“You need to find the child’s currency” is something that was said to me fairly recently by a new ‘therapist’ that was sitting in on my child’s therapy session. She was sitting in, in order to watch and learn how to work with autistic children in schools. I immediately responded to her comment with – “NO! That’s abusive!”
Let’s find out why.
When you see a therapist or attend a school you must trust your therapist or teacher implicitly. You can’t learn from someone who tries to manipulate you, control you, convert you or abuse you. Using your ‘currency’ against you is abusive. This does not build trust or teach children skills, but it does incite trauma and teach hatred and teach children to not trust adults.
If your partner asked you; what do you love to do, how do you calm yourself, what do you use to stay happy every day of your life – you’d think that was wonderful – that they are trying to get to know you. But if that partner then took all those things away from you, hid them, and only gave them to you for limited periods of time and only returned them- if you did what they wanted… you’d dump their frigging ass and shove them out the door as quick as you could (well I hope you would).
Now, you may be thinking – but when teachers and therapists do this, it’s not abusive because they are using this strategy to teach a specific skill… but you’d be wrong. It’s still abusive – no matter what you try to teach them, because you have still used their loved thing against them.
You have still removed something that is dear to them, possibly what they use to regulate themselves, and possibly something that they use like a baby would (a soother, blanky, binky, bottle or any other soothing tool). It is also often their possession. You have no right to even touch their possession – let alone remove it. Some autistic people use tablets or other things to communicate – removing it is the same as removing someone’s mouth – it’s highly abusive. You cannot EVER justify using someone’s things to get them to do something.
If that partner had asked you to murder someone or chop off one of your legs etc – in order to get back your things – they’d call that extortion. And that’s what this is – it’s extortion. It doesn’t change just because the thing you have asked them to do or to learn is something more ‘simple’ or less violent, or ‘small’ in your eyes… it’s still extortion. It’s still wrong.
It’s even worse that you are doing it to a child who is more vulnerable, in your care and trusts you. If you only do these things to children or people you consider ‘less than’ or subservient to you – what does that make you? Yes – it makes you an abuser. If a man only did it to women – you’d call him a chauvinist, female hating, abusing prick. In a relationship it’s called domestic abuse. Some people have used withholding finances or love to manipulate the partner – this is domestic abuse. We usually tell the abused to seek shelter, support and to run away as far and as fast as they can. Because that a-hole is abusing them by using their things against them.
So why can’t adults see this for what it is when we do it to children?
It shows no respect to the person, their needs or their pain. It only shows that the partner is a manipulative abusive prick ba$t@rd. And no, I won’t hold punches on this one, because you need to see the reality of this for all it’s worth.
When you are withholding recess until the child does a specific piece of work – you are actually withholding the basic right to rest (under international human rights laws). When you withhold going home until a child apologises, you are withholding the right to freedom. When you withhold the right to go to the bathroom till recess or lunch – you are withholding the basic human right to personal hygiene (you may be forcing them into having an accident – whether that be pee, poo or period – forcing an accident is a form or torture and pubic humiliation). When you withhold their toy until they ‘behave’ the way you want them to – you constituting extortion and theft – and you are withholding self-regulation. All of this is inhumane imo.
There is always another way to teach a skill without extortion and without abuse. If you are using these methods – you are taking what could be called ‘the easy route’ – but it doesn’t mitigate the harm you are causing to another human being. Just because you hold power over the child (because you are the adult) does not mean you can or should. In fact – it’s the reason you should NOT do it. And if you do use these practices – people have the right to call you abusive.
When a partner tells you “you can’t leave until you clean the kitchen” that’s domestic abuse… if you add an incentive like: if you clean the kitchen I’ll give you a hug – that’s emotional manipulation and abuse. If you add an aversive like: if you don’t clean the kitchen, I’ll withhold food or love from you – that’s still emotional abuse. If you add “if you don’t -I’ll hit or punish you” that’s more declarative and obvious (physical abuse) – but it’s still abuse– just worded differently.
This is why rewards and punishments are abusive – they are emotional and sometimes physical abuse tools.
For autistic people, it’s worse, because rewarding someone for doing something you want ignores their experience and needs -and is a totally a selfish act. It ignores the fact that the person may not be ‘able’ to do the thing without significant pain or harm to themselves, or able at all. So, punishing them by not giving the reward, after they’ve tried and failed – it still a punishment and still abuse.
Eg: you tell an autistic person that they can have 10 minutes ‘screen time’ after they put the trash out, because you have identified that ‘screen time’ is their ‘currency’. This ignores that they may be in meltdown or shutdown, have severe executive dysfunctioning issues, pain in certain areas of their body (due to co-occurring issues like EDS, fibromyalgia, dysgraphia etc), require a body double, in burnout, can’t without help etc. But it also ignores the fact that they need regulation before doing the task, they may need more than 10 minutes to regulate, or that their ‘currency’ is actually a regulation tool that shouldn’t be bartered for in the first place.
