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16 year old girl barely speaking

NAS35120

Hello 

looking for any advice/guidance regarding my 16 year old daughter.  She has become really withdrawn, barely communicates with myself, husband and older sister.  She does text daily with her 2 friends, doesn’t often see them but texts daily. She is currently not attending school, has been in mainstream with autism unit attached.  She has really struggled with secondary education and is desperate to leave.  Doesn’t have a plan in place, won’t talk to people she doesn’t know at all.  I’m totally lost and don’t know how to help her! All advice welcome. 

  • My son is also out of college at the moment. Educational institutions can be completely overwhelming for autistic people - especially if they’re not getting excellent support (which most don’t in my experience).

    it’s good that she’s texting her friends - that’s really positive. It can be nicer and less stressful than seeing people in person. What interests does she have? It is some intense interest of some kind that usually energises autistic people and motivates them and makes them happy. Without that we soon get very down. 
    I would make it clear to her that you are always there for her and that there is no pressure coming from you to get her to do things. Pressure from any source causes a huge amount of stress and often makes people withdraw. 

  • Hi , thank you for sharing with the online community. I am sorry to hear that your daughter is going through such a difficult time. Have you tried contacting your GP to get some support for your daughter?

    In terms of her education and having a plan for the future, you may wish to contact our Transition Support service, who offer advice, support and information to young autistic people aged 14 years plus and their parents or carers on the transition to adulthood. 

    If you would like to contact the Transition Support service, you can reach them by completing the online enquiry form here: https://www.autism.org.uk/what-we-do/help-and-support/transition-support-service.

    I hope this helps.

    Best wishes,

    Anna Mod

  • While all teenagers to some degree will be trying to work out how to find their own agency in the world and retreating away from parents, withdrawing can be a sign of trauma. But it's neither productive to force relationship. Building trust with our children is often a learning experience and sometimes by helping them reason through and trouble shoot life problems while finding ways to earn time with them. 

    But first, I might suggest to assume she will never have a 'plan' in 'place'. This is neurotypical Desire as encoded by society. As autistics, we have strengths of our own but the brain cannot be everything to everyone and while we succeed at neuro-networks which NTs fail at, Executive Functions are not in our bag of tricks. We learn ways to work around these but we never conquer them. 

    She may happen across something inspiring. And it may allow her to feel as though she finally has a direction for her life. When she's 25. But it's better for us if we focus on finding out what our skills are and work on emotional wisdom and analytic reasoning. We can possibly mature in Different Ways much faster than our neurotypcial peers, while they may advance in social and practical ways faster than us. But rarely will you meet any 18 year old who will have a mindful life plan while slaying daily responsibilities like a 40 year old. It just doesn't exist except in rare cases of children who have trust funds and peerage. 

    If she's not attending school, what has she found that she can focus on. What are her surroundings like as far as sensory elements including emotional, not just physical?

    Does she have a halogen lamp for reading? Is there an uninterrupted space for her to focus (no social media for instance), does she have a delegated time to just be creative? A 16 year old won't come up with a daily log and lesson plans. I'm in my 40s and in order to put a one day seminar together, it can take me a week or a month. This, after 15 years in my field. If I were to set up lessons for my son it might include a week foraging, learning how to camp in the wild, picking up the paper daily and then a few subjects of study daily. I couldn't teach him many things, so I might find tutors or plan one day at the library. There are so many things in life one can learn at a work shop from coding to jewellery making. These explorations can open doors and possibly spark interest. She won't contain the resources to know how to find these, that's what we, as parents, are for :)