To expect my ASD daughter to love me?

[CryingCaroline]

I’ve just had a heartbreaking conversation with my ASD daughter ( 12 years old ) where she said that she doesn’t feel she loves me, or anyone.

I feel terrible because I burst into tears and she just looked at me and said “ This is why I don’t tell you the truth and just say I love you back when you say it “

It feels physically painful for me to think my young daughter doesn’t love me and possibly never did - she certainly acted like she did when she was younger but as puberty hit she has become far colder and less emotional.

Common with some people with autism op. My son finds emotional attachments with anyone difficult. I tell him every night I love him and he replies OK. Know she does love you really.

Actions speak louder Than words I know its a cliche but my 13 year non verbal severely autistic child shows he loves me by occasionally giving me a kiss or cuddling me or just putting his head on my shoulder when he wants comfort

I have a daughter with asd, they just struggle with abstract concepts and she’s just being honest that love is a word she is not understanding, as many people don’t. Parenting a child with this condition is tough and you’re allowed a cry, I’m sure it’s not the first time you’ve longed to experience the kind of interaction that parents of neurotypical children have but please don’t panic. You no doubt mean the world to her but she won’t necessarily have the capacity to understand or express it as a feeling. My daughter calls me a fat ugly cow most days because I say or do something wrong. It’s not much fun on our road but the moments where you do feel a bond are more subtle, more rare and therefore more special.

OP you're not doing your daughter any favours letting her treat you like shit and walk all over you.
You sound like you're desperate for her approval but she'll respect your feelings a lot more if you stop that.

I say this as a diagnosed aspie - it would have been really bad for me to have been given that level of parental spoiling and pandering at that age.

And honestly the "love" thing is a side issue in all of this. She's not daft, she's worked out how to needle you with that one.

That's nice to hear. :) what he says is in a roundabout way a very genuine expression of love. He tells you he loves you because you want to hear it; it might mean nothing to him, but he knows it means a lot to you and that it makes you happy. He wants to see you happy because he loves you, so he says what you he knows will make you smile.

I'm autistic and it works like this for me too. Sometimes I will say stuff to the people I care about because I know it makes them feel good when I say it. Those words might be whatever to me, but the point is that I've learnt them because someone finds them important. I've had this dismissed as a 'learned behaviour' or 'not genuine' when I've explained that in the past, but I think that's just a lack of understanding on their part. It's about the reasoning behind it, not the things that come out of my mouth and how I feel about them in particular.

I can ask my mum how her day was and I might not really care about her day, but I care about the fact I know that she enjoys it when I ask and I want to make her happy, so I learnt to ask. Learned behaviours aren't necessarily devoid of sentiment.

DD was asked to describe the emotion "happy" during her assesment and she struggled, but quite frankly so did I (not autistic as far as I know) how do you even describe an emotion.

If I tell DD I love her I often get an "as you should" and on some rare occasions she might say it back. But what she does far more often is affectionately pat my head as she walks past or if I'm standing near her will raise her feet so I can rub them like I did when she was little. After school she'll come and tell me about her day, or ask if I want to go on a night walk for ger offering her time after an exhausting day at school is significant. Before Christmas we were at a party for her sports club and she went up to the buffet and carefully chose foods that I liked, not just randomly chucking bits on a plate. That's her way of showing and receiving affection.

As for describing love and feeling it what would you say? For me it's if we were ever in a life or death situation. I would sacrifice myself for her everytime, I wouldn't do that for anyone else.

SomecatfromJapan

Thank you for your honest reply
DH thinks I allow her to treat me badly too and says I never would have allowed our eldest to behave in the way she does.
This is true but elder DD sailed through school / life regardless of ADHD / ASD because she is very happy go lucky generally and she doesn’t worry about anything so if I told her off she would do the “ normal “ I hate you etc and within 19 minutes she would be saying sorry and it would all be okay again - I can’t do that with younger DD as she wouldn’t speak to me for a good length of time and then I worry she genuinely believes I don’t love her.
I’m not in her world I guess so I’m always guessing and it’s made me into a massive over thinker as I just don’t want her mental health to plummet as she already seems such as unsteady and fragile child in comparison to her peers.

