Published on 12, July, 2020
My son has recently been diagnosed. He managed to cope with life throughout his school years but when he left home to go to university he became very anxious and depressed. Despite this, he graduated last year after 3 lonely and unhappy years. It broke my heart to see him so isolated but although I tried to persuade him to drop out of uni and come home, he insisted on finishing the course.
Since last summer, he has had one temp office job which didn’t work out as they weren’t aware of his autism and he was unable to work to the standard that they were expecting. They liked him but in the end they suggested that he might want to resign rather than wait and be fired. Since then he has been unemployed. I found a local community arts centre for mental health and they have taken him on as a volunteer but this is only on one half day a week. They also arranged for him to do a short course at evening class on teaching skills as he is a talented musician.
Most of the time he spends in his room on his laptop. It is 11:30am and as usual he is in bed. He has no motivation to help me or his dad and has regressed into the role of a child with us running around after him. I am finding this very stressful as his older sister is disabled and is also unemployed although she is trying her very best to get a job.
I have put him in touch with the local autism centre but he doesn’t want to meet other people with autism. He is extremely intelligent and knowledgeable about a number of subjects. I am very concerned that he is so unhappy and anxious. He says he wants a job, a girlfriend and just to be ‘normal’. I have found a psychotherapist who specialises in Aspergers and I am paying for private sessions as my son says that she ‘gets him’. In the meantime I am unable to turn to friends or relations (with the exception of his dad) for support as he has told me not to tell anyone.
I don’t know how to help him. Are there any parents in a similar situation or that have had to cope with this sort of issue? To be honest all this is starting to affect my mental health.
Hey, my son is 22, diagnosed with Asperger's at 15. He tried a few different work placements but just couldn't cope. he now runs his own business from home as a photographer and digital artist, with my support. its hard work supporting him all the time but I think he'd be in the same position as your son if I wasn't doing it and be in his room a lot of the time. its brought him out of him self and given him more confidence and a sense of worth. Because My son gets pip it opened up the door for working tax credits for him, so even though he earns very little the working tax credits help him do a few extra things. Im sorry you and your son are struggling at the moment. Im struggling at the moment with it all as well, I don't know about you but I could do with a break, on my own, with a good book and no phone! Here if you want to chat
BC x
Thankyou for your message. What sort of support do you give your son with his business? I am thinking about helping my son to set up as a private tutor but I don’t want to end up spending my life nagging him.
I know what you mean about a break alone. I have found myself fantasising about running away on occasion. But then I come back down to earth and realise that I couldn’t leave the people I love behind. So then I think about us all running away together and starting a new life maybe buying a smallholding and living the good life....or sailing around the world......but they wouldn’t agree to it.....so I guess I had better just keep calm and carry on
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Flipping tough isn't it!. we still have days when it seems like I nag but, we have daily lists that he has to go through, like checking and updating social media, checking his website for sales and all the processes of packaging it and sending it off, then if i'm busy he can just go through the lists and follow the instructions, its taken a bit of time to come up with all the different procedures but thats been really important, we have a daily meeting at the start of the day and he delegates jobs to me. We have strict rules on new ideas, they have to go in the book for the next mornings meeting so as not to overload the day.
I've managed to get 12 hours free business support with our local council and they have been brill , we do it in 3 hourly sections 1to1 and they let me sit in and take notes, its really helped. When he 1st started we managed to get the grant for starting your own business I think that was £65 a month or week for a few months (sorry it was a while ago) the biggest help to our day is that I have a laptop so I can check his emails and sales to make sure he doesn't miss anything and google calendar, I can add tasks from my computer and he gets the reminders pop up on his. it means I don't have to ask or remind him to much.
As a mum, I feel like im doing the best I can for him and championing his corner, helping him be the best version of him that I can, but as a person it can be a lot of work, our work dynamic has changed a lot, my jobs are getting more menial (tonight im cutting out 250 key ring photo's) and he is taking on more. its taken 3 years to get here and I think if we had gone any faster he would have crashed.
If I can be of any help or support, just ask. It makes me very proud when he sells stuff or get good comments about his work, it makes all the hard times worth it