To wish I didn’t have my 3yo son?

I suspect that many such parents would consider adoption if it was a real option. I'm pretty sure I would.

Thisgroupneverceasestoamazeme

A gamble yes but you wont get access to overnight care for young child without speaking up and saying i cannot cope and I am having thoughts of wishing my child is not here . Sems to me Op clearly woukd benefit from overnight 24 hour or weekend respite and needs to say so and be ready for child to go stay elsewhere. ... or can ask for o /nite care in her home and take breaks elsewhere herself . Yes i know it s hard etc but if family at breaking point/parent at breaking point/child at risk then this needs to be said. Spelled out. Better than a parent snapping.... People suggesting adoption or fostering are not being naive, it s a valid option if the whole family want that .

My ds ' dad expressed " i wish we didnt have him" "i wish he had never been born" these words should be taken seriously.

Ds dad snapped and the outcome could have been a lot more serious than it was.....ds was non verbal poo smearing asd etc, etc.... My ds' dad had to leave after he snapped, I was prepared to look after ds and we did have respite .... Op needs to say those words to ss and gp and agree to look at part time or emergency foster care.... Have the discussion with wider family. ...but what does the child 's dad say?

@cestlavielife that would be a bit of a gamble to take. It could definitely be a way to get help. It would most likely involve a CP investigation but I guess if someone is desperate that could be a way to get some support. Often these kinds of things can be met with a counter threat of prosecution for abandonment/threats to harm. It would all depend on how the person it’s shared with responds to it. Like I said upthread in 20 odd years of working with countless vulnerable families I’ve only known of two occasions where it’s resulted in a child being placed in foster care for much older children where families had other vulnerabilities at play.

Nothing to offer OP, other than an enormous hug and to say that no, it isn’t horrible, and no, you aren’t being unreasonable to feel as you do. It is relentless and never ending and a non-stop battle and utterly unbearable. It’s not a question of not coping as you will keep doing what you’re doing - putting one foot in front of the other and getting through each minute - but that does not mean that it’s right. Social care in this country is a disaster that should make us all ashamed, and it is letting you down: you are not letting either of your children down. You are doing everything you possibly can to be three if not four people at once. Vent and rant here if you need to - and ignore the idiots on the thread with “oh just ask for/shout louder/there will always be something out there”. They don’t have a clue. I left social work when I stopped being able to protect my service users from our senior managers, and almost broke down from the fear and the shame of what I was leaving families to manage - you don’t have that luxury. You are an amazing mum, even if you don’t feel like it.

I have severe l d son
I know foster carers who take in such kids
I know and understand it s not easy to get help
But if op tells ss and her gp she wishes him not to be here that should trigger help
If op is prepared for others to care forher child

It is better than she snaps
My ds dad expressed he wished ds was not here, and one day he did snap and threw him across room....

(Years later therapy etc long story he does cope with him)

You need respite or residential care. You deserve a life.

NO! You don't say???? How about when he's 20??

You must realise their is a huge shortage of Foster Carers for DC who have no one to care for them. I'm a Foster Carer and I know the agency I work for is always looking for new carers so much so that if a Foster Carer introduces a potential new Foster Carer and they do all their training and start Foster Caring the Foster Carer who made the introduction gets £2k. That's how short of Foster Carers they are. When a FC I know told her SW she had thought of retiring early the SW persuaded her to continue and suggested she just took a holiday in between placements. Foster Carers often have 2 or 3 placements at once. It really sounds as if this DC would take all of probably two people's time every day just to care for him.

@cestlavielife what’s your personal experience of this?

You have my sympathy. I've looked after some quite difficult children on the autistic spectrum and I've often wondered how tough it must be to be their parent dealing with their behaviours pretty much constantly away from nursery. It can be quite challenging to have them for just a few hours and with support from colleagues.

Push your health care providers and nursery to put as much in place now (EHCP, OT, SALT, CDC etc) ready for starting school so that you have all the funding and support you can get as your child gets older. Once the assessments are completed you may find you can assess more help. I have a friend with a child who is unable to manage simple things such as getting dressed independently as an autistic teen and she said sometimes it seems harder to get support for more severe situations as so many are in the system for more mild situations since everyone is under the umbrella of ASD rather than the distinction of Asperger (ie mostly able to manage an independent life) vs severe (will always need care for basic functions).

Foster care agencies exist for this scenario
If child is potentially at risk from parent who cannot cope then yes child can be dropped at ss door figuratively

https://www.orangegrovefostercare.co.uk/about-fostering/types-of-fostering/fostering-children-with-disabilities/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_content=Disability_Fostering&utm_campaign=%F0%9F%9F%A0_All_Regions_-_Types_of_Fostering&utm_term=disability%20foster&gad=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjwusunBhCYARIsAFBsUP_BB-myandfa_jfV2SO7T0ACOfe1DsXNQBvVAa2RYxe_5LuF6FGiLAaAv-bEALw_wcB

I was raped by a foster brother in one home and then sexually assaulted by a foster father whilst on holiday in front of the whole family.
I was a young teenager with a mouth, not afraid to make noise.

