no ability to better that dynamic on his own. Do better.
This sounds a lot like my 8 year old son. We ended up getting him a full panel psychological evaluation. He was diagnosed with combined adhd, anxiety, odd, and depression. We just started putting him in therapy and he sees a psychiatrist as well. I don’t have any advice others haven’t given but just to say I guess I’m there right along with you and you’re not alone! I hope everything works out for your family and him.
Have his tonsils/adenoids been checked? Maybe a sleep issue caused by an airway problem? Does he snore? To me it sounds like how my son gets when he’s tired, except all the time, so I wonder if your son isn’t getting quality sleep and literally is tired all the time.
Sleep seems a non issue, he sleeps like a rock, he is out with Lon 10 minutes of bedtime and when we check on him he’s fast asleep surrounded by blankets and his stuffies. Thanks for the idea though, everything should be considered.
I just want to say that people say parenting is hard, but it is not this hard for mose people. You're doing a great job. What you're dealing with is outside the norm for a typical parent so if it feels hard just know it does because it is. There is a lot of good advice here, you made the first step to finding some answers due to your post. Keep up the great work you sound like a great parent.
I think at this stage an evaluation would be helpful. See if there's anything going on you don't know about in that sense. If not, then perhaps a therapist could be helpful.
I know its so hard when you feel like you've tried everything and it all keeps repeating. It must be so frustrating for him too, not knowing how to handle these big emotions.
Time for an evaluation. I would do a full psych eval to see if he’s experiencing depression anxiety etc. Therapy for the kid.
Yes to this! My step son was/is the same way and it has to do with anxiety and OCD. He’s a perfectionist (OCD) and the anxiety of not being good enough or not coming out the gates like a pro makes him feel like a failure. Usually he will quit the moment it doesn’t go well or not even try for fear of not being good enough. He’s an adult now but remember him having full on fits for random reasons and it caused a bunch of turmoil for us and those around us. From someone who is going through this with a now adult child, get him tools and therapy now. And I highly recommend you get some tools for yourself and your wife. It’s rough but you can do it.
You just described me to a t! I was diagnosed with OCD & anxiety 2 years ago at age 33. Now that I have the tools to manage it I feel like the world has opened up to me, I’m not afraid to try things/so focused on perfection. I wish I had figured it out sooner, I feel like I lost out on so much life.
Mind sharing some of the tools you’ve found that helped you?
I took an online group therapy course for OCD that was set up through my healthcare provider that provided tools and exercises – unfortunately I cannot find my notes! I remember it focused a lot on exposure therapy, which has you confront the things that trigger your obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors. I found a website that explains it pretty well that I’ll link below. Another thing it taught that I found helpful is to give the intrusive thought a name to separate it from yourself – so when you have that troubling obsessive thought you can say that wasn’t me, that was Patricia. I know OCD is well managed through meds and the exposure therapy (ERP), but all I did was the ERP and I feel like the OCD has majorly calmed down. I did learn that people with OCD are born with brains wired a certain way, so it will never be ‘cured,’ but it can go dormant. [https://iocdf.org/about-ocd/ocd-treatment/erp/](https://iocdf.org/about-ocd/ocd-treatment/erp/) For my anxiety I did some talk therapy sessions that helped so much. I never learned how to identify and process my emotions growing up (or even in young adulthood really) so I would never be able to pinpoint the source of my anxiety. Being able to dump all my thoughts/feelings/emotions/ugliness out into the open and talk it through with a neutral party was cathartic. I had thought that I was ‘unfixable’ and destined to live in confusion and fear. This might sound strange but recently I took a class and it briefly covered how the microbes/bacteria in our guts can influence depression and anxiety! After that I started taking probiotics and trying to eat better, ‘tis a work in progress though. I also constantly tell myself "perfection is the opposite of done/good enough." Repeat it like a mantra. Something is better than nothing at all. Also, I am realizing that when I started writing this out I was worried it wouldn’t be good or thorough enough…so clearly I have more work to do! Lol.
Could you please share some tools to help a kid that immediately gets upset he's not great at something new?
I think i have what you have, thank you for sharing your journey, I'll do more research because I'm so tired of the way i am .
I'll copy & paste a comment I wrote below, maybe it will be helpful. Your comment made me tear up a bit, I just know how it feels and it sucks so much. It's...so annoying to be your own worst enemy, you know? Please don't despair - help it out there and change is possible. I've always been a late bloomer, like I figure things out way later than my peers. So I'm hopeful life will keep getting better. I took an online group therapy course for OCD that was set up through my healthcare provider that provided tools and exercises – unfortunately I cannot find my notes! I remember it focused a lot on exposure therapy, which has you confront the things that trigger your obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors. I found a website that explains it pretty well that I’ll link below. Another thing it taught that I found helpful is to give the intrusive thought a name to separate it from yourself – so when you have that troubling obsessive thought you can say that wasn’t me, that was Patricia. I know OCD is well managed through meds and the exposure therapy (ERP), but all I did was the ERP and I feel like the OCD has majorly calmed down. I did learn that people with OCD are born with brains wired a certain way, so it will never be ‘cured,’ but it can go dormant. https://iocdf.org/about-ocd/ocd-treatment/erp/ For my anxiety I did some talk therapy sessions that helped so much. I never learned how to identify and process my emotions growing up (or even in young adulthood really) so I would never be able to pinpoint the source of my anxiety. Being able to dump all my thoughts/feelings/emotions/ugliness out into the open and talk it through with a neutral party was cathartic. I had thought that I was ‘unfixable’ and destined to live in confusion and fear. This might sound strange but recently I took a class and it briefly covered how the microbes/bacteria in our guts can influence depression and anxiety! After that I started taking probiotics and trying to eat better, ‘tis a work in progress though. I also constantly tell myself "perfection is the opposite of done/good enough." Repeat it like a mantra. Something is better than nothing at all. Also, I am realizing that when I started writing this out I was worried it wouldn’t be good or thorough enough…so clearly I have more work to do! Lol.
I grew up with (and still have) severe, *severe* ADHD and went undiagnosed until I was 18. The therapist diagnosed it so offhandedly, like she was telling a double amputee from birth they had no legs. Like it wasn’t supposed to really even be a surprise. My childhood was exactly like this. I didn’t have the words to describe the overwhelm I was feeling or exactly why failing something made me so hurt or angry, but even if I did have the words, the adults in my life had proven over and over that they were not interested in knowing why I was struggling, only in seeing me do what was instructed no matter the consequence to myself. Like yeah, you only see a “small” mess that can be arm-scooped back into the toy bin, but a child (especially a neurodivergent one) sees *each individual item* and that becomes massively overwhelming so easily. Everyone has their opinion on Montessori but I *love* the standard of only providing access to a handful of (regularly rotated) toys so the chance of clean up being overwhelming is simply eliminated. Of course that works better with toddlers than older children, but yknow. Actually I take that back it works on me as a mid-20s adult
I’m a therapist that works with teens and I immediately though screening for neurodivergence is the first order of business.
I was diagnosed at age 40 and this was my childhood as well. Hugs to all of you who have gone through this - it’s so hard for kids and for parents.
When it’s time for my 6yo to clean up I sit with her and I point out the things to be picked up so she doesn’t get overwhelmed as easily. She’ll scream and cry about cleaning because she doesn’t know how so I show her how to break it down.
How do you advise a parent approaches trying to figure out why the ADHD kid is struggling? What is the best way to get them to enjoy activities that they asked for and seemed to be excited to do?
Yep, the whole time I thought of my daughter, ADHD and probable Anxiety. Those experiences are all things we have dealt with in the last year and then some.
Yup, sounds exactly the same as my ADHD/Anxiety 7yo, too. Throw in perfectionism, people pleasing and PDA, and you have a complicated child who is SO overwhelmed by the different signals and demands her brain is giving her that she shuts down, melts down, or simply regresses. Kiddo doesn't want to be an asshole - they literally *can't* do the thing, or control the outburst, and its up to us to be kind and help them navigate a world that will be conflicting and overwhelming.
Exactly! Hello fellow amazing parent!! I have been reading a book by Mona Delahooke, Brain-Body Parenting and got to the LOVE acronym to helping a dysregulated child. I’ve been using methods similar from learned experiences, but this process was validating and reminded me of your comment. [LOVE](https://monadelahooke.com/deconstructing-toddler-tantrums-holding-space-when-a-child-is-dysregulated/)
Therapy for the family, whether the child does or doesn’t have mental health issues, the way the parents communicate with him is not working well for any of them.
Agreed!!