Do you have to barter for your right to eat or drink? Do you have to barter to get a break at work every day? Do you have to earn the oxygen you breathe, or the water you drink? If you do – you are being abused… the same goes for this method. And being paid a wage is not the same thing. You get paid a wage, and you don’t get paid for your breaks – they are a human right – under law, they are not part of the bartering because your boss is not allowed to and cannot take them away – they are protected by employment law. The same as recess and lunch is protected in schools.
If you arrive home exhausted from a terrible day…and your partner says “cook dinner for everyone or you can’t watch TV tonight, or get changed into comfortable clothes, or go to bed (because watching TV, wearing comfortable clothing and going to sleep is your ‘currency’ - it is how you relax and calm yourself) Would you hit them? Would you divorce them? Would you say – you cook dinner? Would you kick them out the door? Would you just go straight to bed? Or would you say F OFF!!!?
Or do you think this is what you do everyday, and you put up with it? Because if you do – you really shouldn’t.
Do you INSTEAD: find an amicable solution – order take out, chuck a ready meal in the microwave, work together to do dinner because you are both exhausted, and collaborate. Eg: one of you helps kids with homework and the other cooks?
I’m going to bet you do one of these – because that’s how reasonable people behave towards each other – we don’t threaten or withhold or cajole or mistreat people. We work with them to find a solution. And we don’t use their ‘currency’ to make them do things. And if you do use their currency against them – there’s a consequence for that abuse – you go to jail – you have a restraining order against you, you get divorced or perhaps a partner kills you in your sleep (just kidding – but seriously – think about the hurt you feel when someone abuses you like this – what measure/consequence is relevant in your experience of that harm you’ve felt and endured).
Eg: When a parent is really mad at their child for scaring them almost to death – the parent always says that the amount of ‘mad’ is equal to the amount of scared/worried. If you abuse a person with this method – the amount/ level of meltdown and violence they show towards you is the level/amount of harm you caused them.
Parents will often ask autistic people, “why did my child break everything in the room and throw things when I said they couldn’t do x, or I took away Y?” the response is always “you need to apologise to your child and repair the relationship – you harmed your child, you should have done X, and your child threw things/ became violent as a direct and equal reaction to what you did”. (X should have been to: find out why the child was doing whatever they were doing, instead of taking things away like a torturer/dictator). The chid is reacting in equal measure to the thing you did. They experienced a level 10 or 8 pain (due to what you did), and responded with showing you that pain with 10 or 8 behaviour response.
But in schools – teachers often don’t see or understand that. They’ll use punitive measures to control and to get what they want – but not understand what the child needs. They are equally surprised when the child reacts violently. It’s the same thing. You abuse them – they show you, with behaviour, how they feel. That what you did caused them harm, so you need to see that harm to understand it.
It’s not a controlled response or choice – it’s a fight/flight response or equal measure – it’s the nervous system saying “protect yourself – PROTECT NOW!!!– use your body and behaviour to show them what they did to you – use your body to demonstrate the harm and to protect yourself from them doing any more harm”. They sometimes throw things is an act to get you as far away from them as possible – because that’s what a nervous system response does – it protects the body from harm, and sometimes it confuses emotional or thinking harm as physical harm. Eg: it retaliates with physical protection when it feels it has no other options to protect itself.
When a child is backed into a corner; either physically, emotionally or with thinking – the nervous system reacts violently because it’s already perceived the threat, or already teetering on the edge, or already has stored trauma from previous similar situations – so it’s already primed for maximum protection (ie: violent protection). To stop them from doing that, they need to feel safe and to deal with that trauma.
This is where a teacher will say – but not everyone can get what they want, and we can’t meet the needs of all students. And in part, I’d agree (that it’s hard to meet everyone’s needs all the time)– but you don’t have to be a dick about it either. And the punitive measures and using their currency isn’t helping – it is adding the literal fuel to the trauma fire. You are causing the behaviour you receive.
A child’s ‘currency’ is their regulation tools and strategies. Eg: their tablet time, their food and water, their rest time, their regulation toy. To use these things is extortion. What kind of a-hole extorts a minor? And what kind of ‘person’ extorts a disabled minor? What sort of person are you? Are you one that tries to understand their needs and helps them? Or are you the sort that uses that knowledge to your advantage and to harm them? If you are the second – you shouldn’t be working with anyone at all – but definitely not disabled children.
Yes, it’s hard to help everyone at once, but withholding their tools and strategies, or bartering with them won’t get you anywhere – it’ll just force them to drop those things as tools – to drop them as loved things. You are actually terrorising them and their loved things. Most kids who have their things arbitrarily controlled or withheld learn to hate you and the thing you use against them – it sometimes even turns them to a life of thinking they don’t deserve simple things, that no one cares, and into severe depression or anger issues.
Do you really want the child to hate you and learn to hate things that used to help them? If so – I’m going to be honest here – I think you are sick and need real help for yourself – go and seek that help please, before you harm more people.
For everyone else, thank you for listening/reading and realising there is another way. That using currency and behaviourist methods, is the cause of the increase of behaviour problems in schools.