14 Year old daughter

As a mother, I feel this pain. As an Autist who had a mother who didn't understand her, I have experience being young without the language to communicate the problem. 

I spent my 30s diving into psychoanalytical understanding not knowing I had an autistic-analytic brain. We are wired very differently.

First of all, it's good to remember you're not her competitor. Our job as parents is always the mentor, never the equal. It's not my sons job to be my therapist. It's mine to accumulate wisdom enough to help him and now he's 25, I'm still in that role. Watching my grandparents with my father I don't doubt I'll ever leave that role.

I would stop trying to make her understand and start trying to understand her. Autism doesn't come and go. It's a complex different way of experiencing and understanding the world. We don't compete. And it is the one way to lose trust with children. 

We now have neurological proof that the Autistic brain is impacted intensely by emotions and senses. From what I've found, our Beta Waves oscillate different than Neurotypical brains. This is 1 part of the key reason we cannot just 'dull' our senses or get 'used to' a thing (the other has to do with language). We are impacted by external sensory - smell, taste, sound, lights, atmosphere, etc. and internal sensory including Emotion. It IS intense. Thus, the only way to find a balanced 'sense of being' is: 1. Change my environment so I'm not constantly battling external sensory impact and continually frustrated. 2. Learn matters of wisdom, ethics, relationships, boundaries, what is abusive and what is 'life'. How to invest and how to set standards. How to earn and allow others to earn my trust and how to spot a sociopath. I cannot tell you how absolutely necessary this is for her emotional well-being. I read The Artists Way. I took yoga classes. I went to church. I did anything I could to find principles of being. I found a balanced sense of being finally around 35. I didn't discover autism until my 40s.

Feelings and Emotions are a response to our internal Perceptions of the world, plus our beliefs of those perceptions add a Real Impact. If someone provokes me, I should feel something. The degree of that will be determined by a context. If it's intentional or abusive (a partner or a parent or friend), it will sever trust and if I'm too young to know better I may think it's my fault or I'm not worth much which could cause unnecessary trauma. If I'm old enough to recognise it for what it is, I may feel angry or I may snap and suddenly recognise this behaviour is not worth my time and sever the connexion. Now. this context changes entirely if it's from a 5 year old.

One thing that has made it easy for my son to become so much more emotionally stable at 25 than I ever could've been, is I have done this hard work which he seems to just pick up. He battled these extremes in his teenage years. Once his father passed away and I was able to be around him more often, the hard work I'd been doing to grow emotionally and psychologically just dusted off onto him. My job is to simply help build a platform for him to dive off of. 

Taking away things won't fix these problems. Daughters need to feel protected and understood. That is repeatedly the most impactful and soul-crushing experience most Autistics express by 30. From her stand point, she might feel no one empathises with her. And in this society, which hinges on fairness, humans pay forward how they're treated. But deep down, autistics don't desire to Constantly Live feeling Isolated and 'Shielding', or always in a sort of Survival Mode. We need to thrive. Even plants have a nursery, our children need the same. 

We cannot force a process. Nor cut it short. x

I don’t think I really understand all of this. 
I don’t think I can ever properly understand how she thinks, as I can never put myself in that situation unfortunately. But I do understand she thinks differently and pick my battles accordingly to this. 

Regardless of having autism or any disability I would still feel that you need to be mindful of hurting other peoples feelings. Which is what she did do here. 

I don’t want her growing up thinking you can upset people and blame autism. I wouldn’t accept the behaviour from my 3 other children. They all have different needs but I don’t believe it’s ever right to hurt and upset someone else. 

The parent of the upset child wanted me to take my daughter to have a chat with hers. I didn’t agree to this as I knew my daughter wouldn’t talk or be able to verbally put into words why or how she was feeling. 

Oh goodness. I do not ever agree that we should set aside ethics. But what I am suggesting here is that there is a Larger Construct of what is happening.

All humans need to be held accountable for their actions and words. They need to understand Consequence. They also need to understand the Natural Order of Things. What my role and responsibilities are. And how to ask for Help. And how to facilitate room for those I am responsible for to ask for help. Principles exist for humans to learn matters of ethics. 

I don't think it's a bad thing to have a chat. That is a valid form of reasoning. However, I'd suggest it happening in the right time. It may take your daughter a few weeks or a month or a year to work out what is happening and what exactly, she is Responding To. For autistics, we are typically in Survival Mode and Response Mode until our mid 30's due to how society currently is. We need help identifying emotions. We need help identifying how Allistics (non-autistics) manipulate others. When I use identity I simply mean applying the Pragmatic Language to a seemingly invisible system or thing happening. Like gift giving. Is someone giving me a gift to create a debt? Or is this person a genuine friend who knows I cannot pay this back. 

Here is an example of Response / Survival that many Autistic children live with: Many children are subjected to ABA (applied behaviour analysis) which has been constructed by Non-autistics or Allistic individuals as a form of attempting to force or coerce Autistic children to be Compliant and Socially "normal", rather than (appearing) "stubborn" and socially awkward. When I say stubborn, this is the word Allistics would use. From an autistic standpoint, that child is feeling Trapped, vulnerable and being stripped of Agency.

