a collection of posts filled with insights, experiences and challenges of parenting a child who is more—more intense, more spirited, more expressive, more sensitive, more explosive.

This page represents some of the joys and struggles I have while parenting what author Mary Kurcinka has termed a "Spirited" child and Ross Greene has termed an "Explosive" child. While the techniques and perspectives outlined in Greene's book The Explosive Child are incredibly useful, the term itself can be somewhat unproductive. I prefer looking at it from Kurcinka's perspective where she suggests in her book Raising Your Spirited Child that putting a positive spin on some of the typical descriptive words will go a long way towards changing a parent's attitude toward her/ his spirited child. How parents view these children—the eyes with which they see them and reflect the child's self back—are crucial, and making sure that view is positive rather than negative is perhaps the single most important gift a parent can give these children.

Written in February 2007 on the Always Unschooled e-list:

Just wondering what makes a child "sparkly"... I sometimes wonder if my dd is. I was thinking though, that if I have to ask: she isn't . LOL But I was curious. Yeah, probably. People's definitions of "sparkly" or "spirited" are individual, obviously.

Sam has what I call an "internal autonomy meter," which others might view as "contrary." Even when he likes something, if it comes from outside himself, he resists it completely and totally with his whole being. He's extremely intense emotionally—going from zero to sixty in the blink of an eye. He can be intensely happy then intensely angry the next moment, and it's not at all unusual for him to go directly from "This is my best day ever!" to "This is my worst day ever!" and back again to the point where it can get really exhausting to be around that emotional intensity.

Sam has been Sam since before he was born! Although he was premature, he's always had an amazing body awareness, so Sam was the child that when I'd bend down to help Em with her rollerskate buckle at the park, by the time I'd look up again, Sam would have his scooter off the scooter path and up at the highest point of the climber. We learned that Sam was mobile before he could crawl because when I came back into the living room from getting one of the girls a sippy cup, he'd rolled all the way across the room and was chewing on the Christmas tree lights. When Sam was just learning to walk, he was already an avid climber, and I'd frequently turn around to find him perched precariously somewhere like on top of the woodstove or the kitchen table. Once, I turned around while making dinner to find him midway up the refrigerator shelves, tossing raw eggs down onto the floor to watch how they splat. He's the kid who will immediately take his bike to the top of the mulch pile, though great credit goes to his developing trust in me not to thwart him because he did wait and agree to put a helmet on first.

Sam has little veins that bulge out like crazy on his neck when he's mad or excited—it's a little scary. We were once sent to the ER by my ped on a Sunday because he spikes really high fevers when he's sick, and he had a little purple spots all over his face and neck that were really hard to describe over the phone. Erring on the side of caution, our ped sent us to have it looked at in order to make sure it wasn't meningitis. Turns out, they were little burst capillaries from one of his rages. :-/

Sam is highly sensitive—he feels things more acutely than lots of people, and he gets overloaded by too much sensory input. Between about 6 mos. and 2.5 years of age, he needed a perfectly quiet, perfectly dark room to sleep. He requires very particular articles of clothing and needs them in a certain way or it makes him crazy. If he gets too hot or too cold, he loses control. He loves to play with water or paint or mud, but he has a sensory threshold that once crossed, whoa! Once he decides it's too much, he needs to be clean NOW (which has always been kind of a double-edged sensory sword for him—at first the activity is really soothing and reorganizing, but when there's not a tub around instantly, he freaks.)

It's kinda hard to put into words what makes Sam Sam. He literally climbs and bounces off walls—dh used to joke about why I was feeding the boy crack. (He has kind of a sick sense of humor.) Sam can be like one of those little cartoon characters that drinks the potion and then whizzes around the room like a pinball, ricocheting off everything in sight.

Written in January 2007 on the Always Unschooled e-list:

It could certainly be a food sensitivity issue, and Doris Rapp's book Is This Your Child? is really helpful in terms of considering either food or environmental sensitivities.

The biggest tool I can suggest, however, is something I just brought up in a different thread: do an autonomy inventory. For several days or even a month, spend time observing and thinking carefully about all the ways your guy is disempowered in his life. Look at *all* the "have-to's," the "can'ts," the "won'ts," the "not right now's." Look at all the things he can't do for himself whether he *wants* to do them or not. What can he not reach, see, do and why?

This is where to start. Intense kids, at least my intense guy and others I've seen and heard about, have what I've always called an "internal autonomy meter." They feel *very* acutely all the minor injustices of life and resent *deeply* outside attempts at control.

Intense kids, too, tend to have lower frustration thresholds and difficulty with transition and integrating reality that doesn't fit their expectations. So, if parents can minimize the number of times a day, a week, even a month that these kids use up their resources, then they are better able to find successful ways of dealing with frustration, transition and thwarted expectations. If, otoh, they're having to deal with those things several times a day or week (and lots of times when parents look carefully, they'll see it's more like several times an *hour*), then they're not going to have the resources to discover and learn to use more successful tools. Basically, they're just walking around frustrated at the whole world, like a ticking time-bomb waiting to go off, and everyone around them feels like they're walking on egg shells.

Are intense reactions "just" part of being an intense person? Sure, to a large extent, and we shouldn't expect anything to be a magic fix. In fact, thinking in terms of "fixing" at all can be really detrimental to parenting these children who are who they are and need help loving themselves in all their intensity, need help seeing all the really amazing and positive aspects of their passionate intensity, need to feel our trust and faith that they will grow into amazing, passionate, intense people with a toolbox filled with coping strategies and so very much to offer this world.

Written in March 2006 in response to the following post on the AlwaysUnschooled e-list: I originally wrote: "If instead, I focus on supporting him in his intensity, loving him through his intensity, then we're back on the same page, back to being partners working together."

Poster: "Something that I've been thinking about since you originally posted the idea of loving children for who they are, the good and the bad, is that I just don't know how to do that when dd1 is pummeling dd2. I know dd2 is a very, very passionate person about everything in her life. I try and respect this passion, but not if it is hurting others. I don't know how to embrace or accept her anger, maybe because my family hid anger and you were punished for expressing it."