I think my upset yesterday was because I have realised that she’s not going to revert back to the little, almost clingy child she was.
She used to say she had tummy aches nearly every day of her first year of school for them to send her home, she would cry and say she missed me if I went anywhere even when DH was at home - this all suddenly stopped a year or so ago and now I’m worried I damaged her by putting her through things she wasn’t comfortable with - I drive myself mad playing it all over and over again wondering where I went wrong and how I didn’t see the signs until she was 11 years old.

@CryingCaroline I totally understand your nedd to be kind to your daughter seeing as she is clearly fragile and struggles, and of course I'd never suggest you were harsh or unkind, but I do wonder if she'd actually feel more secure with firmer boundaries? Is she maybe pushing and testing you in an attempt to find out where those boundaries of what Mum will tolerate actually are?

I've been thinking more about the love thing to the point where DH and I even tried to qualify how we experience it and neither of us could. I'm ND and he is (supposedly) NT.
Yet society does make a huge thing about love in its many forms so it's very likely that a young ND girl with black and white thinking assumed she isn't feeling it because it doesn't match the societal description. Plus as I've said she's noticed now that that is a button to press.

But I do absolutely guarantee you that she loves you deeply, and has done her while life, but she's probably no more conscious of it than breathing or having four limbs.

SomecatfromJapan

This is a really helpful insight as she really doesn’t understand why people enter relationships or have children.
She says that these are ridiculous things to do as then you end up being stuck with someone you might change your mind about and then you can’t get rid of the children!
So I think “love” generally is a very difficult concept for her - I feel stupid saying this but I just didn’t realise that also includes me!
I think there’s a definite control issue between us - I am definitely the one who wants and needs control in a relationship as DH would let the world go by with nothing ever being done! but she seems to want the control on an every day basis with me and because I’m worried about her so much, I generally allow this which maybe isn’t helpful to her

I agree with the posters saying she finds "love" as an abstract concept too hard to understand and recognise and that actually she does love you.

I'm not diagnosed with ASD but one of my children is and the consultant remarked I had traits which I wasn't at all surprised by. I used to have terrible trouble with abstract concepts. I had the impression "being in love" would/should be a spiritual experience and I wondered why I'd never felt it despite having had boyfriends, some of whom i was obsessed with to the point of almost physical pain. Eventually it dawned in me that those feelings of intense attraction were "it". There was nothing special or spiritual about it despite how the poets wang on!

I do think you need to be kinder to yourself. Yes she has ASD, yes adolescence is a difficult time hormonal and mentally but she needs to see you have boundaries too. It will help her feel safe and secure.

The ‘clingy’ behaviour will naturally change over time, you haven’t damaged her. Please don’t feel guilty about not seeing the signs, girls often mask very well and it’s usually only in adolescence that the signs become more visible as the demands of life increase. The best thing you can do now is keep learning about autism in girls. There’s a good Facebook group Parents of Autistic girls uk that might help you learn and gain support from other parents. There’s also lots of good podcasts about autism/pda. Would really recommend Dr Naomi Fisher’s webinars if you are looking for ways to adapt your parenting to meet your daughter’s needs.

I think it's totally okay to cry in front of her when you're upset, you just need to explain and emphasise that it's okay to cry, it's okay for her to express her emotions and it's okay for you to express your emotions. It's okay for her to feel no love, and it's okay for you to feel upset about that. Your relationship and bond will always be strong no matter any of these emotions

I've thought for a while now that I may be ASD for many reasons and reading this thread has brought me to tears. I empathise with your daughter, I've never told my parents I love them, in fact I struggle with any sort of emotional intimacy. It doesn't mean I don't love them, I just don't express myself like other people do.

I have a long term partner and I feel different with him because we are the same. He loves me for me and doesn't see any part of me as deficient (and vice versa).

