We are getting really desperate!

Coreys violence has gotten out of control, I can’t even leave him in a room with my other children anymore because I can’t trust him not to hurt them.

Yesterday he punched his 7 year old brother in the head and then the mouth because he wasn’t ‘playing the game right’.  The night before he had a friend sleep over and I ended up ringing his Mum to tell her to come and pick him up after him and Corey had a big fight and were threatening to break each others neck.  Corey apparently pulled a knife on him too when I was in the shower.

Coreys behavior is getting bad at school too, where in the past he has always managed to control himself at school.  He has had a couple of detentions and has now been suspended from school for 3 days, which is to happen after the school holidays which we have another week off.

So as you can see, we really are quite desperate now as his violence really is out of control and I am so worried that someone is going to get badly hurt again.

The natural medicine that I got doesn’t seem to be helping at all.  I know it said it could take 3 to 4 weeks before you start seeing results and it’s been about 3 weeks now that he’s been taking it, but no change yet, if anything he is worse.

Today he slammed the door against his brothers leg and when I heard him crying and asked Corey what he had done to him, he grabbed a glass that was in his room and was going to throw it at me.

We have been told that he doesn’t have ODD (oppositional defiant disorder) because he doesn’t display his symptoms at all times in all places.  Although now he is starting to.  Anyway, I don’t know whether he ‘technically’ does have it or not but look, here are the symptoms taken from MyOutOfControlTeen.com

=> Are you concerned that your child:

• Is going to hurt himself? YES
  
• Is going to hurt someone else? YES
  
• May end up in juvenile detention someday? YES
• May experiment with drugs or alcohol someday? YES
  

=> Has your child:

• Lied to you? YES
• Stolen from you? YES
• Destroyed property? YES
• Ran away from home? YES (although he usually just goes to the end of the street)
  
• Refused to do any chores? YES all the time
  
• Refused to follow any rules? YES
• Been verbally & physically aggressive? YES VERY
  
• Had temper tantrums that knew no limits?!! YES DEFINITELY

So, these are the symptoms of ODD and yes he has every single one of them to a HUGE DEGREE – so you tell me – do you think he has it?

I know a little while ago I talked about having a forum where parents can get together and chat with other parents in similar situations, but I really just haven’t had a chance to get it established.

So, I am just looking at the MyOutOfControlTeen.com website and it looks quite good and it’s only $29 (which compared to the money I’ve spent on natural therapies and pscyhologists and pyschiatrists isn’t much) and they have a members forum which would be good.  So I might grab a copy of this and see what it’s like, it has a money back guarantee too so if it’s no good I’ll get a refund, but hopefully I wont need to.

Like I said – I’m desperate and I know many things online are just to make money and don’t actually work, but I’m desperate so I’ll give anything a go at the moment.  So I am going to get this and have a read.  I believe it has an ebook, videos and a forum.  I think we are going to go away for a few days in the caravan on Sunday, so I might print it out and take it with me to read.

So – wish me luck!

Tuesday – this is the day that I had a meeting with the school counsellor, a lady from the education department and Corey’s teacher.  This is also the day that Corey decided to wake up in a foul mood and absolutely refused to go to school.

I’ll talk about the Corey situation first.  I don’t know if he just woke up in a foul mood, whether me having this meeting at school was on his mind (although I hadn’t really mentioned it much) or what the reason was for his behavior, but on Tuesday morning it was terrible.  He was foul right from the moment he got up, then when I was in the shower I heard Lachlan screaming, then Lochie ran through to my room and refused to go out and get ready for school because he was too scared Corey would hurt him.  Apparently the scream was because Corey had hit him across the face. 

We have a reward system where they get a pin on the board if they are good or lose a pin if they are naughty.  If they are naughty in a violent or abusive way toward a sibling, then that pin that they lose is given to that sibling.  So because of the hit across the face Corey lost a pin and Lachlan got that pin – well you would have thought the world was ending, he was not happy at all.  I wasn’t giving in though as they are our rules and I’m sticking to them.

Anyway, that just made his mood even worse and he just refused to go to school.

