My 8 yr old took off with our 3.5 yr old

david_n_cole

I need some help on how to deal with this issue.  I barely know where to start...

My 8 yr old snuck out of the house tonight while Dad was watching the kids and took his 3.5 yr old brother 1.5 miles down to the store.  I wondered how did this happened when I got the call from the local police informing me they had found my two children and could I come get them.  I was 45 minutes out of town, but my hubby was only 5.  I was unable to get a hold of my husband because he was out looking for them and forgot his phone at home.  Eventually, I convinced the police to take my children to our home was the immediate solution.  

Obviously, we have the potential issues of social services getting involved, but more importantly, how do we deal with this issue as a family?  My son has a whole host of diagnosis, including ADHD, Mood Disorder-NOS, Anxiety Disorder, Dysgraphia, and SPD which will likely result in a real diagnosis of Asperger's when he is no longer "in an acceptable range for behavior."  He is medicated and had done a whole lot of therapy for both behavior and for functionality.  He has issues seeing others' points of view and lacks empathy.  He is very intelligent, but seems to have no common sense.  

This is not the first time he has done this either.  He took off a few weeks ago and took his little brother after we just moved to a new town which resulted in the suspension of social events, limiting his range in the neighborhood, and chores.  Clearly that did not work.  He doesn't even understand he did anything wrong. He could not supply a clear explanation as to why he left or how he got there.  He is busy justifying how he could escape a stranger trying to grab him, but gives no thought to if something happened to his little brother.  The little one goes along because he looks up to his big brother as an authority figure and often is coaxed into it by promises.  

I have no idea how to deal with this to help both boys understand and to prevent it from happening again.  I hope that someone may have some pearls of wisdom to help our family navigate these uncharted waters.  

 

CaptainSerious

I don't have much advice to offer, but wanted to ask if you've considered getting a door alarm for his bedroom?  That way, if he gets up at night, you'd know it and could respond.  Of course, if he typically uses the bathroom at night, this might not be the best option, but at least you'd be aware of when he leaves his room at night.

outnumbered

CaptainSerious:

I don't have much advice to offer, but wanted to ask if you've considered getting a door alarm for his bedroom?  That way, if he gets up at night, you'd know it and could respond.  Of course, if he typically uses the bathroom at night, this might not be the best option, but at least you'd be aware of when he leaves his room at night.

I second the door alarm.  My 6 year old is a sleep walker.  The night I found him outside was the last night we were not alarmed.  It scared the crap out of me. 

david_n_cole

Auntie,

He probably took off because I told him he could not go out when it was getting dark and cold.  He often wants to buy things with the money he has earned with household chores and I know he had a small amount of change with him.  The stories are a bit conflicted; in one he says he left while I was on the phone, but it wasn't possible since DH and I were literally standing in front of each door at the time; the second, he told DH he didn't plan on going that far; in the third, he was going for something to eat. I am not sure he knows and perhaps it's his reality of all three.  The same situation happened when I asked him how the police called my phone; had he remembered my number, given my name, his name or address?  

As far as the dxs go, he has been evaluated by so many professionals over the years and each one of those has come over time, but the ADHD, Mood, and Anxiety came from one child psychiatrist three years ago and confirmed by a children's development center almost a year later, and Children's Hospital a year and a half ago when we requested him to be evaluated for Asperger's.  The SPD and Dysgraphia came from two years with an OT. He is currently on 54mg of Concerta Rx and 5 mg of Ritalin twice a day as well as Intuniv 2 mg once daily. Obviously, these meds impact his appetite and they are nothing new to us. We accommodate him by allowing three meals in the evening since he is often ravenous as they start to wear off.  He's even gaining weight on the meds. 

He has been a sensitive boy since he was in the womb.  He would often throw off my equilibrium inutero when I was walking, kick so hard to bruise me, do somersaults literally all before he entered the world.  Once he was born, he was so colicky, I had to live on a special diet while nursing for over a year.  He was rarely sick, but his ears were a constant issue as was his diaper area.  Everything had to be just so with him even at two weeks old.  His meltdowns have been off the chart causing grown adults to lose it on him or run off.  He is in all likelihood Bipolar, but no one will formally diagnose him until he's older.   He lacks an understanding of empathy, danger, consequences, but is super logical and often gets hung up on issues if they don't work/match.  He once wasted an entire testing period arguing with a teacher because he was given the word "luv" in a nonsensical word test and had to point out it was the word love but spelled incorrectly.  He often runs through the house screaming in both good and bad moods.  He has issues regulating his volume or intensity.  He is incredibly intelligent since they tested for mental issues at the development center.  He is obsessed with bugs and now birds are being introduced into his obsessive knowledge since they eat bugs.  Before he was obsessed with trains, but he had issues reading so could only learn what we taught him or took him to learn.  He loves legos, but we often fight with him because he forgets he can't take them out of his room and he is always putting them in his mouth.  We have tried to show the numerous professionals the things he does in video and pictures, but it doesn't seem important to them.  Before the last two major evaluations, we had 6 medical professionals suggest he was Asperger's.  Before the suggestions, I had no idea what it was.  