I can hear your pain through your words, but so, too, can I feel your daughter's pain. (deep sigh)

Supporting Sam in his intensity isn't about letting him pummel anyone; it's about seeing the pain and suffering that drive his need to lash out and knowing that when he can access better tools, he will. Until then, however, he needs me to love him and trust him and help him when his emotions threaten to overwhelm him.

If you don't embrace or accept her anger, where is it going to go?

You can't change her—you can only work with her or against her. You cannot change the wind or the mountain, but you can learn to appreciate them for what they offer. You can choose between loving compassion or disapproving judgment—which do you think will help your daughter more in her growth as a compassionate person?

If she has no one to love her and help her when she's angry, how will she see her way out of it? How will she feel safe enough to begin to let the anger flow through her and out of her body without hurting others if it only makes her feel alone, scared, ashamed and guilty when she feels it? Anger is an isolating emotion; it is an emotion born out of helplessness and frustration. If parents add to the isolation, helplessness and frustration, then they are feeding the anger, too. Loving compassion, however, has the power to defuse anger because loving compassion removes the fuel that isolation, helplessness and frustration provide.

I believe that only by learning to love Sam wholly and compassionately even in his anger have I been able to be the parent he needs me to be. Just yesterday, he got very angry—I can't even remember over what—and began screaming. "Everybody hates me! Everybody just wants me to be miserable and die!" This boy has intensity that's overwhelming, but in the midst of it all, even he began to temper it, he took a small step in refusing to feed the anger and said, in a much smaller voice, "Except for you mostly, mama, only you mostly be kind to me."

Of course, none of that is "true"—no one in this family wants him to be miserable; quite the opposite, in fact. His sisters are quite kind and compassionate with him. He just gets overwhelmed by life sometimes more than other people. But, he *feels* this anger and helplessness deeply—and that's really what matters—that, and the fact that he sees *me* as a way out of the anger, as an anchor and source of love even in the midst of that incredibly overwhelming emotion.

Sam can be exhausting to parent. Plain and simple. It's not easy—it's damned hard, in fact. But, he *needs* me to parent him and to be there for him *especially* when he's overwhelming and exhausting.

At times, I've worried about the messages I'm sending to the girls when I spend so much time with Sam, and it's really important to me that they *know* they are loved just as much and that it hurts me when they are hurting—even more so when it's another one of my children who's hurting them. We spend important moments talking about it, too. Jules is *crushed* by Sam's intensity; she just cannot stand screaming or confrontation or high emotion—it physically pains her. That can be *really* hard, and wow, to have them in the same household. Whew!

There are times, like yesterday, when I just hug her tightly and say over and over again, "You are loved. It's not you. You are loved."

There aren't really any answers; there is only life and love. When love is expansive, I believe it can hold all things and heal all things. I've come to see the messages I'm sending to my children are about loving deeply and compassionately. I've also seen Sam take small steps each day as he gets older, and I trust that he is an amazing person in all his intensity—he's just a little person very new to this world and trying the best he can to handle very strong emotions and learn to use them.

Written in January 2006 on the AlwaysUnschooled list:

I wanted to talk a little bit about helping kids find coping strategies and solutions...

Sam has had two rough periods this morning. First, he was upset because Emily announced she was going to go play a game on her computer (a Mac, which has different games than the PC). He decided he wanted to play that particular game at that particular time and asked if he could play instead. Em said no. I suggested he ask if he could play when she was all done, but he'd already begun spiraling.

I quickly crossed over to where he was, got down to his height and rubbed his back as the girls went downstairs (running a buffer). He let me hug him. I picked him up and carried him back to his bed where he continued to scream at the top of his lungs how much he hates Em, how he loves everybody else in the family but not Em, on and on, hurling these words in his rage.

I stayed close by, listened, validated by placing just a couple slight rephrasings along the lines of "you really hate it when Em says no". Basically just stayed there to support him as he vented because I've learned that he just needs to be angry and release it. Once it's released, he's done.

He went downstairs with the girls and played happily for about an hour.

Em came upstairs to play in her room. Sam and Jules came up shortly to ask her to help them get to the next level on this marble game, but she was in the middle of something and didn't want to help. I'm useless in such situations—the kids help *me* play games. Sam started missing his dad, who is the game guru. I helped him call dh on my cell phone, but there was no answer. Sam began to melt again, kicking and screaming. I listened, loved and validated and when I saw an opening, I offered to run him a tub and sweetened the deal with the offer of a candle.

We have some Aveeno lavender stress-relieving bubbles that we use, so that's one of our coping strategies. Sam begrudgingly said he didn't want just one candle. Okay, lets find some more. Maybe 4 or 5 is what he said, and we became partners tracking down the votives. I lit them as he climbed happily into the tub. I gave him some time to himself with the lights off and 4 candles glowing—one on the edge of the tub and the rest up on the counter. When I came back in, he was happily squirting the candle next to him with the spray bottle. He told me how it went out, what sound it made, showed me how cool the water was, felt that the wax was still soft but not hot. Happy as a clam.

He's now dressed, happily playing on his computer again after asking if the girls wanted to get in his tub. Now, the girls are playing Bratz in the tub by candlelight, and I'm off to make a snack plate to take down to Sam—at least ensuring that food is not a problem.

Helping him create a checklist of strategies—calming activities, safe places to vent, ways to ensure his body's needs are being met—all in a loving and supportive environment: that's my job. No, he's not happy 100% of the time, but he is safe and loved and respected 100% of the time.

Written in August 2005 in response to the following post on the AlwaysUnschooled e-list: "I am finding myself more and more at a loss on how to deal with my daughter and I would like some advice. DD is 3, and a very violent child. She hits, pinches, kicks, pulls hair, and sits on her sisters, ages 9, 6, and 18 months, and me. The older two usually end up coming to me crying because they know better than to hit back. When dd doesn't get what she wants, her first recourse is to hit and shriek at the top of her voice. I try to talk to her and she shrieks some more. Her response is the same whether I have asked her to not snatch the toy from her sister or said she can lick the bowl *after* I'm done cooking with it or her sisters don't want to play with her because she has been disruptive or destructive while they were trying to play."

