So my 10 yo is having self control issues, primarily to do with stealing (limited to treats, drinks etc) that do not belong to him, or controlling his own environment regardless of the effect it has on others.
We have spoken to him about this behaviour, explaining from several different angles:
- Perspective of this behaviour happening to him instead; how would he feel if someone had taken something from him? Lollies he got from a party bag, or a drink he bought with his own money?
- Self-control is an active thought process; a decision to act one way or another. He has expressed an understanding of this, and has also explained that he is aware of the cause and effect of his behaviour during the action, but still decides to carry out the behaviour.
- Financial cost/reimbursement of the behaviours. He earns pocket money with jobs, and putting it simply, again form a different perspective is basically just giving that hard-earned money to someone else. He works for the money, only to have it taken from him.
- This also applies to controlling his environment (he turns on lights overnight as a "night light" - he does already have a night light in his room - in his room, in the hallway, and on the front porch outside his bedroom window when he can't sleep). This behaviour costs money, and if it continues (which it has) he will need to do extra work to compensate for the additional incurred costs. We have even pushed the potential of security risks of this, with little apparent impact.
Our latest attempt to explain this (which we use for everyone in the house, including my partner and I) is the "Three C's: Communication, Consideration, and Cooperation" which basically boils down to: we talk to each other when there is conflict, expressing our feelings and what the problem(s) are; we consider each other's feelings; and we find a way to cooperate with each other.
These behaviours have been ongoing for over 6 months, and when we believe there is an improvement in the behaviour, he gets caught out again (either by getting caught red-handed, or new food wrappers/hidden cups in his bedroom during a big clean).
We have decided to give him a consequence of breaking up sticks/branches in the backyard, as well as restrictions to his time on iPads, watching TV etc, and does not get "special treats" unless we say so. He spends an hour each day in the yard, and we have explained that the duration of the punishment is up to him - the more work he does each time, the shorter the duration of the consequence. We allow him to do as he wishes however. If he chooses to simply sit around, that's his decision, though we do remind him of the obligation, and we do supervise to ensure he isn't doing anything he shouldn't be.
However, he is still carrying out the misbehaviour. It is even becoming more frequent, and he does seem unperturbed by the consequences. We have stated that for each time this occurs, he will be adding an additional day to the consequence, but again, this seems to be having little impact. In truth, I believe that this may be becoming an attention seeking behaviour.
His older brother that has different privileges (he has a laptop as a requirement for school) which he uses to play Minecraft with friends, and a phone to contact them. He also has different behaviours (he has invested in Warhammer miniatures, therefore he has a better interest in carrying out his jobs to earn pocket money) however he is also more introverted, but with changes in his social environments, as well as potential early teenage hormonal changes (he is only 12 so this may not be a factor) he has random, violent and emotional outbursts.
He, on the other hand, is still only interested in Lego, and due to his excessive extroverted personality and behaviours (children in his class have expressed that he is "very intense"), he can be very attention seeking, and due to the fact that he doesn't have many people in his life to spend time with, this falls on his mother and I, and his older brother; which does quickly become overbearing.
I am starting to believe that "more consequences, more pressure, more strictness" is not going to work, as I have explained that this is potentially becoming an attention-seeking behaviour, but the original approach of explanation has made no impact either. What can we do to help him correct his behaviours, without causing further conflict within the family?
Some clarifications:
- How much attention is he getting? As both of us work a 40-hour week, during this time it is mostly from his older brother (which, as I explained has been directed away from the younger brother to his friends), and his mother and I are generally either spending our own time relaxing, or dealing with cooking, cleaning etc. When it comes to chores, I tend to hover about and keep them both on task, giving compliments and encouragement where I can, particularly if tension is getting high from emotions, stress etc. During the weekends, Mum tries to come up with family activities, like going to the park or visiting family, and we often ask the older brother to spend time away from his devices to do things with us/his brother.
- I do believe that due to his intensity - he often "contributes" to a lot of conversations that he is not a part of, or he continues a joke to the point of annoyance, or he jumps to very dark imagery as "funny", probably due to scary/horror games (E.g. Five nights at Freddy's) being a fun topic. This causes us to ask him to stop a lot of the time, or calm down, etc.
- In regards to assistance, I am going to personal therapy, my partner has been in and out of therapy for herself, and we are looking into the boy's mental health as well. We have a potential that he may be brushing the spectrum, but we have yet to receive confirmation after an initial analysis. Both boys have been seeing counsellors which has been revealing for us (for example other kids seeing him as being too intense).
- What are the major sources of conflict? Primarily emotions - what is "fair" and "unfair" from different perspectives. For example, after several instances of pointing out that a job has not been completed properly, explaining what needs to be done, how it was not achieved, and giving advice on how to do it, make it easy, etc., placing down a consequence for repeated lack of effort is immediately responded with "not fair" which can quickly escalate, especially on stressful days as management of this almost always falls back on me depending on how stressful the day has been for my partner.
- In this instance, the only idea of "correcting behaviour" would be to remove any kind of "treat" from the house. However this could end in two ways - everyone feeling this is unfair, "why should everyone suffer because of one person", which would likely punish him indirectly and even harder; or after a stint of inaccessibility, similar to the addiction conundrum of exposure to it causing the initial problem to escalate.