So then when I had my meeting at the school, he was left to sit in the car.  I parked the car in the taxi spot right outside the office door so the receptionist could keep an eye on him.  The meeting was good.  His teacher is new to the school and she is really lovely – yay, finally he has a nice teacher.  His teacher last year just didn’t care about kids with needs, it was like they are a big inconvenience to her (and already this year there have been issues with that particular teacher with another child but I wont get into that).

Coreys teacher this year though is so nice and in the last few days since that meeting I think she has really tried to help Corey.  He came home on Friday and told me that he thinks he is the teacher favourite as she always asks him to help her out and do special tasks and is really nice to him.  So that is great to see that he has a teacher that is giving him the help he needs in the class room.

The other good thing that came out of this meeting is that I think the seriousness of his behavior has finally become known.  When I mentioned how he gets quite violent and punches walls and punches himself in the head etc, it really got their attention.  So the education department is now arranging another meeting with a lady who specializes in this side of things and will know what path to take.  So I should have that meeting within the next couple of weeks.  That is their biggest concern now, is that he has so much anxiety and anger and that really does need to be addresses.

YAY – finally!

A Good Book – my Aunty was out the other day and saw this book called “Have a New Kid By Friday” by Dr. Kevin Leman.  She thought about me when she saw the book and bought it for me.  When I first heard the name I just thought ‘yeah right’ how can any kid change that much in just a few days.

But, she had bought it for me so I sat down and had a read.

WOW!

This book is really good.  I have read a lot of books on raising children, how to have happy children, how to have healthy children, do you have a tricky child, fed up (Fed Up by Sue Dengate is also a good book if you think their diet may be affecting their behavior),  etc etc etc, I’ve just about read them all.  This book would probably be the best one I’ve read.

Sometimes when reading these books I feel like they must be written by someone who has never had kids.  Not with this book, when I was reading this I could relate to it very well.  The strategies that he uses are quite good and although I know it’s going to be difficult sticking to it I’m certainly going to give it a go.

Just as an example – for sibling rivalry, when they are fighting he says to put them in a room together and let them work it out.  I really didn’t think that would be possible with Ben and Corey – I didn’t believe they could have a civil conversation together.  But I tried it yesterday, I put them in the laundry (the least fun room in the house) and told them they couldn’t come out until they had talked about why they were fighting and reached some sort of agreement.

My golly gosh they actually did it.  Instead of just yelling at each other, they discussed it sensibly and were quite serious and when they finished they called me in and told me what they’d discussed.  They even admitted to what bits they had done that they shouldn’t have done.  They had told each other how their actions had made them feel.  The best bit is – for the next couple of hours they were good and didn’t fight (I know a couple of hours doesn’t sound like much, but it is in my house).  They had another fight later in the afternoon and I did the same thing again and once again they talked about it and worked it out.

So, I’m going to be reading it again, just to make sure I know exactly what I’m doing and then these strategies are going to be enforced and we’ll see if there is any change.  I need to talk them through with my husband too to make sure we’re both on the same wave length with this.

So far though I’m quite impressed with this book and definitely recommend it, but if you want to wait a few days and see what results I get I will post back here and let you know.

Thanks for reading
Take care
Sheryl

Have a New Kid by Friday: How to Change Your Child’s Attitude, Behavior & Character in 5 Days

When Corey gets into one of his rages I really can’t stand to watch him like that.  Sometimes he just gets so upset that I think he’s going to explode if he doesn’t stop yelling and screaming like that.

For example, last night him and Ben just wouldn’t stop fighting.  My husband just got to the stage that he’d had enough and told them both to go and have a shower and go to bed – it was only around 7pm at the time.  Corey just went crazy and lost it completely, no way was he going to have a shower and go to bed that early.

Of course Corey isn’t going to give in but neither is my husband and my husband completely refused to leave Coreys room until Corey agreed to go and have a shower.  Which of course he wouldn’t and the longer my husband stood there the more Corey would scream.

I just couldn’t stand listening to him screaming like that and I know it isn’t good for him.  He always ends up with headaches after he screams and screams like that.  But, my husband was dealing with it and we know that even though we don’t always agree with one another on discipline, you can’t show that disagreement to your children, we need to be strong and back each other up, so I decided to just stay out of it.

