A couple more questions about my son's behavior

Post Reply New Topic

I am so sorry that you are going through so much stress. I am a firm believer that parents have to take care of themselves first if they hope to take care of their children. You have to think long term about how to financial prepare for your older years and maybe also prepare for your son as he grows older. If you need to take some time to get your education together and to get your psychological state in order, I really think you should. Then, when you come back to deal with your family, you will be doing it with a clear head.

Something has to give, and none of us here can make that choice for you. You aren't going to find a magic pill, a parenting suggestion, or anything else that will short cut the process and give you the things you want without having to make hard choices.

And it stinks.

But that is life.

My thoughts reading about your position flew straight to your husband: he needs to invest in a solution just as much as you do, and this conversation needs to happen with him. What can he do to help either you or your son? What can he change for a few years so that he becomes part of the solution?

Sometime over the next few years, your family will have to dig in and invest in your son big time. I personally think that now is the best time, but I also can't guarantee that making that choice won't mean you won't hit another wall down the road, although I personally think the odds of heading things off with a few years of extra focus are really, really good. I have never regretted the investment I made in my son when he was 10-11-12, and I've spent a lifetime regretting that I was too trapped in the equivalent of a speeding car when my son was 3-4 to give him what he needed most then.

Right now you are strapped in a speeding car, and it just isn't working. I wish it was, I really wish it was, but it isn't.

Of course, one thing that may make all this more difficult is that you probably did some heavy investing in your son years ago, and things went well for a long time. That can lull a parent into a false sense of security, thinking the worst is over. Yeah, we're never done, and middle school is a known super tricky time. Forewarning: some other common tricky phases with ASD boys seem to be pending graduation (high school and/or college, Junior year sometimes) and young adulthood / transition to independence.

You might be able to get by ignoring the issues, or hard-hand disciplining them until your son figures out on his own how to pretend well enough to avoid severe negative consequences. But I've read enough posts from adults on this forum to know that that isn't an answer any of us really want. Far too many will never speak with their parents again, and far too many grow up with permanent issues that strongly negative affect their adult lives. You wouldn't be here is that was what you were willing to accept for your son.

So.

Don't forget that your son can probably be part of the solution. Start by being honest with your son about the situation as you see it, and what your needs are. See if you can get him to share what he is feeling (if he even knows what he is feeling; he may not). Try to read between the lines: our kids don't always communicate in the common way, so sometimes they mean something different than we would naturally assume they do. And see if he has ideas on what he can do to help the situation. You might find that he thinks he can cook family meals easier than he can remember to pick up after himself (many middle school boys really enjoy cooking, although being naturally unsanitary I wouldn't leave them totally alone in a kitchen; my son will forget to do things like wash the veggies, and has been known to chop them up and start cooking with labels still on; its that odd gifts and burdens thing). Many of our kids are very willing to help; that isn't the problem. The problem is figuring out what they can do effectively and without a lot of stress. You may find the answers in surprising places; don't assume anything is off limits. He might even enjoy paying the family bills; who knows (not that I know any kids doing that one; cooking or laundry or gardening seem to be most common).

I have one idea on wholesale changes that might help, and I realize that there are no ideas here that won't be painful: cut back on the animals. You worry about their safety and you worry about their care, and unless they are a key part of someone in your families stress relief and self-calming process, they are not necessary to your life. Invest in finding them good homes elsewhere.

I don't know if you can or should reconsider homeschooling or not; many of our families here homeschool for the simple reason that their kids cannot function well in a traditional school environment. If that is true for your son, you are stuck there.

Is your mom close by enough that she could help out in some way? Have that talk with her. Let her know everything you are facing.

Everything else: sit down with your husband and prioritize.

I am sorry you are in this position and, yes, you have to take care of yourself, too, or you can't be there in the way your son needs you to be. Spend some quiet time outside of the speeding car that will allow you to visualize all the difficult decisions ahead, so that you can find the best route. Sometimes we can really surprise ourselves, finding an option we had assumed wasn't there.

Best of luck and huge hugs.

Oh, thank you, thank you.

I really don't know how I am going to do this. Once I get hired, life will be better because there is a lot of down time on an ambulance, which I can use to study, check homework, etc. Before that happens, I have to get through the class. ANd I have to do it really well, because I want to be able to pick my assignment and get the company and shift I want.

I have talked to my hubs until I am blue in the face. It doesn't help. He has way too many excuses and a lot of learned helplessness. Where I am usually saying, "how can I make this happen?" he will say, "it can't be done."

