To not want to look after my daughter any more

[Goaheadflameme]

My daughter is 8. She is recently diagnosed with autism. No problems at school but a nightmare at home.

Predictably, being out of the school routine has made her challenging behaviour more challenging. She regularly tells me she hates me, wishes I was dead, that things would be better without me. Everytime
I say something she mocks me. She won’t do anything she is told and consequences are meaningless as she just doesn’t care. Today she has also thrown food round the living room and when I tried to stop this she has violently attacked me multiple times. Previously she has broken my finger and scratched me to the extent that I was hospitalised due to a serious infection in my arm.

I just honestly can’t do it any more. This has been going on for more than two years now. It’s completely ruining me, my relationship with my husband and our family life (we have other children). The violence triggers me so badly due to childhood abuse and I don’t feel safe in my own home.

Do social services take children away in these circumstances?

We didn’t get any help or support from SS .. though, to be fair, we never asked them for any.

We did access support from other organisations. We found https://autisticgirlsnetwork.org/ to be really helpful.

Agreed awful thing to say

Please ignore this atrocious, ignorant "advice" OP.

This !!!

@Goaheadflameme get your GP to refer your to Cahms

otherwise if you go privately (psychiatrist), you can get help within days . Good medications helps , some of them help within hours

This is a very good, sensible post.

I work in this field and my experience is that, no, social services will not remove your dc. But they can still offer support from the early help team.

Have you tried contact with any support groups for parents of children with autism? They can be fonts of knowledge and support. I wonder if there are ways for you and your dh to give each other a break when you can, or other family who might help out? SS may help you organise a family group conference to plan this.

In my area the YMCA facilitate teh Child to Parent violence specialist support service.

You are absolutely right it is very very common. In both preteens and teens - also very often nothing to do with a learning need.

Also, contrary to much of the advice I see on MN - only very few families are offered respite in the way it is described on here.

In my area Parents are expected to fund this via the Childs DLA if this is where they think the need is.
I only know of a couple of exceptionally high need families where the child visits a foster family for a weekend a month funded by the LA. It just does not happen in the way described on here.

I would do anything I could to support you as a family

I worked as a TA in a school with a high level of children with Autism. I was assaulted, hit, bitted, punched, sworn at, and not once did SLT ask how I was. Not once.

That is the reason I left and would never go back.

I seriously hope you have the same support for your staff.

I would honestly bring back smaller, quieter schools for children with autism and have a set routine - including holidays so everyone would be a lot happier.

I’ve only ever seen incredible bright children with autism, imagine what they could achieve with the right environment.

What medications are you referring to? The Child Psychiatrists I've worked with would not be willing to prescribe medication to an Autistic 8 year old because their parents were struggling to manage their behaviour.

My son is 6, diagnosed with ASD and ADHD.
He has trouble with emotional regulation, and is very impulsiveness, he will lash out during a meltdown, or if overwhelmed, he will hit, kick, bite, throw and also mock.

What I have learnt over the last couple of years is that works for me is, utilise positive reinforcement and recognise good behaviour, and where possible ignore negative behaviour.

My DS loves a reaction, positive or negative, so if he does something bad and gets a big reaction to it, he’s still won in his eyes, as he’s got the attention.
When I do tell DS that something isn’t kind, or not a good choice, I keep my tone neutral, if he senses any confrontation in my tone, this will trigger him to react.

My husband, is a lot more reactive than me, and I can see a huge difference in my sons behaviour with me, than his dad. His dad is working more to ignore certain behaviour, but he is used to children listening to their parents, and with ND kids, parenting is often very different.

Happy for you to drop me a message!

I'm sorry you had such a poor experience. Not all schools are the same. My school takes the wellbeing of staff extremely seriously, they are certainly not expected to put up with being assaulted, and staff at all levels look out for each other.

'early help' is definitely an option for you guys here. Also if your borough is like ours then you have to fight for services, they often try to just get you off their books by bouncing you around.

So pleased to see the post from ExtraOnions. Absolutely brilliant advice and not much I can add other than to say I echo it as the mom of an 11 year autistic son who became incredibly challenging and violent with me at around age 8 too. We're now in a FAR better place.

I think we all need to be mindful that we have a MNer here who is crying out for help.
As someone who has had a friend (Mum of an ASD child) take their own life, I think the last thing OP needs is criticism on here.

It is disgusting that we (as a nation) do not provide more support, both in terms of funding for services and in terms of the general public trying to understand what some parents are going through, instead of criticising.

OP, if you can, look up Dr Naomi Fisher on FB.
Her advice really helped turn things around for my ASD DD and I.
Also using the principles of low demand parenting worked for me.

So sorry - that sounds incredibly tough. if you are in England, your LA will have a Local Offer for children with SEND. See if you can find this for some options. Contact your local Parent carer forum for SEND, your SENDIAS service and most importantly social care. You need the Social care children with disabilities team and Early Help. Your daughter should be eligible for Short breaks of some kind. Also ask for a carers assessment for yourself. This is not sustainable for you.

