To wonder what I've done wrong?

[JustAMumDoingHerBest]

My DD is 23 and although between the ages of 16-18 she attended college, she never went to university. She has worked full time in dead end jobs, mostly catering and retail, since leaving college. Although for the past six months or so she's only be working 20 hours a week as that's all she can get. She says she wants another job, a full time one, but tbh I'm not even sure she's trying hard enough to get one. She has had a couple of interviews though and makes an effort for those.

She has also never left home.

I feel like a failure because DD has always been unsociable, very quiet and solemn. When she was a child we just assumed she was shy and that she would grow out of it and get more confidence as she got older but that never happened.

She's never really had friends and doesn't have any at all right now and hasn't for years. She never goes out drinking or socialising, she's not a member of any club or society or anything like that.

She's does have an interest in animals though, especially small ones, which tbh is weird. She has a pet hamster and two rabbits and nearly most of her pay goes towards her pets, food, toys, treats, etc. The rest of her pay mostly goes on books and when she's not spending time with her animals you'll probably find her sitting alone reading.

She gets a bit obsessive over her pets tbh. She's constantly reasearching and finding out more about whatever pet she has. She's a member of forums dedicated to them and likes to talk about them on there.

I worry about her so much. Like I said she doesn't have friends and she's never had a boyfriend either. She says she has no interest in having a boyfriend. She's never told me but I have a feeling she's still a virgin.

I feel like such a screw up. She is so intelligent and capable of so much more than what she has. She has the brains to go to university and get a good job. But when you try and talk to her about her she'll say she's not interested in a career and just wants a job that will earn her money. She also wants to move out within the next year or two.

Her life consists of going to work, going to the gym and going swimming, her pets and reading. It has been the same for years now. She also likes sticking to a routine and gets upset if it has to be changed. Again she has been that way since she was a child.

Someone please tell me I haven't messed up and she hasn't messed up and she'll be okay?

She does sound lovely but I understand your worries too. If she is unhappy in some way, it's not your fault, though. You can support children all you can but you can't change their essential nature. The more you say about your daughter the more I think that this is just who she is - some people don't need other people very much. As for work, I'm 36 and I never really wanted a career either - just a job I like, that pays enough for me to live without worrying about bills and enjoy my real interests in my free time.

Happiness itself I think of as a sort of fleeting giddy state of being - better to aim for contentment, I always think: and being at ease with your own self in the way that only a few people really seem to manage.

You're saying 'what have I done wrong?'

You're making this about you.

Yes, this is more about you than her, OP, in the nicest possible way. It sounds as if you can't quite envisage your daughter as anything other than your own creation, whose success or failure/happiness or unhappiness reflects upon you, perhaps because you don't see her as having achieved any of the 'milestones' of independent adulthood as you understand them - career, moving out, boyfriend, friends/a social life etc.

My mother is exactly like this with my younger sister, and in her case it's completely a projection of her own thwarted ambitions and anxieties - my mother is completely friendless, with a very strict timetable according to which she views 'normal life' as operating, and continually worries about my sister not continually going out on the kind of 'girls' night out' she herself has never been on in her life.

Not suggesting this us the case with you, but think about what anxieties or issues of your own your daughter's life as you see it may be stirring up, and try to see her as her own separate, independent identity.

Have you specifically looked as Asperger's traits for girls? They are different to the typical (male) presentation of Asperger's. Have a read of the two links below and see if they sound familiar.

www.autism.org.uk/about-autism/autism-and-asperger-syndrome-an-introduction/gender-and-autism/women-and-girls-on-the-autism-spectrum.aspx

www.willowhope.com/pages/aspergers-traits-in-girls

Do have a look at what Westmoorland linked. You talk about her not making friends, having obsessions, keeping to herself, reading....if she's bright (which you said she was) she's probably high functioning and has strategies to get on with life. It may not be necessary for her to be assessed at this point but it might help you to understand why she is as she is. It might be that rather than her not choosing to change, she can't change. It's not necessarily a bad thing. It's just that she might be wired slightly differently.

I say this as someone who has recently requested an assessment myself.

OK so I've had a look at that and those descriptions do sound a lot like her but sorry for sounding stupid but what does it even all mean? I don't really know what it means to have aspergers and what to do now. Do I show DD and ask her what she thinks? Or do I just keep quiet?

Rusticated I don't want her to have regrets. I don't want her to look back on her life and think "what if?" and "if only". I don't want her to feel she's missed out. Like I said I don't even really know if she is happy .

So she has a job and four separate hobbies, two of which get her out of the house and keep her fit?

Really not seeing that the world has ended here.

Maybe she should look for a job in a pet shop?

The only thing you're doing 'wrong' is not accepting your daughter for who she is.

She isn't doing what you think she should do. Yet her life is fulfilling to her and full of exercise, discipline and compassion. You have lots to be proud of.

I only hope she doesn't realise that her mother thinks she's a failure. That's what you should be concerned about, actually.

What you need to grasp, by the sound of it, is that it's OK to for her to be herself. She doesn't have to be obsessed with dieting, shopping for shoes and Catching A Man to be healthy and contented with her life. People with independent interests and non-mainstream attitudes are generally only miserable when their mundane relations try to coerce them into behaving like mundanes.

Why is liking small animals wierd?? I must be unhinged then

Your dd sounds fine, it's you that's trying to pigeon hole her into something she's not. Let her be and relax.

Agree with the others. She sounds perfectly contented and it is about her life.