Homeschool, 4-H projects,. animal care, housework, cooking, laundry--its all mine. I can ask for help, and sometimes I get it, but most of the time the job is not finished or it is done wrong or it is done in some way that messes up some other part of my life. For example, last night hubs did half the dishes, got side tracked, and never finished them. This happens all the time, but for some reason he refuses to do a whole sink full of dishes. He just won't change his system. Another example--I asked him to clean my pet mice cages, because I had to work. He did it, and they look great. But instead of putting the trash in the trash basket, he put it in the basket that is supposed to hold the towels in the upstairs bathroom. (I am trying to make a system where he folds the laundry and sorts it into the proper baskets for each room) then he put all the upstairs bathroom laundry in Kiddo's basket, and now kiddo has no basket. So he folded Kiddo's clothes (the one chore he does consistently, but he never finishes that, either) and put them all over the living room.

So you see how things can really spiral out of control around here.

It is really tough, isn't it?

My best advice is to simplify. I am a list person, so I would make a list of all the chores, and everything that I want to get done and , need to get done for future goals. When you see this list it is going to be huge. Pick out the few things you think you can give to your husband that won't get you more upset if/when he messes them up.

Figure out what is faster if you do it yourself rather than having your son do it, dropping anything that is not absolutely crucial. Then you will have to make the hard choices. You may have to postpone some goals, you may have to multitask some of your downtime recharging activities. Don't eliminate them all though or you will go crazy. If you have the money, and it is worth it to you, outsource some household tasks to a housekeeping service or a trustworthy neighborhood kid.

The animals are there primarily for your son (and maybe husband?) I would second DW, then - that's a lot of work and you don't seem to be getting any payoff in terms of learned responsibility, etc.

Explain to your family that you need to simplify, and that you will be relocating the animals to a local school, church, or somewhere where kids can learn from them. Tell your husband and son that you can't take care of all the things you need to do AND animals - but if they can learn strategies to help you around the house and make some progress in contributing to the work, you will see about bringing the animals back. Chart and list your expectations and have some way of showing progress over time - a couple of months, at least. (Ask wherever it is if they can "foster" the animals for you so you have that option.)

Your husband needs to know you need help and to find a way to figure it out with you. He may not be able to BE the help, but he can certainly work with you to figure it out.

Your husband might be ASD, as well. One of the traits I've observed is an inability to see option D as a way to get something done. Or maybe its just coincidence that both my husband and son struggle with it, since my NT sister is the same. Anyway. Me, I'll never give up if I want something to happen. If I've eliminated A and B, I dream up C. If that doesn't work, I keep on going. But both my husband and son believe every last possibility has been exhausted if B fails. Going beyond that just doesn't seem to be something they can do. So, I have to brainstorm it for them. Keep throwing out nuggets of ideas and hope that one strikes them as possible. And I never stop with those nuggets, lol; like I said, I'm not into giving up. When something is important.

Definitely simplify. Less pets, less breakables, less dishes, faster dinners. Don't assign chores, but encourage them to find ways to help that work for them. And so on. You don't have to have it all, you just have to have enough.

Actually, I have been trying to simplify for quite some time. I do a lot of crock pot dinners and casseroles, that I can throw together in the morning and then have it cook itself. My son has a morning routine and a chore chart that he does, if reminded consistently to do it.

Most of the animals are mine, actually. They are important to my self-soothing. Almost any time I sit down, there is a cat or a chicken (I have 2 tiny ones that are house pets until it gets warm enough to put them outside) in my lap. Sometimes it will be two cats AND a chicken and even a guinea pig or two. To be honest, I would be going to veterinary technician school instead of EMT school if I could afford it.

My son and I share their care, with him doing things for them in the morning and me doing them at night. Usually I do half the morning chores, too. It doesn't take that long.

But I did send an email to a shelter that I know takes roosters and asked if I could turn over 2 of my boys. I could give them away for meat, but that makes me sad to think of it. I also decided we would not be getting any new animals for quite some time. Normally we would be ordering some chicks this time of year, and I had my eye on some young hens of a rare type, but not this year. For some reason, my husband decided we should adopt a dog, but fortunately the shelter never called us back. Thank God!

I have been giving this situation a lot of thought, and this is what I have come up with:

I have to take this EMT class and I have to take it now. We are not making enough money to survive and I have to get a full time job and insurance. This is not an option.

Next to my own education, my son's education is my highest priority. This is where things get sticky. Up until now, I have given him my full attention during school time. Now I will need him to work independently at least part of the day, so I can study. This is where it gets tricky. I think I am going to start a new thread for these issues.

