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Refusal to believe in diagnosis

petal

HI, been a while so here is a synopsis. Son now 14, diagnosed ASD at 12, primary school botched up statementing progress so another year to go round robin with all parties, ot, ed pysc you know the drill. Finally agree to statementing and use of a laptop by time he is 13 1/2. Faast forward a year, everyone keeps leaving the school so continuity of statement does not flow as it should, school lost the laptop i purchased and still argue that orignal SENCO agreed he should use one as writing so bad.  GCSE year coming up and he is so behind on all course work, all oredictions of grades are D or lower, heartening isnt it. Now over Xmas whilst staying iwht in laws my sister in law decided it was time to tell me Alexanders diagnosis is wrong and that he was given the diagnosis just to push him through the system out of the way as they were sick of being presented with him. This is from an aunt who cant have kids,doesnt understand kids and refuses to allow the family to acknowledge Alexander is different. He is loving , kind and a great laugh and support to me,since he lost his dad in 2006 to cancer.  He finds tasks difficult but us attending school without hitch , apart from a weeks suspension for going after the bullies with a pair of scissors after four weeks of torment which the school were monitoring but he snapped before they dealt with the situatiuon, all before xmas this year. He does Moving forward project wotih Barnados which I highly recommend to anyone with a child needing life skills taught, volunteers in Oxfam for a few hours here and there and has managed to land a weeks worth of work experience at a very nice retail place, so its not all negative from my side but Im so frustrated with being on my own, with and 11 yr old daughter as well coping with no family support, no offers of taking him out or having him overnight in over 8 years. Im slowly starting to crack round the edges and my kids are noticing my short temper and less than understanding approach to things. I adore my kids its a shame the family, mainly the in laws do not feel the same as they are missing out on two great kids who are spirited, rowdy but so loving and would do anything to help when the chips are down. Glad I was able to get that of my mind for now. Best foot forward as they say and leave the negativity behind as best I can, thats my plan.

Thanks

Petal

Parents

  • Welcome Petal,

    My situation is very different to yours - I'm a middle aged guy who was just diagnosed recently.  Yet I can identify with how exasperating it can be to deal with people who will not accept my diagnosis for what it is, and me for the person I am.  Amongst the few people I have revealed my diagnosis to, I have encountered everything from people who took the time to try and understand what the experience meant to me, all the way through to folks who simply don't beleive my condition even exists.

    Sadly there are an awful lot of common misconceptions about autism - prior to diagnosis, I held many false notions about it myself..  The best that I can suggest would be to introduce any more sypathetic friends and relatives to resources like this one - and maybe not in the prescence of your in-law if she is one of those people that tends to dominate a conversation.

    How does your son feel about his interactions with the in-laws? (assuming that he has contact).  Thinking back to myself at that age, I could imagine the interactions between the adults around him might be quite a challenge sometimes - I know I often used to get a sixth sense for when there was a bit of an "atmosphere" between people, even if I could never nail the details.  Has he expressed any concerns about tensions within his family? or is he blissfully unaware? (as I was when my parents divorced - due to being autistic as much as anything they did or did not do).

    I wish I had an better answer for you - "there's none so blind as those that won't see", so they say.  You need allies so that you're not having to constantly justify that the situation you and you son find yourselves in is real.

    Best wishes.

Reply

  • Welcome Petal,

    My situation is very different to yours - I'm a middle aged guy who was just diagnosed recently.  Yet I can identify with how exasperating it can be to deal with people who will not accept my diagnosis for what it is, and me for the person I am.  Amongst the few people I have revealed my diagnosis to, I have encountered everything from people who took the time to try and understand what the experience meant to me, all the way through to folks who simply don't beleive my condition even exists.

    Sadly there are an awful lot of common misconceptions about autism - prior to diagnosis, I held many false notions about it myself..  The best that I can suggest would be to introduce any more sypathetic friends and relatives to resources like this one - and maybe not in the prescence of your in-law if she is one of those people that tends to dominate a conversation.

    How does your son feel about his interactions with the in-laws? (assuming that he has contact).  Thinking back to myself at that age, I could imagine the interactions between the adults around him might be quite a challenge sometimes - I know I often used to get a sixth sense for when there was a bit of an "atmosphere" between people, even if I could never nail the details.  Has he expressed any concerns about tensions within his family? or is he blissfully unaware? (as I was when my parents divorced - due to being autistic as much as anything they did or did not do).

    I wish I had an better answer for you - "there's none so blind as those that won't see", so they say.  You need allies so that you're not having to constantly justify that the situation you and you son find yourselves in is real.

    Best wishes.

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