It sounds like your dd's environment is greatly attributing to her discomfort and need to lash out. Why is she alone with her sisters? Kids who tend towards explosiveness really need a parent constantly available when they are with others; a parent can help interpret and intervene to help find solutions *before* the lashing out occurs, and finding ways for them to have quiet and room to move around without always having to negotiate with others can be really important.

My Sam needs *lots* of space, lots of attention, lots of opportunities to decompress and blow off steam. Much of his lashing out stems, I believe, from sensory overload and by being overly taxed with transitions or demands—going places, waiting, things like that. Minimizing that as much as possible is absolutely key. I no longer take the kids grocery shopping, for instance, finding that activity in particular is difficult for Sam with the fluorescent lights and constant sensory input.

Giving time with transitions and allowing the child to come to terms with the transition is absolutely crucial. A three year old is not going to remember what you had agreed upon earlier when she's in the moment. Find tools to help ease transitions for her; don't expect her to conform to everyone else.

I'm betting she feels she's not being heard. Her first recourse may be to hit and shriek because she doesn't trust that those around her are listening to her needs and dedicating themselves to helping her find ways to meet them. Once she develops this trust along with more verbal skills, she will have more patience and tools at her disposal. Make absolutely certain she doesn't *need* to shriek to make herself heard. This is particularly important for younger siblings who have more competition and are far more likely to be carted around meeting everyone else's needs.

Remember, there are many solutions to any need. Sam is sometimes more willing to entertain alternate solutions than other times, which largely depends upon how depleted his resources are at the moment. His resources can be taxed by lots of things over a period of time; checking back over the past two weeks to get a broad overview tends to be really helpful.

DD wants to lick the bowl while you're cooking. Say okay and try substituting a dollop in a different bowl to lick without waiting. Try transferring your contents to another bowl so she may have the original bowl she wanted. You can still finish and another child with more patience or distractions can have the joy of licking the new bowl. Lots of solutions. If you're still stuck on the one solution, then you're creating a power struggle between yourself and Lauren. She's 3, she's going to be stuck on her solution unless you can show her the Truth of other options.

"Sometimes when she is abusing her sisters, I ask her why she is hitting them. She answers, "I want to." I point out that her sister doesn't want to be hit, and she says "Yes, her do." I ask if she would like it if someone hit her, and she answers, "Yes," then cringes as if expecting to be hit. I don't ask her that in a snarky sort of way, but as a way to try to help her understand how her sisters feel."

Yes, but she *has* been hit in the past. It doesn't matter how you're saying it now; it sounds like a threat—a threat that you and dh have demonstrated you're willing to follow up on. Don't say that anymore. Find another way to get the information across. That's one of the reasons I choose to say "hitting hurts"—a logical follow up to that is that people don't want to feel hurt, people don't want to suffer.

"Another thing that I am struggling with is her running away. Today we were waiting at the clinic because she had to have blood drawn to test for lead. She was really having a hard time sitting still and there were absolutely no toys for her to play with. She was climbing on chairs, and crawling on the floor and running around. Our appointment was running late and we weren't called in until 15 minutes after our scheduled time. Dh was yelling at her stop running around and a security guard came up and said people were complaining. Dd took off down a corridor and I took off after her. She can move, so I sprinted down the hall to catch her. This was the second time today she had done that; the first was in the midst of a parking lot. She giggled when I caught her and I was so frustrated with her I stuffed her under my arm and strode back to the waiting area. She does this (running away) a lot whenever it is time to go somewhere, too."

Did she know why she was there? Did you prepare her before hand? Did she want/ agree to be there? That's a pretty intense thing to deal with; she needed lots of support.

If you have a child who has difficulty waiting places and has difficulty expressing displeasure without using violence, then you need to be sure that she is not in these kinds of situations. That is part of your responsibility as her parent—to help her be in places that allow her to be the best Self she can be. If she is constantly put in situations that tax her resources, she will react. Bring food where ever you go; bring toys and things to interest her where ever you go. Don't expect the environment where you are going to be conducive to dd's needs; instead, find a way to bring the things she needs to turn any environment into what she needs to be settled in herself. If that can't happen, then find ways for her to stay home.

15 minutes is not a very long time. What were you and dh doing to try to entertain her? What were you offering her in place of sitting still on a chair?

"I would like to get to the point where we are non-coercive, but for now, my goal is to find alternatives to spanking and screaming at her, which obviously have done a world of good thus far (read sarcastically). Can someone help me? How do I communicate with a screaming mouth in my face?"

The communication has to happen a thousand times a day, day in and day out, before the screaming mouth is in your face. Learn to read dd's needs and dd's cues, learn to make her environment conducive to meeting those needs 99.9% of the time, learn to read her cues and disarm them 99.9% of the time and be there to do that, learn the kinds of activities or strategies that help diffuse and disarm so that you have a *full* toolbox of non-coercive tools available to try. You need new tools to replace the old ones; start finding those tools as soon as possible. Anne Ohman talks about becoming a student of your child—do this so you may help your child be the expert on herself.

Here's a list of calming/ reorganizing activities Treegoddess posted a while ago. It's a good place to begin, but the expert is your dd. Go to the source and see what she naturally does to try to calm herself. It sounds like running is a good place to begin. And, please, remember that these are things to try *if* she wants to, not things to force her to do for her own good or because you think it will help.

All of these things I've talked about and some of the strategies below help tremendously, but there is *no* easy fix for intense children. I'm convinced that as long as parents continue to search for a *fix* rather than embracing their intense children for the amazing people they are and helping them to channel that intensity in non-destructive ways, parents do more harm than good. The best thing we can do is to become partners not adversaries, celebrating them every step of the way. Just as every child deserves and needs and can have with radical unschooling.

