In brief - DS is now 4. I left his father when I was pregnant with DS, my ex then stalked me continuously for over a year until I fled the area completely.
I have complex-ptsd from the ongoing trauma.
DS is being assessed for ASD/ADHD. He loves his routine, has no sense of danger, takes stupid risks, he hates being told no, he's incredibly violent. He's a runner/bolter. He will talk to (and go off with) absolutely anyone. He gets very fixated and will not be swayed from whatever fixation. He appears to have sensory issues (loving and finding lights soothing, but covering his ears at noise and normal everyday noises like lorries and motorbikes). He chews things and eats non-food items.
Bedtime is a massive battle most nights. He just doesn't want to go to bed and that's usually when he is his most violent.
He's only four, but he's a big four and the level of violence he uses is terrifying. He snapped my nail, bites me leaving bruises, he hits me with objects and throws things at me. I have a video on my phone of him repeatedly kicking me in the stomach after he got me on the floor. He was saying he wanted to hurt me, he wanted me to cry, and he wanted to kill me.
It's been suggested by our family support worker that he could be experiencing some form of unresolved trauma himself.
I thought I'd protected DS from most of what went on. I left when I was pregnant, I tried to always wait for him to be asleep before uniformed officers attended. Something happened and I fled the area initially for a few weeks to allow my ex time to cool off. It was then pointed out to me the full extent of the abuse and what level of danger we were in. So we remained in refuge. He persisted in stalking me as much as he was able to, and that's when my ptsd started becoming apparent.
Before we fled to the refuge, my ex would hang around outside of my house, he would turn up places he knew I'd be, he learnt my routine and would always be somewhere along my route, he would follow us through town positioning himself in front of my pram (especially when the pram was world facing), he escalated to the point where he was breaking into my home whilst we were out and moving things around to make me think I was losing my mind (which it did), and escalated further to the point where I would wake in the night and he would be in my house, I would waken to the sound of DS (then 1yr old) screaming the most ungodly scream (unlike all his other cries) and my ex would be somewhere in my house. Obviously there were times when I'd have uniformed police round even when DS was awake, police attendance was almost weekly.
DS never ever witnessed any violence. But he would have likely been aware/sensed how afraid I was all of the time.
My ex broke into my house in October, I then suffered a breakdown and ended up being medicated for my c-ptsd. DS (3 then) witnessed all of this.
And recently there's been a trial which was massively detrimental to my MH, and issues with an aggressive neighbour resulting in banging, him shouting abuse, and more uniformed police officers.
My family support worker suspects that DS has unresolved trauma stemming from the first three years of his life, exacerbated by recent events with my ex and my neighbour, and also by my own c-ptsd (as I often gets bouts of feeling incredibly anxious and scared and jump at my own shadow)
I'm so so sorry this has been so long - I was trying to be thorough - if you made it to the end. Can anyone help me make sense of this?
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Child mental health
ASD or Trauma? Someone help me? Long
4 replies
SailAwayWithMeHoney · 13/07/2017 21:27
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