The last year has been really difficult with C, our 17 yo trans daughter. She was diagnosed with autism at about 9 and has always been very bright, engaged and although she had some social problems at school and struggled to keep friends, and we suffered a lot of anger and violence at home, we kind of clung on.
Thankfully the violence has stopped recently but C has spent the last year gradually withdrawing. It started with school withdrawal just before her GCSEs and she'd simply stay in bed. Thankfully we managed to get her through GCSEs and thanks to her work and memory she did well.
She got a place in college and the first two months were okay. Since she fell out with a friend though she's struggled with friendships and this has precipitated another withdrawal. She can't get to the bus on time and instances are getting worse and more frequent. Over Christmas it turned into simply staying in bed most days. She wouldn't come to her grandparents or out with us on holiday, simply refusing to do her her or start her routine. Some days not eating.
We have been for family therapy, which started to try and tackle the violence. We're continuing that but doesn't really work as she simply doesn't want to solve her problems, or really have any insight into them. If we talk about the future then she gets stressed, she wants to go to uni but we can't see how it's going to happen at the moment so we're encouraging her to take one day at a time. She refuses to accept she's autistic, and won't engage the GP or college to get help,.not does she want us doing it.
She spends all her time on her phone and stays up late, to 2 or 3am. We simply can't take away WiFi or Phone as the violence we've had terrifies us, and we've had to adopt a policy of not tackling her forcefully with anything like that as it's not helped.
I've come up with pages of ideas to help her,.and at the therapists suggestion I'm trying to be supportive and offer constant love and not criticism (although it's hard, I just want to shake her and get her moving).
The phone "addiction" (because I think that's what's it is) seems to be the biggest challenge, she can't put it down for even a few seconds. It causes delays in her routine so even when she's getting ready for college and trying her best she will often lose focus because she loses time in her phone. I've suggested she installs blockers but she insists it's not a problem and she's only listening to music (but then gets distracted again).
Even the dinner table which used to be phone free has seen her insist "that was never a thing" and why wouldn't she use a phone.
Me and my wife are at our wits end. Seeing our amazing, intelligent daughter simply withdraw and disappear and get worse and worse is heartbreaking. And we simply don't know what to do.