Calming Activities: Experiences that may help to relax the nervous system

• Stretches
• Deep pressure massage
• Slow rocking or swinging
• Fidget toys
• Progressive muscle relaxation
• Quiet music with a steady beat
• Bear hugs
• Reduced noise and light levels
• Lavender, vanilla or other soothing smells
• Snuggling in a sleeping bag, large pillows or bean bag chair

Organizing Activities: Experiences that can help an individual become focused and attentive

• Sucking or chewing on hard candy or gum
• Adding rhythm to the activity
• Vibration-toy massager, vibrating pillow, wiggle pen
• Heavy work tasks to include hanging, pushing, pulling or carrying heavy objects
• Swinging on a swing or climbing
• Rhythmical sustained movement: marching, washing a table, or bouncing
• Rocking in a rocking chair
• "Squeezie" toys (koosh balls, balloons or rubber gloves filled with flour or cream, soft balls, gak, silly putty)
• Hanging by the arms on the monkey bars (20-30 seconds)
• Pushing/carrying heavy objects
• Carrying back packs weighted with books or bags of dried beans (this should only be worn for 15-20 minutes with an hour or two between)
• A reading corner with a bean bag chair makes a wonderful place for escape when there is too much stimulation. Some children may like the bean bag on top of them.
• Play dough
• Tactile Bins (cornmeal, oatmeal, water, sand, rice, beans)
• Kitchen time (mixing, tasting, smelling, washing up)
• Finger painting Some children also need extra sensory input in their mouths and hands in order to organize their behavior
• Drinking from a water bottle
• Chewing (you can use a straw, rubber tubing or coffee stir stick)

• Being brushed with a corn de-silking brush (in one direction approximately 10 times with pressure brush their arms, back (but not over the spine), legs (on the top, outer parts and underneath, avoid the inner thigh area), top of the feet and the hands)
• Sucking on hard candy, frozen fruit bar, or spoonful of peanut butter or marshmallow fluff
• Licorice tug-of-war, blow pin wheels or various types of blow toys, bubbles and whistles
• Pushing against walls with the hands, shoulders, back, buttocks and head
• Cuddling or back rubbing
• Taking a bath
• Being rolled tightly like a hot dog in a blanket
• Being squished under a therapy ball, mat or couch cushion
• Tug-of-war
• Wheelbarrow walking, jumping games like hop scotch
• Crashing games-run and dive into boxes, bean bags and couch cushions
• Pulling a wagon, carrying a heavy book bag, digging in the yard or carrying groceries
• Sports such as wrestling and football
• Deep pressure (giving a massage) and joint compressions (holding above one joint and under one joint then doing a quick 10 repetitions of compressions, pushing and pulling)
• A mini trampoline
• A sockem bopper or whatever they call those weighted kid-sized things that spring back up after you knock them down, or a hanging heavy bag

Written in August 2005 in response to the following issue on the Shine e-list: "From what I've read in other posts of the "increase in aggression" thread, I think that I'm not doing a good job of validating his feelings—rather I'm trying to offer solutions. So I definitely need to work on validating his feelings and not offering solutions unless he asks for them. When he was telling me today that he was stupid for forgetting about wanting to go to the game store, rather than telling him he's not stupid and that everyone forgets things sometimes, I should've said that I could see he was really upset with himself for forgetting? Is that right? Anything else?"

It sounds like you're checking out all the really important and obvious triggers. I do the same thing and try to really verbalize them so Sam can begin to go through his own checklist when he's ready—it'll just automatically be there, kwim? I do that both with myself and with him, so it's not always about him. If I'm feeling really tight, I'll verbalize that and wonder aloud what I've eaten. If I'm feeling really tense, which sometimes happens when we're trying to get out the door, I will likely say to the kids once we're settled in the car, "Guys I really need to take some deep breaths right now because I'm feeling really frustrated. Can you give me a few minutes, please?"

If we're running into a sibling conflict, Sam has pretty much a two-solution limit, which can be tough because Julia is all about problem solving and keeping the peace. There are times when he can go longer, times when he screams at the first mention of an alternate solution. Just depends. I do find that validation before any proposed solutions helps a lot. With two older sisters, Sam can sometimes feel like he's just not being heard, which understandably leads to more frustration.

Validation, for me and the way I practice it, is all about empathy. So to negate someone's feelings by telling them "no you're not" is absolutely the wrong approach in my mind, though I do try to work the conversation around to "wow, you figure lots of things out, don't you?"--a slightly more subtle rejection of the original "I'm so stupid."

So, for instance, in your example, I probably would've have said something along the lines of, "Oh man, and you really wanted to go! You really wanted to get that new game (or whatever)!" Then, kind of thinking aloud to myself, "We were going to go after lunch but then we got caught up in doing x." Assuming the store was closed by the time he realized, I would say, "hmmm...they're already closed, but I think they open tomorrow at 9. Could we go then before we get in the middle of something else?" That's the solution—he may or may not be ready to move into solution mode, and I would very carefully gage his reaction to the initial validation to see if he were ready to move onto that. If not, I would continue by asking him about the game and what he was going to do with it if he felt like talking about it some more. If he just felt like emoting, I'd keep quiet and let him do that before moving into the let's imagine it phase.

Let's see, writing the above, I see that I have kind of a pattern of responses based on my guy's needs in the particular moment: 1) validation—verbalizing what he's feeling, trying to connect over the valid nature of that feeling through empathy 2) imagination—imagining the way he wishes things were, allowing him to mourn, in a way, the loss of that image in his mind 3) solution—finding a way to meet his need I think many times Sam absolutely must go through that mourning stage—which is part of what I see the rage as, that cathartic release—before he can be ready to problem solve.

Written in August 2005 in response to the following issue on the AlwaysUnschooled e-list: "While reading what I wrote here ds said "I try not to get angry but I can't *control* it". I have wondered over the years sometimes if he enjoyed his anger but I couldn't comprehend how then and so didn't think to much about it. I have to admit when ds actually did say he did like his angry feelings it stumped me for a bit. He seemed just as surprised that I don't remember ever liking the powerful angry feelings. As long as *I* can remember I've always thought of anger as a negative things people have and 'control'. I've read about letting anger flow over you or other ideas but I think I was still thinking of the flow, ect. as learning to 'control' it."

I think for Sam anger is a default emotion in part because it makes him feel powerful and the anger generally arises because he's *not* feeling powerful. So, Sam's need, as I see it, is to feel powerful in the face of powerlessness.

My goal has been to help minimize the number of times in a day when he feels powerless, which is not easy with a perfectionist youngest child. :-/ Every time a sibling can do something he can't or do something "better," every time he loses in a computer game, every time reality doesn't match what's in his mind. Of course, these remaining moments are, imo, still really important because they provide him with valuable opportunities to work through his intense emotions with lots of reserve resources that haven't been taxed by useless rules. So, it's all good.

