Behavior Techniques needed! | ADHD Information

Hello! I am new to this forum and I have a five year old little boy who has just recently been diagnosed with ADHD. He has been on Rittalin for a week now, but I am still struggling with behavior.......today was a pretty rough one....tonight we went through such an issue once I tried putting him into time out for hitting me....he flipped out (melt down), and began beating me......literally.....I felt like I was at my bottom.....i didn't know what to do,,,,,after he shot me a good one in the mouth, I gave up and let him go......I need advice,,,that's why I'm here.....can anyone give me some good pointers on how to deal with this when he's at his "melt down" point.....what do you do when this happens?????

 

Any advice would be great!

thanks so much!

shannon

what we were taught to do is take away privilages and he has to earn them back by good behavior or choose a chore for him to do to earn it back so there are consequences.  We were also taught to do behavior limited punishment an example if she will not pick up her toys everything stops until she listens and does and then she has to demonstrate to us she can do it even if it takes all day.  Yes it is not easy but works and is what our psychologist is having us do. 


Another idea do a point system at home where he has to earn TV time or Computer use the things he likes.

Call your psychiatrist ASAP and let him/her know about the behavior.  It may not be a "behavior" issue so much as a mental or med issue.  Kids can have major anger issues after "coming down" from Ritalin.  Mine was on Ritalin for a short time.  Every night when his meds wore off, he would get violent and angry and hurt family members.  He is now on Focalin and doesn't have those issues anymore.  Remain calm.........don't give in to the rage.  Walk away if you have to.  There is hope.  But please.....call his psychiatrist ASAP.  Leave a message if you have to.  I don't think the current med is working for him.....ask the doc how long it takes to "kick in".  Don't worry about behavior modification right now but moreso getting him the proper med/dose.

twirly1

tryingmom26: Not sure from your post if the anger issues are new withe meds or were their before.  If they are new with meds, I'd look for a different med.  

If not,  we've have struggled with the same issue with my daughter - who is almost 11.   It does get better as they get older.

A few things we have learned with my daughter.

Remain calm.   Yelling would add more fuel to the fire. Restraining wasn't very effective with my daughter.  It works for some kids, but with her, it sometime could make things worse. Avoid reacting physically back. There is no amount of reasoning that is going to work when a child is in the midst of a tantrum.   There minds turn off.   Their flight/fight instincts kick in and rationale is out the window.  Do what you need to do to keep people safe, talk later. At times, we have had to physically take her to her room - sometimes kicking and screaming and then pretty much lock her in her room.  She could have her tantrum there.   Many times she trashed her room.   When things are broken, she either need to help fix them or pay for them to be replaced.  (We don't physically force my daughter into her room any longer.  It made things much worse.  Once calmed down, the issues are discussed and the consequence for actions occur.) Leave the room and take a time out yourself.  Keep a daily log of behavior.   This will help you find patterns and better able to predict issues. Rewarding and acknowledging good behavior is also really helpful.  It helps the child feel good about himself.  

A couple of months ago,  she went through a rough couple of months.   Many of the behaviors that caused us to seek help were back.   While working on adjusting her meds (which I think we have found the right combo now),  we also have been working with a therapist.   He defines to types of behaviors - "Never" and "Dial-Down".   Violence falls in the "never" category and things like "yelling" fall into the "dial-down" category.  

With the "nevers",  his philosophy is that these behaviors need to have very expensive consequences.  We went as far as removing pretty much everything from my daughter's room except for the furniture. After a really bad outburst where she hit and kicked me more than once,  she spent an entire weekend in her room with pretty much nothing but a couple of books and her favorite books on CD.   She missed all of her activities for the weekend and ate alone in her room.   She absolutely hated it and got the point pretty quickly that were were serious about not allowing this type behavior.   Since then, the violent outburst have decreased significantly and if they happen the intensity and duration are shorter.

This may not be the right approach for a 5 year old.  I also wouldn't have gone to this extreme on my own without the guidance from our therapist. 

We also have spent a lot of time taking about things after an outburst occurs.  We talk about what happened, what she was thinking and what she was feeling.  She was really lacking a "feelings" vocabulary.   We've worked on really trying to understand why she was angry and what the more appropriate response is to the feeling.  For example, frustration and disappointment trigger much of my daughter's anger.  We tried to teach her how people with those feelings act.  They don't hit and throw things.  She also needed to learn that it's OK to have these feelings and I'm not going to be able to "fix" everything.  In addition to her understanding her feelings better, I am also more aware of her triggers.  I am better able to predict and redirect.

There are a couple of books that are really good.    I highly recommend The "Explosive Child" by Greene and  "10 days to a Less Defiant Child".  Both are very helpful with these types of issues.   

