Monday 14 April 2014

Night time with an ADHD-Aspie-Gifted-Pubesent daughter



GO AWAY!
DD was very against me going into her bedroom as we were preparing her for bed tonight.  This, of course, makes my mommy-sense tingle.  I went into her room wondering what I would find and saw that a sweater was on the floor trying to cover up some water spill.  She is not allowed to have food or drink in her bedroom.  There is a bottle of water or a cup on the bathroom counter for her if she needs a drink in the night.   She leaped onto her bed and curled up over her pillow.  *tingle, tingle*  I got DH to pick her up to give her a big hug while I snuck in for the search.  Sure enough, in her pillow case, was a little stash of contraband.  A few toys that were supposed to be put away, a whole bunch of little plastic pieces of a toy that she had taken apart and collected the shiny bits like a raven and the thing she really didn't want us to know about; the chocolate bar wrapper.  Now found out she screams for us to get away from her, to go away and to shut up.  (Yes, we let her get away with saying that.)

DON'T YOU DARE PUT MUSIC ON!
Our coping is to put music on, walk outside or medicate.  If we go outside lately she starts to panic and scream and cry.  She has serious abandonment issues, too many of the peripheral people in her life have left her.  DH picked up the remote and quietly told me he was going to put music on, confirming that I was okay with that.  That was when her screaming became actual words.  "Don't you DARE put music on!"  She does that 'don't you DARE' stuff a lot. As soon as the sound came on the screaming got much worse.  I explained to my DH that she has snapped and completely lost control of herself.  She has gone from our DD to our AUTISTIC DD and the music is making it worse.  It's overstimulating the child that has snapped because she was overwhelmed already.  He agreed, turned it off and let me know he was going to close her bedroom door though.  It is standard here that if you keep screaming you will have to have your door closed.

OPEN THIS DOOR RIGHT NOW!
DH reminded her if she kept screaming her door would need to be closed.  She kept screaming at him to leave her alone and just be quiet.  And this time, she did say 'be quiet' since last time there was no reaction to 'shut up'.  Don't you dare close my door came next, shortly after the door closed there was the banging and screaming and kicking.  Then something different happened; she started to panic.  She started to cry out that she was scared and DH opened the door.  She lunged into his arms and clung to him crying.  She kept saying that she doesn't want to be alone.  She is scared to be alone.  When the door closes she is too alone.

After a bit of snuggles she climbed into her bed and under the covers, meltdown over, she's reading a book before lights out.

This used to be a regular night for us.  Years ago when we did not have the knowledge that we have now.  Except it used to be a lot worse.  The screaming would go on for at least half an hour, we would scream at her and each other.  Sometimes there would be spankings, objects hurling, holes in walls, broken doors.  There were times that I didn't think that we would last.  What marriage can persevere through this? Was a regular thought.  I thought my daughter would never succeed in life because I was not a good enough parent to teach her respect.  I worried that she would grow up to be a selfish bitch that no one really liked.  I don't anymore.  I know she will be an amazing woman because she has grown into an amazing girl.

1 comment:

  1. (hugs)

    Just read a book that I thought might give you some useful tips on helping her along when she gets angry. It's called The Explosive Child by Dr. Greene. His website is http://www.livesinthebalance.org/

    Wish I had read this years ago. It's a great approach for ALL children, not just kids with ADHD, Autism, anger issues etc.

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