Thanks for all of the insight everyone...this really is helping me tremendously! Even the hard to read things are good to consider. Oh trust me, I have feared that he is going to be a sociopath in many instances, although I do truly believe he doesn't intend to hurt anyone ever...I try to not let my mind go there too often, because as a parent it is pretty much the unthinkable. But, nonetheless...it's there. I do think sometimes it is attention seeking for sure. I think the trampoline issue might be a SPD issue like aquinas mentioned above because he doesn't do it except in that highly gross motor type of situation. I think once he gets gross motor going, he can't stop it and modulate it. I'm a PT so I kind of deal with this type of thing with my job also. In any event, I get that...his threshold is definitely way lower than ours for many things. I'm hoping getting him back into OT will help us work on some of the sensory things, and I like the idea of some sort of play/social therapy. Since he is in this window of time where his behavior is still malleable, before that magic age of 8...I would like to bring in all the resources we can. He has so much potential...I see it every day and it is sad that he can't let that side show more. Most importantly, aside from his parents, he has a loving adult in his life (his teacher) who believes in him and he responds well to her. She treats him differently than possibly even I do, and he behaves for her. I am in disbelief, because all teachers before threw their hands up in the air and conference after conference were at a loss for what to do. But she GETS him...He even told me "mommy, I wish you could be more like Mrs. J"....this really hurt my feelings but at the same time it made me realize I need to strive to do the exact same as she is doing for consistency. He then countered that by saying "but mommy, don't tell her that I told you that..." I think I expect total obedience every step of the way and when he gets flat out defiant I have a really hard time figuring out what to do next. Any parenting tips here?

I do not want to defend him for the aggressive behavior. I guess I just always felt like the other kids were unfairly excluding him because of how "quirky" he is. I can't shield him from the ways of the world, I know that...and they aren't totally to blame for sure. He is just soooo incredibly sensitive.

Another frustrating behavior that he has is that he has a hard time when I talk to other adults...when I drop him off and pick him up from school and talk to his teacher, he loses it. She says it is so odd because he will be having a fantastic day with her, no aggression, listening well, following rules. And as soon as I walk in the door he grabs his bookbag and throws it across the floor, starts yelling and acting loud and disruptive to cancel out what we are saying so we can hardly hear each other. Again, the totally opposite child thing. I feel this must be attention seeking, but it is incredibly frustrating. He does it sometimes when my husband and I are trying to talk to each other also. How would you address this? Simply telling him " you're being too loud, that hurts our ears...you need to go outside if you are going to be that loud...threatening to take away a privilege etc just falls on deaf ears. In these instances I am embarrassed and want to disappear. If you give him no attention and ignore him, he only gets louder and starts doing worse things to get attention like trying to break something he ordinarily wouldn't pay any attention to...It makes no sense to me and his teacher. We have started just doing brief drop offs and pick ups and that makes a world of difference. She even says, during the disruptive times during drop off once I leave and she gets him engaged he is a joy to work with and listens to her and works on his activities for hours and she has no trouble with him whatsoever. This is something he needs to work on though, because it happens at doctor's offices and places like that as well. I'm pretty sure the new doctor we got established with (since we moved) thinks he is full blown autistic. He didn't speak at all in the room to her, yelled and shouted over us while we talked...jumped from chair to chair like a lunatic and it made me break down crying...she is pushing for the psych eval but I know he is not usually like that! When the appointment was over he then started asking me tons of questions, conversing like a normal human and calmly walked out of the office like nothing had happened. It's times like that I just want to crawl under a rock. After episodes like that I explain to him why xyz was not appropriate and that he needs to allow adults to talk sometimes. He will say "I'm sorry mommy, I just didn't know what to do." Would you recommend getting him a tablet or something to curb his excess mind energy? His excuse a lot of the time is that he was looking for something to do. I have been trying to keep him unplugged mostly aside from some educational children's programming because I see so many kids addicted to it, but I am starting to think maybe during those "down time" moments I should have something like that to keep his brain engaged so that those behaviors stop being the norm? I need that insanity to end....it is upsetting to his baby sister as well, who I am trying to teach how to properly behave and he is making it incredibly hard to show her correct examples. Ugh...

So any help or insight is appreciated, no matter how harsh. We have to make some changes. My husband is on board totally also. Our whole family agrees something needs to be done about his behavior. It's just what exactly works for him, we simply cannot figure out. It would be nice to know if he is gifted, sure...it will help us understand him better...I just wonder about the other diagnoses also and those worry me more...