Parenting has always been a full time thankless job but it becomes all the more challenging if your child has a medical condition like Autism. I do not want to sound like a completely thick-skinned and an insensitive parent but I have always been a strong supporter of pragmatism and like to practice and preach whatever is logical and practical. Though many child psychologists and clinical psychiatrists may not agree with my line of thought on this but I find it completely rational and justified with proven results that mild force works in reducing the deviant behavior in an Autistic child and definitely helps in better conditioning of the child's behavior. I know as a parent, your child means the world to you and it's never easy to use force on him/ her but its for the good of the child that you have to make yourself a bit thick-skinned as your excessive emotional sensitivity may be diminishing your own confidence in parenting and further deteriorating your child's condition. I simply advise you to be practical and use force to control your child but the usage of force should be subject to various clauses:
1) Keep it mild and not brute
The age and physical strength of the child are a major factor to be considered. If the child has outgrown his/ her formative years and reached 20's then mild force may not apply. But children below 10 can be controlled very well with it.
2) Don't make it a shortcut
If the child starts responding well to mild force and starts complying with the command of the parents, it is very obvious that the parents will be tempted to make it a shortcut to get each and everything done from the child what they expect him/ her to do.
3) Fix the threshold
Patience of the parents cannot be made threshold of using force but the threshold needs to be fixed w.r.t the behavior of the child as autistic children could even do unnecessary exaggerations despite understanding. Temper tantrums could be natural or self-induced by the child. The pattern of these temper tantrums need to be closely monitored before resorting to force. Precisely, only parents can understand their child inside-out.
4) Effectiveness of the traditional parenting model
It's not a tough thing to comprehend that the traditional parenting model was much less formal and analytical but much more effective and practical. Just remember the days when we were being brought up by your parents, we'd always live in a fear of being beaten up by our father or being slapped by our mother if we do something wrong and that fear definitely made us better and more disciplined adults. Absence of parents' fear could have made us spoiled brats and even anti-social elements.
5) Negative motivation is equally important
The best example of positive and negative motivation can be given in terms of motivating a child to study hard and get good marks. Positive motivation will sound like, "Get good marks and I'll buy you your favorite game." and Negative motivation would sound like, " Get good marks or I won't take you to a vacation this year." What better negative motivation could there be for an autistic child than,"Behave yourself or you'll get beaten up." But this can always be supplemented with a positive motivation as,"This is your favorite chocolate for your good behavior."
6) Force is omnipresent and in our natural instincts
It is very important not to live in denial mode as we see that force persists as an omnipresent phenomenon and there's no family, organization or even government regime established without the usage of force and even you always want to use it. It is just the superficiality of today's culture that has actually made us synthetically courteous. Moreover, excessively curbing your natural instincts can disturb your energy centers.
I was really shy and reluctant initially to use force with my son but when I saw my son indulging in self-injurious behavior I simply figured out that something is definitely wrong with his or my energy centers. But when I started using force on him his self-injurious behavior absolutely vanished because when I or his mother hit/ slap him, we don't physically injure him the way he injured himself. So, I simply want to conclude that my line of thought may not be universally applicable but it has definitely worked things out for my son. Being a strict parent is never bad as I believe that good parents will not only teach love to their children but also fear.
1) Keep it mild and not brute
The age and physical strength of the child are a major factor to be considered. If the child has outgrown his/ her formative years and reached 20's then mild force may not apply. But children below 10 can be controlled very well with it.
2) Don't make it a shortcut
If the child starts responding well to mild force and starts complying with the command of the parents, it is very obvious that the parents will be tempted to make it a shortcut to get each and everything done from the child what they expect him/ her to do.
3) Fix the threshold
Patience of the parents cannot be made threshold of using force but the threshold needs to be fixed w.r.t the behavior of the child as autistic children could even do unnecessary exaggerations despite understanding. Temper tantrums could be natural or self-induced by the child. The pattern of these temper tantrums need to be closely monitored before resorting to force. Precisely, only parents can understand their child inside-out.
4) Effectiveness of the traditional parenting model
It's not a tough thing to comprehend that the traditional parenting model was much less formal and analytical but much more effective and practical. Just remember the days when we were being brought up by your parents, we'd always live in a fear of being beaten up by our father or being slapped by our mother if we do something wrong and that fear definitely made us better and more disciplined adults. Absence of parents' fear could have made us spoiled brats and even anti-social elements.
5) Negative motivation is equally important
The best example of positive and negative motivation can be given in terms of motivating a child to study hard and get good marks. Positive motivation will sound like, "Get good marks and I'll buy you your favorite game." and Negative motivation would sound like, " Get good marks or I won't take you to a vacation this year." What better negative motivation could there be for an autistic child than,"Behave yourself or you'll get beaten up." But this can always be supplemented with a positive motivation as,"This is your favorite chocolate for your good behavior."
6) Force is omnipresent and in our natural instincts
It is very important not to live in denial mode as we see that force persists as an omnipresent phenomenon and there's no family, organization or even government regime established without the usage of force and even you always want to use it. It is just the superficiality of today's culture that has actually made us synthetically courteous. Moreover, excessively curbing your natural instincts can disturb your energy centers.
I was really shy and reluctant initially to use force with my son but when I saw my son indulging in self-injurious behavior I simply figured out that something is definitely wrong with his or my energy centers. But when I started using force on him his self-injurious behavior absolutely vanished because when I or his mother hit/ slap him, we don't physically injure him the way he injured himself. So, I simply want to conclude that my line of thought may not be universally applicable but it has definitely worked things out for my son. Being a strict parent is never bad as I believe that good parents will not only teach love to their children but also fear.
