I wish I could brag about how I resolve conflict with my wife. All of the interpersonal skills acquired through life experience, good mentoring, AND counseling classes, many times, go out the window when we are engaged in an intense debate that can have serious implications. It happened this week over how to appropriately discipline our special needs guy for not meeting an expectation. Thankfully for us, we’ve got some clarity moving forward should, or really when, this situation surfaces again. Getting to that clarified place, though, was pretty tough.
One of the areas where our son has some challenges is in organization. If you peered inside his book bag, looked in his desk at school, or glanced in his bedroom you might see that not only can he be a little “messy”, but his ability to give attention to detail has been a consistent struggle. I’ve found, in my interactions with parents of special needs kids, that there exists a two-fold challenge: a challenge for the kids, especially when they work hard to do better AND a challenge for the parents in trying to provide the right kind of support for the kids to be successful. Many parents work hard to help their children by setting up systems, creating routines, and communicating expectations. They do this with hopes that when the children are older and move beyond the home environment, they can recall the skills acquired in the family system and apply them in different environments. We are trying to prepare our kids for success beyond our own households. One critical question arises: at what point, and at what level do you subject your kids to the consequences of not meeting said expectations? For me, I want the consequences to be harsh enough to remember the next time an issue arises, but not so harsh that no learning takes place. As my wife (and any behavioral therapist) would say, “the punishment has to fit the crime”. Avery’s autism diagnosis can hinder his ability to be organized, and he sometimes interprets messages so literally that it can be a barrier to his success. So, when he came home without his homework folder – AGAIN – I was frustrated, but calm. I told him clearly that he would not go to karate because he forgot his homework folder at school. I might as well have told him that he would never eat macaroni and cheese (his favorite meal) again. He didn’t give me tantrum/fallout behavior, but he was clearly distressed. LaChan was curious why he had not left for karate yet when she arrived home. I told her that he forgot his homework folder. She adamantly…well, adamantly may not be the right word, but she was pretty convinced that I didn’t make the right decision. She adamantly communicated that the consequence did not fit the infraction. We disagreed…for the entire evening. Her perspective was that he forgot BECAUSE of his challenges, not because he was just randomly forgetful. Even through all of the discussion, she conceded. Reluctantly. I mean REALLY reluctantly. In fact, if you know the kind of women around whom my wife was raised, you would know that conceding is difficult for her. She’s been raised around women who have taught her to not just find her voice, but to use it consistently, confidently, and convincingly. It's one of the things that makes her behavior incredibly attractive...and equally frustrating (when its not directed at me!). Later on, she shared that she felt guilty because one of the reasons Avery may not have brought home his homework was because of instructions she gave him. You see, Avery’s fine motor skills are not entirely mature, and they may never be. He still has a really hard time tying his shoes even at 8 years old. Well, on many days his math homework comes out of a workbook with a quarter of the page missing because he has a hard time ripping those pages out cleanly. At an earlier point in the year, LaChan told him clearly: “When you have to bring home math worksheets, ask the student who sits next to you to help you rip them out”. Pretty clear, right? Well, on this day, when he forgot to bring his homework folder home – with only math homework that night to complete – the student who sits next to him was not in school. So he didn’t attempt to rip out his math homework worksheet because in his mind HE WAS FOLLOWING MOMMY’S DIRECTIONS. I wanted to cuss. In fact, if you cuss, you can cuss right here. At that point, I wasn’t mad at LaChan or mad at Avery. I was mad because I realized I overlooked a major factor. I have become so used to responding to him like he has no special needs that I forget that some of his needs can be as pervasive as any kid with more severe symptoms of autism. I forgot that that his needs can be as pervasive as my need to keep lists or Nile’s need for 10 minutes grace time when waking up. So, if…I mean WHEN this comes up again, the consequences of the infractions not only have to fit the “crime”, they also have to fit the kid…and that takes parental discipline.
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AuthorI'm Mike. If you have an interest in mental health, family functioning, and disability advocacy, this blog may be of interest to you. Archives
January 2016
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