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Please, please don't shut him in his room. By all means give him a safe space to run to, to retreat to - but shutting him in his room is going to terrify him. He's still very new in placement. He still doesn't trust you. And I can understand that you may feel threatened by his violence but if your dh is going to manhandle him then it really has to be a last resort after trying to de escalate bad he needs to be trained in safe handling. Consequences, removing privileges? Is there a direct kink to the behaviour? In this instance removing the scooter for a day would be appropriate. Disallowing a DVD before bed (for example) wouldn't be. The two are not related.His behaviour us telling you that he's a scared little boy and a typical response will be fight, flight or freeze. Clearly he fights. It's not a battle that you have to win. It's not a case if giving in to demands but rather trying to understand why and what's behind them. If he can't have sweets then that's fine. Make sure he knows that well in advance, that's the rule stick to it but accept that he may fight it. If you want him in his room then make it a safe space. We turned the lower bunk into a den - blankets, soft toys, and made it a retreat for him. Under the dining room table also worked well. Stay close. It is so hard. And when the meltdown is over then talk about it, then have hugs and regroup.

Commiserations wee me - not sure how old you son is so uncertain about aged appropriate advice. In my experience escalating the consequences has been disastrous & extra wearing so I've brought it all down a notch - now the size of consequence doesn't match the size of acting out but is linked in some way. I try & discuss it later when all is calm (sometimes having to wait until the next day).Often I'm heard to say that it seems you're needing a bit more support so I think you need to spend more time doing something with me.....sometimes does the trick & sometimes not.Good luck......I'm sure you'll find what works best for you but it's emotionally draining & hard to see how far they go & the size of their feelings. I don't think it's anything about you but more likely the past coming up to bite themTeletubbies x

Do you think that maybe school had something to do with it?I think you need to be more curious about why he is behaving like this and not just load punishment or telling off or whatever onto his behaviours, because he is clearly not responding to this approach. My nephew is like this. He won't tell what's wrong and then he starts to act all bolshy and basically, he won't give in for anything. If you keep giving him a consequence or similar, you are just dishing them out for no clear benefit as he won't change.All you can do with kids like this is to find out what's wrong. And he probably won't tell you.But school is probably in there somewhere. Or the playing out with the other kids. Or missing his foster or birth family. Or....There are loads of possibilities.Have you read anything about non-supernanny type ways of parenting a traumatised child? I think this would be helpful to be honest with you.Really what you have to do is calm them down, not ramp them up. It's very counter-intuitive.I also suggest you come off this board now and onto the adopters' board, where you will find more adopters with experience which can help you, as most of the prospective adopters won't have children placed.Would have a think about what will happen when he comes home from school today and how you are going to make an environment for him where he can start to be calm and get rid of his too-big feelings. He isn't like the other kids in your street in so many ways and maybe you need to be thinking much younger.Good luck

Thanks everybody.Think last night was a lesson for us both hiw not to handle things. It seems when you're in the heat if the money all training goes out the window doesn't it? We'll be better prepared in future. Going to through some rules with him as we just didn't really want to be laying down the law as soon as he walked through the door, but I think it's time. Oh the joys!! Still love him to bits though, he's a wee treasure.

Have no experience of this sort of trauma/ behaviour ....YET. Just a suggestion, have you tried a visual timetable - free to download off the internet, to include " when we pick you up from school, I will bring you a cake (comforting carbs), we will go home via the park,( burn some energy) for dinner you will be eating......?Lots of children need to know the plan and it might be that sweets were a major feature in FC. Very best wishes. Tomorrow is a new day x

Hi,Just wanted to say we all have been where you are, it is pretty horrible but:It is early days, he is finding his way with people he doesn't know well yet.My tips would be:Don't let his anger become yours. As soon as you get annoyed it will escalate the situation.Distraction is a good tool to have in your armoury! Choose your battles. Would it have been so bad to have his sweets or some of them before dinner? Can you try giving him an alternative? I use make the happy choice - eat your roast chicken dinner thn you can have your sweets, watch a DVD, rude your bike etc or the silly choice where you get annoyed, cry, don't watch tele etc. they usually cotton on quickly by thinking it through.Can you manage to move away if things are heated to give yourself time to calm down.It is hard I know and things may get worse before they get better. Good luck x

I'm not sure that laying down the law is the best option tbh. His behaviour is his language and you have to look behind the behaviour to discover what he's really scared and worried about. Plenty of time to lay down the law, if that's the way you choose to parent, when you're a more confident parent and he's feeling more secure. He's not your normal bog standard 7 year old so what works with a well adjusted secure 7 year old isn't necessarily going to work with your son. Rules and regs might have their place but maybe look closer at therapeutic parenting. Making everything a battle will make everyone's life more difficult.

Thing is, you can set out the rules as much as you like - but very much like the phrase "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink", you cannot make a child obey your rules if they don't want to.And then what is going to happen?Many adopters have children who simply don't care about rules. They simply will not do what you want them to do. They don't really care about upsetting you - maybe they actively want to upset you. It's nothing like having a well-attached birth child who wants to please you.If you go for the rules based approach, you will be dishing out consequences all day, every day, and nothing will change.This is again where it's different with birth children. They will generally come to realise that it's not worth the grounding or whatever.But if you give masses of consequences you will be faced with a child with e.g. no playing out, no tv, no games, no teddies, no treats tomorrow, or at the weekend, no....... Basically nothing left (because they won't back down) and then you will be the one left cancelling everything, having to entertain him etc.Would honestly look more at therapeutic parenting and in particular how all of this affects, us, the parents.Hope you are having a better time this weekend.

We have two boys, aged eight and seven. That whole strop sounded very familiar!There are times when they are determined to have a row, and will just keep trying until they succeed in driving me crazy! Don't beat yourselves up about regretting how you handled one tantrum. The great thing about children is that they will have many many tantrums and give you lots of chances to fine-tune your approach!Personally, I usually find the hardest bit is controlling my own actions (I can't control the children's). Deep breathing, and sometimes I do step away and make a nice cup of tea. As for shutting them in their room. Could you try going there together? When mine throw a dangerously violent tantrum, I sit in their room while they get through the yelling and kicking, sometimes they end up falling asleep. Sometimes they eventually get to a point where they can be calmed down again.Try not to leave for too long. Try to keep calm.Sometimes I can shut a strop down with a mug of hot chocolate and the TV. We tend to treat tantrums as a loss of control, and a sign of being tired, rather than as bad behaviour. But, unless you're actually there it's hard to tell what us emotional overload and what is plain naughty. Adopted children can be deliberately naughty sometimes!Honestly, I suspect it will take a lot of tantrums before you start to feel like you have a response that helps. Every family is different and you need to find what works for you.But each tantrum is another chance!And every time you come through to the other side and show him that you still love him you are giving him a vital message! Just carrying on taking care of him despite the strops is worth a lot. Good luck and enjoy being a mummy!