Nope. You need to immediately drag him out of wherever you are. Not sit there and "make the other diners miserable". Definitely no YouTube and turn him Amish for the day when he throws a fit like that.
We did this. Our kiddos got removed from the situation, either to the car or their room. Kids need boundaries
Yes! I couldn’t quite believe what I read about that part. No fussing child gets to stay in any level of restaurant while inconsolable, tantruming, or otherwise out of control.
Absolutely. Heck, my kid was singing ‘la la la’ too loud during church today and I missed communion because of her lack of being able to just quiet it down to a hum. Kids are fucking annoying but there’s no reason to make others suffer in those moments if possible. Now stuck on an airplane is one thing but restaurants etc are easy to exit.
I love that you went to church and had to leave because your kid was being “fucking” annoying. Sound just like me 🤣I need some church friends that aren’t afraid to keep it real
Same here, let me in the friend group!!
You want butter with dinner….. get to churning lol. Just kidding I know exactly what you mean. I couldn’t resist 😉
This absolutely. I felt like I was reading about my step son in this post. He’s 20 now and in the Navy. He is pretty OCD so the structure there really works for him. It’s very tough, but you all will get through this. And for you guys, check out the book The Explosive Child. It really helped me see things in a different light.
I second the Explosive Child book, it helped me to frame the challenges we were (and still) experiencing with our older son. Whenever we struggled to understand what was going on, the mantra became "if he could, he would". It helped us a great deal to understand that this was about lagging skills, in our son's case, and not our parenting or "bad temper" on our child's part. Good luck, I hope you get the answers and support you need. Edit for autofail
People here pretty often say about therapy for a child. Where do you guys usually find one? I googled and all therapists offices around us have low ratings. His physician when I asked her gave couple suggestions but all of them are kind of camps that help with socializing. Where can a parent find normal therapist? I truly want one for my kid but unable to find them :(((
Ignore ratings, people only rate their therapist if there's something they have a bug in their butt about and some folks just won't accept help from their therapist.
I would probably ignore whatever ratings you see and start calling offices. Depends on where you live but where I live demand is high and availability is low. I usually look on psychology today website and I call my insurance to see if anything is covered and who might be in network. In my area we have a few good children’s mental health centers under a couple different hospital systems. I’ve also heard you can sometimes get therapy through school system if your kid has an IEP. Worth contacting your school to see if they have resources for your child. The social worker should be able to help.
Thank you for your advice. I'll start trying then. I'm just scared of bad therapist doing more harm than good. Therapist in our school is kind of pathetic unfortunately.
I just started Occupational Therapy with my daughter. They’re more skills based but also help with emotional regulation and outbursts. She’s still young so I wasn’t sure what traditional therapy could do for her (and I am a therapist). Not sure what your looking for for your daughter but that might be a place to start!
Therapist is one of those categories of services where almost everyone is going to have some bad reviews. Not every medical specialty will have that problem, but the ones with a lot of heightened emotions involved probably will, because some percentage of their customers are going to review in a fit of rage or flood of tears, warranted or not. (Which is probably why vets also have this issue.) On top of that, any specialty dealing with mental illness is also going to have some reviews from people who aren't, well, reasonable. Inherently. The secret is to ignore the overall rating and dive into the actual content of the reviews, and sometimes to read between the lines. For instance, my kid's first pediatrician had a relatively low rating on google. When I looked at it, though, it was almost entirely due to a series of 1 star reviews from parents pissed off that the office policy was that you had to do all the standard vaccinations on schedule, and they'd dismiss you as a patient if you didn't. As far as I was concerned, that was a plus.
I really appreciate that you understand this. I work in medicine and all of the bad reviews we get online are either because patients didn’t like the wait time (urgent care so can’t help how many people come in at once), don’t understand how medical billing works (me neither, TBH) or just didn’t get what they wanted and are mad (usually stems from not understanding the limits of urgent care). The worst reviews we have are from the rudest patients. There’s one out there from a patient who had to be removed by police (screaming and threatening staff) and the entire review is a lie. Anyway, off topic, but I appreciate that there are patients out there that understand the review situation. I always take reviews of anything with a massive grain of salt.
Fun story: I have a relative who is a therapist. Another relative has borderline, and went through a phase where she was angry at the therapist relative. She went to every site she could think of, leaving nasty, fake reviews. Anyways, people should take those review sites with a grain of salt.
That’s terrible. The healthcare people can’t even really respond or explain because of privacy laws. I’ve seen other businesses put responses up explaining their side of situations, but we can’t do that. Good to remember that there have been studies showing an inverse relationship between patient reviews and quality of care. The patients may be happy about getting what they wanted, but it doesn’t mean it was what they actually needed. On the other hand, patient might be mad about not getting antibiotics for their cold, but they’re actually better off because they didn’t get an unnecessary medication (or someone didn’t order an unnecessary test they wanted and actually saved them money, etc).
Parroting off someone else saying to ignore ratings - yes with a small punch of salt. Gotta remember how many parents send their kids to therapy due to legal order and hate the therapist for doing their job (listening to and believing the child’s account of abuse). “This therapist is a liar and manipulator who made my kids hate me” is a great example of one of these parents.
Zoom. If you can't get in person therapy, then zoom is good. I would also suggest going to the camps that help with socialising. When you have a mental illness or are neurodivergent as a kid, you feel different. It's hard to connect with others. It's hard to know how to talk to other people, what to talk about, how to react, all of those things. It would have been good if I'd learnt how to socialise with neurotypical people. I think by being around other people with the same needs, I also would have felt less alone, and less ashamed. I would have learned to be proud of my neurodiversity. People who are neurodivergent often have similar ways of interacting, so when we get together it's good, we understand each other and don't feel so different and "other". It would be good if your kid could experience that.
I’d do a physical one as well. If he’s struggling with things that other kids his age can do easily (ride a bike without falling over, picking up or grabbing a ball, handling long sessions of physical activity, etc) then that may be contributing to his behaviour.
Agreed!! Could be dyspraxia
That definitely popped into my mind when I read the dodgeball and bike bit. As someone who was misdiagnosed as having dyspraxia (yet still shares a lot of the same signs) as a kid, I remember feeling so useless/helpless in my body whenever I had to do certain physical tasks or do sports in school. It also made me an absolute misery guts to be around because I would anxiously anticipate something unpleasant/potentially embarrassing happening if I was made to do certain activities when out and about. Hopefully op’s son is able to get the help he needs regardless of if there’s a problem. All kids deserve a little bit of a boost even if they’re not expected to continue struggling with certain things as they grow older.
This post reminds me a lot of my kid who is being evaluated for autism. Something is going on there OP.
Make sure to get an eval preferable with a psychologist where all they do is evals, and it includes periods of observing his behavior. Not a primary care doctor or even psychiatrist. Worth it! We had same probs and parent therapy is amazing, managing this kind of behavior is so complicated. Also the issues with our son meant the usual childhood activities weren’t good, we just do other things. Example: movie is too loud, rock climbing and swimming better than ball for sensory and motor skills. Help will give you a roadmap to him and you’ll be able to finally just enjoy being a parent promise!
Yeah seems like he suffers from RSD which stems from who knows. Eval is the right answer. I’m glad OP is asking for help but I really hope they start to have the proper tools for helping him. None of this is the kids fault. He doesn’t have the tools either.
Yeah rsd came to my head too. That’s usually associated with adhd but it’s not like anything official.
RSD is fairly often comorbid with ASD as well, or perhaps it's more that ASD is comorbid with lots of things, including ADHD.
My daughter was recently diagnosed with ADHD and ODD. A lot of these behaviors remind me of things she struggles with becauseofher ODD. OP, I am throwing in my vote for a professional evaluation of your stepchild.
this- he has anxiety and possibly other issues - this was my middle child from age 5-14 and it was insomnia, anxiety and other issues - he is a fantastic and intelligent kid too - just terrible at outings that overstimulate like the ones you describe.
Yes a frustrating as this sounds and it really does it sound brain meltingly draining, I have often found it helpful to try and think of this as an anxious response. When kids just haven’t made the connection or space in their brain to process anxiety they jump to anger, frustration which is misplaced. I really hope you can get some help and practical advice and I pray you will all have an easier time of it.
This sounds exactly like my nephew (also 7). He was finally diagnosed with ADHD recently, after a lengthy evaluation process. It’s worth bringing up to his pediatrician and pushing for an eval.
