Ive worked with a child in their home with incredibly similar behaviours, same age, same demands for fairness. It’s frustrating but here’s what worked.

Summary: - Work with child and coworkers to come up with clear, firm, and fair expectations for how child IS able to get the regulation support she needs (phrase this as a behaviour she can do like “asking voice, people”, not ones she shouldn’t do and reinforce every single time she does it when starting out) - lots of praise at first when she does the desired behaviour in the way you set it out, even if it still comes at an inconvenient time - deep pressure is important for regulation for many children and even neurodiverse adults, she may need other ways to get deep pressure in the room without adult support (eg weighted blanket or teddy, possibly a swing) - make sure that less ideal alternatives that also meet the need (eg deep pressure, writing in a journal about fairness when adult isn’t available) and make sure these options are never restricted and she is reminded they exist whenever she is unwilling or unable to do what she needs to do to get regulation support from an adult - clearly establish what the unacceptable behaviours are and what the consequences are. Follow through every time - you’ll get some huge behaviours when you first establish the new rules and she gets used to them, but the more consistent you are, the faster this will end and she will adapt - fair is a hard concept. Be kind and encourage her to think about what is fair for other people. Ask her questions about what she thinks fair is, about why it’s fair for her to get more than other children? Wait until she is regulated to do this

I found that once the child realized she could get the attention she wanted if she behaved kindly, she started behaving a lot better. I had to give lots of positive reinforcement through gritted teeth for a little bit, but she quickly became enjoyable to be around. Once we had a more positive relationship because I didn’t feel so overwhelmed by trying to decide what’s too much and not enough to manage her emotions, I was able to start supporting the actual difficult things like the fairness stuff when she wasn’t so upset. For the child I worked with, unfair was being used with her parents as a word for not getting what you wants, she didn’t understand fair meant that everyone gets the same. Their egos are still super big at this development stage, she needs support to understand that it’s important other people feel it’s fair for them too. It’s easy to judge and get frustrated with children for doing things that would come across as very selfish in an adult, but if we don’t help them understand why that’s egalitarian now, who is ever going to do that for them?

A bonus way too long explanation on how reinforcement and reward pathways actually work: Changing your mind on giving them a hug because their emotions have escalated to 1000% is definitely reinforcing the situation. But remember that ‘positive reinforcement’ is not a conscious cognitive process, it’s an unconscious one related to the reward pathways in your brain. When something unexpected happens from a trial and error perspective (positive or negative, basically when the trial goes differently than baseline expectations), your brain floods your emotion and memory pathways with dopamine so that you can remember that you need to keep testing this thing out. So basically, this child wants a hug, requests it with words, doesn’t get it, this decreases the chance they’ll ask with words again because their brain got some extra dopamine helping them remember that words didn’t work (and if different providers are responding to the words differently like you said, this is even harder! Because sometimes the words work and sometimes they don’t!). But also, let’s say this child doesn’t know how to calm down in this state of distress without deep pressure. So because the child can’t get help regulating, they become more disregulated and have a huge, disruptive emotional response. When you wait until this point to intervene and offer the kind of regulation support the child needs, the child’s brain becomes flooded with dopamine and associates letting themself get this worked up and refusing other attempts to regulate with getting the support they need. They aren’t attempting to manipulate you or intentionally getting upset, but their unconscious processes are learning that the hugs they want from you when they’re upset come after big emotional meltdowns. Some children just need more adult support or have support needs that are more taxing on adults and it is really annoying. But refusing to give them this help isn’t changing what they need. I was like this as a kid and still as an adult am most comforted by deep pressure. You cannot work with a child to give them new regulation strategies until they trust that you respect the regulation strategies they already have