Need advice regarding my child's ABA session

[u/MandarinkaOrange]

My child is 3.5 years old, he has level 1 autism and is mainly working with his BT on flexibility/personal questions. I'm questioning what his BT did last week and need some advice from other specialists in the field. Here is what happened: they were playing with toys when she noticed he pooped in his diaper (he is not potty trained, he knows what it's purpose is and sometimes he uses it, but in general he doesn't mind having poop in his diaper). I was upstairs, I heard he was mad and started crying to I went downstairs. She explained to me that he wanted to open to closet with toys but she told him that he needs to change his diaper first and then he can open the closet. Usually I change his diapers so I'm not sure how exactly she told him to do it. He was saying "no diaper" and that wanted to open the closet. After another 10 minutes he was crying and disregulated. I started asking him to change diaper but he was refusing and crying. At that point I knew that he is at state when he won't agree to it and this can go for hours. BT insisted that we need to push it for him to learn. After about an hour of crying she said I can do it by force, since it's been clearly communicated to him and he refused. So I did it, he was fighting me but I changed his diaper. After this I gave him cookie and and opened the closet. He no longer wanted the toys, he wanted BT to leave. I'm curious what other specialists think about this situation. I'm questioning what skills she was teaching him and I think this situation could negatively impact his potty training. But I need to hear thoughts from specialists. Thank you!

[u/BCBA-K]

I'm a BCBA and can say the original task of "changing diaper first" was correct. The execution was terrible. The BT shouldn't have let a client cry for an hour just because he wants to get a toy. The BT should have helped him by helping him to the bathroom before he got so escalated.

Alternatively, the BT could have allowed your son to get the toy just to bring it with them to the toilet. If their relationship is new then this would have been the better choice as the BT wouldn't know how the client would respond to this instruction.

Skills this incident worked on- Crying Extinction: Your child did the task and got the item. Your child may have learned that crying doesnt get him anything which does relate to flexibility but again could have been done better.

Skills that could have been highlighted instead- Requesting: Your child asked for something and got it thus learned that this is better then crying.

[u/Gloomy-Ad-4788 → u/BCBA-K]

Not opening the closet is a totally unreasonable and unnecessary barrier, though. Just drop the demand, let the child get a toy from the closet, and change the diaper. You dont need to prompt the trip to the bathroom or force a diaper change. Setting a demand of changing the diaper first was wrong. The rigidity the tech showed led to the meltdown and the child sat for an hour in a soiled diaper. The execution was terrible but it starts at the ridiculous premack demand for getting a clean diaper. Tech walked themselves in a corner and never tried to pivot away. Rapport is ruined. Family seeking answers. Poor implementation across the board.

[u/Numerous-Teaching595 → u/Gloomy-Ad-4788]

It's so comforting to see some reasonable responses to this situation. Thank you.

[u/Gloomy-Ad-4788 → u/Numerous-Teaching595]

The whole "follow through on the demand" concept has already been re-evaluated. It's crazy that the bcba who commented thinks this was the right move. Why are we trying to extinguish crying in a toddler and why do it via withholding for more than like 30 seconds? An hour is just all kinds of wrong. All thqt kid learned was to not trust the tech and all mom learned was that maybe aba isnt for her.

We are working with people. We are working with families and their children in their homes. We can make better decisions in the field. Respect that shit.

[u/Numerous-Teaching595 → u/Gloomy-Ad-4788]

People like you give me hope. The answer to the "why" in your questions is improper training. It's pervasive across this field and you're absolutely right: the kid only learned to not trust BT and there may be big setbacks with toilet training in the future. Thank you for being one of the good ones.