Published on 12, July, 2020
I am curious if other parents with kids on the spectrum have as much difficulty as I do 'making' their children do chores? I have put 'making' in quotes because to be honest, their is no 'making' .. there is only the getting them to agree that it would helpful for them to be helpful at this particular time and place ...
And I guess I just more or less answered my own question because it seems to me, their is no 'making' because attempts to reason, or yell at them (my frustration) don't work - they tend to meltdown if I do that. They will be very helpful if they are in the mood to be helpful which doesn't actually happen all that often for my son (almost 16) (once a month and when he does he is outstanding but he has all kinds of other issues like he can only be around other people for about 3-4 hours before he shuts down).
This leaves my poor oldest daughter (age 17) as the main 'slave' because at the moment she is the only one who will do anything ... she doesn't like it though and if I ask too much she will also melt. And timescales ... unless I give a good reason that she agrees with that it needs to be done 'NOW', she will put it off and go back into her own little world and forget even if I remind her 3 or 4 times a day for 3 days (3 days is about the average length of time it takes for her to do something if it isn't urgent).
NT daughter (age 12) with sensory issues generally times a temper tantrum or angst the moment she is asked to do anything and thus wiggles out of it ...
This is a bit of a rant. I know I must not be the only one. During school term time, I don't even begin to ask as everyone is so stressed and overloaded from school
I hate housework myself. If I had known it would be my main job (besides working full-time and running the house including all the finances and making sure people ate properly ...). ARRRRRRGGGG ....
Too much. And the worst thing is ... they aren't getting the skills they will need in the future when I'm gone ...
Anyone else?
Dor
I read this thread and really related to it. I have 3 children, 1 of which is diagnosed autistic, plus I'm suspecting I'm autistic too. Getting any of my children to help with chores is a real trial, but particularly my ASD daughter.
It used to be we could effectively "bribe" them to do it, meaning they clean their rooms and once a month they get pocket money, but that is definitely losing its luster. My ASD daughter won't even let us into her room now because she likes it just her way, but she also won't do anything to tidy it up either.
Me and my wife both feel the strain of it at different times. When she's in the positive mood she reminds me what I was like as a child, but I always say I did tidy up after myself, I was incredibly conscientious (still am), so I'm probably not the best role model!
I'm also a programmer (coincidence) so totally get how after doing a full time job where you concentrate really hard makes it hard to suddenly context switch back to parent mode. I'm trying at the moment to really make an effort to work out priorities when that happens - like focus on making dinner before any big tidying up, that could wait. I still find it annoying though when my kids have just dumped school bags and shoes everywhere for me to tread over though.