I know how difficult it can be.  If nothing else, vent here.  There are lots of people who care and listen.  Best of luck to your family.

I agree with all the things horsemom says.

First and foremost is do not engage him when this is happening. This will be your most difficult task. Although we do not have an issue to this degree nor did we ever, but ALL tantrums my children are removed from the "family", or whoever is around. They are to be alone. Generally this is in their room. I've also literally dragged my youngest to her room and stood outside her door letting her know I was outside the door, but she was NOT coming out until she was "done". I still do this for things like being fresh (very fresh), or not being nice to anyone in the house, for both kids. We also ALWAYS discuss behavior later and what/how it could've gone differently. I've been doing this for years, started when my youngest was a toddler and had toddler tantrums. Obviously the "after talk" was less involved in those days and more time was spent on learning to calm down. You may need to work at your sons time alone for a bit if this is new. Once he is more under control (in his room alone), you go in and if he is still upset but not physical you may need to sit with him (no talking) and teach him to take deep breaths, count to 20, some things to calm the rest of the way down, then talk about the situation. Now that my children know how to calm themselves they go be alone and they know not to come to me until they are calm, and THEN we talk. I stop whatever I am doing and give them my undivided attention (even if its for 5 min) to talk about what happened. btw, time outs never worked on my 5 year old, magic for my oldest when she was younger and she is the one with ADHD, but not with my youngest.

I am also curious if this is new behavior with the meds?

Tryingmom26:  I want you to know that your situation is my situation.  We too, have a 5 yr old recently diagnosed ADHD son, who is lately very argumentative and defiant.  I (his mom) am the one who gets the brundt of it, Dad gets some of the behavior but mostly the worst of it comes out when I am home w/the kids & Dad is gone.  Everyone keeps saying "pick your battles", even my husband has come to terms with this, but I am finding it very hard to "pick my battles" when absolutely everything is a battle!  I am not exagerating about everything, it doesn't matter how I say something, how I present it, he chooses the opposite and the battle ensues.  I get the whole "pick your battles" theory, but at the same time he is only 5 yrs old and I will not allow him to run our house & do whatever, whenever he wants.  I too have been beat on, screamed at, etc...  I hear a lot of "your not the boss" and "I hate you's" regualarly.  Unfortunately my DH's job has kept him from home much of the last month 1/2, which I feel could be part of the problem, our son tends to act out more when Daddy isn't around.  We are (impatiently) waiting for our Psych appt mid-Jan to get answers as to how to handle these situations.  I feel like I have no control over him.  I'm sorry that I don't have advice for you, but I at least wanted you to know that you are not alone.  PM me if you want to chat more, sounds like we have a lot in common.

Hi epokey, I think what people mean when they say "Pick you battles" is quite literally pick which battles you are going to work on correcting. I know if I'm having a day where I have to correct my son every single minute of the day, and that is no exaggeration, I know I need to let up a little and focus on the bigger issues. I can't spend 16 hours a day fighting with my son. My biggest thing might be hitting or another major offense. I will work on this instead of something minor such as using a word he knows he shouldn't be saying.

I do understand what you are saying though. It is all day long and you feel like if you let some things go he'll think he can get away with stuff. And this might very well be true, but you can always work on this once you have estalbished a pattern of correcting things one at a time, instead of tackling it all at once. It will burn you out. Just remember...How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

My son had a very serious problem with hitting, kicking and biting when he had meltdowns.  We put him on Adderall.  When his behavior was really out of control, we decided to take him off the Adderall.  His behavior improved.  Stimulants can adversely affect some children.  If you think his behavior became worse after starting meds, you might try a non-stimulant med.  If his behavior has always been this bad, you might give the med some time to kick in.  It may take awhile to show improvement or you might have to talk with your Dr. about increasing the dosage.  I can really appreciate your situation.  We tried everything and it never seemed to work.  Our son was younger (about 3 1/2), so I think he has improved with age.  We currently don't have him on meds except for herbals.  We will probably have to put him back on a non-stimulant though when he starts school this year for attention, etc.

Do you think that it is rebound that is occuring in the afternoon?!

When the meds wear off they literally feel like they are being dropped on the floor and it makes them irritable.

You may also want to look into the med that he is on, whether the dose is high enough or too high, AND then figure out if the med. itself is the right one.

We tried adderall, several doses, before moving to concerta and leveling off after almost 6 months. We went through the rebound (I found hershey bars helped!!)

Son was at the same med and dose for 3 years. He is 10 1/2 and was increased over the summer.

guanfacine (tenex) also helps!

Best wishes!!