As for Hubs, I don't know what to say there. I asked him for some basic help. it's not that he WON'T help, but he wants to help in his own way, which is not going to be all that helpful. His idea of helping includes large, elaborate chore charts (pages of them!) What I want is simple: put away ALL the laundry, do ALL the supper dishes, and help kiddo with school work. He does NOT want to do these things. He wants to start each week by spending an entire day vacuuming one set of stairs and organizing all the shoes there. I wish we could just put our shoes in the closet, but for some reason this is unacceptable to him. I know from experience that he will follow his plan for a few months, if that, and the house will look spectacular. Then he will crash and burn, and all will descend into chaos again. He will also get so involved in his housework projects, he won't hold up his end of kiddo's schooling. I know this because it has happened several times before. He will also want to know why I have not been doing any housework, when I have spent the entire day with my son and his school work, and starting next week, my own. If he can't see some actual result, he just will not give me any credit.

I can see where having animals is help soothe you, but you may want to find a way to simplify. Also, it might be easier to hire in a neighbor just for animal husbandry than for all the other stuff (a kid your son's age might be able to do it, or to help your son do it.)

Money can help. Keeping stress manageable can help, too - be sure you aren't giving up one for the other.

My husband is this way: he's all-or-nothing. We had to find ways to work around it to make sure we all got things done to a reasonable level that was acceptable to all of us.

It also helped for me to find one of those "Mom calculators" so I could express in a quantitative way all of the things I did every day and why the house was always a mess.

What did you end up doing to work around that gung-ho mentality? And where did you find the Mom-calculator?

I can't see hiring anyone for the animals because they really don't need all that much, and money is tight. I will have to do it myself. That's OK, though, I just have to add them to my routine.

I am ALL ABOUT systems and routines. I learned it in the Army and the more structured my days are, the better off I am. I like my routines because they give me a sense of control and help me remember to get everything done. I am always tweaking the routines to make them easier and more efficient. I do pretty well with small systems over which I have control. For example, there are about 10,000 steps involved in what I have to do to get ready for work (driving a horse and carriae) , from my first cup of coffee in the morning, to dressing for the cold (in stages), to grooming, harnessing, and hitching the horse. It is a 4-5 hour process from the time my feet hit the floor until I drive out the gate at the barn. I keep all my stuff in the same place and put everything back at the end of the day, so I know where to find it all the next day.

This works so well for me. I wish I could get them to see the benefit of it, too.

I am actually on the other side of this type of system. All people are different - what benefits you may be detrimental to them. That's what my husband and I finally did: we sat down and figured out which results were most important to us, and then how we could get to that result in our own way.

I sometimes get "stuck" in lots of little details. I always used to compare myself to the Hare in the story of the Tortoise and the Hare - I always wanted to re-write it with the result at the end being that they all got there at the same time, which I think is more like the truth. We find that if my husband and I work on tasks together, I do better tackling the big, scary part of it - and he does better finishing up the detail work. So, for instance, I will get the pots and pans soaking in the sink, and get the table cleared off and in the dishwasher...and sometimes I will get the pots scrubbed. DH will find all the little bits (glasses, silverware) that I missed and put them in the dishwasher or sink, and he will wipe down all the surfaces and get everything tidy. Neither of us likes cleaning up, but we each do the part that comes most easily to us - and things we hate equally, we try to split 50/50.

Just google "Mom Calculator" there are many. Salary.com has one, but they are all over the place.

Everybody is coming up with interesting advice. Here's mine (which may or may not be worth the price of free): One cat, all the other animals find new homes. Paper plates, bowls and cups. Only four days worth of clothes for everybody and let hubby and son get their clothes out of dryer. Move to small apt? Thus no yard work and less space to clean and possibly less rent?
And my mother's advice: don't ask somebody for anything they won't give you.

ErinatWitsEnd, what I'm seeing reading your most recent post is that you are developing a sense of how you are going to move forward, and remembering your own strength and drive. I know there is a long road ahead, but you're stepping out onto it. Hopefully you can find a way for your husband and son to help out a bit with household chores, in their own way, of course; some method for carving things up a little more. I can see why it is tough, but sometimes when you think outside of the box, and let go of expectations, solutions happen.

I don't know if I have any more suggestions, but I am willing to keep brainstorming with you when you need it.

Thanks for the support, everybody! We did talk about what changes need to be made, but I am sure this is going to be an uphill battle.

I don't get it with Hubs. He got started on his pet project (those ridiculous stairs) and then he broke the vacuum cleaner. He breaks everything. I don't know what to do about him!

Paper plates have been an option in the past, but I can't always find the ones that are compostable. As for my critters, they are part of my family. While I am going to start trying a little harder to re-home my two rooster boys, the indoor pets are all here to stay for the time being.

Kiddo and I have had a cold all weekend. We are using the time to relax, reboot, and talk about planning and schedules. I feel like things might be all right after all.

Compostable plates can easily be bought in bulk on the internet. Amazon has them, for one.

I think the planet could survive if you used non-compostable plates for a few months.