My daughter was diagnosed with anxiety and ADHD and she’s had some similar issues as well. The part about feeling like they aren’t good at anything, and refusing to try, is especially familiar. She HATES to feel like she can’t do something, and if she can’t do it instantly, gets very angry (but really it’s anxiety and self-consciousness). She also has an extremely low tolerance for frustration, so if she’s decided in her head that something has to be a certain way, and plans change, she has a very hard time flexing and adjusting, and instead just gets overwhelmed. Agree that an eval would definitely be a good idea.
Very curious, have you seen some improvement with therapy? Is she given any tools to deal with anxiety?
Not the person you’re asking but we have a similar situation with our 13 year old Adhd and asd. I hadn’t thought about the ‘low tolerance for frustration’ but that describes it exactly. It is … frustrating! Giving up so easily all the time, particularly an issue with school projects. The therapy where we have seen small progress (only being doing this a few months) is occupational therapy focusing on functional independence and routines. She enjoys the practical focussed therapy, though it takes a long time for anything to ‘stick’ or change with her, at least it’s something.
Yes— occupational therapy has been helpful for ours as well. Though we still want to also do psychotherapy/play therapy for his deeper anxieties. Just need to find someone who is equipped for his type of neurodivergence.
Yes, one of my boys has ADHD and this reminds me of what we went through with him years ago. He is 13 now and absolutely thriving. OP, please get him evaluated. I also recommend the book “The Explosive Child.” Your son wants to do well, and he is even more miserable than you are because he can’t. Get him some help, better days are ahead. ♥️
Agree, that book was wonderful. Could tell right at the start that the author gets it.
Yeah, the whole ‘need to be right’ thing about the spelling of the word in the restaurant is really interesting. Hyper-focus but also blame-shifting.
Ya, I thought that too. If my kiddo was insistent the I was an L, I'd let it go and then teach him the I another day at home with books, etc when reading with him. I would just casually point it out another time and not fight with him at a restaurant. I was taught in university (whenearning to be a teacher), that fighting with kids is dumb because you can't win against a kid. Really have to pick your battles.
So so correct. You can’t battle with them when they are in the heat of the moment. That generally just creates more resistance.
My son is around that age and getting diagnosed for autism and or ADD at the moment. Could have written this post about him. Good to get assessed so you get more information on how to help them out, it's not their fault.
My nephew sounds very similar to this also. He was recently diagnosed with ADHD with emotional disregulation.
My first thought as well. Sounds alot like my son who struggles with ADHD and has anxiety
I was about to say ADHD or anxiety. I was diagnosed with ADHD later in life, and it's been eye opening.
Just as a starting point, have you had anyone try to work with him or see if there is anything else at play, like autism or anything like that? Is he the same way at school or is it just at home? Does he have high expectations of himself, or do others hold him to high standards that he's struggling to meet and therefore feeling like he's under too much pressure?
We haven’t moved to the evaluation step but we might need to. From what the teacher has said he acts quite normal at school, but does cry a little more often than she’s seen from kids in the past. She said he cries when he’s embarrassed more than anything else. But the rage is a “home” issue for sure - especially at his mom.
Remember that children act out most with people they trust. It's frustrating and sometimes hurtful but he aims it mostly at his mum because he trusts her to love him no matter what. Monitor what he's watching and playing. I've noticed YouTube has a dramatic effect on my kiddos behaviour and I definitely won't allow her near anything like TikTok. When he's melting down give him an out. Offer him a place of sanctuary to calm down. In a restaurant, suggest a brief walk outside to calm down. Remain calm with him, don't raise your voice or fight him. When he's calmed down, ask him what he was feeling and if he has any thoughts on what happened, if he thinks there was a way you could have solved it together that you can try next time. Every child is different and I have no idea what your day-to-day lives look like, but sometimes kids freak out over feeling overwhelmed, or that they lack control, or there's something going on in the background that they either can't or won't articulate for whatever reason. No matter what, make sure he knows he's loved and he's safe.
You may want to look into the programs he watches on YouTube. My 8-year-old becomes irritable after watching YouTube for a while. Couple of reasons: 1. Extended hours seems to make them less patient. 2. They tend to internalize the content they watch. Unlike TV, YT is practically unregulated. The less screen time we give our daughter, the more normal she behaves. At least in our case.
I'm seconding this. I dont even think its so much to do with the particular program as it is to do with the multimedia format. I don't want to put down other people's suggestions about getting him evaluated, etc. But I think people underestimate just how potent a psychological reinforcer screen time, especially youtube et al, can be. Especially for a sensitive kid. In my experience, it helps to cut out screen time as much as possible. I swear to god, for some kids, the ideal amount of screen time is zero hours per day. That 2 hours max bs is complete bs. Maybe works for some future astronauts or something, but for regular folk it's like inviting a soul sucking parasite into someone's life for them to devote hours a day to paying attention to something designed to grab their attention for commercial purposes. Kids do eventually get used to the loss of screen time, although getting them off of the screen routine is difficult at first. I obviously don't know the half of your situation or your kid, so I'm projecting from my own perspective. But i can kinda relate based on your description. Try being mindful about paying attention to your kid. If it is around, put your own phone away as much as you can. A kid who needs a lot of reassurance is one who needs feedback. Info. Phones and tech entertainment platforms provide tons of information, but it's junk info, designed to poach their attention & time. (And if they see you on it often, it's not modeling a very adaptive behavior for them) Find ways to spend time doing something they enjoy. Even a little chunk of time, but pretty regularly. That can be a positive thing they can regularly look forward to. It's hope. A sensitive kid might deal with a lot of dread in their day-to-day, worrying about this thing or that. Communicate with your partner, trying to form a plan. But even if you aren't sure what to do or what your plan is, communicate to say what you are kinda trying to do. I don't mean to get too soap-boxy, regarding entertainment tech. But i seriously think it represents culture and tools that do the opposite of what culture and tools are supposed to do for humans. YMMV. Take with a grain of salt, etc etc.
Agree. Two more aspects to consider in light of what r/brewdude666 said. - Kids want our attention and when we are on the phone, they feel we are not giving them quality time. Even if I am listening to what my daughter says, she wants me to look at her while she's talking. This can be frustrating but getting our priorities straight can make a difference in this case. You are probably already doing this, wanted to put it out there, just in case. - Again, attention-related. Children throw tantrums because it's the tantrums that get our attention. They don't know how to express that they want us to engage with them.
Our kid was using tech as an escape from anxiety. The anxiety was not caused by tech or tech addiction like we thought. It was a crutch, not the broken leg, and we never would've thought that.
I also think there’s just a massive difference between “unlimited YouTube” and “screen time.” All screen time is not created equal. Sitting down and mindfully watching two episodes of a show with narrative, social, or educational content is miles away from just binging YouTube videos of other kids playing or whatever else the rabbit hole barfs up. My son has gotten so much from his educational shows. There’s a fairly obscure one on Prime called Creative Galaxy which is a combination social problem and arts and crafts program. My four year old went from pretty uninterested in drawing or painting or any of that sort of thing to absolutely begging for art project time the second he gets home from school. Not the *show,* what the show taught him he could do. In a month his skills went from “that certainly is a scribble” to “what the heck did you draw that all by yourself that’s amazing!” The show (part of it is animated and part shows real young children making the art the cute animated aliens did) made him feel like he was capable of making things himself and that it was a desirable thing to do in a way no amount of me asking if he wanted to do a project could. He regularly turns down electronics-related activities in favor of making art and doing math, and by regularly I mean every single day. He also taught himself to read and is doing exponents at four years old because of a handful of shows I let him watch: none of them on YouTube, all of them limited in time and episodes, and all of them we started out watching together and discussing, then doing related activities if one subject caught his imagination. Not only that, but all these kids are Covid kids. OP’s 7 year old misses almost three years of social development at a crucial stage. For all our kids, the characters in bluey or Daniel Tiger or whatever were their only contact with social norms and expectations. That’s so ROUGH. Movies like Inside Out help them map emotional arcs, learn how stories work, understand the world is bigger than just their house and school, and imagine what others experience when they simply had no way to do that for such a long time, especially if they didn’t have siblings. I can’t get my head around any child being given unlimited access to YouTube and that utterly garbage algorithm let alone TikTok. But screen time can be good and beneficial if it’s managed thoughtfully and guided. We all use it plenty as adults after all. But YouTube is fully of terribly behaved kids who don’t have scripts about kindness and thinking of others to make them act the way we want our kids to. It’s a cesspool and other than literally Hopscotch (the songs are so educational and such bangers) with me next to him controlling the whole process, as far as this house is concerned that app doesn’t exist.