His punishment for last time was to reduce his social interaction.  I use that word very loosely since it involves going to grandmas and playing outside by himself.  He looks forward to this time alone and we were hoping by temporarily removing something he loves, he might remember what he did wrong.  The chores he had to do without pay since he was saving for a toy and it would only move him towards his goal faster when he was suppose to be learning a lesson.  I understand you have much more experience with a child with ASD, but we have been trying numerous things with zero lasting results.  We have used suggestions from his therapists, the family therapist, the psychologists, the OT, the psychiatrists, his teachers, and from numerous books centered around a child with special needs or Aspergers and anything we could think of that might be effective.  We have ran out of ideas and useful suggestions that are not repeats of what we have tried and were unsuccessful.  I need real suggestions because I have racked my brain with every idea I have ever had or ran across to help my son and without the correct dx we are spinning in circles and exhausted. 

I understand I am looking at this from a negative view point right now, but that is simply because we are currently in a complex and difficult situation. I understand my son is an amazing in ways other children are not, but this threatens our family's survival so that is my primary concern atm.

david_n_cole

Auntie,

 Thanks for the book selections.  I will definitely get my hands on those to see if they can help fill in some of the blanks.  Where do I start to look for a Dr. to try for another Asperger's dx?  We are Tricare and they are of no help to guide us.  We ran into this issue when searching for a new therapist for him.  

His psychiatrist sent us to Denver Children's where he participated in a three week program (structured like school) to evaluate him.  After that time, I was called in and told he did not have Asperger's, but the rest of the dxs were correct and how long did I want him to stay in the program.  I pulled him then and there since I shouldn't be telling them how long to keep him; it wasn't a babysitting program for us.  They did try a day without meds, which resulted in them giving it to him 2 hours into the day.   (I had this life for 5 years before we got our first dx!)

All his meds are written by the psychiatrist and we have tried different types like Vyvance and another one who's name escapes me, but the results were disastrous.  I ended up having to call the Dr. with the Vyvance because he was having a psychotic episode and threatening to kill me.  The other caused severe mood swings and aggressive behavior as well.  The Dr. believes his metabolism is so high that he runs through the meds faster than most kids which is how we got to such a high dose over 3 years. He gets the first 5mg when we give him the Concerta because it takes almost 2 hrs before we see any results with the long acting med.  By 5pm, the EX seems to be gone which makes homework and family time difficult.  He won't sleep either if he doesn't get this dose.  We have tried melatonin in the evening, but it often wouldn't work.

 I hate putting this much medication in him, but it seems the only way to help him stay focused for school.  (We've encountered phone calls in the middle of the school day if my hubby forgot to give the meds in the morning.)  Before we even considered meds, we tried a couple of the ADHD diets trying to avoid processed food and sugars.  

The only thing that makes me pause on thinking he is AS is that he does sneak.  I don't know if he does it because he knows we"ll get mad at him, but this isn't always the case.  It is when he had done the action before (many times before) and gotten in trouble because of it.  For example, tonight I was changing the baby's diaper and I hear a plastic bag rattling.  I go into the kitchen to find DS stuffing chocolate chips in his mouth and holding them in his hands.  I told him to show me what he had, and he put his hand out and lowered his head.  The actions tell me he knows this is wrong though he may not think about it while he is doing it.  This happens frequently with food despite me stocking many of his favorite foods (some I would never consider purchasing otherwise) and allowing many opportunities to eat.  (I won't let him gorge himself late of sugary things for obvious reasons.)  Other times, he is oblivious to consequences.  He got into the medicine cabinet last night and was mixing a concoction of kids mouth wash, benedryl cream, and a Chinese topical ointment, but thought nothing of what that combination could do, where it was spilling, or that it could hurt someone.   I have no idea what he was planning to do with it. (Often DS2 is the guinea pig for his experiments.)  Have you ever heard of kids with AS having guilt/shame? (I don't know if these are really the right words because he might only be upset he no longer gets the goods and his expression reflects that, but I want to see acknowledgment that he knows he did something wrong.) 

I know if he is AS, he is definitely high functioning. I identified him as a mimic of the four types of AS personalities.  He often watches people in action, but then uses the behavior/language at the wrong time and/or in the wrong situation. Sometimes he fakes it well enough.  We have placed him in numerous activities to help with socialization, but other than karate, he often removes himself from the action.   I tried getting him into a social group for AS kids, but without a formal dx they won't let him in.  It seems the people I have encountered so far demand the AS dx since they needed it to get in or to be included in the treatment, hence my frustration to this point. 

I guess trying again for a proper dx (beleive me when I say I have known something didn't make sense with his dxs for a long time) but it took us a year to find someone who saw the same issues and gave us the name, Asperger's, to understand some of the pieces we were missing about our son.  We are still fighting for the right dx to help him in every way we can.  Thanks for your wealth of information since we often feel isolated and other's looking in just don't understand.