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Simple things like telling him that his shirt is on inside out... his answer will be no it's not. Or his shoes are on the wrong feet his answer is always the opposite and he refuses to ever be wrong about anything.

If I notice these things I will tell him and when he argues back that I'm wrong about whatever I've said even though it's obvious I'm right I just drop the conversation as I see no point in arguing over silly little things.

However I've noticed over the years that he has difficulty with his peers.. with his peers they don't just drop the conversation like I do they ofcourse argue their point in which they correct about. My son gets more and more angry insisting that he is right and at times lashes out. Due to this he now doesn't have any friends and is becoming more and more isolated.

He has learning disabilities and so is quite behind educationally.

I'm at my wits end with this and really don't know how to deal with it. Has anyone else been through this situation?

Kelc
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    The mention of learning disabilities here feels a bit tacked on relative to how front and center these kinds of disabilities can be with regards to socialization and learning (which includes accepting past mistakes). I'm not sure how well this can be answered without knowing more about the learning disabilities in question and tailoring the response to them. – Flater Aug 02 '23 at 05:30
  • Hi thank you for your reply. – Kelc Aug 03 '23 at 08:58
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    When I said learning disabilities I meant to say difficulties. His handwriting is that of a year 1 child.. he writes his certain letters and numbers back to front... has been assessed to have dyscalculia so has difficulties understanding mathematics. Understanding and following instructions is not easy for him and instructions need to be made very simple and short. HIs behaviour at school is very good but it seems that he distances himself from people because he is worried about his emotional outbursts and is scared to get into trouble at school – Kelc Aug 03 '23 at 09:13
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    He prefers to be in lunch time detention for not doing homework because the playground is too crazy for him and takes him out of his calm state. He gets very upset after an emotional outburst and more upset in the days that follow because his friends stop playing with him. One mother has told her son he is not to play with him anymore which is really sad because he is my sons best friend and is just making my son feel even more horrible about himself – Kelc Aug 03 '23 at 09:17
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    The disabilities you mention are more related to learning, but the issues you point out in the last comment suggest there may be something going on on an emotional level. I would suggest consulting a pediatrician on this. I'm not going to make a layman's diagnosis as it's more liable to be wrong than right. – Flater Aug 03 '23 at 09:31
  • I have to agree with @Flater. The learning difficulties, problems with socializing, the arguments about clothes. Behavior is communication. This is a much deeper ocean than you might realize. This feels like it is much more than learning disabilities. – Greg Burghardt Aug 06 '23 at 00:15

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I didn't have your exact situation, but I have a phrase you might use to signal to your son that the discussion is over.

When my son tried to argue with me, to convince me that something was true, even though it was clear to both of us and anyone else present that it wasn't true, I would say "I don't belive you."

Once I said "I don't believe you," I said nothing else. My son at first continued to try and convince me that he was right, but very quickly, since I said nothing else, he learned that the conversation was over.

I don't recall where I read this, but I read a lot about parenting and one thing that stuck with me was to never argue with a child.

With this phrase I was able to end my part in any discussion, and soon after I started using it my son stopped trying to argue with me.

This doesn't address all of the parts of your question, but it's a change that I think will help you the same way it helped me with my son.

  • You could have tried to figure out why your son felt a need to discuss. You could have considered that your son may be right and you wrong. Instead, you used dog-training methods on him. – Dennis Hackethal Aug 11 '23 at 14:51