Throwing things?

[Mayzoo]

My kiddo is doing fairly well most the time right now. However, we do have short bouts of "upsets" now and again in which her vocal tic returns and she has a body tic (twitch) that looks like she has hiccups.

 

During these bouts, she tends to throw one object (usually i-pad or nintendo but sometimes food or remotes...whatever is most handy). After she throws an object, she usually seems to feel better and sometimes the upsets go away completely. We have offered numerous acceptable ways to release her frustration (stomping, hitting the couch, writing, etc...).

 

We have been punishing for throwing the ipad and nintendo by taking them away for two days but, I am beginning to wonder. Throwing seems to offer some type of release that allows her calm back down. She really loves her ipad and her nintendo, so she really tries, under normal conditions, to not loose them.

 

I am beginning to wonder if this is a compulsion or just a typical kid fit during a time of intense frustration. If only I had all the answers . What are you folks votes? Compulsion, tantrum or other?

[Hrosenkrantz]

Mayzoo -- we are dealing with throwing and other aggressive behaviours in our child.

This is not the "raging" we dealt with earlier in the the process. It's different.

I was discussing behaviour modication programs with my husband; we are finding they are not effective with him.

 

Like my husband says: "when he is like this, it's as if he is in a trance."

Don't know if this is what you are seeing.

[chubbermommy]

When my son tics severely, he sometimes throws - thankfully, only sofa cushions so far. It's not something he can control at all. I know for him it's not a voluntary thing, so punishing him isn't going to help any. In fact, may cause more stress resulting in more tics.

 

Can you place soft things nearby so when she has the compulsion to throw, it's something soft? Like bean bags or stuffed animals?

[4Nikki]

DD started out with this during raging. Throwing and breaking things which seemed to help her as if she was venting. We had no choice but to restrain her because of the damage she would do. She then started targeting other things, people and herself which also required restraining. Her rages we so strong that she ripped a door off its hinges and threw it down the stairs. She threw her brother across the room, DS lost it and hit her back and that created a lot of anamosity that was very difficult to overcome. She would try to pull her hair out, choke herself or break her hands between the door and the jam or the floor to get whatever was inside her out. She started tying her hands with anything she could find extension coords etc. so tight her hands had no circulation. We experimented with different approaches to change things. We found that restraining actually increased and lengthened the episode intensity. We found it was better to help her self-manage rather than restraining. Pillows and blocking rather than restraining helped reduce both the intensity level and duration. Giving her paper to tear up helped with what seemed to be a need to vent. Every day, fighting the rage episodes, I would help her to her bed and tell her it was her safe place and she eventually used that safe place to self-manage. She would also write on walls, so I gave her paper to write on and she started writing on the paper to help her vent as well. We had lots of luck with her phone and tablet throwing of the items not breaking but eventually they did. We took them items away, when she did throw them, but eventually through self-managing and reminding her to protect, at every on-set, she eventually stopped throwing them. (After the first tablet was broken, I always bought protection for peace of mind.) It took time and heart felt acceptance from DS that DD's rages were not something she could control, before the animosity dissipated. After DD's steriod blast her symptoms changed from being unaware at the onset of her verbal tic to aware. She now does her best to self-control but shouts very loud to vent. Sometimes she slams doors but I try to keep a presents suttle enough to self-manage show she doesn't let it go out of control. If I leave her be, the behavior will exculate.

[Mayzoo]

She has not ever been in rage, or physically aggressive with herself or us, yet. She gets upset and quietly cries, and has a vocal tic, then seemingly out of the blue (which we can predict more or less now), she grabs something and throws it, or hits the couch or stomps and it is over as quick as it started. However, it does not happen every time she gets upset and the throwing would be the only aspect of her behaviour that could be labeled aggressive. We are VERY fortunate in that regard.

 

Since we can usually see this issue coming now, we try to remove electronic items from her reach. We remind her when the upsets start, to not throw electronic and what is appropriate behaviour. I will prompt her to get up and stomp and I stomp with her. We also remove the ipad and nintendo, and tell her she can have them as soon as she is not upset. We have also discussed this with her when she is not upset, and she agrees she should not have the electronics when she is upset.

