We had a problem tonight with Gavin. Elliott got hurt again tonight as a direct result of Gavin's actions. Whether he meant to hurt Elliott or not (and I don't know that he did) there are consequences for his actions. As usual I recorded it as a means of simply documenting what actually happened should this ever be called into question. I took a more hard line approach with this one today because I have just had it with this behavior. No part of me believes anymore that he CAN'T control this. In my opinion this whole thing was a willful act that he could have stopped at any point but simply didn't. This meltdown is because he was told he was going to have oatmeal instead of a chicken patty for dinner not because Elliott was hurt. I want to stress that the "oatmeal" itself has NOTHING to do with this. It's the fact that he is being held accountable for his actions, pure and simple.
I take a more "fed up and aggressive" approach to this meltdown. The level of self-injury is the worst we have seen so far. I want to point something out as well, when Gavin started to meltdown we tried to get him upstairs but it was to late. I remind him several times that he has the right to scream but our rule is that it must be done into his pillow, this helps to mitigate the impact it has on the other boys. I don't think this is unreasonable. He choose to throw his fit in the kitchen so I told him that since he choose to do this downstairs instead of upstairs like he's supposed to he gave up his right to scream. Whether or not that's the right things to say, I don't know but it didn't work anyway. I also let him know that I'm not going to stop him from hitting himself and that he will NOT be going to Akron Children's Hospital as a result of this. I tried to encourage him to breathe and get himself under control. He was screaming so loud that I was surprised no one called the police. I told him that if someone calls the police and they show up it won't go well for him. At one point I actually got kicked, although I don't think it was on purpose.
Look, I'm not perfect, in fact I'm far from it. I say and do the wrong things but I will say that most of the time I'm feeling my way through the dark. With Gavin at this point, I'm at the end of my rope. Earlier today he "lost" another tooth. I don't know what we are supposed to do and NO ONE has any answers. All I can say is that I do the very best I can with what I have left to give. I'm trying a different approach in this video and I'm sure I come off and uncaring but I assure you that's not the case. I'm trying every approach I can think of to help these situations and the end result is the same every, single time. Gavin meltsdown and Gavin self-injures. The only way to avoid these meltdowns is to NOT hold him accountable. As tempting as that is, we can't do that.
Also I'm not sure what went wrong with this video but the color is way off and it's like it was shot in the dark but it wasn't. Literally, it hard to watch but I think you will get the point. I hope our experience can be beneficial to someone else out there.
