Advice for young son on spectrum/autistic fatigue/burnout

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Hello to all who are reading.

I'm writing today seeking first validation and second advice for ways to cope with autistic fatigue and burnout.

My son Abel is on the spectrum. He is 7 years old and verbal. He got his diagnosis at age 4. In fact his daycare had prompted us to get him evaluated at age 3. It didn't take long for the diagnosis, approximately 9 months. We have embraced and encouraged him in every way that we know how.

He has a sister who is very close to him in age, she is 6. She is neuro typical. They are very different. I never compare the two as they are both amazing and wonderful in my eyes.

Fast forward to now. Abel is in the first grade. He has an IEP but spends the majority of his time in a typical classroom setting. He attends speech and occupational therapy at school also additional help in reading outside of the classroom. I pick him up an hour early on Friday to attend OT at an autism services center.

His teacher has been expressing to me for a long time that Abel falls asleep in class. At first I thought maybe we should adjust his bedtime. So I did that. He and his sister got to bed at the exact same time every night, same bedtime routine. Well, that didn't solve the problem. The teacher would continue to message me saying he is still sleeping in class. So I thought maybe he is on his tablet too much before bed. He is a gamer at heart. He is still young and enjoys Roblox. I myself am not a gamer but I find it's a way I can connect with him, so I enjoy it when he gives me a glimpse of his life on Roblox. He doesn't have to worry about stressful social interaction or masking his autistic traits on there. Anyway, I have tried to limit his tablet time before bed due to falling asleep in class. Nope, no results. Teacher still telling me he's always very tired and I should know.

I must tell you, Abel is a sweet, sensitive, rather shy boy. He has never cried to me about not having any friends until this year. He has cried out of the blue saying and I quote "I just want someone with me at school" I asked him what he meant and he said "a friend". I went so far as to throw him a birthday party, karate themed as he is in karate. I sent invites to the whole class. Not one student showed up. He is in a class of 20. So as a mom this hurts because I want to help but I can't go to school with him.

I had a couple of meetings with his teacher in which she expressed concern about his reading level and sleeping in class. I thought this was the perfect time to express my concerns to her about him feeling isolated from his peers. Making him dislike school. Maybe she could encourage some mingling amongst the children.

When we met it was half way through the school year. As we are talking she is telling me he's very quiet and his behavior is great but he does better in one on one settings. I was not shocked to hear this as it sounded very much like him. Then I mentioned he's been feeling lonely and she reacted as sympathetic and quickly changed the subject. Then I had mentioned him being on the spectrum and she goes "oh you say he's on the spectrum, ok" then again quickly changed the subject almost like she's uncomfortable with talking about it, like it's not COMPLETELY RELEVANT. I'm not sorry he's on the spectrum. I don't throw a parade about it every time I meet with someone because it doesn't define him as a person but I certainly take into account that he has a different set of needs than the average child.

Anyway the meetings are getting me nowhere. I don't feel heard by his teacher I don't think Abel is having an easy time at school. Then I got another message from his teacher literally as I'm in my car in line at school to pick him and his sister up. She messages me and says "Abel is very tired he's falling asleep right now" so I politely message her back saying thank you for letting me know.

Then I got to thinking when Abel was being diagnosed in the early stages, they would always ask me if he tires easily. Then I looked it up and discovered something called Autistic Fatigue/Burnout. I read about it and realized this is probably what's going on.

If you think of public school as a factory that processes a product (children), one might expect that not all products can be processed easily. While some factories attempt to work with non-compliant products, they are limited. For this reason many consider homeschool.

Here is a free pdf booklet about Aspergers, An Intentional Life that you might find interesting.

http://christianpioneer.com/blogarchiev ... e_2017.pdf

Years ago one guy in a Youtube video said that he would never marry because it was so tiring to "mask" at work (pretended to be an acceptable persona) that he couldn't image having to do that at home as well with a wife.

If one thinks of Aspergers as a neurological variant resulting in a neurology that is faster, more complex, or more sensitive, one can imagine the demands such a neurology would provide in an avalanche of sensory and cognitive information to be processed. This usually results in developmental delays. I joined Mensa when I was 30 and observed that many others were in their mid 20s to mid 30s. It was almost as if we had all hid from the more normal social encounters in our high school years and were only now emerging to experiment with social engagement.