 

I think finding soft items to throw is a good idea. She does occasionally throw hand towels, and she does not get in trouble for that either. I guess we need to come up with other soft things to keep nearby. I think we get some scrap paper and encourage her to tear it up.

 

We have the protection plan on the ipad. If she breaks by throwing it, it will be a hard sell to get daddy to let her have the replacement. We are just fumbling our way through this trying to decide if this is within her control or not. I flip flop back and forth.........geez, clear knowledge, without having to guess, now and then would be refreshing.

 

Thanks for the responses!

[riffleshell]

Like your daughter, my son is mostly doing well these days. But when he is not well, and is raging, he too likes to throw things, including his iPhone. I have told him many, many times that if he breaks it, I am not getting him a new one. (And I mean it.) He has been able to stop himself from throwing it. Ripping up paper is a good substitute. It's been a few months since we dealt with any of that. I miss it not at all. Good luck to you!

[4Nikki]

Only thing I can guess is that the throwing and breaking is some sort of venting relief. I've been trying to Google it from my phone but that don't work so well. Most of what I've found is from people that think it's a naughty reaction but I doubt that very much.

[Momwithacause]

My son is almost 4 and has PANS ....most likely Lyme, he was bitten by a tick when he was a baby ( we used to LOVE the great outdoors) anyway, & we spent the day in the hospital because they wanted to make sure it was not a poisonous snake bite. Recently I had facial palsy for 2 months & a fever so now I am being blood tested for Lyme also, I now am a fan of the great indoors. That's our history. Iam not on here very much, I do a lot of research at night when my kids are sleeping.

My son was throwing his iPad when he could not get to a new program like going from ABC Mouse to Super Why Spelling Fair.

I did not want to take it away from him because he has learned how to be very gentle, I remind him of the word gentle & he now slows down & laughs a little. So, when he would throw it , I would get on his level and say. "Gentle, gentle, this is your iPad, no throwing it or I take it. " I would explain this to him three times, then hand it back and show him how to navigate back & fourth or if a learning program is way over his head I do it with him,,,,, if he can't calm on that program after 20 minutes I put him on a program that he is more used to. BUT now his patience for new learning has really gone way up lately

I need this groups help on a topic I feel like autism and PANS may be one in the same ,,,, I have heard of other doctors thinking this too that classic PANS is an occurrence after age three, & my sons situation is before he was three with his tick bite when he was a baby.

We are doing oral human gamagobulin for 2 months and starting our 3 month we now have good speech but very little desire to be social or use language in a back fourth receptive way. Maybe this will come? Does anyone have this situation? And has anyone tried oxytocin or Respen-a? We will continue the oral hg , but I am just trying to see what others have done in this situation.

[Mayzoo]

Like your daughter, my son is mostly doing well these days. But when he is not well, and is raging, he too likes to throw things, including his iPhone. I have told him many, many times that if he breaks it, I am not getting him a new one. (And I mean it.) He has been able to stop himself from throwing it. Ripping up paper is a good substitute. It's been a few months since we dealt with any of that. I miss it not at all. Good luck to you!

 

Yeah, kiddo "knows" that if she breaks it through throwing then I will not replace it, but I am not sure she fully understands this. Kinda of like snakes and spiders (we live in the country). When quizzed she "knows" if she is bitten she could become quite ill, yet she still grabs them if given the opportunity .

 

I always chalked the snakes, and spiders to impulse control issues. Maybe the throwing is much like this. She has intense bursts of emotion/frustration, then due to a lack of impulse control, throws what is handy.

 

For now, as soon as she shows first signs of "the upsets", I put away the electronics. I tell her she can have them back when she is calmer. So far, it is working to some degree. I discuss with her the importance of not throwing electronics and offer alternatives, but I am not sure if she is learning anything from this approach. I can hope and time will tell.

