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Struggling with helping myself and my 26 year old son

nikkij

Hi everyone. My son was diagnosed with Aspergers a couple of years ago. he is very high functioning but cannot make friends and is therefore very lonely and depressed. He is also unemployed as he had a breakdown a couple of years ago after the loss of jobs and family misunderstandings. He still sees his psychiatrist every now and again, she considers his depression fairly minor even though he goes through patches of suicidal talk and severe unhappiness where he just sleeps all the time. I go with him to the doctors as getting him to talk is a bit like pulling teeth.

He presents to the rest of the world as being "fine" and it seems that I am the only person that realises how unhappy he is.

 

I am a worrier and want nothing more than to be able to help my son be happy. I do realise I can't do that but I am always trying to be as supportive as I can.

i think that I need to get some support for me as I am slowly getting more and more depressed myself as I don't see any way out of our situation.

When  my son and I talk we are usually having two different conversations. I do my best to ensure that we understand each other but lots of times that has not happened even though I thought it had. Life is very stressful at the moment I am on the verge of tears constantly.

Has anyone got any advice. I am going to see my GP tomorrow. I have had CBT and do understand the theory of being able to turn things around with positive thinking. That is so much easier to say than do. Antidepressants don't agree with me.

I am feeling pretty awful I just need someone to talk to that understands and can perhaps help me to come up with a way of talking to my son that does not usually end in confusion or an argument.

 

Parents

  • I have also had a recent encounter with the idea that people on the spectrum are more empathic. The problem is that sensory overload gets in the way.

    I can also relate to Dream's experience of shutting down when trying to go through any kind of unfamiliar experience, like logging in to some websites. And if someone is going on about something, I shut down.

    A parallel issue is this notion that people on the spectrum "lack imagination". If you have difficulty following social interchange, and take things literally, and take a long tiime to process information, you might well appear to lack imagination. But the claim is nevertheless preposterous, and if anything the opposite is true.

    It just evidences the consistent failure of the so-called centres of excellence on autism to properly understand the condition and the difficulties in people's daily lives.

    But if you look at the study population they use to provide examples, they are usually working with people with secondary issues such as depression or psychiatric problems (as, let's face it, people who are managing don't get seen). So how do they distinguish actual day to day behaviours due to autistic spectrum, rather than those due to secondary complications?

    I suspect the problem for many parents is that a great deal of the day to day issues facing people on the spectrum are inadequately documented and little understood. Meltdowns are an obvious example.The people in the front line are the parents or carers. They have nowhere to go to for help, and are often left to problem solve via first hand experience. Yet their experience generally isn't being recorded or studied.

    So I can fully empathise (even if not deemed capable) with what Nikkij describes. There really needs to be better support for parents and carers. Parents Groups don't necessarily do that, as they just seem to fester with anger. And I cannot see anything meaningful in this direction coming out of the Autism Act.

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  • I have also had a recent encounter with the idea that people on the spectrum are more empathic. The problem is that sensory overload gets in the way.

    I can also relate to Dream's experience of shutting down when trying to go through any kind of unfamiliar experience, like logging in to some websites. And if someone is going on about something, I shut down.

    A parallel issue is this notion that people on the spectrum "lack imagination". If you have difficulty following social interchange, and take things literally, and take a long tiime to process information, you might well appear to lack imagination. But the claim is nevertheless preposterous, and if anything the opposite is true.

    It just evidences the consistent failure of the so-called centres of excellence on autism to properly understand the condition and the difficulties in people's daily lives.

    But if you look at the study population they use to provide examples, they are usually working with people with secondary issues such as depression or psychiatric problems (as, let's face it, people who are managing don't get seen). So how do they distinguish actual day to day behaviours due to autistic spectrum, rather than those due to secondary complications?

    I suspect the problem for many parents is that a great deal of the day to day issues facing people on the spectrum are inadequately documented and little understood. Meltdowns are an obvious example.The people in the front line are the parents or carers. They have nowhere to go to for help, and are often left to problem solve via first hand experience. Yet their experience generally isn't being recorded or studied.

    So I can fully empathise (even if not deemed capable) with what Nikkij describes. There really needs to be better support for parents and carers. Parents Groups don't necessarily do that, as they just seem to fester with anger. And I cannot see anything meaningful in this direction coming out of the Autism Act.

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