Today was a bit of a bumpy road. M. didn't want to go walk the field as usual. I had a hard time even getting her to come out of the classroom. She was busy picking the strings out of her socks and refused to be interrupted. I finally walked to the door, and told her, "I will be going now, I will be over here". She got up and hurried to the door with her shoe in hand. I told her she needed to put her shoe on, she ignored me and kept walking. When she felt the ground on her foot, she was upset. I reminded her she needed her shoe. So she put it on and went towards the field. She crouched down as she usually does after her lap. I asked her to go walk, but she just ignored me and kept picking her socks. Her teacher said it was ok, she didn't have to go.
Back in the classroom she was ok, but having little hiccups. She kept turning to the wall and ignoring me. I gave her time, and waited it out. She was more obsessed than usual with the sock strings today, and kept talking in little voices. It was like she had blocked me and everyone around her. i gently tried and she did do her work. In spurts, but did it. She kept having issues where she would be working, then suddenly scream, and flutter, then continue. At one point I walked off for something and she had hopped up on her chair screaming. What surprises me is that her teacher will tell her, firmly, but politely, that she has to calm down, and that this is unacceptable. She listens and complies. If I did that, she would get worse.
She kept having small outbursts. That is until she tried to do math on Chrome book. she got an answer wrong, and got upset. i tried to get her to keep going. She got another wrong, so she got so mad, that we could just not continue. She ended up screaming, hissing and thrashing around. If I am correct, I remember her teacher stopped by to ask her to calm down. We stopped and she cried and cried quietly. I tried to calm her, talk to her. I told her that we all make mistakes and it is ok, but we need to keep trying. I am not sure she heard me. I think she did, but at that point it didn't matter. I remember one of the ladies I talked to that was autistic under Asperger's. She said that autistic people are terrified of not being good enough; and they are so hard on themselves. They want to do right, and get so frustrated when they don't get things right.
Later on, I had to get her on her reading program on Chrome book. She was kind of ok, but still bothered. She again, got a spelling question wrong and lost her cool again. It was screaming, laying down on the chairs, crying and at one point she grabbed my arms hard. I asked her to let my arm go, Not sure what she wanted, but it was worrying me because it seemed it was out of anger and frustration. I also caught her at one point, when she was getting upset at the reading program. She was like holding onto a scream that was building up. I then noticed she had her right hand on her throat, she was starting to turn red. I grabbed that hand and it was tight around the front of her neck. It was not easy to pry it off. And yes, at first I tried to get her to grab her pencil, getting her hand off her throat, but that didn't work. I asked her calmly to let me see her hand. But when she started turning red, I had to pry it off. Sigh.. I remember reading something about self harm before on this. I will go search that link again.
After all that, I gave her a moment, then presented her with a math coloring activity she didn't finish yesterday. (or the day before) She was calm and colored while talking in the small voices. I can't make out most of what she is saying. Sounds like repeating tv shows. She speaks like cartoon people. I brought her some play-do and the gel in the packet. She liked touching the gel. I asked if she liked play-do. She did, and I let her use it for a bit. It was good to watch her build a little monster while singing so softly you could barely hear it. I have not heard her sing like that before.
I then asked her to put up the play-do and do some of her work. 2 pages and then we can use play-do again. She was ok with it, but before finishing the work, she kept trying to snatch the play-do. She was getting mad. She wanted it NOW, or else. i asked her to finish up. I had to hide it behind me until she did. It worked out ok.
Teacher said we have to work on not getting so mad when she makes mistakes. I will have to try to figure out a way to have her understand that. Not sure exactly how quite yet.
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