Parenting is tough. It is perhaps the toughest job in the world. We give everything of ourselves for the well-being of our children. If our child has special needs such as autism, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, or some other neurobehavioral issue, the degree of difficulty rises exponentially. With these children, the answers aren’t necessarily in the standard parenting books.
I don’t know about you, but I can’t tell you how many times friends and colleagues have either politely changed the subject or given me the dreaded “what-the-hell-do-you-do-this-for” look when I tell them what my kids have done. (Hint: I have a line item in my yearly budget for replacing toilets; I have to do that once or twice a year on average.) The bottom line is if your kid has special needs, the usual avenues of family and friend support are often not helpful in getting advice to resolve behavior issues. While they mean well, our family and friends often lack the knowledge and experience to give us sound support and advice for our unique circumstances.
In this article, I want to help you help yourselves. You aren’t alone, and you have the tools to deal with many of the situations your child will throw your way.
What to do when your child is doing something you don’t understand? Why is he drinking entire bottles of ketchup in the middle of the night? (True story.) Why is he writing his name in excrement on the wall? (Also a true story.) Why on earth is he doing homework but not turning it in for a grade? (Seriously … another true story.)
- Take a deep breath.
- Don’t panic.
- Ask yourself this question: “Why?” In counseling circles, we ask, “What is the function of the behavior?” (Yeah, we like to use 15 words where one will do. Go figure.) The answer to this question is going to give you a lot of insight into what is going on and help guide you in your efforts to deal with the situation.
Entire books have been written on how to do this. However, for now, take a close look at the W’s: When does the behavior occur? What happens before, during, and after the behavior? Who does the behavior happen around? Where does the behavior tend to occur?
Based on your analysis, see if it fits with the following common functions of behavior:
- To get something: People do things to get things. It might be a toy, it might be attention, it might be food, etc.
- To get something to stop: People do things to get stuff to stop. For example, I just told one of my kids to quiet down because they were distracting me while I wrote this article.
- To escape something: Similar to the previous function, if we don’t like the activity we are doing, we will do things to get away from it.
- It feels good: We tend to do things that feel good. Go figure.
- It’s a reflex: We don’t have much choice with these behaviors (startle reflex, for example).
There are other behavior functions, but those above cover most situations. It’s important to figure out the function because missing this step can make your attempts to deal with the situation less effective, at best, and possibly make things worse. For example, a child who runs away from you every time you want him or her to do chores is going to need one kind of intervention if you figure the function is escape (making the child finish the task but giving a big reward for completing it) as opposed to if the function is attention (withdrawing attention except when the child is on task).
I hope this information helps make your day-to-day challenges less challenging. Please feel free to comment below with any thoughts, questions, or suggestions. Next time, we will talk about reinforcement. Hang in there, parents, and remember: Breathe and don’t panic! You got this.
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