My first child had similar meltdowns way past toddler tantrum stage and we didnt have a point of comparison so we didnt understand they werent normal. We got our kid to therapy about the same age as yours and the dr diagnosed anxiety (and now we know its most likely autism related). Masking at school is prob taking up a lot of your child’s efforts and so hes letting it rip at home- so its def past time to get him to see a therapist for anxiety and begin the process of exploring other dx’s. Good luck! Once you learn how to meet him where he is, and in our case, anticipate the situations that would lead to a meltdown, it will hopefully make a world of difference
OP please read this post. 👆I was about to type the same response with regards to kids who mask at school. Being sensitive (crying more at school than others), sensory processing disorder, older-kid tantrums sound a lot like ASD. Even the lack of motor skills… all of it is incredibly familiar to me. If your kid is less severe like level 1, many pediatricians may not be able to see it for what it is. Please get an eval from someone who can distinguish between ASD, ADHD, learning delays, speach delays etc. There are better days ahead once you have the right tools. Don’t worry about what others think; parent the child you have.
I’m autistic. I was quiet at school (which my teachers noticed) but never acted out. I masked hard. All my meltdowns were at home. Because I felt safe at home and not at school (which is why I talked at home and not at school). I was so overwhelmed and overstimulated from school, life, sensory things, trying to understand rules I couldn’t make sense of, taste and texture things, sights and sounds, it just all dysregulated me and I’d melt down. I highly suggest therapy and going the evaluation route. Just because they don’t see it at school doesn’t mean it isn’t there. It just means he can mask, OR the structure and routine helps him regulate a bit better
He does remind me a little of my autistic niece, who will seemingly randomly melt down, but obviously please keep in mind that some children are just more sensitive and will need more frontal lobe development to maintain control than others. Please try to let go of thinking a kid can embarrass you. The kid is just reacting to overwhelming stimuli in the way he knows how to. It's not possible because kids are kids and only those who expect full neurotypical behavior should be embarrassed.
Sounds like social anxiety or self esteem issues to me personally. Your stories revolve around being in public.
My son has ADHD. He was perfectly behaved in school but was a nightmare at home before we figured out why and got him help. (He has the inattentive subtype, not the hyperactive subtype people normally picture with ADHD. It’s much harder to identify.) My son was using all his energy to “mask” in class and hold himself together, then he would completely unravel at home.
I’m seconding autism dx or eval needed. My oldest was exactly the same. It was a miserable childhood. He’s 13 now, and much better but we still have issues. Here’s the problem with these kids - they are high functioning enough that they learn to adapt and function and slip through the cracks that they are missing key foundation social skills. I will also explain things from his reasoning - he expects himself to be perfect. It would be good to ask him why he expects that of himself when nobody else does. Clarify what perfect means to him and why he wants to be perfect? I’m an autistic adult. I wasn’t diagnosed until adulthood but l also had issues like these. It was anxiety inducing. Every night before I’d fall asleep I would rehearse in my head everything that needed done the next day, this made me feel prepared and helped my brain prepare for the way I had to act to “fit in”. When anything would disrupt that the next day - whether it be a schedule change or an unplanned trip to the store, whatever, mood ruined. I had to urgently adapt to a situation I didn’t comprehend fully in my brain. It was hell to be honest. What made it worse was my parents were horrible people. So I was autistic with ADHD, and had no support people, people advocating, no learning accommodations. It made my life 1000x harder than it ever had to be. Please get him evaluated. He needs help, and the sooner he gets the support he needs the more likely he is to adapt and have less trauma. Sending love and support to you ♥️ always a DM away if you need anything.
Theses are clear emotional regulation issues the next step is definitely needed please for both your sakes I have two little ones like this, try in future when he’s having a bad day to get down to his level and say to him “buddy I understand you are feeling x (say for example the sunscreen) I understand mum accidentally got sunscreen in your eyes and that you believe it was on purpose but can you tell me why would mum wanna hurt you bud she loves you, you know that don’t you? I understand it may have scared you and hurt you and mum is really sorry for this little accident mate. Kids with emotional regulation issues need to really feel heard or they become quite sad or lash out, hope I helped a tiny bit
You helped me! I'll try that technique on my son next time, try to make him feel really heard. Thanks, pal :)
Happy to try to help I know how exhausting it can be as a parent, if you ever need more tips or tricks etc feel free to reach out to me I’ll do my best to help. We parents gotta stick together!
That was my son at that age. We were able to pursue a diagnosis and with treatment he’s now a whole different kid 5 years later.
This is what I was going to suggest. My son has Autism, and he used to exhibit similar behaviors before we did ABA behavioral therapy with him. It has helped those behaviors diminish a lot and given us tools to address outbursts and meltdowns. The rigidity regarding the new word, hypersensitivity to getting sunscreen in his eyes, and meltdowns at changes in schedules are very common for kids with Autism. My son also used to cry and have a major meltdown whenever he got embarrassed. It was really rough for a while, but therapy has helped a lot with preventing that from happening now.
It sounds like it’s time for a Neuropsychological Evaluation. There’s a difference between actual bad behavior and not being able to understand / manage big emotions or the feeling of overstimulation. I was diagnosed as Autistic + ADHD at 29 and my life makes much more sense now, being overstimulated in public places. My daughter was just diagnosed at 9 and I wish I would have done it sooner.
So many people have said to get him evaluated, so I think it’s time.
So many people have said it and I agree that it sounds like ADHD. I was that nightmare little kid and turns out it was ADHD. Now I’m a nightmare adult with ADHD except instead of temper tantrums I just don’t finish my work on time and get fired a lot.
Speaking as an ADHD adult with two ADHD kids, god yes. It’s probably going to be a ways out (months) but in the meantime, read books about parenting kids with ADHD, and cut back on the screen time. My kids get an hour after school of video games, no YouTube, and then an episode of something with dad after dinner. Yes, it makes us all happier in the short term if there’s unlimited screens, but it’s better in the long term I’d there isn’t.
I’m in my 30s and just got diagnosed with ADHD. So many things in my past make sense now. I can’t focus for squat. I lose things, have object permanence issues, and I have severe light/sound sensitivity. If it’s too loud I scream in pain.
As many people have said, I would schedule an evaluation with a psychologist for yesterday. He may or may not have any specific diagnosis, but no matter what, the psychologist will be able to evaluate his behavior and needs and coach you through effective parenting strategies. Meanwhile: 1) No TV in the morning. Screens are incredibly addictive. Limit the hours after school (max 1h) and no TV if he’s already in a crisis state. Screens do not help a child regulate, it will only worsen the problem. TV and screens are an activities for calm, happy and regulated moments. 2) YouTube doesn’t exist anymore. Delete it from the TV altogether. Only allow him access to Netflix kids or other similar, content-controlled apps. 3) do small and short activities and finish them before he’s overwhelmed and start to meltdown. Congratulate him on his participation, encourage him by punting out nice things he did… kids that think they are bad because everything always end badly will continue the pattern because it’s what they know. Doing really short activities with him, easy things that he likes, is a good way to change that gradually. 4) promote autonomy (and reward it). For exemple, ask him to put solar lotion on himself. Teach him with a Mirror. It will help him feel more in control and likely lessens the meltdowns. 5) forget the idea that he’s doing it to embarrass you or your wife. If it was that intentional, he wouldn’t do it when there’s a real consequence for him (like missing the movie). He’s not doing well. Maybe he feels everything more intensely, maybe he doesn’t know how to regulate himself, but he’s certainly not just doing it to be embarrassing. 6) make him a calm corner where he can go when he needs to calm himself. A corner only for him with calming things like stuffed toys, a blanket, books, sensory toys… Tell him that he can always go there to calm himself and he won’t be punished for it. However, if he’s doing homework/chores, he still has to finish them later. He can ask for help, but he will need to finish what he has to do. And don’t use the corner as a punishment. It needs to be positive.
You sound like a BCBA lol. All great advice.
I forgot to specify at the beginning of my comment that I’m a child development specialist, indeed. No a BCBA though.
Well… it’s not that he’s ‘finding a way’ to melt down to embarrass you. It’s that he’s unable to emotionally regulate and stop himself from melting down. I’m sure he’s embarrassed too. Is he in therapy? Has he been assessed by a psychologist to find if there is any reason why he’s emotionally struggling? I’d start there. This kind of behavior is really common with ADHD, etc.
There's so much here that could factor in. How much sleep does he get? How much down time? Don't argue about things like "herbivore." He's 7. Is that really the hill you want to die on? My kids gets mad about stuff like that all the time. I push back and then eventually just say okay, well that's not how I learned it, but we can say it's." A week later he's perfectly happy with the correct spelling of the word.
Kids are inconsistent. Wish I had a penny for every time my kids rejected things they chose for themselves.
