Parents of Autism
Use the words that fit how you feel.
Do not hide your feelings or lie.
I am not a professional therapist or an Autism specialist.
I have Autism. And my child is also Autistic.
My other child however, is not autistic.
As soon as my child was diagnosed with Autism, we immediately went through all the possible options with how we could help our child navigate through life.
We are strong believers in early intervention. And early intervention is what we did.
From going through therapy at least 3 times a week which include:
- Speech and Language Therapy,
- Behavioural and Social Therapy and
- Pivotal Response Treatment Therapy
And also reading books, articles and speaking to other parents.
I have written several posts about the various therapy sessions we did with our child for free and all the advice I was given by the professionals and the therapists. I do this because I believe these things should be available to all parents.
Some of these posts you can find here:
Pivotal Response Treatment Therapy:
and
Speech and Language Therapy:
- Helping speech development by play
- 6 Speech Therapy Techniques for children with Autism
- Best Cartoons for Autistic children
We love our children and want what is best for them.
Money, funding or availability should never be an issue.
God knows we struggle with our Autistic children enough. SO any and all bloody help should be absolutely available.
It can start to feel lonely really bloody quickly and also it is like completely unchartered territory unless you have experience in the Autism area.
Moving on…
I have found one of the best of all parenting books.
I am not kidding.
This book is called, “Between Parent and Child“. I recommend all parents who enjoy gentle but assertive parenting read this book. It is very much leaning towards a Montessori teaching method.
I really find that the techniques in this book works with my Autistic child amazingly well.
And the thing is, it is not even designed for Autistic kids.
There is a large chapter in that book which speaks on how you can handle your anger as a parent.
I have combined that chapter with the advice of my childs Autism behavioural therapist and also with their specialist.
The thing is, you can never improve yourself unless you are self aware.
Know where your faults lie and what your limits are.
Because then you know exactly where and what you need to improve on.
1. Check Yourself
Teaching yourself how to control your temper is really just teaching yourself self restraint.
And what better way to teach self restraint than by practising what you preach.
Children learn through mimicking and copying behaviours that they see around them.
The first people they are around are their parents.
So if you, have issues handling your anger and your responses and snappy, short and rude. DO NOT be surprised when your children show themselves to be mini versions of you.
Check yourself first and then your child will slowly follow.
Think of yourself as part of a cat.
Patience as a parent is almost like trying to bathe a cat.
We will eventually get scratches and be hurt but the cat will be mud and dirt free by the end of it.
The process can be extremely hard but the end result is worth it. Unless you are okay with muddy paw prints all over your furniture and counters.
Try to note down and realise what points trigger you.
See how far things need to go before you are really triggered and understand at what point the situation needs to stop to avoid your anger.
2. Do not lie about your feelings
Sometimes we run out of patience and we lose our temper.
The problem comes if we pretend and lie about being okay.
When we do this, we are keeping everything inside which is extremely unhealthy, can lead to us exploding in spouts of anger or even to us resenting our very own children.
This slow build up of resentment WILL be felt by our children and it will definitely damage our relationship with our children.
Hiding our feeling in front of our children for the sake of avoiding confrontation teaches them to lie about how they feel in order to keep the peace.
This can lead to them being placed in abusive situations and keeping quiet about it because they do not want to ruffle any feathers.
And for the fact that we have taught them to lie just to say that they are okay. When in fact they are not okay.
It also teaches them to keep everything inside and not express themselves because they think that is the best thing to do. Even though this will destroy them from the inside.
Sometimes, we think we are protecting our children by lying and saying we are okay, when in fact we are not.
However, our kids are much smarter than what we give them credit for. And they will know that we are lying.
If we lie. They will also lie.
And if children lie, then it is because we taught them to.
Always be honest about how you feel.
AND put words to your emotions.
No
Not only that but they will also have moments of emotive explosions.
Which can possibly destroy their other friendships and relationships.
Do not pretend to be okay if you are not.
It is okay to not be okay.
3. How to handle your anger
Try to not scream or raise your voice at your child.
Do not insult your child or use harmful words against them.
Know that anger is a natural emotion and that it is inevitable.
When you let your child know that you are sad or angry. Also let them know how you will try to handle this.
For example,
“This..(state the situation)….. has made me angry”
“I am very angry right now”
“I need to sit down in a quiet space alone to calm down”
“This does not mean I do not Love you”
“It just means that this is what I need to do to feel better”
Parents are humans and are allowed to have their ups and downs.
It is how we express and show these ups and downs to our children that allows them to develop healthily.
For example,
If you are angry, say it!
“I am angry right now. Give me some time to calm down”
It is important to tell our children the words that reflect the way we feel.
This way they can also begin to use their words to tell us how they feel.
This will prevent destruction of furniture and precious items. Because the child will learn that speaking their emotions is better and healthier than showing it aggressively.
It also guarantees that everyone else around them can understand what is going on and act accordingly.
When children do not use their words to express their negative emotions, it can lead them to destroying property and/or possibly even themselves because they simply do not know how else to express all this pent up energy.
it can also lead to anxiety, stress and an ignorance of expressing themselves really can destroy their future relationships, personal and/or otherwise.
4. Do not put others around you down
This is a very bad character trait. It is not nice and extremely unfair.
No one is responsible for your emotions, except yourself.
Especially when you are a parent. Never, ever
- Yell,
- Insult or
- Attack
Your childs personality or character.
Bringing other down so you feel better is never a solution.
And the people closest to you will resent you and not want to spend any time with you.
It can also lead to children to begin to bully others.
But more than that, it can lead to low confident, insecure and low self esteemed children.
Really this is doing the child a huge misfavour.
Children have not even been on earth half as long as we have and for us to put them down everytime they make a mistake is an injustice on a very large scale.
Control your words when you are angry.
It is better to keep quiet than to say something that will make another person horrible.
5. Do not bring up the past
This. And This
And then more This.
Do not bring up previous mistake of the person who made you angry.
If you cannot accept that others make mistake, no one will accept that you make mistakes.
It also leads to the person on the receiving end of this nonsense rant of yours being afraid to even speak to you.
Do you want your family around you to tiptoe when you are around.
Or to avoid having a conversation with you for fear that it will be used against them in the future.
In the end, this can lead to your family members finding relief and sighing out loud in relief every time you leave the house.
Your family will feel at peace and a sense of calm as soon as you are away from them.
Do you really want that?
Is that the kind of influence you want to be around your children?
6. Say what you want to do. But DO NOT do it it
Safely express yourself.
If you are so angry you want to throw the TV out from the balcony.
Say it.
Express it.
DO NOT do it.
If you are so angry you want to climb on the ceiling and rip off the lights.
Say that too.
You might even find some of the things to make you laugh once you say it out loud.
Just because of how absurd you find the action that you want to do.
This is a healthy outlet of how you feel and how you wish you could deal with it.
It is much better out than in.
When it is out at least some of the pent up energy has been released and it does help.
But again. Do not act on it.
This is how people become serial killers and serial abusers.
They act out how they feel.
And they cannot keep control of their emotions and their actions.
So train yourself.
Say it. Do not do it.
FYI
Words only, no actions. ONLY work when you are angry.
Only use this rule when you are angry.
But in every other part of your life do the opposite. Actions and not words!