My older sister is 43, lives in the parental home and sounds fairly similar to your daughter. She has a job she likes, reads constantly, writes a bit too, loves DVDs, the cinema etc. she goes to yoga and has a small number of close friends. Last time she had a bf was about 20 years ago - she's just not interested in either gender really, just potters about. She has never been formally diagnosed as on the spectrum, but we (and medical / educational professionals) strongly think that she is.

We all just accept her as she is. If your daughter is happy, do the same.

Liking small animals isn't weird

She sounds lovely

She needs a vet assistant job or similar. - get her to volunteer at a pet rescue place

You've done nothing wrong, she's living her life, not yours.

And there's nothing wrong with introverts, I'm one myself and I love pets

FWIW I don't criticize her. I tell her to do what makes her happy but that still doesn't stop me from worrying.

I don't know if I am being silly but I do worry especially about her not having a boyfriend yet. She's said that she doesn't want one and while they may be true now that might not always be the case.

I worry that when if/she does start having relationships that she'll be especially vulnurable to people wanting to take advantage of her because of her lack of dating experience. She can also be naive sometimes and I worry that those two together isn't going to make a good combination.

There's a book called Asperger's pink about being a Mum to an aspie girl. It might help you. Honestly, have you sat down and just chatted with your DD? I guess pointing out the possible aspergers depends on if you think it would help. My Mum asked me when I was the same age if I was happy and I burst into tears. Years of trying to be someone I wasn't had taken it's toll. Now I realise I might have aspergers I see myself quite differently and it's a relief. I'm trying to learn to live as the person I am, not as society says I should be. It sounds like you're daughter is already doing that. I'd suggest reading around the topic. Maybe look for jobs that she'd enjoy - pet shop is a great idea and some stores might put her on training that might stimulate her.

She's helpful and generous in the household, kind and good to her pets, she keeps fit and healthy, takes great pleasure in reading, holds down a job and you say she seems content.

I think she sounds like a lovely young woman. You should be proud, not anxious that you've messed up.

There are loads of women on MN who have Asperger's who will be able to tell you they live perfectly content lives they just happen to be wired a little differently

She will find her own way, don't worry. The most important thing for you to do, Asperger's or not (because lets face it we just performed an armchair diagnosis without ever meeting her!) is be there for her if she needs you and accept who she is.

It just sounds, OP, as if you're the one imposing the template of life goals you worry she may come to regret not having achieved, and she's still so young. Are you at some unconscious level ashamed of her lack of obvious achievement because it reflects on you?

I come from a sink estate, have four degrees including an Oxbridge doctorate, a multinational set of friends, and a successful professional career, and that never made my parents happy. They would have preferred a more 'ordinary' daughter by their standards, someone who had an office job locally, got married in white to a nice local boy and had lots of children and always came over on Sundays, not went off into a different world they don't understand or care about. I say this to show that it's possible to be a disappointment to your parents in other ways. My milestones just didn't count in their world at all. The only thing I did right was to have a child.

Your DD sounds similar to a friend of mine. She has aspergers..
She's extremely intelligent, quite, has OCD at times about certain things. She Doesn't have many friends as people don't really understand where she coming from, Her train of thought is a little quirky at times.
I understand her cos my DS has it too.. Girls and boys show differant symptoms..

It's nothing you've done wether she has this or not. She's probably just a quite person that likes keeping to herself.
Have a read up on the subject see if anything helps.

She sounds a lot like me except I'm a couple of years older and married but I didn't go to uni, didn't leave home permanently till my early 20s, don't have many friends, don't like going out, love reading and animals and have had a series of dead end jobs that don't fulfil my potential. I have Aspergers Syndrome so that's a possibility. It can lead to a need for routine, obsessive interests and struggles with social interaction. Sound familiar?

If I thought my DM felt like a failure and wondered where she had gone wrong raising me it would absolutely destroy me. Please try and appreciate the person your daughter is instead of seeing her as some kind of error. Her interest in animals isn't weird, it's a passion. Maybe it could lead to a job in animal care one day. She's still young and learning how to fit into the world and find her role in life, she might surprise you!

I can't see what the problem is TBH.

She is who she is, not someone you want her to be. It's you with the problem not her.

How odd. Your daughter sounds a lot like mine, but whereas I can't believe how lucky I am to have such a wonderful daughter, you're wondering where you went wrong. I find that quite upsetting tbh.

Please try to appreciate the numerous lovely qualities you've listed and feel proud of her.

There is a saying: - "A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle"

She sounds a little like my SIL. She goes to work (in a shop), has two cats which are her life, lives at home, has both male and female friends but doesn't go out to anything other than Pizza hut type meals, the cinema or has sleepovers-rather like a lot of people did as teenagers. She is lovely-very sweet and friendly and generous but she gets older and her friends are getting younger. She socialises with seventeen to twenty year olds in general and always has done. She's older than me though and I'm nearly 40.

I've always wondered if she was on the spectrum though. She's always talked about wanting children and wanting a husband but I've known her since she was 19 and she has never had a boyfriend.

I don't think my SIL is happy though. Your DD sounds like she is, which is very different :)

I was a bit like your daughter when I was younger, my problem was a serious lack of confidence to get out into the big wide world and I just felt comfortable in my dead end job and spending time at home.

Slowly my life started changing when I had no choice but to find a new job, from then my confidence grew and grew. I am now happily married in a fairly well paid job and doing everything that makes me happy. It's funny how things turn out.

Be proud of her, perhaps try and encourage her to look into job options in areas she's passionate about but don't push her or make her feel like she's not living her life.

There's nothing wrong with working in a shop.