Meltdowns...

The phone rings and it's the school's number - during the school day, and your kiddos are there... What's up? As the mom my mind automatically goes in a hundred directions before I even say, "Hello?". As a mom of autistic twins it goes to places I never would have even thought of before. I answered the phone the week before last to find out that Daniel was having a major meltdown. Nothing like anything he has previously had in his current classroom. He had been escalating for the past hour. Nothing that would usually help to calm him down had worked.

It was almost the end of the day already, so I asked my sister to go with me to pick up the boys. Since they are in the same classroom, I knew that if Daniel was "going off" that intensely, Anthony would be a mess. We went to the office, signed them out and headed for the classroom.

When we got there, the teacher, two instructional aids, the program psychologist and the principal were with there. The other instructional aids were with the other kiddos. Anthony's aid had taken him for a walk because he began reacting to Daniel. Daniel had become highly agitated and before he could "regulate" himself, his meltdown had escalated. It was almost an hour long meltdown. He had become extremely aggressive and was trying to bite, scratch, pinch, etc. anyone he could, including himself. He had never been self-injurious before, it had always been directed outward, to others that were within his boundaries.

One benefit to having your kiddos in a special needs classroom that's designed specifically for them (in our case autism) helps tremendously. Every kiddo and parent with autism knows that meltdowns can be a regular part of their life. Children in autistic classrooms have the benefit of the teachers and aids knowing a meltdown can happen at any time and usually does. They are trained to be able to help re-direct a child so that the meltdown doesn't escalate.

It had been years since Daniel had a meltdown that lasted more than 10-15 minutes. I think it's been more than a year since he's had a meltdown that couldn't be re-directed. Once a meltdown has really begun, all you can do is wait it out. For our kiddos there are three things that will usually start a meltdown: frustration over not being understood; over tired; or not feeling well.

Once we got home both boys fell asleep - exhausted. We did figure out that Daniel had been getting more aggressive in general since he began a new medicine. As he was increased on the medicine, he had difficulty going to the bathroom. Once we stopped the medicine, his demeanor changed for the better. Once he began going to the bathroom regularly again (which was just a day later) - he was back to his old self.

Letting his doctor know what had happened confused the doctor. Why? Because he had never heard of that reaction before. But we know that the only thing that really changed was removing the medication. So, he no longer takes that medicine. Everything is much better now, still looking for a replacement medicine, but not at the expense of our little guy feeling badly.

From a mother's heart - always remember that you are your child's best advocate. I don't care if the medicine doesn't list something as a "side effect", we're convinced it was the cause. Go with your instincts, especially for your kiddos. ASD,
God Bless