As far as friendships go, you might encourage him to be a friend to someone by asking them what they like to do and showing an interest in that. You might engage him is describing what he does or thinks during the day that is stressful or exhausting and then suggest strategies and alternatives. You want to identify that which can trigger anxieties because that can cause problems. The desire to manage anxieties can even lead to self-harm like cutting or eating disorders. The need to feel control can be powerful.

Fatigue and burnout mostly come at times of stress. I hit a burnout (Which might have been a breakdown) every year or two later in life where I would work, hit so many shutdowns (Mostly partial) which lead to burnout, anxiety each morning so if I drove into work, I would have to arrive early as for up to half an hour I could not get up out of the car etc... Found I could hardly sleep at night even though I gave myself LOTS of time to sleep etc, as my mind would be alive processing the days events before, and anticipating the next days events...Then came burnout/breakdownand I would hand in my notice. It felt like murder to last those last four weeks where employers assuming one needed the money would get one to work overtime....
Then when job would end (Never said the real truth through leaving as I never knew I was autistic and I never knew what was causing it. Had been back and fore to doctors for 30+ years to try to discover what the shutdowns were with no success, and I was always met by thinking they were my fault as if I was faking them, so I learned how to hide them so no one knew).
But when I ended up out of work, I would often go for a year or two without income to recover. I was not allowed back then to go on benefits, so I sold everything I could of my personal things to survive.
So when eventually the trail lead to autism, and while waiting the four and a half years to be assessed (And diagnosed), I was helped when in the last burnout, 6 months into the wait to be assessed there was an "Open day" where I dragged myself to the event where I met the psychologists who saw the state I was in and wrote to my doctor so I could have a note to claim a sickness benefit so I could have an income. Was not a lot, BUT I was soo greatful for it as I did not have to sell any more of my lovely trains!

Schooling... I was often told off in school for being too quiet. The truth is, both due to undiagnosed autism and also due to prosopragnosia (Faceblindness) which I did not realize I had until I was around 16 to 17 years old (Faceblindness is funny like that), is that it causes one (Especially the faceblindness) to be really quiet in school or in an enviroment away from the home and causes one to be extra clingy to parents when walking through crowded towns (Or cities or shopping malls etc), but when at home one opens up and is noisy and ones usual child-like self! (Unless one is hitting times when there is something wrong in school or at work etc... One then goes quiet at home too!)

Now here is what my lovely Mum did to me and sometimes also my brother when we were in primary school. (Age 4 to 11). When she knew we were stressed, she would give us a day off school and would pack a snack to eat, and would then walk with us down to the beach where one could be alone sitting in the lovely sand dunes and just look... Watch the water, watch the birds etc... And I learned more from my Mum during those rare times than I did from weeks or even months of being in school... And it was NOT that my teachers did not try their best. It was because the stress left me I was able to take information in!
In school I had to learn how to sit in the place where I could hide so I was less likely to be asked questions so I could shut off my mind to the enviroment so I could enter into daydreaming mode. I learned how to use one part of my mind to recall the last sentence or two a teacher would say so if asked I could repeat it, but I was really in daydream mode to reduce the stress! I was ok if asked and the teacher never asked about what they had said, as I had not processed what was said! All I could do was repeat it! But for me, I learned how to look as if I was paying attention to avoid getting into trouble, but really I was having "Time out" in my own little world as stress had got too much!
Was often bullied while at school. I was never really popular. Teachers told me off for being too quiet, and at parents evening when parents met with teachers once a year, one teacher had forgotten I was in her class as I was so quiet.

What you will probably find is his mind may not be able to shut off at night. When I was bullied at one job I did, I wore my top teeth out at night. I would wake up with the sound of my teeth grinding together. My other upper teeth had gone early through stomach acid. Dentist once sent me to see my doctor and my doctor refused to do anything saying "Dentists do not know what they are talking about". So I lost many teeth.

When in secondary school, I could not walk to school due to anxiety as I could not get strength to my powerful legs. (Powerful legs due to riding my bike up the steep garden paths). Was about a mile or two away. Mum had to walk with me (Sometimes steadying me) to the bus stop. Was an additional expense for my parents, but... On the way home, I could walk, jog, run etc! Often ran back home!

Hope this helps?
On the way back home