Keep Calm and Carry On

One of the recommended survival tools to deal with a meltdown/misbehavior is to keep your cool. For a person with my outside-of-the-home stress level coupled with my type A personality, staying calm during these moments is often one of the most difficult things to do. You are expected, in the heat of things, to overcome your frustration, embarrassment, anger and behave rationally. Be the adult. Sometimes I manage to do this successfully and other times not so much. 

My most recent example of this occurred Christmas day. My dad and his wife came over to our house Christmas morning. We see them only a few times a year. My mom and stepdad had come and gone from our house already that morning, and my dad and Sandy arrived around 10am.

I forecasted their arrival, "Pawpaw and Sandy will be here later this morning." "Pawpaw and Sandy will be here in an hour..." "...in 30 mins" "...in 5 mins." I had warned my dad ahead of time of the risks, but I really naively thought it would go smoothly. After all, we were in our own environment, with only the 6 of us present. I thought that from a sensory perspective Austin shouldn't be seeking or overloaded-with input because there was nothing new to generate that response.

My dad arrived, we had a loving exchange and we sat down to chat and catch up. True to his Aspie nature, Austin never directly looked at or spoke to his grandparents. There was a lot of frenzied running from toy to toy, high speed mumbling about this toy or that one, run-on sentences explaining every intricacy. Then, he started building a tower between my Dad and Sandy on the couch, and attempting to climb it.

In fairness to Austin, the tower WAS made of blankets and stuffed animals, so when he tried climbing it the "blocks" he sent hurling at their heads didn't do a whole lot of damage. But it sure did hurt my pride and put quite a damper on conversation.

I tried the calm approach. "Austin,  you may not build a tower on the couch." "Austin, that is such bad manners. Stop." "Austin, those blankets are for decoration, please do NOT STACK them." "Austin, you CANNOT climb a tower of blankets. You will fall over." "Austin you are knocking those over onto Pawpaw and Sandy. STOP."  I apologized, got up to move the tower myself, put the blankets away. The tower reappeared, one blanket at a time.

By now my stress level had elevated to the highest. I was ticked and ready to explode. I understand that there are issues, but how much of this behavior is SPD/Aspergers, and how much of it is just plain bad behavior? We were in the middle of an all out power struggle and everyone in the room knew it. WE ARE THE PARENTS. You do what we say. There is nothing more maddening to me than just flat out disregard for my requests. I was ready to throttle this kid. If my dad hadn't been present, I would not have kept my cool, and a meltdown would have ensued.  But is that SPD? I don't think so...
From what I've been told by therapists the need to control is more along the lines of Aspergers, and manifests with my child in Oppositional Defiance Disorder (ODD.) Normally we try to prevent the outburst/misbehavior. When it occurs anyway you have to be ready. Our Christmas gathering in my mind was a fail. I'd like to believe that any time spent with my parents will be beneficial for my children, and that my own expectations aren't inhibiting the experience. I hope Austin looks back on these gatherings fondly, but we need more practice.
Signing off with a sigh...