One method ABA will use is that of continual interruption, which is exciting for many Non-Autistics. However, the autistic-brain is wired differently. We can succeed with the ability to hyper-focus, with Diligence and Integrity: our internal world and desires, with proper mentorship, can match our external words. Our words and actions can easily match. At a mature level, we can be authentic and mindful. Most Non-autistics cannot ever be genuinely authentic. But as Autistics, we can easily become dependable and trustworthy. But these are because our Natural Mode of Being should be a state of Flow, without Interruption or interrogation. It should be we're giving 15-30 minute warnings before a sharp change happens, we should have 3 hours on one subject as children or a whole day rather than micro-bits of 7-8 subjects. This capacity is built into our Gamma and Beta waves. We are structurally different. So ABA, when using this form of constant change, instead of it being exciting, it is experienced by an Autistic child like a prisoner of war: harsh lights at random night hours to interrupt sleeping, in-human Sensory outputs which we feel waterboarded by. It is like living in a horror house of mirrors with things constantly popping out and screaming at you. ABA, using a method for Allistics on a completely different brain type, thus terrorises and traumatises young autistics turning them in to Zombies at best. Is this ethical? No. Yet this is considered OK by society. 

Back to your daughter. It could be this girl smells funny. Or it could be she's incredibly sociopathic and manipulative and an Autistic child will never know how to properly identify and deal with this. We don't possess the language skills and social 'coding' to play these theatre games - which much of society does enjoy. And here I'm talking about human behaviour, well studied, with at least 100 years of psychoanalytical proof. The way Allistics use their brain is such that there is a heavy amount of reasoning with the Lobes responsible for language and meaning. 

While it's OK for your daughter to learn to be ethically Kind because she has experienced kindness when she didn't deserve it, or to be ethically upright - Doctor Whovian like even with her principles and engagement, understand this takes years of Becoming and becoming mature. The first point which needs addressing is What is she Responding To. 

It is possible to understand her to many degrees. How does society behave in ways that are actually unkind but "that's just the way it is". What is the reason for this. When the ethics of these are better understood,  sometimes it's easier for the Autistic to just allow them, as the compounded frustration of not knowing how to identify a thing has subsided. 

Oh goodness. I do not ever agree that we should set aside ethics. But what I am suggesting here is that there is a Larger Construct of what is happening.

All humans need to be held accountable for their actions and words. They need to understand Consequence. They also need to understand the Natural Order of Things. What my role and responsibilities are. And how to ask for Help. And how to facilitate room for those I am responsible for to ask for help. Principles exist for humans to learn matters of ethics. 

I don't think it's a bad thing to have a chat. That is a valid form of reasoning. However, I'd suggest it happening in the right time. It may take your daughter a few weeks or a month or a year to work out what is happening and what exactly, she is Responding To. For autistics, we are typically in Survival Mode and Response Mode until our mid 30's due to how society currently is. We need help identifying emotions. We need help identifying how Allistics (non-autistics) manipulate others. When I use identity I simply mean applying the Pragmatic Language to a seemingly invisible system or thing happening. Like gift giving. Is someone giving me a gift to create a debt? Or is this person a genuine friend who knows I cannot pay this back. 

Here is an example of Response / Survival that many Autistic children live with: Many children are subjected to ABA (applied behaviour analysis) which has been constructed by Non-autistics or Allistic individuals as a form of attempting to force or coerce Autistic children to be Compliant and Socially "normal", rather than (appearing) "stubborn" and socially awkward. When I say stubborn, this is the word Allistics would use. From an autistic standpoint, that child is feeling Trapped, vulnerable and being stripped of Agency.

One method ABA will use is that of continual interruption, which is exciting for many Non-Autistics. However, the autistic-brain is wired differently. We can succeed with the ability to hyper-focus, with Diligence and Integrity: our internal world and desires, with proper mentorship, can match our external words. Our words and actions can easily match. At a mature level, we can be authentic and mindful. Most Non-autistics cannot ever be genuinely authentic. But as Autistics, we can easily become dependable and trustworthy. But these are because our Natural Mode of Being should be a state of Flow, without Interruption or interrogation. It should be we're giving 15-30 minute warnings before a sharp change happens, we should have 3 hours on one subject as children or a whole day rather than micro-bits of 7-8 subjects. This capacity is built into our Gamma and Beta waves. We are structurally different. So ABA, when using this form of constant change, instead of it being exciting, it is experienced by an Autistic child like a prisoner of war: harsh lights at random night hours to interrupt sleeping, in-human Sensory outputs which we feel waterboarded by. It is like living in a horror house of mirrors with things constantly popping out and screaming at you. ABA, using a method for Allistics on a completely different brain type, thus terrorises and traumatises young autistics turning them in to Zombies at best. Is this ethical? No. Yet this is considered OK by society. 

Back to your daughter. It could be this girl smells funny. Or it could be she's incredibly sociopathic and manipulative and an Autistic child will never know how to properly identify and deal with this. We don't possess the language skills and social 'coding' to play these theatre games - which much of society does enjoy. And here I'm talking about human behaviour, well studied, with at least 100 years of psychoanalytical proof. The way Allistics use their brain is such that there is a heavy amount of reasoning with the Lobes responsible for language and meaning. 

While it's OK for your daughter to learn to be ethically Kind because she has experienced kindness when she didn't deserve it, or to be ethically upright - Doctor Whovian like even with her principles and engagement, understand this takes years of Becoming and becoming mature. The first point which needs addressing is What is she Responding To. 

It is possible to understand her to many degrees. How does society behave in ways that are actually unkind but "that's just the way it is". What is the reason for this. When the ethics of these are better understood,  sometimes it's easier for the Autistic to just allow them, as the compounded frustration of not knowing how to identify a thing has subsided.