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Denial and threatening with a knife

NAS83580

My daughter is 14. Her autism was recognised a year ago and initially she was very accepting and quite relieved to understand herself better.

She has a long history of school avoidance and is currently not in school at all. She is in Year 10 and missed 9 months of Year 9. We are trying to get her to consider non school alternatives like online school so she gets a few GCSEs to help her in the future. However she flatly refuses to discuss any alternatives and keeps herself in a state of denial by watching TV and social media all day (nothing dangerous - mainly Taylor Swift and make up videos).

She says she is just dropping out and doesn’t want to do anything. Will not talk to me or to anyone. We have screen controls in place and she is getting increasingly frantic about them.  I let her have a lot of screen time to regulate herself but it is also her way of avoiding reality.  

This morning when I turned off her TV and her phone was off she had an extreme reaction. She got out a kitchen knife and was waving it around screaming about hating me and killing herself. It was all a big drama but frightening. I calmed her down but I am very shaken.

I don’t really believe she is suicidal she is just being extreme about getting what she wants as a teenager. But what on earth do I do next? I often back off with the view that she will find her own path and doing her GCSEs when she is older is fine I put her well-being first. But letting her ‘drop out’ does not feel like putting her well-being first. It feels like letting her down. 

Parents

  • Abosultely, if the pressure is too much, yes drop  out. My son had school trauma and had trouble during the last couple of years focusing and ithdrew from the  school system and basically from life for 12 years in his room, he often phoned me from his room saying he was suicidle. Howver, didn't do anything about these threats as I completely took the pressure off him and just encouraged him when I could. He did not take any exams, which saddened me at the time, when I heard other mothers say what their child had achieved, but as time went on and life went in, that boxed off view dissappeared and it was just about his survival and happinessand likewise the family. He's 33 now, still at home and has keem interests with a very educated mind and is helping me care for his younger brother who has quite serious MH problems currently. He is very keen to progress in his life when his brother survives his crisis. His younger brother was home schooled from 11 onwards and again did not fall in the same boxed off school system and did not take exams, however, went onto teach himself many languages which i hope he will resume at some point.

    You can't always chose how life should be, it just becomes and i dont mean to sound wise with that, think you are doing right by your daughter and allowing her to do what she can cope with. All the best

Reply

  • Abosultely, if the pressure is too much, yes drop  out. My son had school trauma and had trouble during the last couple of years focusing and ithdrew from the  school system and basically from life for 12 years in his room, he often phoned me from his room saying he was suicidle. Howver, didn't do anything about these threats as I completely took the pressure off him and just encouraged him when I could. He did not take any exams, which saddened me at the time, when I heard other mothers say what their child had achieved, but as time went on and life went in, that boxed off view dissappeared and it was just about his survival and happinessand likewise the family. He's 33 now, still at home and has keem interests with a very educated mind and is helping me care for his younger brother who has quite serious MH problems currently. He is very keen to progress in his life when his brother survives his crisis. His younger brother was home schooled from 11 onwards and again did not fall in the same boxed off school system and did not take exams, however, went onto teach himself many languages which i hope he will resume at some point.

    You can't always chose how life should be, it just becomes and i dont mean to sound wise with that, think you are doing right by your daughter and allowing her to do what she can cope with. All the best

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