He is 12. Has ADHD and is awaiting an ASD assessment. He has never managed to make friends. He is a pleaser and so desperate for boys to let him be their friend he will do anything. This has led to him stealing money from me to buy them things from the shop in the past for his “friend” who was sending him his order every morning by text. thankfully that friendship has ended. He has managed to make one actual friend in secondary school, a girl and the difference in how he engages with her and the boys is like chalk and cheese. He was always far more natural, relaxed and joyful with girls but somehow he has just always been desperate to be one of the boys. He and his new friend in school have been subjected to taunting, people calling them boyfriend and girlfriend and other silliness. I’m not sure if this is making him pull back from the friendship or if they are just naturally pulling apart but they seem less in contact out of school than they were. he has been in contact again with a boy from his primary school. They’ve met up a few times. One time my son came home wrapped in bubble wrap his friend had dared him to put on. The boy was with him so I asked if he had put some on too and he said he didn’t want to. I feel like he is making DS be his clown. This friend always makes plans with my son and then when it’s time to meet up is non responsive to calls and texts from my son. DS has gone to his house to see if they are still meeting up and the boy says he doesn’t feel like going out. They made plans to meet today at 1. The boy has been non contactable all morning. He saw DS’s message last night checking they were still meeting but didn’t respond. He finally got back to DS at 1:30 saying they were still meeting and he’d let him know when he was ready. DS has been standing out in the garden for the last 20 minutes ready to jump as soon as he gets the text. He even asked me to ring his phone to make sure it was working properly. In all likelihood his friend will change his mind today and tell DS he isn’t going out. Which has happened in the past and DS will be miserable. This makes me so sad for DS. I wish he had the self esteem and confidence to realise he doesn’t need to wait around to be available when it suits other people. I made the mistake in the past of suggesting that the friend he had stolen money for (not this same boy he is friends with now) mightn’t be such a good friend and DS went on the defensive and wouldn’t discuss it at all. So I don’t want to do that again.
How do I help him? I don’t want him to be stuck in this behavioural pattern. I’d love if he could just be friends with his girl friend from school as they are so lovely together but obviously you can’t force friendships.