Love in the Midst of Meltdown Hell

I have been reading "The Explosive Child" over the past week and with each page turned, I become more excited to start using the methods. I've already started trying to ignore and "let go" of certain behaviors like name-calling and screaming. Old habits die hard and I'm not getting it right every time yet. But I'm getting better. Especially now that I got past the part in the book that tells me what I CAN respond to and how best to do it.

This past week has been terrible for melt-downs. It's like he's getting worse. But I have to acknowledge that his life must seem pretty out of control for him right now. He has a newborn sister who is sick. His dad has been feeding him food with gluten in it and I think that may be contributing since we do have medical lab results saying he is gluten intolerant.

And I haven't been totally sticking to his diet either. Last weekend I gave him strawberries, during the week, an orange. Also I've been giving him a new multi-vitamin and making a new bun mix. Any of these things could be contributing.

His father isn't helping matters. Yesterday when our son was getting frustrated, he began to verbally attack his dad.

Dad (who I personally believe is the adult version of an inflexible-explosive child who never developed the skills I'm attempting to teach my son) responded with a meltdown of his own. He reached over to our son's lego house that he's been working on for the past week and said that when our son talks to him like that it makes him want to break his lego house. When this response only made our son more verbally abusive, Dad pushed the lego house off the edge of the table letting it smash to pieces on the floor.

As you might predict (and I'm sure ANY child would do the same), Our son screamed in horror at the top of his lungs. He came running upstairs to tell me what happened. I was lying on my bed nursing my one-month-old.

I was unbelieving. Although it's true that Dad has behaved very childishly in the past, I still found it incredible that he would do such a thing. My son assured me that he did. I said, "Maybe he was just cleaning up." But my son said: "No, I was looking at his face when he did it and he had a mad face." I asked my son, "Why was Dad mad at you?" And he responded crying loudly: "I can't remember!"

A few moments later, Dad came into the bedroom scolding our son for whatever he'd said to Dad, and informing us that he was leaving. Then he followed our son downstairs and continued to scream at him about what an awful child he is.

I broke free from my nursing newborn and attempted to intervene because I can't stand to see my son being punished for behavior he has no control over. That's when Dad turned on me and blamed me as our son's "primary caregiver" for not raising a son who knows how to respect his elders. Meanwhile, baby sister too has started crying. Our son is falling apart about his lego house. And I'm in shock wondering how my house went from quiet and peaceful to psycho-ward material in a matter of minutes.

Needless to say, I was happy to see my ex-husband leave.

This had been a long day of difficulties for my son. Earlier I'd asked my dad to come over and drive me to the hospital because my youngest daughter is sick with a terrible sounding cough, congested nose, and vomiting. She's only a month old, so this can be serious stuff. My son was playing in the snow when my dad arrived.

Thinking to help me, my dad asked my son several times to come and get into the car because we're going to the hospital. My son wasn't ready to leave the snow yet and didn't budge. My dad decided a heavy hand was needed (and he'd seen me do the same many times in the past so he probably didn't think it was wrong) and he picked my son up and carried him kicking and screaming to the door of our house.

"The Explosive Child" warns about physical contact during meltdown phase...

My dad dumped my screaming son in the door. All the while he was kicking, screaming, and telling my dad what a stupid idiot he is and how much he hates him. My dad, feeling very upset and offended got in the last barb before walking out the door to wait in the car and called my son "a spoiled little brat."

I can't blame him. I've done a lot worse than that in my attempts to punish my son for his behavior (like hitting him back, telling him maybe he should go live with his dad, feeling almost hatred towards him in darker moments of his disability). Before I understood that he couldn't help it, I was determined to "teach him a lesson."

Now my son was adamant that he was not getting into a car with Papa.

It took about 15 minutes for me to calm him down. I used the Collaborative Problem Solving technique described in the book. I told him we needed to compromise. He didn't want to go in the car but I needed him to go in the car because we had to take his baby sister to the hospital. He was too far gone to consider a compromise himself, so I suggested one. I suggested he comes in the car but he doesn't talk to Papa. After a few minutes, and I'll admit I cried in front my son while attempting this negotiation, he agreed to the compromise. (It had been a stressful few days with my sick newborn and out of control son.)

Once we were in the car, (thankfully) my dad acted as if nothing happened and suggested taking my son for fries while baby sister and Mommy went to emergency. My son came around pretty fast. It was actually kind of surprising.

I've also had a few other surprises. Although my son seems to be melting down every few minutes over any little thing (he dropped his pencil, he leaned on his button getting out of bed, his older sister's singing is "annoying" him, etc), I am ignoring all his outbursts. And what is surprising is that after several of his outbursts, he walked over, gave me a hug and told me how much he loves me.

This morning it went basically like this:

My son: AAAAAGGGHHHHH! I DON'T WANT TO GET DRESSED YOU STUPID IDIOT! NOW SHUT UP!

Me: (cleaning kitchen and completely not responding)

My son (comes over to me two minutes later and wraps his arms around my legs): I love you so much, Mom! You're the best.

Normally I would calmly remind my son that he should not talk to me like that and then he'd respond with something about how he hates me or how I must not care about him. Then I'd reassure him that I still love him even when he treats me like this. But this was an interesting development. Ignoring him completely - acting as if it didn't even happen - worked better faster. (And I have to tell you that short outbursts are much preferred to prolonged screaming fits.)

If I hadn't read the book and I'd tried the ignoring completely thing, I'd think he's manic-depressive. But I now know he's "incoherent" when he's frustrated. His reaction to this incoherence is to yell every bad thing he can think of and sometimes hit or kick.

Getting mad at him makes him more incoherent and his reaction becomes even more out of control. Not reacting to him gives him a chance to calm down, gain back his coherence and in the aftermath, he wants to make up to me, so he tells me he loves me.

I can't tell you how much this warms my heart. For the first time in a long time I feel like my son actually does love me. Often it felt like he only loves me when he gets what he wants or things are going his way. But the truth is, he's loved me all along. He just can't cope normally with heightened emotion. He is emotionally developmentally delayed.

(And I've punished him for it incessantly!)

My oldest daughter has a learning disability math disorder. I wouldn't get mad at her for not learning math. So I shouldn't get mad at my son for not learning emotional control. That is *his* learning disability. And as their mother, it's my job to do what works. Not what others expect me to do.

My son is not a "spoiled little brat." He is doing the best he can with the skills he possesses. And if you take away the meltdowns, he is a loving, intelligent, funny, creative, beautiful person. So as the book instructs, my first priority is to REDUCE MELTDOWNS.