The thought of having kids scares me

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I'm high functioning on the autism spectrum, and totally capable of having kids. I'm scared that if I have kids in the future, I may pass on my autism to them. It's even scarier to imagine that they might be low functioning on the spectrum. I know that I shouldn't worry about this now since I'm still 18, but I worry about how I would raise my future kids if they end up being on the spectrum. I did ABA therapy and it helped me a lot, but that may not be the same for my future kids. They're going to have different needs than I do. I'm just scared that my future kids are going to be on the autism spectrum like me.

Plenty of people, autistic and neurotypical, don't have children

Shortfatbalduglyman 39, zero children

I don't have a spouse and earn minimum wage

That's barely enough cash for groceries and utilities

Inflation, especially since Covid

Do not want children

The solar system contains eight billion people

One more is not necessary

Children require time, cash, and energy

It seems that there are more autistic parents here with autistic children than autistic parents with non-autistic children. I might do a poll in the parent's discussion to prove this actually.

The only possible spectrum parent with a neurotypical child I know is my aunt. She is an undiagnosed Aspie it seems, but her daughter seems neurotypical because she can make friends so easily and keep friends too. But me, both my parents are neurotypicals but I had to come out on the sh***y spectrum.

Don't listen to people here who will tell you that "having spectrum children is OK as long as you are in control and give them all the support you can and then they will be happy and breeze through life like a dream". That is just bollocks. Sure, it might work with some, but not all. Some autistic children really, really HATE being autistic, no matter how much support you give them. They've still got to go to school and you can't control what other children are like with them.
Yes, some lucky autistic children seem to make friends fine and not get bullied. Some get accepted by their peers and are happy. But most aren't happy at school. That's what usually happens to high-functioning autistic children.
With low-functioning autistic children, mostly it means the world HAS to revolve around them. If you don't put his drinking cup down before his bowl, a collosal meltdown may suffice, with screaming so piercing that it will make your eardrums bleed. This could go on for hours. It'll be like going through the terrible two's for about 20 years.

But I'm not saying autistic parents shouldnt have children. If they're prepared to risk the chance of bringing up challenged children then that's up to them. But if you're not, well, it's not fair.
But even if you were neurotypical you still might have got unlucky and still got a child on the spectrum. I literally drove my poor mum into an early grave, if I'm honest.

One should expect that a neurological variant would have a high degree of heritability.

Raising children is not as difficult as one might think. While raising Asperger children has some more challenges, it is still manageable.

If you child has a meltdown, have him sit on a chair until it passes and then review with him what more could have been done to minimize it.

If your child has selective mutism, see if communicating in writing will work.

If your child has too narrow a focus, see if he can practice occasionally turning his focus on to what he considers peripheral things even if briefly.

Homeschool will provide a less risky and more controllable environment.

If a kid is having a meltdown, they probably won’t be capable of sitting in a chair.

Homeschooling is a bad idea in the vast majority of cases.

Raising children IS extremely difficult. Some children are more challenging than others, too.

Not everyone has to have children. I have a son who is mildly autistic.

I don’t view autism as a bad thing.

Do you want to have kids?

It would be terrible if you had a kid because you feel pressured to do so.

i was a single parent and found it hard at first when my son was a baby but then it got easier as he grew into a little boy

the only hard part was being there because my job involved driving coaches so his father had to have him sometimes while i was away at work

If you're only 18, it should scare you.
You will mature a lot in the next ten years or so.
You'll learn to acknowledge your strengths and skills.

I'm raising ND 20-somethings.
Every day of parenting is "scary" if you think about it too much.
It's a big responsibility, but it's well worth it.
Those relationships are unlike any other, especially if you are all ND.

Autistic people don't automatically bear autistic kids.

I know you're thinking in the future, and not the present.

Ideally, the person you have a kid with will be at least as responsible as you are. That you both share the childcare duties equally. And that (the father) doesn't leave you in the lurch, which happens all-too-often.

Make sure you both are protected equally, should you have sex.

Who knows? Maybe you will have a kid on the Spectrum who is actually a genius.

I don't view autism as a bad thing, either. If autism was wiped out, the world wouldn't be as beautiful.

The thought of being old and alone scares me, the fear of regret when I'm old that I didn't try. I actually have a lot of parental instinct and I don't mind the role of a mentor a lot of the time. I learned that I can probably do it, and I definitely should try.

Last edited by magz on 09 Sep 2022, 8:15 am, edited 1 time in total.: Personal information removed

I had a daughter at 25 , she is a great person and I dont regret it. She may be HFA or not ,im not sure , but she is doing well.

Yeah nobody has to have kids. It's not necessary if you don't want to, your life is not incomplete without kids.

If you are sure you want kids not because of the pressure, but because you actually want to, then you will probably find a way to deal with them despite their disability or lack of one. Or maybe you wont, but the world is also full of people with single parents that are fine. You can't really plan for the future all that much, we don't get to decide what happens. We can only try to make right decisions for ourselves in this current moment.

Kids that are low functioning autistic are my biggest fear.

I vote for "raising children is extremely difficult". Personally, it led to a complete collapse of my mental health and years of recovery that may have not happened if I didn't meet the right people to help me.

Don't have children unless you're deeply comfortable with yourself and your partner and still you both genuinely want to have them. Reproduction is not mandatory. Nothing wrong with not having kids.

If the thought scares you, it may be a signal from your body that raising childen would be too much for you - even literally dangerous, like in my case.