However, after another 5 or so minutes of this constant screaming I couldn’t take it any longer.  As much as Corey makes me angry and when I’m so angry with him I really don’t feel like hugging him, but I knew that it was the only way to calm him down.  So I walked into his room, told my husband to leave and just sat next to him and hugged him.

I talked to him and told him to take some deep breathes and we just sat there like that for a while until he calmed down.  Once he was calm I told him that I wanted to talk to him but I didn’t want him to lose control and get angry, I just wanted him to listen.  Then I calmly asked him to go and have a shower and tried to explain to him that all this screaming doesn’t help the situation and certainly wont make Dad give in to him.

Corey got up and had a shower – he did make sure to point out that he still refused to go to bed after the shower, but I just ignored that and only worried at this stage about him having that shower.  Because he did then go calmly and have a shower and had completely calmed down by the time he got out the shower, we did let them stay up a little bit longer before going to bed.

I know that I have occasions where I just have had enough and I lose it with them, so I know how my husband felt.  I am trying hard lately though to try and not get to that stage and to try and stay as calm as I can.  It isn’t always possible, sometimes you just lose it and I think anyone that tells you they’ve never lost it with their child (especially if it is a child with behavior issues) is probably lying.  We’re only human and it is a difficult job to raise and deal with a child that has behavior issues and it’s normal to show cracks and lose it from time to time.

It was a nurse at the hospital a couple of weeks ago that told me that if anyone denies ever ‘losing it’ then they are lying.  That was when I did reach the point of not being able to take any more and I went to slap Corey on the arm.  We were doing dishes at the time and Corey was holding a metal spatula thing and when I went to slap him, he went to put his arm up in defense and my wrist came down onto the spatula and cut open my wrist.  I ended up with 7 stitches in my wrist.  When it is a cut across the wrist, it isn’t easy trying to explain to people what happened – a lot of people just assume that I tried to cut my own wrist being in that position.  I just tell everyone that I had an accident while doing the dishes – which it was, I know it was an accident and if anything it was my own fault for losing it.

But I guess it did teach me to try and be more calm and not to lose the plot so quickly.  I think since this happened I have really put an effort into being calmer with the kids which is a good thing.  I have brought in some new rules and they miss out on things for being naughty and I’m being tough in that sense and sticking to my guns when I tell them that they are banned or missing out on something.  For example, we have a rule that they only have friends over after school or go to a friends house on Mondays and Fridays.  Now, we’ve added to that rule that if they are constantly fighting and their behavior is really bad at home, then they don’t have anyone over at all.  Last week they had no-one over on Monday for bad behavior and so for the next few days they were quite good and so they had friends over on Friday.  They have been fighting constantly over the weekend so today I’ll be sticking to my guns and not letting them have anyone over.  I know they won’t be happy about it, but they learn quite quickly when you enforce rules like that.  Especially when their little brother does get to have someone over because he does behave.

Anyway, I’m raving again, I know that once I get started I usually rave on a bit.  So back to the hug therapy….. that was my point of this post, in my new quest to stay calmer with the kids I have used the hugging to calm Corey a couple of times and it has worked very well.  Sometimes I think that’s all he needs is a big hug.  I think he often feels so lost and like he doesn’t fit in.  Sometimes I think he gets quite jealous of his little brother who is a real affection kid and is always coming and giving me hugs.  Then with Corey who is always naughty I usually don’t feel like hugging him, so I know Lachlan does get more affection and I think that really does bother Corey.

So, as well as trying to stay calm, I think I really do need to put more effort into showing Corey more affection too.

Lots of hugs – you can never give your kids too many hugs!

Thanks for reading and I hope you and your kids have a lovely day
Sheryl
My-Beautiful-Boy.com

Since starting this blog I have had a number of emails from Mothers with similar issues, with kids that have behavior problems and can’t seem to find a solution to them.  Some with ODD, some with ADHD and some with Aspergers and then some, like Corey, that can’t seem to get a diagnosis.

One thing that most of these Mothers have in common is that living with a child with behavior issues can be incredibly challenging and difficult and often you feel like your all alone.  It is difficult putting up with tantrums on a daily basis and it is just as difficult having other people look at you like you are a bad Mother that can’t discipline her child properly.