[Mayzoo]

My son is almost 4 and has PANS ....most likely Lyme, he was bitten by a tick when he was a baby ( we used to LOVE the great outdoors) anyway, & we spent the day in the hospital because they wanted to make sure it was not a poisonous snake bite. Recently I had facial palsy for 2 months & a fever so now I am being blood tested for Lyme also, I now am a fan of the great indoors. That's our history. Iam not on here very much, I do a lot of research at night when my kids are sleeping.

My son was throwing his iPad when he could not get to a new program like going from ABC Mouse to Super Why Spelling Fair.

I did not want to take it away from him because he has learned how to be very gentle, I remind him of the word gentle & he now slows down & laughs a little. So, when he would throw it , I would get on his level and say. "Gentle, gentle, this is your iPad, no throwing it or I take it. " I would explain this to him three times, then hand it back and show him how to navigate back & fourth or if a learning program is way over his head I do it with him,,,,, if he can't calm on that program after 20 minutes I put him on a program that he is more used to. BUT now his patience for new learning has really gone way up lately

I need this groups help on a topic I feel like autism and PANS may be one in the same ,,,, I have heard of other doctors thinking this too that classic PANS is an occurrence after age three, & my sons situation is before he was three with his tick bite when he was a baby.

We are doing oral human gamagobulin for 2 months and starting our 3 month we now have good speech but very little desire to be social or use language in a back fourth receptive way. Maybe this will come? Does anyone have this situation? And has anyone tried oxytocin or Respen-a? We will continue the oral hg , but I am just trying to see what others have done in this situation.

 

 

We tried the oxytocin for a about 5 weeks. I never took her up to the max dose (2 sprays in am, 2 sprays in pm) since I never saw benefits at 2 sprays in am and 1 in pm. If you ask my kiddos doc, he would say I did not see benefits because we had the spray compounded locally for 25.00 rather then going through a mail in pharmacy he recommended that wanted almost 100.00 per bottle (25.00-40.00 for overnight shipping and 60 + per bottle made).

 

We have not tried the Respen-A.

[Momwithacause]

Thank you mayzoo. We are really missing that socialization piece. I have heard people comment on Respen-A doing just that, facilitating in ones own oxytocin by decreasing the over supply of serotonin, resulting in more communication & socialization. I am trying not to do to work on too many treatments at the same time. But this may be next when we are finished with human gamagobulin.

[Mayzoo]

I have not found any herbal/natural products that help with autism or socialization. The oxytocin was the last thing I am willing to try, and we really tried it for anxiety related to PANDAS.

 

Please keep in mind our kiddo is "mild" when it comes to Autism, yet she will likely never be truly independent (severe math learning disability leads to severe money issues, which leads to lack of independence). With that in mind: We are not going to try any more herbal/natural stuff for autism, and I will not go with pharmaceuticals unless she is a danger to herself or others (which I cannot foresee at this time).

 

If you are interested in the bio-med aspect of treating of autism, have you been on this site yet? http://www.autismweb.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=4&sid=1e1da048c64c676e50dc250d3aa8435d. It has been informative, and I will still hang out there some

 

We have never tried ABA per se. We did do ST and OT for years through a private company. We home school and as such seem to not be eligible for any therapies through school. We are going to go back to stuff like floortime and behavioral approaches and I am reading a book (Unlocking the Social Potential in Autism) on how to socialize her better. I am not far enough into it to know if it is any good or not. We do special Olympics, a special T-ball team, and I am trying to get her in girl scouts, but cannot seem to hook up with the leader.

 

Good luck on your journey. We had a pretty good handle on the autism aspect until PANDAS. Now, it is unlikely she will ever be able to live alone.

Edited August 13, 2014 by mayzoo

[qannie47]

Even if it is a compulsion, she still can learn to take some control.... And while that may take awhile, I would take the Ipad away UNTIL she is able to control what she throws. However, I would not put it too her as a punishment; more so a necessary cause and effect because "Ipad's cost a lot of money", and they can't be thrown. I would keep it short and sweet.

Edited August 14, 2014 by qannie47