Another goal has been to help him get to a safe place to express the anger. Raging for him is cathartic in the same way someone else might just need a "good cry." What we try to convey is that having a cathartic rage (and I've been known to let go a couple primal screams myself) can be done somewhere and in such a way that we don't hurt people or things, where we don't do things in the context of the rage that we later wish we had not done. The problem, as I see it, is when we do something we wish we hadn't, that damages our emotional core, fueling a kind of self-loathing that, in turn, fuels more angry episodes as a way of feeling powerful. It becomes a negative cycle. If, instead, we can get ourselves to a safe place where we can scream and let it all out without hurting others, we move through the rage and beyond it without it necessarily fueling subsequent rages because it's another reason to feel bad about ourselves.

The catch is that if one is raging in order to feel powerful, then removing an object of that rage reduces the momentary feeling of power. That has been the real struggle—finding ways that he can feel powerful that don't require an object for his rage. Finding a way to have the catharsis without the object, if that makes any sense. That remains our biggest issue.

Written in August 2005 in response to the following issue on the AlwaysUnschooled e-list: "Actually, does anyone have any strategies that help when a child gets an idea in his head and just can't let it go, no matter how much validating is done?"

Well, the obvious answer is to ask whether I've *really* done everything I can to help him get to that idea. Are there any other ways to get to that idea? How creative is he willing to be? Unfortunately, often he's only willing to be creative and think about it *after* he's raged. It's almost like the rage is equivalent to grief in letting go of the original idea. It's very cathartic for him, very draining for me. I find my own meditation helps fill me up and give me the patience and loving kindness I need to parent Sam.

For instance, Sam really wants to build a robot, but the first time he wanted to do that, he wanted to do it on a grand scale, right then. He was not interested in listening to building a robot out of legos; he wanted to get started building a robot right then. He wasn't interested in listening to me say that I didn't know much about how to build robots but that daddy would be a really great person to talk to about it. He didn't want to look at robot pictures on the internet to learn more about it, draw robot pictures or call daddy to talk about how to get started building a robot, and each suggestion sent him further along. Yet, once he'd raged a bit about the injustice of not getting to build a robot right then and my inability to help him get there, he was sweetly able to talk about all those options and pursue a couple of them.

Sam has about a two suggestion limit before he starts to get mad. This can be very difficult in terms of going through the problem solving process, and I'll sometimes have to remind Julia, who always wants to fix things and keep people happy, to tone down her suggestions a bit.

Somebody brought up the idea of "justice," and this is *huge* for Sam. Unfortunately, much of what he perceives as injustice has to do with things that are developmental and cannot be changed. He'll be having fun with his sisters as we're drawing, playing games, whatever, and the minute one of them is able to do something he cannot, he spirals into "I can't do anything, I'm so stupid..." He doesn't want help, he doesn't want handicapped rules—he sees all that and despises it. He wants to be able to do everything they can do, exactly when they can do it.

That's why I say these kids need as much autonomy and control over their lives as possible because life has enough natural limitations without overlaying artificial parental limitations. The kinds of things Sam rages over are the kinds of things I cannot change like making grand ideas happen immediately, being developmentally behind his sisters (even though he's physically very advanced despite being a month premature), and not getting something on his gameboy or a computer game.

Very once in a while he rages because I'm taking care of someone else's needs, and that's always tough. Just the other night, he had a minor meltdown over his gameboy, I think, and I was in his room with him, just rubbing the hair back off his forehead and blowing on it to cool him down, which he likes me to do. As he began to calm down, I reminded him that I'd found the book Each Breath a Smile earlier that day (we just moved for those who don't know) and that I'd be happy to read it to help him find his breathing again. I began reading it and he's flopping around every once in a while, letting out a "But I caaaan't do that!" I paused and asked him why not, but he didn't know and seemed rather agitated by the question, so asked if he wanted me to keep reading. He did. He continued to flop around a bit during the reading and I'd ask if he wanted me to be reading it, and he'd say yes. At any rate, he felt better by the end of the book, ready to go face the world again. This was probably his 4th or 5th meltdown that day, which had prompted me to really dig for the book during the day.

Julia goes to bed earliest—she's happy to brush her teeth, have a story from Papa and her song from me and close her eyes at around 9:30 or 10:00, generally speaking. Well, all the kids are having emotional adjustments to the move, not just Sam, which is to be expected. One of the things Julia had been looking forward to was getting a kitten. We had asked to wait until we'd gotten most of the painting done, to which she agreed, but she decided she didn't want to wait until the kitchen was all put together. I backed off because it is so important to her and she's always the one to give something up or go without for those around her, and I try to make sure she doesn't *always* have to do that, kwim?

So, we went this weekend to pick out her kitten at the adoption day, and I'd called ahead and made the process really clear to Jules so she didn't expect that we'd be coming home with a kitten that day. She picked one out, we made sure to take pictures that we could print out, and we came home. The interview counselor was really nice, as was the foster family, especially the 10yo or so little girl who talked to Jules about the kitten. Sorry—long story. At any rate, Jules was tired and was crying because she really wanted her kitten now, and I was spending time with her when Sam barged into the room. We asked him to please wait because we were having some private time and I would be there in a minute. He launched into the whole "You never give me any private time, yadda, yadda." I briefly tried to point out that I'd been in his room with him reading a book, but that's not what he wanted to hear. Jules didn't feel ready to let me go even if I were to come back. I stayed with her until I'd sung her song and tucked her in.

It's very hard to feel split in two, and Sam definitely gets the lion's share of my time and energy. I'm grateful that the girls have each other, but I try to listen and honor when they do need me and to do little things to let them know how important they are. Most of the time we do pretty well and we have a really wonderful, peaceful, joy-filled life. Just last night, we ordered in pizza because I'd been working hard all day trying to get the house ready for the carpet installers to come this morning, and we still had all the carpet to rip up. Sam was gracious enough and quite pleased to lend us some cash, trilling "Mama's in debt to me!" When the pizza came, we made a point to thank him again, and he was so pleased with himself. He then came up with a game for us to play, a variation of "What animal am I?" that we've played for years. He kept changing the rules as we progressed through different levels. The first level was making the noise. The second level was a verbal riddle. The third level was charades only using hands. Then we had to use our hair for one level. It was hysterical and he was having so much fun. He shines quite brightly and rages just as hard—intense. Just like his mama.

