Published on 12, July, 2020
He has always struggled with people, confidence and school that's gradually gotten worse as he's gotten older.
He has been upset with school from the start but they were adamant he'd improve eventually and to just 'keep on getting him in'...
I tried from nursery age to get an autism referral but he masked massively so no one would believe me, the last school year things got progressively worse and despite my best efforts school wouldn't put anything in place to help because they didn't believe there was a problem ,to the point he stopped going in June. We decided to go 'low demand' over the summer and just made sure that he ate, slept, kept basic hygiene and spent his time as he chose in the hope he'd recover from what I'm sure is burnout but now he rarely speaks or comes out of his room and just asks us to go away and leave him alone. Saying he's fine, often whilst crying.
We obviously told him we love him, care, understand, are here when/if he wants to talk but he just doesn't and we don't know what to do? We're still awaiting a diagnosis, and everywhere else says it's someone else's issue and basically they can't help.
This sounds really difficult. My heart goes out to you. Could you do a chart with some sticker ideas for him to write what goals he would like to achieve on for you to work on and strive towards?? Loneliness is something we feel as shame for an early age? Perhaps gently asking open questions as to why he feels so low? Then more direct questions about social life, if this is the cause of his worries/fear?? What are his interests? Do you play things together???
Really hope things improve!!