It’s extremely hard parenting a child with behavioural issues caused by nuerodiversity.

my DS doesn’t have autism, he has general developmental delay, speech and language difficulties and ADHD. He is 19 now and I can relate to your post completely.

please contact social services and ask for support

ask for parenting courses for children with autism, the usual parenting strategies simply do not work

ask to be referred to a CAHMS psychiatrist, if they offer medication don’t be afraid to take it

look into potential residential schools for kids with autism, they are specialists and know what they’re doing

be ready for the puberty and teenage years, things get more difficult

dh and you need to have a good chat, you need to support each other and be on the same page.

im not going to lie to you, it is blooming hard work, but she is your child and she’s only 8. I won’t say my DS is perfectly behaved now but it’s miles and miles better that it was when growing up. We love him to bits and all our efforts were worthed!

You've had some good advice OP. I am sorry this is happening. I have an out-of-control DSD with similar issues. I would suggest:

• Self-referral to social services asap - tomorrow morning. Let them know everyone in the household is at risk due to her behaviour.
• GP appointment ASAP. Also, make a formal complaint about the failed referral, where you make it clear how the situation has escalated without appropriate support.
• Reach out to charities/support groups/networks who can advise and offer suggestions about e.g. respite care for a child with your daughter's issues.
• You probably are not going to be able to surrender your child to the care system. They simply do not have the capacity to take on children who are reasonably well looked after by their parents. So you need to put a plan in place that allows you to manage her needs and keep your home safe for everyone else. That could be working in a joined-up way with social services, school and charities to have routines and consequences for her behaviour - it could be a residential home or network of carers in your own home. There are options but you need to be proactive. Managing the needs of an SEN child is a full time job.
• Violent and other destructive behaviour should result in you calling the police. She will then hopefully be flagged through that channel too. Also it gives her real-world consequences for her behaviour, which she needs to learn.

Sending her away will probably exacerbate the problem. It's truly awful living through it though.

I had this for almost a decade and it only stopped when DD dropped out of secondary school and was almost a recluse for six months. I think we have well and truly turned a corner now.

Firstly, so sorry to duplicate this excellent post but I agree with Tangerinets completely.

My now adult DD is 30 years old but at your dd's age was an absolute nightmare too. She had sld with severe autism and cluster epilepsy. She too was violent, very destructive, didn't sleep etc. etc. Thank God we moved to a county which at that time proved very supportive. We managed to access respite each week together with help during school holidays. Our DD was placed in a special needs nursery and then moved to a special needs day school for which daily transportation was provided. However, by the time she was 7 years old we were advised that the school could no longer provide the level of care and support she needed and she would need a 52 week residential school.

As you can imagine, despite the tremendous difficulties we were living with, we were devastated but agreed it would be best for her.

We eventually found her a wonderful place 2 hours from home which proved an absolute godsend. We visited every weekend. She was there until she was 16 then moved to another residential school slightly closer to home until she was 19 at which time we found a fabulous, brand new centre - 25 mins drive from home - in a 24 hour managed centre for supported living.

DD has now been in her gorgeous apartment for 12 years and we now see her 4/5 times per week.
She has never lived at home - other than occasional visits - since she was 7 years old but she is now blissfully happy and 1000%per cent improved. She won't stay at home now. She visits us occasionally but 2 hours later she wants to return to her apartment and mix with her friends 😁. Obviously, she would no way be able to work or live without 24 hour support but we never imagined in our wildest dreams we would see her as she is today. We are all incredibly close and she adores us but certainly has her own life.

Unfortunately, as Tangerinets pointed out, you do have to persevere with SS to get the help you need and I hate to say but I believe, from what I read, that places are even more difficult to acquire than in our day and especially so in the south which is outrageous but if there is any way through these barriers I honestly would also recommend this route.

Wishing you all the very best as I know EXACTLY how you feel. (Just to add, we also discovered only 2 years ago that our dd's condition and difficulties are due to her having a very rare gene mutation. Only took 28 years to diagnose 🙄.) 💐💐💐

Forgot to say, contact PEGS. They're a great support to parents in your situation.

https://www.pegsupport.co.uk/

but some will prescribe - i have seen it with an 11 year old in a similar situation.

As part of our diagnosis journey, I went on a course run by our council that was called he's not like that at home. Our school couldn't see any reason for a referral - he seemed 'okay in school'. (our doctor didn't do referrals, which is a separate sore point) The room was full of parents listing the same thing; kids were coping in school, but not at home. The multiple inputs, other children and sensory overloads had exhausted all the coping skills the children had and when they left school and started to decompress, the explosions would start. Our SENCo came with us - it was like a light bulb coming on, they put measures in place in school and things did improve. Has to be said the first week of every holiday was always horrendous until we got into holiday routine rather than school routine. He's 17 now and high school made a massive difference too - he found his own people, which has removed a lot of the social requirements that he struggled with.

Are you okay OP?
Can go online today and self refer into Children’s Services, if getting the ball rolling would make you feel any less desparate today ? And then call them first thing?
Hope you’re okay x

Others have better advice, but I just want to say that I feel so sorry for you, your other children, your daughter and your husband. You are all being failed.

I should imagine SS would want to put in support for you and your daughter first. Putting a child into care affects their future chances

Maybe think about what support in your home would help? Then approach SS?

Also go and see your GP about what might be available to help your daughter?

Also there might be training via SS or a diagnosis related charity to up skill you and your DH in feeling more confident in dealing with your daughter.

SS will do means testing and you and your DH will most probably have to pay towards and any care and support that they provide for your family.

Have you had a Carers Assessment from SS?

Good luck.