What do you think happens to the non verbal, mentally disabled, physically impaired CHILDREN you are suggesting we give up?

We don't want to give our children up, we've already fallen in love with them by the time their disabilities and difficulties appear.

We just need help and to not have to fight until we are nearing a nervous breakdown to get it.

If society is judged on how it treats the most vulnerable in society then judging by the attitudes I routinely see directed towards disabled children alone brings me to believe we all share an equal amount of shame.

Don't forget this, every single one of you is one infection or accident away from being completely reliant on the wider society around you.

Never forget that.

In some instances Foster care is actually a much better option for the child than adoption. Family contact is more regularly facilitated and can be arranged with the Foster carers, parents retain full responsibility for decisions made about their child's care and it means the situation can be reviewed regularly. It also means that the decision isn't final. If the child's original families circumstances change they might be in a place to have their child live with them again. There's also much more support in place for foster parents than adoptive parents which can mean they're more likely to sustain a long term placement. (Messed up since they should be supporting the family better in the first place. ) Also in that vein a child would need to have a pathway drawn up meaning that on turning 18 they would be helped access long term supported accommodation to live securely in which is usually a huge worry and struggle for carers as they get older and their children grow into adults.

I understand this is something you feel strongly on but you're presenting blanket statements and that's not fair since every situation is individual.

@Yalta what evidence are you basing the fact that somewhere would be found in these instances on? You seem pretty certain. What’s your experience of these situations? I’ve witnessed many many ‘I can’t cope, you have to come and take them’ situations and I’ve known it to be successful in very specific circumstances twice with much older children.

That sounds so hard. I bet you’re doing a great job, I wish there was more help offered to you in this country.

Somewhere would be found of course but the quality.of care might be questionable

Your child would likely not be adopted May be lonng term fostered maybe with a loving family or maybe be being moved between adequate foster cares who can just about cope likely the latter option .

Can people please please stop suggesting residential care? There is no such thing esp for 3 year old. There is next to no support for families with complex kids let alone residential placement. Please, for the love of god, stop suggesting this nonsense

If Thehonestbadger turned round tomorrow and said that is it. No more I need SS to come and get him then somewhere would be found.

If something happened to honestbadger and her dh and they were in hospital then somewhere would be found.

It isn’t that there isn’t anything, it is because what there is, is too little to go round

If I were in that situation, I would like to think I would give my child up for adoption. Don't think about the snobbery people have. You have to do what is right for your family, not for the on-lookers and naysayers.

This is the family I grew up in, it’s all so true and yet I’ve never seen it said. I’m glad I did

The only person who thinks I’m going a good job or that I’m strong or amazing (despite me having the entire ASD, EHCP,DLA,Carer and now entry to special school processes completely on my own alongside parenting, is my mum. Who is basically a third parent to my kids and not by choice, just because she understands from her own childcare career that my situation is actually totally unmanageable

I have a 5 year old with ASD who has a younger sibling and I think it sounds like you are strong, amazing and doing a great job. It's massively hard at that age, but please do have hope that things will get more manageable.

You will get less batshit replies and more solidarity on the Special Needs MN boards.

@Honeybu what a load of rubbish. Life isn't a fairytale and if you "believe in your heart" hard enough you'll get what you want.
You obviously have no clue about the daily struggle that is OP's life. What on earth are you on about?

Even if she choose to allow others to care for him, that's ok. She's not giving up on him.

I.agree with you
Its one thing looking at residential.care after.everything else has failed and I have friends in that position who.have had to make the heart breaking decision to place a child in residential school.when its clear its the only option after many years of fighting the system
But to flppantly kep.suggesting a child of three should just be placed or adopted is shocking

Hi OP, I work in a special school for specifically autistic children. I can imagine exactly what DS is like - most of the children I work with are very similar, we mostly have children with very severe ASD.

I can imagine how incredibly difficult your life is. I sometimes wonder how parents of severely autistic children cope. It can be hard enough for us in school.

What I will say is that every child with ASD is completely unique, and you can never really know how they'll progress. I've seen children change dramatically - in both communication, understanding, independence and behaviour.

I've worked with children who in reception are like little whirlwinds - unable to sit still for 5 seconds, climbing furniture, biting/scratching, zero communication or understanding etc... But by year 1 or 2 they're like different children, and a few years down the line they can communicate. Perhaps not by speech, but other ways such as PECS. School can be transformative. I imagine from your description of your child he will be straight into a special school, which is exactly what he needs.

I know that doesn't help for right now, as he's only 3 so you have awhile to wait, but hold out hope that school might make a world of difference.