As mothers with difficult children we all know that there is much more to it than just discipline and in fact if you have more than one child and your other children are perfectly normally behaved, then it really can’t be a discipline issue if they are all disciplined the same way.

Anyway, here I go raving again, if you’ve read my blog you have probably realised that once I start writing I do tend to rave on a bit and let it all out

The reason for todays post is that I have just replied to a couple of emails that I’d received from other mothers and I started thinking about whether I should have a forum on my site.  Not that I mind people contacting me via email, I don’t mind at all and in fact it is nice to hear from people who read my blog and it lets me know that I’m not alone in my quest to make my child happy.  I was just wondering whether other mothers would be interested in a forum where they could share their experiences and talk to other mothers will similar issues.

So I’m not going to just jump in and create a forum (a bad habit of mine – get something in my mind and rush into it) I thought I’d put it out there and see if anyone would be interested in joining a forum.

So if you would be interested in joining a forum with other mothers of children with behavior issues then please leave a comment below to show your interest and if I get enough response and enough interest then I will set it up.\

Thanks for reading – I hope you and your children have a great day!
Sheryl
My-Beautiful-Boy.com

So here is our update……..

Corey is now 9 1/2 and is still causing us a lot of trouble. His language is terrible and he still has a lot of anger. I went back to our GP and asked to be referred to a paediatrician since the psychologist and psychiatrist really hadn’t helped us all that much. Even though they seemed quite good, they just didn’t really help.

So the paediatrician did a full physical exam on Corey and full blood tests and other than finding what we think was a lollie in his ear, everything else was normal. He then referred us to another psychologist for a full psychiatric and academic assessment – he was quite surprised that no-one had done a full assessment on him yet and this new psychologist was very surprised too that it hadn’t been done already.

This psychologist is Dr Lindy Petersen and she is really, really good. I can’t believe that she actually got Corey to talk to her and he likes her so is much more comfortable with her. She spent some brief time with me getting a general run down of the problems we’re having and then she brought Corey in for the assessment while I waited in the waiting room.

Then my husband and I went in for another appointment a couple of days later to get the results.

His IQ (I can’t remember the exact score) is normal, except in one area where he scored quite low – it is the area for emotional/social stuff. Then his academic assessment came back good also, he scored at around the level for 10 1/2 year olds, so he’s about a year ahead academically.

Dr Petersen said that the emotional/social area where he scored low, that most Aspergers kids score low in that area.

Next we discussed ODD (Oppositional Defiant Disorder) and she said that he doesn’t have it. The criteria for an ODD diagnosis is that they need to have about 4 of the 8 symptoms and Corey I think has 7, but the reason he doesn’t have it is that the other half of the criteria is that they show these symptoms all the time. They are disrespectful and defiant with everyone, all authority, even at school, which Corey isn’t like that at school. At school, he would be too scared to say ‘boo’ to his teacher. So that rules out ODD for him, even though he does have the symptoms but just at home.

Dr Petersen has been doing this for 30+ years and she said she can get a general feel for things when she’s talking to kids and she definately got a bit of an ‘autism spectrum disorder’ feel with Corey although only mild. He hasn’t officially been diagnosed but she does feel that he has mild Asperger Syndrome.

Once again though, he passes the criteria quite highly in one section of symptoms, but is only borderline in the other section. One section involves social skills, lack of empathy, that sort of thing and that is where Corey scored quite highly, he has a definate lack of empathy and social skills. The other criteria is the obsessiveness and repetitive behaviors, which Corey is not as high on, he does have some obsessive behaviors but not overly obsessive.

I have felt for a long time now that Corey has Aspergers and although not diagnoses both the last pyschiatrist and Dr Petersen have said that he has mild Aspergers.

The other thing she said about his symptoms and the ODD symptoms is that it is quite common for Aspergers to have the ODD symptoms at home but not at school. They hold all the anger and frustration inside when they are out in public and when they get home they explode (exactly like Corey). It was really good to hear her say that actually because everyone else we had seen seemed to think he didn’t have a ‘disorder’ because of the fact that he was good at school. They said if he had a disorder he wouldn’t be able to control it any time and he would be like that at all times, but according to Dr Petersen many Aspergers kids do keep it in when at school.

