My son feeling Negative!

Kerry

debby ?

I would hope school do respect this. Presently though he is not in school , it is at home he does not like the knowledge  and is angry with me for taking him to be assessed 

Is what he is doing at college something of interest? My personal experience is that if I don’t enjoy something I find it virtually impossible to even begin working on it. Simply thinking about that fact I need to start on something and that I can’t find the motivation to really adds pressure and clogs my brain up and then I feel like I can’t do anything and feel like I could cry.

my advice would be to ensure the college are aware of the situation regarding how he is feeling and ask them to give him the time he needs. Let your son talk to you about it. Tell him he can talk to you about it when he is ready. If you try to get something out of him I think he may shut down. It can take me days to find the right words to explain a simple sentence regarding my emotions.

I hope this helps in some way.

can u get him on here to talk to similar people and express himself.   It helps.

i had to guess

if he doesn't like the stereo type surely he's free not to disclose the label? After all shouldn't teachers for example respect his wishers on whether other children should know?

I’m not Suzy, if this is what you are asking. 

I can relate my my 20s i am 25 but when i was in college for Electrics i said to myself i wanted to get an apprenticeship by 19 or i would kill myself in persons mind with aspergers you have a route if you are feeling that is not going to happen it's too much that is my view. I did try committing suicide a few times going into the mental health system is worst thing possible for someone on the spectrum. Consider looking for local support for employment for him he needs something that will fulfil him not stacking shelfs.

suzy ?

Hello. I entirely understand how you feel. My son is 12 and is experiencing these thoughts since primary school. I have read the comments and take away the need to listen and not try to fix. It is tempting as a parent to seek to find ways to remove the pain. That said his anxiety trigger seems to be school so he is not getting an education really so until that is fixed he will not achieve to his potential  and that, I feel ought to be fixed because he is bright and intelligent and not achieving feeds into his negative self image as lazy.  He is not accepting of his AUtism diagnosis and wants shake it off or says he only has it ‘a little bit’ , the power of negative stereotypes seem to resonate more with him.  Anyway I will be trying to sit and listen without my heart breaking each day and night. It is making me pretty sad and stressed though and I battle not to let this show. Good luck to you, and to your son.  you are not alone. 

I do, A lot depends on what he finds frustrating - it may be he literally needs to offload which will help him work stuff through. So rather than hear a suggestion on how to fix things he just might need space with you to explore how he's feeling and what's going on through his head with you - without moving onto how to fix it too quickly. 

 Reading the posts from   Plastic JuniperFromGallifrey I think they kind of got this more than I did. So if you're already making suggestions and he's shutting them down that could be the signal that isn't what he needs and that he needs something else.

Maybe. but what advice would we give him? I've still not got any of that stuff figured out. My best advice would be try and find friends who'll help you make more friends and look for active out going interest groups that align really well with your interests ... but that's not always posable, and even when it is it only takes you so far in my experience.

Oh absolutely. Hoping to help a mum see the upside of her hyper-analysing son. But if this is the case, he might want to have a go at contacting the community board direct?

I have to wonder though. What if its not existential angst. What if its very tangible things many teens struggle with. Things an autistic person might still be strugeling with in their 20s. Less 'what is the nature of reality' more, 'why don't I have any friends?' 'why can't I get a girlfriend,' 'why do I never get invited to join in things.' Some autistic people get a fresh revelation of how much society is treating them differently from others around the transition from school to adult education.

I'm Aspie - I've always found NT management will call me negative.    It's their way of saying "I don't want to hear reality, only ever good news".         When we talk to doctors, we are labelled as depressed and medicated.

The other way of looking at it if I drive an old car, I don't need to worry or think about the bits that are working - I only need to think about the dodgy things and my workarounds if things go wrong - same with life - we concentrate of possible failures all the time rather than just pushing through to success.

Our fight-or-flight is set to 100% all the time so it's natural that we are looking for doom, danger and escape routes as an ongoing process.

What college course is he doing and for what reason?    If he's feeling he's been railroaded, he'll be approaching the buffers and questioning what he's doing.

If he understands himself, he may be realising that he doesn't want the NT rat-race lifestyle.      If he's surrounded by useless NTs, he may have reached his social overload limit.

Are you able to talk to your son about life, the universe and everything - how he feels?    His thoughts, plans, ideas?    Things he wants to do, places to go, experiences to share?

You might be surprised.

Critical thinking, analysaing is a gift. We need humans who contemplate the dimensions of reality, the physics of matter. We need humans who can weigh out comes of steel frames, the elements and think of all the possible things which could go wrong when constructing aeroplanes, bridges, tunnels, ships to forge the arctic. We need humans who can think of what can go wrong in surgery, who can weigh all the possibilities of external problems to make sure a thing isn't cancer but a dietary issue. Unfortunately, this kind of thinking is often termed 'negative'. Yet it is necessary for the most basic survival. 

When I was 2-3 I started thinking about infinite space. I was plagued by nightmares of the eternal expanse of the universe. That's some deep thinking at too young of an age to contemplate. The philosophical constructs that I tried to work out when young - well before I had life experience or all the basic knowledge, caused a great deal of tears and frustration. I really admire that young me now. She simply lacked all the knowledge that comes with proper intensive study and learning and growing and becoming. She needed to sit in a library for 10 years. :)

I would've loved to be able to unload all of that on a parent! Luckily, as I got older, my father has been better at just letting me vent. He listens, doesn't judge, typically says he feels helpless and doesn't have answers but goodness, it's so helpful he just listens and says I love you. If I go extremely dark, just knowing he's catching all the words on the other end of the phone make me feel like I can let go of them.

That's taught me that as a parent, and my son is in his 20s, that I can be a "container" for my son as well. He doesn't always need answers, just some imaginary containment unit to offload all his philosophical inquiry or problems regardless of how grave or morbid. And since I'm maybe a little wiser and not his 'friend' but a mentor, I can just allow him to feel heard and sometimes ask "How can I help?" 

We all need to grow into our intellect. And those who are free to openly discuss a thing are less likely to suffer from it. Therapy can offer some practical help. But having a parent who is willing to listen, not fix, just be available, can make a world of difference. It is the secrets, the things not said one should fear.

That’s a good way of looking at it. “Wrestling with the world” 

Thanx E 

the college I find is that helpful! :( but I will

email them and his tutors and get in touch with the Aspergers centre. I just find my mind goes blank when he starts telling me, when I suggest things to him how I cope it’s just not what he wants to hear and is so negative and finds things to stop the suggestions straight away by looking at the down fall, if you get me :( 

I can only guess but I imagine he feels like he is wrestling with the world? A world not set up to give him a place to be himself.

He is perhaps turning the world over in his mind like a rubixs cube wondering how to solve it. How to make it fit himself, or maybe wondering if he can some how learn to fit it? I find the former more likely. His depression and anxiety don't exist in a vacuum there are tangible things driving them even if you don't understand why they do.

You can try to understand why, to map all the ways in which the world he lives in digs into him making him feel dreadful ... but even when you do you may end up just facing the same set of knotty problems he feels he can't solve on his own. But at least you could face them together. But be warned trying to fix the world to make it give a place to some one it doesn't want to give a place to can effectively feel like declaring war on the world. Still if you're going to go to war better to go with an ally than on your own, which is where your son probably finds himself now.

... but what do I know I'm extrapolating a lot.