Written in August 2005 in response to the following issue on the Shine e-list: "Well, recently and especially tonight, I'm really struggling with an increase in aggression with ds(who for anyone who doesn't know, is inflexible-explosive and has periods of many many good months and then some more challenging ones)...lately even when I am just "being" there during one of his frustration rages and saying nothing he'll come after me and try to kick or hit me. If I move away, he follows me (used to be he just needed his space) to try to hit me more. If I try to hold his hands so he can't hurt me, he gets crazy and kicks and bites me."

Big, huge, giant (((((HUGS))))) out to you because I so know how heart-wrenching this is. There are times when I feel so sad and defeated because I work so hard to create a free, loving, joyful environment for my children and I need for that to be recognized and validated and, quite frankly, to work! The need inside me is to have my efforts actually produce free, loving, joyful children. That's a pretty big burden I place on my kids I'm coming to realize—Sam in particular.

Sam needs to release, which he does through raging. He also needs to feel powerful in the face of powerlessness—rage seems to do that for him. Being hs myself, I can both totally understand the catharsis involved in a primal scream and explosion and totally feel crushed and crumpled being on the other end of that catharsis.

Sam, too, has been having a really hard time these past several (maybe 6?) weeks, though his rage for the first time is turning inward at himself—punching himself, saying he hates himself, wishes he'd never been born. Ugh, so many totally heart-wrenching things that are, in many ways, far more difficult for me to deal with emotionally than the outwardly directed rage which I can dismiss as so much mental debris (like Greene talks about).

At any rate, when Sam was really coming at me, I got to the point where I would walk away out of self-preservation, leaving the room while telling him that I wanted to help him but I couldn't let myself be hurt. I'd tell him very specifically where I'd be when he felt ready to have me with him or have my help. That was very hard, but I began to realize that my presence, my energy, was making it *harder* for him to move through the rage. Even though part of him was scared to be left alone, my presence was exacerbating rather than calming. I think just knowing where I was and that I was *immediately* available was enough.

But, that doesn't address the following you part. Yes, Sam does that every once in a while; thankfully, not very often. I have, personally, always had a problem with closing myself in anywhere—part of that is my concern about other children as you point out, part of it, too, however is a feeling that it does more psychological damage than the approach I've chosen. *sigh* None of this is ideal; none of it.

I don't hold Sam's arms, period. Holding him gives him something to fight against and it doesn't work; it escalates. When I'm removing him from a common space, I hold him long enough to get him to his room or my room, some place soft and quiet and safe, and that is it. I immediately let him go so he may have freedom of movement. I think this is really important.

Okay, all that said, what I do when he insists upon following me and none of the other, preferable, options are working is to push down firmly on each of his shoulders so he goes into a sit. I don't hold him there; I just get him there and step back a few paces. From that position, he cannot hit, kick or head butt without first getting back up and coming towards me again. As I do this, I say very clearly, calmly but firmly, "This is force. I don't want to choose force." Plain and simple. When we've gotten to this point, it takes two or three "sits" before he stops coming at me.

As I said, this is not anywhere near an ideal—the is a last-instance kind of thing. I don't know if it will work for you and Nicky. I don't know that it can be said to "work" for me and Sam. It is what it is. It's not the way I would choose to solve the problem, and I try to emphasize that. I try to keep the emphasis on "choice." When he's calm, we can talk about other choices we could make at the time, other ways to solve the problem.

I just asked Sam what he feels and if he could help your ds in anyway, and the things he offered are the kinds of tools we work to use (and I'm sure you do) but that fail in the moment or become somehow inaccessible: he could try deep breaths, he could go to his room, he could say sorry, he could do something nice for you that kind of thing. They are tools to use before the rage or what he tries to make amends after the rage; he couldn't, in fact, remember what we've done in the midst of a rage or articulate what he would like to have done in that moment. I just don't think the rational part of the brain is accessible in those moments—he doesn't remember really.

No words of wisdom, surely. Just loving compassion coming your way.

Written as part of a follow-up discussion to the original post: "I know that my own HS child and I would be completely HUMILIATED and at the same time OUTRAGED with someone trying to hold us and contain us ~ whether or not there was just cause, it feels like something HUGE that would hurt our spirits deeply. Clarifying that I'm in no way judging those who DO this, as I completely understand...I really was just trying to give the *receiver's* perspective of it."

Well, for me it's deeply personal, as I would feel humiliated and angry and like I needed to fight back—and Sam, I think, gets many of these traits from me. I don't want to say that no one should ever hold anyone's arms because I don't know what anyone else's situation is, kwim? For us, it simply does not work.

For me, it was very hard to realize that my presence was not necessarily the best thing—this is the same thing I had to realize when Sam was an infant and needed to sleep alone in perfect quiet and darkness rather than being with me. It's really hard to not be able to mother in the way that feels right for me, but I had to learn that it wasn't really about me.

For some people, being present is very important, and doing so without being hit has meant holding hands. For me, I chose to stop being present if that was the only way I could do so without being hit. For some people, walking aways seems very punitive no matter how it's done, and I can see their point.

I'm now facing the dilemma of what to do when Sam hits *himself*. That's awful and so very, very hard. Walking away or watching it continue don't seem like options to me. I have grabbed his hands a couple of times and told him I needed to keep him safe, that I wouldn't allow anyone else to hit him. I've grabbed quickly and immediately let go multiple times rather than continuing to hold. *deep sigh* We've talked about how deeply sad I feel that he would hurt himself like that and how badly he must be feeling inside to want to externalize it like that, but I will admit to being at a loss about it.

In these situations I am convinced there is no right and wrong. It *all* feels wrong, quite frankly.

*An article on the Dangers of Holding Therapy written by Jan Hunt.

Written June 2005 in response to the following issue on the Shine e-list: "I feel like I handled it well when his rages involved crying and yelling. He responded positively to validation and me being near me. Now he is more violent in his anger and I can't say anything without it making him angrier. I also can't touch him. His anger used to be more directed inward, him hurting himself or trying to punish himself. Now it is directed outward, mostly at me."