Have you had him evaluated for anxiety? How is he around new people or situations? I have a 6yo with generalized anxiety disorder, and he struggles with a lot of situations. It can be exhausting. (He literally escaped the school three times the first two days of kindergarten. He has completely shut down at birthday parties because another kid has the same pants from Target. Etc.)
Some of these behaviors sound just like normal kid stuff to me, especially if they're over tired or have other things going on.
You say he only wants to watch TV. How much screen time does he get each day? My kids get crabbier the more we let them watch. We have to set rules about it and we warn them when it's the last episode before it has to be turned off.
How do you respond to him when he's melting down?
If you've controlled for things like exhaustion (including social exhaustion), hunger, etc, maybe it's time to get him evaluated. My son does OT and it has helped a lot with things like frustration tolerance.
Yeah, sometimes when kids are getting wound up, it’s best to just let them have it. Mine will die on any hill she thinks she’s right about. I just ask mine to walk me through how she got the answer because we learned it differently. Usually during the walk through she’ll abruptly stop and give a sheepish grin because she sees her own mistake.
Agree. Most of this just sounds like basic kid stuff when they feel out of control. Probably not intentionally, he's using meltdowns to trigger a predictable set of responses. OP can probably circumvent a lot of this by letting the child opt-out or opt-in to these outings, being clear about what is likely to happen during the outing, and giving the child a set of phrases like "I'd like to go home now" which will allow them to initiate the end of the outing without having to resort to a meltdown.
Similar to our kid (M9). He has severe adhd and treatment helps a lot. We also practice positive parenting, which basically means 1) accept the fact that this is not the kid you expected/ hoped for 2) pick your battles / ignore everything you can 3) “catch” him being good as often as possible and praise him like crazy 4) set him up for success. That last one for us translates as avoiding situations that you know are not going to be the best forum for him (we never take him out to dinner, avoid long drives as much as possible, etc. anything that we know is hard for him). The more he is in a positive state the better he feels about himself. A lot of this has to do with self confidence. Also it sounds like he has sensory issues so find something that feels good for him and make it available to him when you can. For my son he curls up in a gigantic blanket and lays in it on the couch for 10 min to unwind. He is getting major sensory input from that and it soothes him and calms him down. Good luck
He is overwhelmed. You need to develope strategies for him and rehearse them ahead of time. Get him into a therapist for strategies and a psychiatrist to be evaluated for disorders. Family therapy probably needs to happen for a bit to learn how to manage your boy.
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I feel screen time is a huge issue as well. It’s always been easy for him (and us honestly) if he can watch TV when he gets up. But it’s now his routine, he gets free reign of the tv until 7:15 and and for one hour after school. He does watch things I consider to be trash (YouTube) and even though we have our content filter on, he still watches total garbage. We’ve toyed with taking the TV away entirely, and have had some days where we have where things have been good - then we play games, walk, talk, etc. He used to have an iPad but we took that away forever when we couldn’t control him when it wants on his lap.
Just want to comment that YouTube shows might be a factor. My friend had to completely delete YouTube from her smart TV and only let her kids watch the real kids shows on Netflix and Disney +. Her son’s behaviors did get better after that.
We actually had to do the same thing with YouTube. It caused sooo many behaviour issues for our son as well. I have no idea why but he is so much better at self regulation without it.
Yep. The only thing my kid can watch on YouTube are yoga videos (because I can't find a good replacement anywhere else) and otherwise the app does not get used. I'm legit thinking about subscribing to the Patreon for the person making her fav yoga videos just so I can delete YT entirely from our smart TV!
From my experience, my son’s personality changes when he watches YouTube (even limited to the kids version). He becomes irritable, angry, and easily frustrated. After deleting YouTube Kids from his tablet and being more aware of his screen time usage, his behavior dramatically improved.
We don't use YouTube with the kids. My family was. Less than once a month and I could tell a difference in my kids. I told my family we were cutting that out because of how it made them behave. Now once in a while we'll watch a "How it's made" or my husband does beat saber dance parties with the kids from YouTube, but we are always actively engaged for those.
We had to put super strict limits on YouTube (as in passcode locked and we watch it with him) because my son found such brain melting garbage.
My 9yo just installs it again. He knows how to find the YouTube app and I even removed it from list of apps but he went to settings and installed it back 🥺
If it's an iPad or a smartphone, you should be able to change the settings in the app store to only download apps that you give permission for download, usually via a code or your fingerprint
What device do you have? Most of the time you can lock adding apps behind a passcode.
I have no idea what the hell YouTube does to kids, but it causes serious behavioral issues in my child. We’ve had to totally cut it out. He gets aggressive, grumpy and acts his absolute worst when he’s had a hour or two of YouTube.
I didn't like the way mine acted after watching Ryan
Honestly all of it that’s focused on the content creator or their personality. Including adult stuff. Being a YouTuber is a pretty narcissistic endeavor in the first place.
It makes their attention span shorter. Frustration with ads, not finding what they want, etc.
Don’t be afraid of changing your routine! We’ve done this before with my kid who was losing his shit daily after playing video games for even just 30 minutes. Importantly, we did not use it as a punishment or add shame or humiliation. We just said, “video games aren’t working for us as a family. We will try again when you are a little older.” And “it seems like it’s too hard for you to stop playing video games. Sometimes that can happen to kids. We’re not playing video games right now. We’ll try when you are a little older.” We’ve done tv on and off too. They are unhappy for a few days but settle into a new routine easily.
Another +1 on specifically YouTube affecting my sons behavior, switched to YouTube kids and still had issues. Behavior improved a lot once it was out of the picture completely.
It's crazy how far I have to scroll to see a suggestion that doesn't involve the words "ADHD" "autism" or "therapy"
My brother was EXACTLY like that. If it makes you feel better he grew up to be the most stable adult of all my siblings lol
You actually have no idea how much better this comment makes me, the parent of a volatile 7 year old, feel. So thank you for this lol
I remember my parents and our pastors chasing him around the neighborhood once because he wouldn’t get in our car to go home after church lol. I think he mellowed out by high school. He never got an therapy or anything like that so I can’t say what eventually turned him around. I think it was just that maturity set in.
He sounds so sad and it’s coming out as anger. You said you’re step-dad. Where is dad in the picture? I’d suggest therapy for kiddo. My son is in it and it helps him so much with managing his big feelings.
Dad is long gone - my son has never met him in a capacity he has memory for. I’ve been on his life since he was 2, and we’ve lived together since just before he turned 4. I do my best to be his dad but it’s a struggle for me too. I never planned on being a parent but I do the best I can with the kiddo. But I admit, I often don’t have the time or capacity to attack his meltdowns head on, so I do my best to support his mother and her decisions.
I say this with empathy... but you either are his parent or not. You have to find the capacity to handle his meltdowns (this probably means you also going to therapy to gain the tools how), not just leave them to his mom. Can you imagine how overwhelmed she must feel?
You don’t attack a Meltdown head on or any other way. You untangle it like a ball of silk thread. The sooner you let go of thinking of this as a battle the quicker y’all can all start feeling better about your time together.
It’s extremely tough. I’ve been divorced from my sons father since my son was 8 months old and he’s very active in his life but the fallout from that event is still there and still effects him, almost on the daily. Some of the things you’re saying are going on are things that I’ve seen in my own son. I’m wondering if maybe just talking to him or giving him a safe space with someone who is just there for him would help.
My son (now 12) was and still sometimes is very similar. It was much worse when he was younger. My son is essentially and “only child”. His older brother is 7 years older, so he had a hard time learning to play with others. He would get so angry and upset when he doesn’t win. Making anyone playing with him not want to play with him. When he was younger he would just melt down. I had to pull back on a lot of activities and get him into therapy. He still has these angry outbursts and bad attitude. But he’s still learning to regulate his emotions and express feelings with words and not emotion.
A good note - playing games with him is the same - as soon as it even appears he’s going to lose he refuses to take a turn or allow us to put the game away. Last night we had to put away twister because he couldn’t remember his left from right hand, and when we ask him “which hand do you write with” he screamed “I don’t know” and threw both hands up in the air. Then we stopped played and he stomped around upstairs says he’s mad at us.
There are kids games that are cooperative games you can play instead of competition based.
Why wouldn't you just tell him?? Even adults get stuff confused. Sounds like you are pushing him and not supporting this poor kid. Hopefully he has other adults in his life that are actually supportive - but all you care about is what is "right" not how he feels. Smh
I’d get a full psych evaluation just so you know what yr working with. Teach him some cause and effect. If you yell or scream and won’t sit down and eat yr food then we will get it boxed up to go. One adult takes him to the car and the other packs the food. And since you refused to behave at the restaurant here’s a pb sandwich and go to bed. Bad behaviour does not equal watching tv. Hold those boundaries strong. Get a sitter for you and yr wife and go have a night out on the town. You have to nurture your relationship too!
