[MollyMo]

OK, so we have a new son - age 8 - that we are in the process of adopting. He has been in our home for two months. He is a wonderful child and so very well behaved MOST OF THE TIME. However, about once a week we have what I call "meltdown". It occurs when he gets called on bad behaviour, or doesn't get his way. His mind-set is that he is right and he will butt-heads to prove it. When he is called on it, he has a horrible anger acting out tantrum. The tantrum usually consists of growling at the top of his lungs, very heavy breathing, and occasional screaming. He has such a hard time calming down and controlling himself. We tried ignoring it (it somewhat worked), we tried timeout (which eventually worked with a lot of time). I would like any advice on how to help hm understand how to deal with his anger, as he lets it get the best of him. I do not want him to grow up bottling in his anger to the point of explosion and losing control each time he is mad or things do not go his way. Help?????

[sspete]

Being the mother of an autistic child who has MAJOR behavior issues I can certainly understand where you are coming from.

We had a GREAT behavior therapist who once told us to:

Give her a pillow to scream and yell into until she calmed down.

Give her a pieces of paper to shred up in pieces until she felt better.

Then After and only After the tantrum had passed sit down and communicate why she felt so angry. We had her then look at the reasons she could not get her way. Teach him to communicate his anger through words....Let him know you understand how he feels, and it is okay to get angry, but that still does not mean he gets his way.

This process takes A TON OF TIME and MUCH PATIENCE!!! It certainly helped in our house, but it is still a work in progress. We still take a few steps forward, and then one step back.

The keys were to not give her an audience, not to let her throw the fit in front of others, and to clean up the pieces of paper she shredded when she was angry, and last but not least Communicate.

Staci

[jessc098]

I've been there with my 7-year-old. She came to our home in February. We had a lot of those meltdowns that you describe. We used to have her have her timeouts in a small bathroom because that's the only place she couldn't get a running start to crash into a wall/door or something else (once, she ran out screaming, headlong into traffic!). She screamed and kicked and wailed and threatened. Our rule was that we do five-minute time outs, but timeouts are quiet.

So we'd start the time when she got quiet (she was a good kid needing self-control). she could scream in a pillow, and shout at us, but she needed to get control before we'd start the clock. Once she was quiet the timer was turned on. If she started raging again, we'd start over next time she got quiet. This could go on QUITE a long time, but eventually she got the idea that it's way more fun to go sit in her room a minute and get control and then come talk to us about what made her angry. It's no fun for these little guys to be raging either-they're motivated to stop, but don't always have the tools.

We once had this screaming/fighting will-battle go on for four hours. (she screams, we wait patiently ready to start the egg timer and soon as she wants to go back to what she was doing). She finally had her five minutes of quiet in the bathroom and I went to talk to her before we tucked her in her room for the night, and she was sound asleep face down on the bathroom floor.

It was REALLY, REALLY hard at the time, but in just a few months we're almost entirely through it and she hasn't had to have someone else manage her time-out in over a month--usually now she goes to her room, screams in her pillow and says "start the timer please now mom, I'm quiet and respectful." and then we're back on track.

Hang in there--it's going to get better!

Oh--another note. Our daughter told us once that she thought if she kicked and screamed or even physically hurt us, that she'd be sent back to her foster mom in another state. We had to explain that she was being adopted and that couldn't really be 'undone." She said "what would you do if I killed Flick?" (our pet bird). We said you'd probabally be in REALLY big trouble. LIke timeout for a week (she didn't know we weren't serious). She said "that doesn't sound fun. Why wouldn't you send me back?" We said, Oh, we might want to send you back, but we won't. We can't. We're family forever--even when we make each other crazy." She seemed relieved. Sad to know she couldn't go back, but glad to know she wouldn't get (as she put it) "strangers for parents." Perhaps your little one just needs to be reassured that A: You love him even when he makes you crazy and B: He's not going back--you're his family.

Remember--these little ones have earned the right to be angry. You're just the convenient outlet.

Good luck!