She discussed with us that since Corey lacks empathy that it is pointless trying to discuss some things with him. Even though he does something wrong, it is almost impossible to get him to see that he has done wrong (which is so true with Corey), so she said we are really wasting our time when we try to make him admit he is wrong because he just doesn’t see it. She said that is something that will never change.

Her main advice for us to try over the following six weeks (off when we saw here) was to try and ignore a lot of his behavior. Ignore 90% of the behavior and address the worst 10% that just can’t be ignored. This is because she believes a lot of his behavior is to get a reaction from us, or to get our attention – particularly when he calls me names and argues with me – he wants me to argue back.

I can see where she is coming from but at the same time we have found this really difficult to do because it is really hard to ignore a lot of what he does. He often kicks the doors and walls, slams doors etc which really annoys my husband as he has spent so much time and money working on our house so how can we just let Corey destroy it and ignore it. It isn’t easy.

I do believe Dr Petersen could possibly be the one to help us with Corey, however, for those 2 sessions it cost $900. Admittedly we got back $500 through our health fund but it still cost us $400 for 2 sessions. When it came around to our next appointment we just didn’t have the money to go so we had to cancel it. It is really unfortunate you know and a bit sad that we finally find someone that we think could help and we can’t afford to take our son to her.

All I want is for my son to be good, to stop being so angry all the time. I want him to get better now, before he is 16 and its too late.

Along with his anger he has a lot of nervous tension too, lately he’s started cracking his knuckles when he’s nervous but it has gotten to the stage where he is just doing it all the time. He really reminds me so much of myself when I was younger – except for the anger.

Anyway, I’m going to stop now because this post has gotten quite long. I will try and get back in here more often to post. Please feel free to leave a comment or if you’d like to share your story on our blog just use the contact us link at the top and send us an email.

Take care
Sheryl

With Dr Callary recently diagnosing Corey with ODD I have decided to find out as much as I can about this disorder and to put the information on our blog. In fact I may include information on the blog of other disorders at some stage also.

This post is basically just about the symptoms of Oppositional Defiant Disorder and yes Corey has all of them.

 I know all children will display some of these symptoms or maybe even all of them from time to time but it really is more than the normal ‘naughtiness’ and as a parent you just know that it is beyond the normal. Take our family for example, we have three boys who have all been brought up in the same house by the same parents and yet our oldest and youngest do not have a problem with behavior. They have the general naughtiness and yes they may be defiant and they may argue from time to time but never to an extent that we have thought they had a behavior problem. Corey on the other hand is defiant all the time, he is constantly angry, hateful, uses bad language, tells me and his father to go away and that he hates us, he throws tantrums every day and punches and kills walls etc. You just know in your heart when it is something beyond ‘normal’.

Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) is quite common and in children that have ODD the pattern of being uncooperative, defiant and hostile is an ongoing problem and will interfered with the general daily functions of the child.

We also know that Corey has an Anxiety disorder and a little bit of compulsive behavior. It is common for children with ODD to also have another disorder such as Anxiety disorder, ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), Aspergers Syndrome or other learning disabilities. For this reason it is important to have your child assessed professionally to have all disorders diagnosed so they can treat all of them.

The symptoms of Oppositional Defiant Disorder may include:

• Excessive arguing with parents or other adults
• Constantly annoying or upsetting people deliberately
• Frequent temper tantrums
• Frequent refusal to obey rules and adult requests
• Not taking responsibility for their behavior and always blaming others
• May be easily annoyed and very touchy
• May talk very nastily and hatefully when they are upset
• Will seek revenge and need to have the final say
• May display frequent anger and resentment

The symptoms may be seen in any environment but are most likely to be displayed in their home environment or a place where they feel most comfortable to display their emotions.

The book Fed Up (Fully Updated) that I am currently reading talks a bit about Oppositional Defiant Disorder and how diet can really affect this and how using elimination diets or avoiding certain preservatives can make a big difference in children with ODD. I am still reading and I plan on starting some diet trials once I have finished the book, but it really does sound quite good.

Read more of this articles here

Thanks for visiting our blog
Take Care
Sheryl