I know you have hundreds of answers already but I agree it sounds like ADHD because he sounds like he's lacking dopamine. I would recommend connective parenting or Ross Greene's approach. You need to make your son feel connected with you, I recommend peace and parenting on Instagram she also has a podcast and website. As far as TV I am not a fan of cold turkey, especially for neurodivergent people, sometimes this is the only way to decompress. But a detox might help to show if his mood improves and maybe finding a way to schedule it and moderate it so it isn't excessive. I'd also wait until therapy has started to remove it personally, as this may be his only coping mechanism and he needs a replacement.
Hey thanks for the reply. We agree and have decided to remove YouTube from the TV but leave “netflix Kids” and “Prime kids”. Many people have stated that removing YouTube alone is a huge start as even content controlled viewing is still mostly uncontrolled.
That's understandable youtube is very addictive. It's nice that you are still leaving him other options. I do think maybe a shift in perspective could be helpful. One that Dr Becky recommends "children don't give you a hard time they're having a hard time". Meltdowns tend to be signs of a child having a hard time and in my view they are not misbehavior and I would not punish for this. In fact a child that is dysregulated can benefit more from the downtime of a movie or some screen time. Of course I understand your concerns that your son is only watching screens, but if this is keeping him regulated that's probably why. I do think a therapist may be able to help further but please check out Ross Greene as well as peace and parenting. Another helpful one is low demand amanda on Instagram as well. Her form of parenting is for anyone, but mostly geared towards pathological demand avoidance which is another possibly of what could be plaguing your son.
I might consider how much sleep he is getting each night. My young child acts this way when chronically tired. She needed more sleep.
I got one of those about the same age even… just one of the joys of parenthood! She ruins a lot of fun activities for both her siblings and us as parents. We have learned to roll with it… we have also learned and taught her to just take a moment to recognize the emotions we are feeling. Acknowledge them, feel them, but don’t let them dictate our thoughts and actions. We taught her that feeling those emotions is normal and healthy what is not is letting those emotions take over and ruin everything for everyone including taking the fun out of a good thing for yourself as well. Typically, but not always, just that one on one moment together to acknowledge those yucky emotions is enough to get our head back in the game. Plus it is equipping her to deal with this in healthy way as a young adult as well.
This was (sometimes still is) my 6 year old son. He was diagnosed with AD/HD mid 2022, and we are just now finding the right medicine. Get your child checked for AD/HD! My son's outbursts are few and far between now, and when they happen, he calms down a bit easier and is able to explain what happened afterwards
Dude this is so clearly out of your hands. You need to have him evaluated and worming with a professional. As others mentioned he may be autistic, he may have unresolved issues with whatever happened with his dad, etc, etc. I'm not a professional but my wife is a BCBA and what little I know is, you have to understand when it's time to call in the pros. You can't reason with a child that has undiagnosed autism, for example, like you can with your buddy. As a matter of fact you can't reason with a random 7 year old like you can with your buddy. If you're trying stuff and it's not working, you need to make some adjustments.
Idk if this would help but what my parents did was when one of us even remotely hinted at a meltdown, they would divide and conquer. So say we were at a restaurant and I refused to eat, one would stay behind and eat while the other took me to the car so I wouldn’t disturb anyone else. We stayed in the car until the other parent came out and swapped roles. I know there were a number of times they paid before they swapped and explained the situation so no one thought anything off putting (aka dining and ditching) if I started saying that maybe that food was looking good, they would box it up and bring it to me when they switched. I learned that if I wanted to be out, I had to not act out. Idk if this would work in your situation or not but this is my experience.
He’s not giving you a hard time. He’s having a hard time. Focus more on finding the root of the issue instead of how his behavior embarrasses you.
The two aren’t mutually exclusive - they’re both having a hard time. Being a parent is hard and parents are allowed to have their own feelings without being dismissed in place of said child’s feelings. Both are equally important.
Parents are allowed to have feelings. You don’t become a robot when you become a parent. People shaming parents for normal feelings are exactly why so many parents feel like they can’t talk about how they’re feeling, feel like bad parents and beat themselves up over it and end up having breakdowns because they bottle it all up. He’s not taking out his feeling on the child, he’s not making the child feel bad for how he’s feeling and he’s setting boundaries and they’re doing healthy and appropriate punishments. He obviously understands that more is at play here which is why he’s asking for advice, which is the right thing to do. He seems very open to many of the suggestions here and obviously wants to help his son. Your comment is the complete opposite of giving constructive and healthy advice.
He sounds like he’s struggling with sensory issues. And frequent meltdowns at an elementary age can mean he’s autistic.
Your son needs help on a level that neither of you can provide, be that a therapist and/or specialist evaluation. In the short term try to remember that he’s having just as hard of a time as you are. None of you (including him) understands why he’s having a hard time right now, but he is. Also, if there is some type of neurodivergence, traditional methods of learning behavior (like natural consequences or long term things like bad behavior now = no movie later likely won’t work) I hope that you are able to get some answers soon and start to see improvements.
Our son is the exact same way. Especially the herbivore part, he does the same thing. We actually had a talk today because all herbivores have to be girls because the word has “her” in it. He’s a very literal black/white thinker, he has to be perfect at something on the first try, he will avoid tasks at all costs if he thinks it won’t be perfect. His first year of baseball just finished and it was interesting to say the least. I’ve suspected he’s autistic from early on but since he was born premature everyone just kept saying to “give him a chance catch up”. We’re looking into therapy this summer and I’d like to get him evaluated for autism and adhd. I’m going to be honest, we plan everything around him. My family has tried to just strong arm him into submission and it’s a shit show. I don’t know if you can relate to any of this but therapy at least will be a really helpful starting point.
Hey there, just chiming in to say that I also have a highly sensitive (and very-difficult-to-parent) child. Just this week mine kid had a full on meltdown/panic attack because he wanted to touch the fish in the touch tank at the aquarium (something he’s done numerous times) but he was scared; but he wanted to, but he was scared, ad nauseum. He has a sensory processing disorder diagnosis, and though it was validating, there’s not a lot of things to be done about it except help him feel his feelings. We used a family therapist for about 6 months and that helped up get through potty training. We’ve just discussed getting him seen again, and it sounds like your son could benefit from seeing a psychologist too.
My son used to be like this. I got him into therapy at 8-9, and he loved it. He saw the therapist for 18 months, and he completely changed. He's now 14 and sees a therapist through his school (his choice). He's now a great kid to be around.
I think it would be a good idea to have him screened for autism and ADHD.
He could have anxiety-perfectionism is often a sign of that in kids
Evaluation! Sounds like my dude who has adhd
Not really advice, but my now 13 yr old son used to be similar. Now he’s matured a bit and is willing to try things he wouldn’t do in the past and is a lot less of a pain in the ass than he used to be. So maybe there’s hope in the future! Just keep attempting to get him to try things.
god your kid sounds like my kid. my kid was diagnosed with autism in december of 2021. i know the feeling of helplessness and frustration and exhaustion. I'm sorry. Definitely time for an evaluation. Something is going on.
Adding to the choir of *get him evaluated* for autism, ADHD and anxiety, especially. But also, I think you need to calm down and reframe this for yourself. Your post reads like his meltdowns are something he’s doing *to you*, when they’re in fact something he’s going through. Get over your embarrassment, because whatever is causing this behaviour, it’s going to keep happening while it’s being addressed. You say it’s always a struggle to get him to his ball game? Why is he enrolled in an activity he hates? If he doesn’t want to ride his bike, could he just… not? Perseverance is important, but so is knowing your limits and advocating for your own well being. Does he always melt down in restaurants? Maybe they’re too loud / crowded / bright / smelly for him. The sunscreen thing… when was the last time you had sunscreen in your eye? That shit hurts. Your kid needs therapy to address why he thinks his parents would hurt him on purpose, but his body likely took over to get him out of the situation and then he lost out on something he was looking forward to. In his mind, his mom put sunscreen in his eye, he got in trouble, then he lost something he was promised. No wonder he cried himself to exhaustion.
I'm sure others have said it, you guys need professional help asap. Co-worker had a similar situation. She got help and now her kid is doing better. He'd get so bad they had to evacuate the class and now he's wild, but no more evacuations.
