We have a little girl we are adopting who is 7 and has Cerebral Palsy,
Epilepsy, Severe Autism, Severe MR, and legally blind without her glasses.
She is very attention seeking and she is also very oppositional.  She bites,
kicks, pinches, hits, and screams, if she is by herself at all, in her room,
outside.  She will after having to do something for more than 5 to 10
minutes, do this with her family and school authorities around without being
alone if we do not change her activity before than.  She did not talk until
4 1/2 but is learning to communicate and responds very little back, but is
getting there.  She goes to a State school and they see the same things.  We
work with her extensively here at home and they also do the same at school.
She is definately a child that we daily have to try to figure where she is
coming from but has come such a long way.  If I can be of any help please
let me know.  Sincerely, Toni


----- Original Message -----
From: "Jason Kruse" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, October 17, 2003 8:27 AM
Subject: Oppositional behavior and attention seeking behavior


> Hello everyone-
> Not sure if you all remember my daughter and I? Lauren is 6 years old
> now and in 1st grade. She had an inutero stroke with mild left
> hemiplegia, and hypotonia, pervasive developmental disorder and some
> ADHD. She is growing up to be quite a charming girl and has the hearts
> of most people that work with her. But she has started to get into some
> trouble with sticking out her tongue, making mean faces, and most
> recently called her teacher poopoo head. She has a interelated teacher
> that is really great and communicates every day with mom and I about how
> she does and feels that she really seems to strive for adult attention
> and doesn't really seem to be adversely affected by timeouts or being
> taken out of class and actually may even being trying to get out of
> class with the behaviors. As her parent we agree that most punishments
> don't work unless they are swift, consistant and very matter of fact.
> Boring time outs that are appropriate timed are helpful. However the
> school doesn't feel comfortable with the kind of timeout that it would
> take to get the same results at school. For those wondering she gets
> enormous praise from both mom and I and we are very encouraging so we
> are a little perplexed why she goes after the other as well. She is a
> hard nut to crack but were still trying. She is very quarky and does and
> says things that don't quite add up and some cause and effect
> understanding seems to be lacking a little.
>
> I was wandering from any of you if you yourself as a child with a
> "disability" and with all this "attention" if you every delt with the
> issues I mentioned above. It certainly is counter productive in our
> girls case but not sure how to go about getting to desire less adult
> attention. She is not swayed in anyway by peer pressure at this time
> yet. How have any other delt with their kids in this similar
> situation??????
>
>
> Thank you all in advance. This has always been a great resource
>
> Jason Kruse and Lauren