Autism is making my life hell at the minute.
DH is HFA and requires a lot of mental support to do things. He is fine with his job but it seems to come out a lot more with his social things. He has a lot of friends online but none in real life. People like him when they spend time with him but he ‘doesn’t get round to’ organising things etc. Then he moans about his life being crap etc. On top of that, he’s been in the same job for twenty years because apparently no other jobs have ever come up that he could apply to. This is even when we weee home schooling the kids and I was a SAHM so we could have gone anywhere. Our sex life is non existent as apparently it is too stressful for him to initiate sex. He sleeps beside my eldest son to check for nocturnal seizures.
On top of this, out eldest teen has had epilepsy since birth, dyspraxia and I am sure is HFA too. He is bright but getting him to do home is a nightmare. He threw a phone at DH’s computer tonight as we said no computer time for him until he’s finished any outstanding homework. He has terrible anxiety and constantly worries that no one likes him or that he is ugly.
We home educated him for years, mainly on account of the epilepsy and dyspraxia as his school were rubbish. I gave up my job as a teacher to do it. I built up a reasonably successful tutoring business and it pays for DS to go to a small, nurturing private school where he is now taking GCSEs. It is not a SEN school. A lot of my earnings go towards his fees.
The nature of my job means I’m not around in the evenings or weekends but that means DH has to see that homework gets done, that toenails are trimmed etc etc and he is rubbish at remembering anything. This is not made easier by the fact that DS lies about homework, screams that he wants to die when caught outwits 20+ outstanding homework’s etc etc. If he fails his GCSEs, it’ll be us who have to support him even further as it will affect his confidence even more.
I just feel so f*cking ground done by it all. DS is still generally above average for everything at school (but definitely underperforming by his own standards except in a couple of subjects).
I’ve just had another blazing row with my husband tonight over him having to notice when DS is hungry etc and it’s so frustrating to not be able to oversee those things myself. He complains that I am angry all the time. Which I am.
At Christmas I just lay on the floor and cried and cried and cried. I feel so trapped by their disabilities and feel like a bitch for even feeling like that. I can’t even find any groups for support, presumably because of Covid, there is nothing anyway. We don’t have any family support. My family were abusive to me, His mother has never forgiven him for being autistic and an underperforming.
I’m a tough person but I don’t know how to cope, I’ve come from a shit childhood and pushed myself up through life. Now I’m pushing my husband and son. So I’m pushing three people on a daily basis. I don’t know how to deal with it all any more.