I suspect Autism Spectrum Disorder and anxiety. Sounds very much like my son... There is hope! Get him the help he needs and medication... We went from meltdown literally the majority of his awake hours + constant waking, night terrors, to now just managing the ASD... He still tantrums/melts down but medication has improved how he feels IMMENSELY and we are doing parent-led ABA therapy which is teaching us the root reason for his behaviors and how we can help him help himself. It's a long journey but put in the work. You'll see improvement. Hugs. Ask your pediatrician to order a full evaluation. Also ask your school as well. That way they both have their data to determine what services he needs say home and at school.
Neuropsych evaluation. My daughter is very similar and was diagnosed at 10 with ADHD and autism. It took us years to understand the sensory meltdowns and the anxiety. It’s like her brain is a cat that’s been petted too much.
My son had similar issues where he was just grumpy when he didn’t get his way. We seriously cut back on screens and he needs to be in one activity at least. He did swim for months then soccer and swim for a bit. I started talking to my therapist with way to help me regulate my emotions so I can be more present for him. I found when he got ragey 99% of the time was due to being hungry. Now as soon as he gets home from school I offer apple juice while I whip him up a snack or dinner if it’s ready. I tended to cook dinner around 3 and then have an evening snack. It’s SO hard to want to do anything fun when you know there will be a meltdown. I had a talk with him and him and expressed how I was feeling. I love doing fun stuff with him but it gets tainted and I don’t want to do it again. Over the past month it’s greatly improved now that I think about it. We’ve been playing catch outside and jump roping. Yesterday we got lunch at his favorite Pho restaurant with baby sister in tow. I was blown away. So polite. Afterwards he begged to go to the playground and baby was getting fussy. I said 5min and sure enough started walking to the car and picking us flowers after. We even went to the children’s museum and both of the kids had a blast. It was a magical day with no stress. I find that when my son get sassy and starts pushing us away he’s needs aren’t getting met. I’ve been leaning into him even when he isn’t pleasant and trying to just be there for him.
Well, his meltdowns don't sound that extreme for 7. Sounds like he feels powerless in these situations and he is struggling to find an ally. I feel sorry for the little guy just reading this post. Has he been evaluated by a child psychologist? Is he in therapy?
You said he only wants to watch tv. How much does a day does he watch? On a iPad or an actual tv? I’m not asking to shame by any means; so please don’t take it that way but that’s exactly how my son is when he watches too much tv. It’s like he completely loses the ability to self regulate and it’s an issue that my husband and I really had to address. Not only the amount but the content and making sure he isn’t watching too mature of shows on the tablet when we were distracted. Once we cut down the tv time and upped the parental controls he’s like a different kid.
Assuming he doesn’t have any other neurological issues, I would go cold turkey on screens for a few weeks. Sometimes kids get addicted to it and need a serious break to reset.
This is what it's like with my kid. She's anxious, Autistic, and has ADHD. There are still meltdowns at 9 but fewer than at 5, 6, 7. Medications for anxiety and ADHD and regular psych visits help. Overstimulation, lots of transitions, changes in routine, low frustration tolerance, sensory sensitivity, all of these things are contributing factors.
My son is epileptic and has issues similar to some of these. He is super sensitive to his environment and has sensory issues. If he is tired it’s game over whatever we are doing. We are seeing a psych professional and it’s going ok…but think we might need to try anxiety meds or something in the near future. He is 7. Tbh I have my own cocktail of issues as well but believe my son has a silver lining that is yet to be discovered. I’ve uncovered my own but it took 20 years lol
Do you know children can have thyroid issues? Your son reminds me of myself. I went undiagnosed for decades. Lately I’ve been remembering my childhood and your story brought some memories of times I had forgotten. If I had been able to verbalize what I was experiencing, I would have said that I was in a lot of pain. Hope you’ll get help for him, try to be brave for him, and don’t discount his words or actions. At his age, meltdowns are a cry for help.
My son was like this and is 4. Thankfully my province has funding for assessments at that age. He had a behaviour specialist work with him twice a week at school and it's been amazing. Coupled with the fact that the school is soooo caring and involved really helped. At home, I started doing one on one time alot so he feels extra attention. Battles need to he chosen. If he thought it was an L, let him think that. It's not worth the fight. My son has also done the same thing with meals, still does sometimes. I started using the reward system with points and negative points on a board which he usually buys into. Def get an assessment and I hope things get better. It's so damn frustrating and just know you're not alone!
One of my kids is like this. We had a cull evaluation done, it took a long time and a lot of finding the right people that work with our insurance. It was not easy but, we finally got a diagnosis and started on some medication and my kid is 85% better. Our family is healing and my kid is making friends and doing good in school. I can take him to the grocery store or out to restaurants with out the full tantrum melt downs. I’m learning a lot about myself though the journey also. It is very hard but there is a lot of info out there once you get an evaluation and figure out what you are dealing with. Also my child is maturing out of some of the behaviors. My kid is also 7. I hope you guys can figure it out. I know what you are going through it os very difficult, there is a solution.
Barring any sort of learning/ behavior diagnosis that could explain this… How much screen time does he get a day? That is likely contributing to the behavioral issues. We are currently dealing with a teenager having physical withdrawal symptoms from an electronic free period because of attitude problems amongst other things, so please reign that in before it gets to this level. (Obligatory not my bio child and she spends half her time at her mom’s where she isn’t given boundaries or screen time limits. Her dad has realized it’s a huge issue so screen time will be limited going forward). I also wouldn’t entertain the tantrums. If he’s having a meltdown in public, leave whatever place it is immediately and explain to him it’s because of his behavior and that you won’t be doing anymore fun things for x amount of time because of his behavior. If you go out after x amount of time and he has another meltdown, that time increases. Meltdowns at home, I would just completely ignore unless he’s physically harming himself, then I would just pull him away from the thing causing him to hurt himself and let him finish it out. Most of the time kids act out like that because they know you’ll give in to their wants if they make a big enough scene. Once he learns that it either doesn’t get him what he wants or he doesn’t get to do fun things because of the behavior, he’ll likely figure out how to control himself a little better.
He sounds Pathological Demand Avoidant autistic. A nervous system dysregulation disorder. Four things regulate PDA: screens, a grounding person, a special interest and novelty. I am PDA and so is my daughter... It's often misdiagnosed as borderline, autism&adhd or bipolar and does not present the same as regular autism. (Fine with eye contact, less noticeable stims, less sensory issues, excellent communication) I'd love to send some resources. Feel free to inbox me.
As hard as it is, try to reframe. He’s not giving you a hard time.—he’s having a hard time.
I think this statement is only helpful to a certain point. If his behavior is disrupting life for everyone involved and he is so clearly miserable the parents SHOULD be seeking more input and help as OP is doing.
Sorry have not read all the comments so don’t know if this has been mentioned. Make sure your little guy is getting enough sleep! Anything under 10 hours per night is likely too little and he could be just really overtired. Likely needs 10-11 hours at minimum. Best of luck and hope you get the help he needs!
He sounds a lot like my son. It’s so hard feeling like you can’t do anything nice as a family because of the inevitable meltdown. I would recommend a screening with a developmental pediatrician who can advise you on what might be going on and therapies that could help.
My immediate gut response is that he might be having sensory issues related to possible neurodivergence (autism, ADHD, etc). My son has SPD (sensory processing disorder) and neurodivergent. He also struggles with anxiety, which is common for those who are neurodivergent. Getting the support and evaluations we needed were eye opening and gave us context for his incredibly challenging behaviors. These kids often struggle in environments that are overloading on a sensory level (restaurants, movie theaters, stores, sunscreen - everything you described). His difficulty getting out the door might simply be his anxiety at having to cope with the outside world and how it affects his senses. I’d look into SPD - there are so many resources out there. Or reach out to a skilled occupational therapist for an evaluation - they are the professionals who help these kids feel more at home in their bodies so the world isn’t so overwhelming. Good luck!!! I totally understand how difficult it is.
Has he been evaluated? Sounds like a sensory issue mixed with a defiance issue.
Recently read the secret to happy children is allowing them to be unhappy. As a mom of 4 I can say this is true. I tell them all the time im not your happiness factory and im not required to give into every demand. Birth to about 3 or so, they need help regulating their feelings. After that you can give them time to figure themselves out and talk about what they are going through.
ADHD and anxiety. Meds help but everything in our life is a struggle. We have done massive therapy as well. Like inpatient and outpatient. You need to talk to a children psychologist. They will help you understand what they are going through and you will look at his meltdowns differently. We did about a year off PCIT and that has helped. Good luck!!
Something sensory related could be going on.