Although you tell your daughter you love her, she will no doubt be highly sensitive to the idea that she's not the "perfect daughter". If she's like me then words won't mean much to her. I find it hard to know when people are being sincere so I take everything with a pinch of salt. Actions speak much louder so it sounds like she's constantly testing you to see how unconditional your love really is. But pandering to her every whim is not the right thing.

Outside of my partner the other person I know I can really trust is my uncle. He's a grumpy bugger and will have no problem telling me to eff off but I know if I was in trouble he would be in his car in 5 minutes. No questions asked. Having someone tell you you're being a pain in the arse but knowing they'd drop everything for you when it really matters is real unconditional love (to me anyway).

I think she's testing you, possibly due to low self esteem. She tells you she doesn't love you, maybe to see if your love is dependant on that. She invites you bowling when she knows you have plans to see if she trumps your friend. She wins at bowling so assumes you let her win as she couldn't do it on her own merits. She suggests you go to Starbucks then tells you off for ordering yourself a drink!

I'm not sure what advice to give other than looking after yourself, parenting autistic teens is hard.

HellsToilet
Thank you - I do think there’s an element of her testing me as she doesn’t seem to want me much generally until I’m doing something else and then she does
I think I need to set some boundaries that she can see that I’m able to if that’s makes sense - I’ve definitely lost my way a little in fear I’ll lose her completely

Pekoe78
You’re right - logically I know you’re right.
I am just consumed by worry at the moment so then start worrying it was making her go to school when she was younger or leaving her Saturday evenings to go out with friends when she was at home with DH but wanted me has damaged her to the point she’s just withdrawn from me.
This doesn’t take away all her other issues which led us to have her assessed though but I’m clutching at straws

O

Getting the feeling you don't really understand autism op
Have a look at some info on autism in girls , especially alexithima

I have a couple of reminders for you, @CryingCaroline

Lots of things parents do are not popular with their DC. It’s still the right thing to do. We make the best decisions we can to benefit our DC, whether our DC like it or not.

We make mistakes. Everyone does. That’s fine. Keep trying.

Your DD needs you to keep learning, keep trying and keep being Mum. She needs you to explain repeatedly that you are learning and trying and doing what seems best and that you will carry on doing so.

She need you to be explicit about what love means to you- learning about her, doing the right thing even when she doesn’t like it, being her mum, wanting to make her happy even when you’d prefer something else.

She needs to know that you must look after yourself as well as her- if you break you are useless to her!

You need to model these things and say them- she won’t pick them up or assume it, or take it for granted the way other children might.

Also, if she’s hard on you she’s probably equally hard on herself- she may not like herself much. Try and find what’s likeable about her and show her that too.

She does love you. Honestly. Puberty is tough when you have ASD

Op, I’m going to say something that may not go down very well but I’ll say it anyway. I don’t look to my now 32 year old severely autistic son to love me. It’s never been something that I’ve thought about because I pretty much suspect he wouldn’t understand what love is anyway. And For me, as long as I love him and I can feel my heart burst with the joy of him I’m happy.

My love for him is big enough for both of us.

I need a thicker skin I know but it’s the change in her I find hard to accept but I shouldn’t look to either of my girls for love I guess as it’s putting an expectation on them to meet which isn’t fair.
She was off school yesterday because she had Spanish and hates it so I’m having a meeting to see if she can have s slightly reduced timetable.
Just because I do all I can for her I full can’t expect her to express gratitude so o need to get my head around that as I took it for granted with her older sister

Honestly, that change in her is just as likely to be the adolescence as it is the autism.

Children brought up in secure households don't know to be thankful for the things we do as to them it's parenting and you are their parent, which is true they don't see the physical and mental toll it takes or the rearranging of a work diary to fit in appointments and general logistics. Which really is a good thing.

That’s wise advice from SingleandProud

Thank you for posting that it makes me feel a bit better about the criticism and rage that I get at home if I get things wrong from the perspective of my child with autism. I constantly worry and plan and have shaped my life around meeting those needs as best I can, but I hadn’t considered that that makes all of the effort and sacrifice just normal.