With Sam, I totally notice things go in cycles or waves or whatever. He has relatively smooth months and he has major short-fuse anger months, and I can't seem to figure out what triggers the differences, whether they are developmental, situational, I don't know.

Remember T. Berry Brazelton, the pediatrician? While I was much more a Dr. Sears fan, the one thing I really liked of his was his concept of "touchpoints," those moments of outward regression in mastered skills as a new skill is being honed and assimilated. I sometimes think of Sam's rage cycles in this way, too, and try to see what skills he might be working towards that are taxing him and creating an outward regression into anger as his default emotion. Sometimes when I can't find the triggers or see where his cup is getting too full, the idea of new skills taxing his coping mechanisms makes sense, and I can see how he'll move through this rage cycle more clearly.

The other day, Friday I guess, we did some errands locally and Sam fell asleep in the car about 2 minutes from home. (I think he would benefit majorly from a nap, but he hasn't taken them in 3.5 years.) He's the kind of kid that once he falls asleep, we do *not* wake up. It's like rousing a titan. :) I had made dh manicotti, one of his favorites for dinner, put in good bread that everyone loves and made sure that I had plain buttered spaghetti for the kids if they didn't want the manicotti. Sam woke maybe 15 min before dh and I sat down to dinner, and he started watching tv happily enough; the girls were off playing somewhere and weren't ready for dinner either. Sam wandered into the kitchen and I invited him to join us and offered him some buttered spaghetti or manicotti, bread and hard cheese--things he really likes. He screamed and stomped off. Couple minutes later, same thing, he wanders in, says he's hungry; I emphasize the *plain* pasta and bread. Again really angry stomping off. Third time he comes in says he's hungry; I say, "Well, why don't you tell me what you're hungry for. I've offered things twice and you got angry." Storms off again (yeah, I probably shouldn't have added that last part). Fourth time he comes in, asks sweetly for some buttered pasta and some bread with some grated hard cheese on his plate. Go figure. Why he needed those four times to make the transition, I don't know.

The only explanation I can come up with for this whole episode is transitioning is so incredibly difficult for him. He had not completely transitioned from sleep to awake even though he used the tv to help with the immediate transition; he simply wasn't ready to deal with talking to people or even with transitioning into meal time despite the fact that his body was telling him he was hungry, and that was particularly frustrating for him.

Sam's reactions at this point were less than friendly, but they were not hurtful. I let them go, though I didn't extend myself with offers that third time. If Sam were being hurtful—throwing things or trying to hit, or the latest clawing like a lion, I would stop it in the same way I would stop him from lashing out like that at his sisters. I tell him it is not okay to hurt or destroy and he needs a safe place where he can be angry and not hurt people—he knows that can be his room or my room. If he doesn't choose either to stop hurting or remove himself, I pick him up and take him. He has gotten *lots* better about removing himself many times. I'm happy to lay down with him on his bed as long as he's not hurting me. If he continues to try to hurt me I tell him that I will walk away rather than stand there and be hurt but that he can come get me if he needs me. I don't go far and I tell him exactly where I will be, but at that point our energy is horn-locking and I'm not helping him by staying and being his punching bag. I think this is very different than abandoning him with time out or something punitive. My actions aren't punitive; they are self-preservation. I am immediately available. I've only started walking to another room in the past 6 months or so. Before that I would stand across the room, but it got to the point where he would continue to come at me regardless of where I was in his room, so I began leaving. He'll usually call me back in a few minutes when he's moving past the rage and into the need for comfort, but as you well know, the comfort part doesn't coincide with the rage part!

For what it's worth, we have tried many things: breathing, hitting pillows, ripping paper, punching bag. None help in the moment—he does not shift the anger from a real person to an inanimate object.

What *does* help is preventing these rages from getting full blown, for which I've found several successful strategies—any kind of water play (tub, hose, sink and sprayer), bouncing him by his shoulders into his bed (carefully avoiding whiplash!), sitting/ laying on him gently, holding him and rolling back and forth with him on his bed, kind of like a giant rolling burrito. These kinds of physical things can usually defuse and reorganize him pretty quickly, and they are lifesavers when we're traveling. None of them, unfortunately, translate too well into public places, however. Those situations are much harder. I can sometimes get him to hold my hands and jump up and down really high, but this does not work consistently and is getting harder as he gets bigger!

We also minimize corn syrup (not sugar!) in his diet. We've tried the Feingold but didn't see much difference, but the corn syrup seems to help significantly. I suspect that he reacts to something else as well, but he doesn't want to go to an allergist at this point and the corn syrup is difficult enough without adding something else to the mix. He does what he's willing to do, and that's it.

Written as part of a followup to that same discussion in June 2005: "I guess because his rages had gotten so much better, I thought we were past them. Silly me! So he is back in a rage cycle, but with aggression added this time. He has always screamed at me, but in the past I could calm him down by validating what he wanted and being near him. Now my validating escalates his rage. This is my main problem, I don't know what to do know because nothing I do helps. I used to have tools that helped him, now I feel helpless."

I completely second Mary's post—the moment I let go of thinking that Sam would "grow out" of the rages, which are a part of his personality, the better off we both were. Now, I accept that as part of who he is and try to find ways to help him channel that rage energy, to work with it rather than against it, if that makes any sense. I used to have moments where I'd think, "Oh my god, my life would be so *easy* if it were just the girls." I tried really hard to shift that because it's true that Sam takes a *tremendous* amount of my energy, but my life would also not be nearly as full if I didn't have Sam. (Not that you're thinking any of those things!) The shift away from thinking that I would find some magic solutions that would turn Sam into a child more like his sisters was the single best thing I did, and this list has really helped me continue that work.

Dh said to me just last evening that it's like taking two steps forward and one step back with Sam, and that's a really accurate description. But, I also know how much more difficult things would be if we were living conventional lives with school, rewards, punishments, etc.