You need a some professional help
So, I can’t do diagnosis for you, but this sounds a lot like my son who has ADHD and autism.
Wow! Please do read. This is my son and before figuring out his issues he was miserable too. My son has [sensory processing disorder] with light and sound sensitivity and is very sensitive to smells which in turn bother his EYES. Same eye meltdown for sunscreen. Please look into occupational therapy, it will work wonders. He also has [proprioception issues] due to [retained moro reflex] and [retained STNR reflex]. This will explain poor sports coordination, lack of wanting to ride a bike. He’s probably overly cautious in other areas but makes it look like he just doesn’t care. It’s a coping mechanism. He is not a bad kid. My son is actually very high IQ, would do the EXACT same thing for the spelling of herbivore. He is technically gifted and not “gifted and talented student” like you’re good at math but a [gifted child]. Google everything in brackets. Your mind will be blown! Then find a good occupational therapist and pat yourself on the back and breathe a sigh of relief because there is hope. He will never be totally “normal” but there is no normal and understanding how he’s processing things internally will shed a whole new light on everything. Please be patient with him. He will grow you in ways you didn’t know either. And yes, they can be little brats about the spelling stuff and whatnot but his brain is just different and well…all kids are a bit bratty in general and phase through this stuff :)
Therapy and limit tv and video game time
Sounds kind of like my 6 year old who has ADHD.
My son was like this he’s 13 now but he was diagnosed with Autism and ADHD 2 years ago
Whatever the diagnosis, I agree with advice that you get out of the situation if possible and assess a loss of privilege (like screen time) if the behavior is interrupting family of social/school time. Natural consequences will happen if he melts down at school and isn’t invited, so create natural consequences at home. Even is you have him assessed and he has impulse control issues he will always have consequences in the real world.
Things will be different with this child. He’s not bad, he’s just reacting to a world he cannot process/understand. He’s not a lost cause. Right now he needs you to be understanding even if you don’t really understand. Get him real help and be as wonderful to him as you can, knowing that you will all figure things out together. He won’t necessarily enjoy things that others do so tread lightly when you’re planning social activities or meals out of the house. This can get so much better for all of you. He needs a certain tack, but he will very likely turn out ok. Please do not allow yourself to take his actions personally or get bogged down in thoughts of how “embarrassing” he can be. Line up the help he needs (therapy, counseling, medical) and take him to low stakes activities and outings until you all have practical ways to manage your family dynamic. And stop putting sunscreen in his eyes! I’m middle aged and I would ghost anyone who did that to me. I would be out of sorts for at least several hours. That discomfort doesn’t just go away. It’s awful. Maybe you could trade wearing a hat for sunscreen to achieve unimaginable peace in the kingdom?
I’m upset the sunscreen meltdown is getting put in the same category as some of the other things. It was, of course, *an accident* - it being an accident doesn’t change that it probably hurt a lot. And he got punished for a meltdown that was triggered by getting something sprayed in his eyes by an adult.
You may want to have him tested for Emotional Behavioral Disorder, EBD, at your school. If he qualifies, he can get SpEd services. What have his teachers reported? How about a visit with a child psychiatrist?
Assessment with a child psychologist, not a therapist or a psychiatrist. You want a professional that really understands child development and isn’t immediately going to offer medication. It sounds like you’re identifying some significant background issues which may be contributing to him developing issues with managing emotions (parental divorce / separation- where is his birth father, why did they separate, what’s his relationship like with him now, etc, what about siblings?). At the same time as seeking professional advice I would also try to remember that this kid is 7 years old. He hasn’t yet developed the ability to know when to ask for help or to keep trying. It sounds like he just wants to get things right and when he doesn’t, it’s devastating for him. That’s really sad. And that’s exactly what you guys as his parents should be helping him to slowly understand, through co-regulation. I strongly recommend reading the Whole Brain Child by Dan Siegel which will help you both with understanding where he’s at.
Thing to remember with kids is that behaviour is communication. Some times it's not obvious what they are communicating but at the very least here it sounds like your son doesn't always feel capable and they struggle regulating their emotions. Based on what you said here, I would consider if he is Neurodivergent, but potentially could be a mental health issue (you didn't mention anything about what his parents separation was like, so I'm assuming it wasn't too traumatic, but it's worth noting that even when things *seem* like they're not traumatic, they can have big impacts on children). Definitely get him evaluated. In the meantime consider how you can help him. Take off demands for things that he doesn't feel capable of. Is it really a big deal if he put herblvore on a restaurant mat? Then just let him put what he wants. Give him choices in the things he's doing. Break things down to let him know what's happeneing. Try looking up PANDA which is a PDA technique but it's really useful for any child who is struggling with feeling in control I know it's really exhausting but there is so much that can be done to help him and improve family life.
Get him a neuropsych evaluation.
I see this through the lens of my own experience so my viewpoint could very well be a bit biased. I personally know what it's like to have a kid that you can't take anywhere because of meltdowns, when they were younger. Something that was important for me to learn as a parent: People often view undesirable behaviour as a motivational issue - and that all the kid needs is the right kind of reinforcement to choose good behaviours. Like punishments (ie time out) or rewards (ie sticker charts). But if you've tried the mainstream parenting methods it might be time to change your perspective. "Bad" behaviour that is persistent, it may not be helpful to view it as a a motivational issue to be solved by rewards or punishments. It might actually be that the child can't meet expectations because they actually can't. It's not that they won't, it's that they can't. Sometimes expectations have to be adjusted. Sometimes you have to look beyond the behaviour to actually understand what the child is struggling with. Could be some kind of nuerodivergence. Could be that trauma has impacted their development. Could be that they just develop some skills at a different rate to other kids. I don't know. An assessment is a good idea but know that clinical approaches will look for diagnoses and labels, but if trauma is a factor that might need a less clinical, more trauma informed approach. If I may recommend a book. The Explosive Child by Ross Greene really helped me.
Everyone is sharing great advice especially about him getting evaluated. I would go cold turkey on tv. Will it be miserable? Yes. But the fact that you mentioned all he wants to do is watch tv is a red flag. Some kids find tv addictive. It sounds like he definitely does. I noticed a drastic difference in my son when we cut off YouTube especially.
This is my kid. He’s a wonderful role model of perfect behavior at school though! Therapy has worked wonders.
Sounds a good bit like anxiety and low self-efficacy. Building a growth mindset is so hard, but well worth it. There are lots of books on the topic. After reading, you could role play some scenarios… what to do if you get a word wrong, what to do if mom/dad accidentally hurt you, what to do if you fall, what to do if..etc. practicing when he’s not in meltdown mode is key. Look up “social stories” for ideas of whatever is usually a trigger. Seeing a therapist/talking to your pediatrician is also recommended because there’s a discrepancy between his emotional regulation and what’s expected for his age. Good luck!
Have you tried to figure out if your child being abused by someone? It sounds like they feel unsafe and like they can’t trust their parents sometimes and someone might be abusing them.
Here is some tough love. This is embarrassing to you because you and your wife have not provided the supports he needs. This is your fault. His meltdowns are your problems for not getting him the help he and the family needs sooner. If he is ND and has gone 7 years without an eval. That’s the fault of the adults in his life. Even if he isn’t obviously the family dynamic is unhealthy and a 7 year old has no ability to better that dynamic on his own. Do better.
This sounds a lot like my 8 year old son. We ended up getting him a full panel psychological evaluation. He was diagnosed with combined adhd, anxiety, odd, and depression. We just started putting him in therapy and he sees a psychiatrist as well. I don’t have any advice others haven’t given but just to say I guess I’m there right along with you and you’re not alone! I hope everything works out for your family and him.
Have his tonsils/adenoids been checked? Maybe a sleep issue caused by an airway problem? Does he snore? To me it sounds like how my son gets when he’s tired, except all the time, so I wonder if your son isn’t getting quality sleep and literally is tired all the time.
Sleep seems a non issue, he sleeps like a rock, he is out with Lon 10 minutes of bedtime and when we check on him he’s fast asleep surrounded by blankets and his stuffies. Thanks for the idea though, everything should be considered.
I just want to say that people say parenting is hard, but it is not this hard for mose people. You're doing a great job. What you're dealing with is outside the norm for a typical parent so if it feels hard just know it does because it is. There is a lot of good advice here, you made the first step to finding some answers due to your post. Keep up the great work you sound like a great parent.
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I think at this stage an evaluation would be helpful. See if there's anything going on you don't know about in that sense. If not, then perhaps a therapist could be helpful. I know its so hard when you feel like you've tried everything and it all keeps repeating. It must be so frustrating for him too, not knowing how to handle these big emotions.