Sam and I do a lot of talking about different choices he could have made along the way once he's calm enough to engage in that kind of dialogue. I think that is helping in the long run if not the short run. If we can brainstorm strategies when he's calm that gives him potential choices early in the frustration the next time or at least lets him know that there's never just *one* solution. If he's accessing those different possibilities 30 percent of the time, then that's a real step forward, and I think it would be fair to say that this is one of the big reasons his rages are reducing.

I know exactly what you're saying. With Sam, predicting a rage is very dependent upon the space he's in. When he's in a good space, there's a lot more time for intervention; when he's in a bad space, the shift is instantaneous. This is where I haven't been able to do much at all in trying to figure out why he seems to have more reserves at one time rather than another. I've tried to shift to a really big picture kind of view and see what has been going on over the last several weeks. This sometimes helps me to see the ways he's been over-taxed in terms of his transitions and challenges.

I often find that when Sam's having a difficult time, if we slow down and just hang out at home without lots of activities or friends coming over that we get back to an equilibrium. When it's just *us* we do so much better—all of us, not just Sam. When we get into the rhythm of our days without all kinds of outside distractions, doing the things we love, connecting, our relationships fall back into place. This list has been really helpful towards letting me see that as well.

No, nothing stops things during a rage. But, I still think it's important to stand up for oneself in a non-engaging kind of way. I think it's important for my guy not to equate love with a willingness to endure abuse. I just feel really strongly about that. I know you're not saying that you allow your son to make that connection—I'm talking about me now, not what's going on with you guys. So, I guess I've struggled quite a bit with how to let Sam have his feelings without hurting those around him. I don't have any real answers. He's been doing a lot of "I hate you. I'll never snuggle with you again." kind of statements in the heat of smaller rages, but he'll often circle back around by the time he's done saying them to hug me and apologize. He seems to stomp off more when he just growls, whereas he melts more quickly if he says something hurtful, like the weight of it is pulling him out of his rage more quickly.

When Sam says that kind of stuff, I usually just say "I'm really sorry for that." Depending upon where I gage him to be emotionally, I may ask him, "Please don't use your words to hurt." If something hurtful is directed towards someone else, I will ask him not to hurt with words no matter what as I remove him from the situation. I don't worry so much about the words at me, though we have talked very specifically about why I would not let him yell hurtful things out the window at the neighbor (the father) after an incident not long ago. I told him he could say anything to me in the safety of his room, but that my job was to keep our family together and I wouldn't allow him to do something that could jeopardize that. We talked a little bit about the kinds of things that could cause people to call the police (or CPS, though I didn't specifically mention them) and make it very hard for us to homeschool. I tried very hard to do it in a non-threatening way, but in a way that also got across to him that there are serious consequences to actions within society. (Whole 'nother story!)

With the hitting and bull-dozing, which he was doing a lot of and is part of what led me to begin leaving the room, I would just say "I'm not going to stand here and let you hurt me. I want to stay with you, but I won't let you hurt me." I hear what you're saying about the hysterics, and it is so hard to find the right line to walk in those instances. I know! I guess my big question would be what happens after that? If you go back will he begin lashing out again or does he move beyond it?

I can't stress enough how important I think it is to make the walking away a matter of self-preservation and not punishment, even though it may be a difficult distinction for the child to make. For me, I talk it out as I'm walking away and I try very hard to empathize with Sam as I walk away even though empathizing may not have been the thing to do prior to that—I want to make it as clear as possible that I understand he is suffering and I'm sorry for that. I say things like, "I hear how much you hurt inside and that you need to get that hurt out somehow. I want to be able to help you, but I'm not going to let you hurt me. I'll be in the kitchen if you need me."

Obviously, the short answer to that is he needs me the whole time, not just when he's not lashing out. I totally understand that, but it's important to me to draw the line about how I will be there to support him. I try to let him know that I am always supporting him even when I'm not physically next to him, that I understand how much he's suffering and that's why he lashes out. I try to provide support through that understanding even as I remove myself from harm's way. Again, a really difficult line to walk.

My kids are 7, 5 and 4, and my 4 yo is extremely intense and explosive, very much like you describe. When he was younger, much of his anger would come out as aggression. Now that he's a bit older, he has shifted into verbal aggression, which is a step better, but still aggression nonetheless. Part of my job as a mother, I believe, is to provide a safe, nurturing environment for *all* my children, and it breaks my heart that there are times when it's a sibling I must protect them from. It's so much easier when it's us against the world! *g*

I didn't reply to you right away because I've been dealing with this very issue myself and had no words of wisdom. I was soul-sick and looking for my own support... I still have no words or wisdom, but I do now have the energy to commiserate and share some of what we're trying to do here.

I have to say that my guy's rage seems to come in cycles. Things will be really good for a while, then really bad for a while. I'm still not quite sure what sends him into a tailspin. It may be that we get too busy and stop honoring his need for down time; it may just be that he has a threshold and once crossed needs to blow off steam for a while.

I agree that controlling and time-outs don't work—in fact it escalates the behavior. I discovered a long time ago, that walking away from my guy while he was in one of his rages was the worst thing I could do to him. The fear behind his eyes cut to my heart, and I could see that I was abandoning him when he needed me most. That need can be difficult to see when he doesn't want a hug or any kind of nurturing that I might try to give, but the need is for my presence to reassure him that he is not alone and that he is loved and that I will be there for him when he is ready to be loved.

When Sam says hateful things, my response is often, "Please don't hurt me/Em/ Julia with your words. You must feel really mad to have to get it out like that, and you just need to get that hurt out, huh? Is there something I can do to help?" Yes, lots of times the response is a guttural, back of the throat scream or a stick the tongue out raspberry. Some of the time, it's a melting, "Yes, sorry mama" and curl up in my lap. I wish I could make the latter response the norm, but that's up to him not me.

I think the important thing with small kids is just being there to calmly, gently, immediately intervene, letting them all know that this is not how people can be treated within the family. Reasoning with Sam when he's raging is impossible, but talking with him after the fact about his need for respect and the need for respect to work both ways is, I believe, helpful for the long run if not the immediate moment. With younger children I really do believe that much of the work we do is groundwork, the effects of which are long term rather than short term. You're welcome to join us over at AlwaysUnschooled, where we talk a lot about Unschooling issues with smaller children—under eight: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AlwaysUnschooled

Hope this is a bit helpful.