Need people's views on what just happened in my home

[Spiderwoman123]

6 year old ASD son. He is currently in process of EHCP application. He struggles socially, has no friends, has weird things about food

H has always said im too soft. Letting him have pudding when hes only eaten cucumber. That kind of thing. H gets v frustrated at DS not eating as H is the house chef really. H always been pretty resistant to adapting parenting but accepts diagnosis and is kind and loving but can also be v inflexible and quick to anger.H much prefers younger DS (none of same challenges). H can get pretty grumpy

Right. So dinner time. DS refusing to eat chicken as he says different to normal stuff. H getting wound up. Me trying to reduce tension. DS says "stop looking at me" as H staring at him. H looks mad. DS getting mad too. Tension rising and both sniping at each other. DS goes to slap H. Its pretty half hearted. DS used to hit a lot when meltdown and we have worked on it a lot together but it still happens. DS barely touches H. H says this is because he moved out the way.

H in response raises his hand to hit DS. I think. Stops himself and then picks up DS chair off the ground and tips it over so that DS falls onto hard kitchen floor. Not from some great height but he definitely picked up the chair and tipped it fully so DS (who was curled up on chair crying) onto floor. Pur kitchen has a fake concrete floor thing

DS bawling. H saying he didn't mean to but he wanted DS to leave room. H saying im overreacting and started blaming me for my shitty parenting!

Currently putting two v upset boys to bed. I think it's fucking horrendous. H thinks DS went to hit him and H was just getting him to leave the room

Pls tell me what to do

Please read the thread. Her son is not violent and made a half arsed swipe towards a grown man who raised his hand, and then picked up a chair with a crying 6 year old on it who landed on their side onto a "fake concrete floor". And then apparently proceeded to "prove it's basically hollow".

This is not about ND. OP has been clear on her progress and her son's.

This is domestic abuse and needs help. This will be very hard for the family but the fact remains this is and could never be acceptable.

Edited to say that her husband refuses any sort of support/ therapy and she has been very specific about that.

I don't think this is normal or acceptable behaviour. I really do understand the difficulty of a child who won't eat what you've prepared. One of my children is ASD. As a small child he ate about 4 things. The advice we got was to serve the four things and try to find other things he liked but not to force. These children will literally starve rather than eat food they dislike. It's often a texture thing. He was strictly vegetarian from about five. Now he's a final year medical student and a very adventurous vegetarian.

Your husband's behaviour did not convince your son to eat the chicken and it may in fact reinforce his decision. Throwing a child onto he floor has never cured a picky eater. I remember a very unpleasant scene with my own father involving overcooked slimey silverbeet and decades later I still won't eat siverbeet in any form and I'm not ASD. (My dad didnt throw me on the floor.) My husband is I am sure on the spectrum although he was never diagnosed as a child but he had enough self-awareness to realise who his son took after.

I suppose the issue is what your husband will do the next time your son doesn't eat his dinner.

Having now read all the posts...can I ask, what do you seek as the result from involving social services? Do you hope that they will make your DH take a parenting course or change his behaviour? I think there is more to this story than we know and without a full family history and speaking to both your sons and your husband it's nearly impossible for anyone on here to give you advice on such a tricky situation.

For reference, I am a family social worker with over 20 years experience and my current job is early intervention in exactly the type of situations you describe. If this is generally a one off incident in a high stress household, you could self refer to early intervention parenting support, probably via your Council. The school will notify social services if you tell them as they would be mandatory reporters, who will note it, but in the absence of any other previous reports or issues it will be unlikely to meet their threshold for a substantiated notification for statutory intervention and they will refer down to voluntary parenting support anyway.

So before creating a social services history for your child, your husband and your family you could try to get a social worker involved for support on a voluntary basis after discussing with your husband about the seriousness of the incident. He must know on some level that SS could potentially get involved here.

If you or your children are genuinely in danger from your husband then contact your local DFV helpline to either get him out of the house or go to refuge.

Is he usually a pretty good parent? Does he spend time with the kids, contribute to family life, does he verbally or emotionally abuse you or the children? Is there a way to structure meal time so it's less stressful? Are there other points of conflict?

Social services are generally limited to prescribing interventions such as parenting courses, they can't tell your husband what to do. They will likely take the line that this is a stressed household due to ND child/ren and relationship dynamics that requires additional support, which depending on where you are located, may or may not be voluntary.

I can understand your frustration with his refusal to engage with professional help. He needs to, possibly for his own mental health as well.

A good first option in your situation might be to call a family line, family violence helpline or some such to talk to a professional counsellor who can assist you to walkthrough your decision making on this. Best of luck.

the argument was because the OP knows it doesn’t matter if he eats his chicken. Her husband thinks it is unacceptable if he doesn’t eat the chicken and says the OP is being too soft. So how can the OP “stop getting into fights about food when it is her husband who is picking a fight with his 6 year old???

Also tired of this gender being excused. If a woman did the same thing they would be dragged over the coals.

Reported

Sounds like your son has ARFID - there are some supportive groups on fb .

It's an eating disorders comment in the neurodivergent community . I have it too and suffered mostly through childhood .

Sorry can't comment on husband as not sure what to say. Much better comments above

All the goady menz activists have arrived @Spiderwoman123 . They're just here to cause trouble and undermine you. It happens on every thread when a man is abusive. They're not subtle.

You leave or he leaves

From what you have said your dh doesn’t work and is in sole charge of your dc which in itself is not good

Why isn’t your dh working?

Reasoning with a person who doesn’t want to see reason is just wasting time.

You do though have to report this incident to someone and let it be known that your dh is a danger to both of his dc if only to protect your dc from having to spend 1/2 the week being terrorised by their father.

At the same time you need to put in place a plan that will show you are trying to protect dc which will mean sending dc to wraparound care and not being alone with their df

i wonder what violence was inflicted on ds to get him to eat his food when you weren’t there. I don’t think you will actually know what went on until your DS’s think they are safe.
I do think that you have to look at the reality of the situation
You won’t be splitting the family. The family is broken already. How you proceed now is going to have a huge impact on your dc. Even doing nothing is.choosing a route through this and the consequences that come with it

I'm autistic, diagnosed years after my DC were
So when they were little ISH ,and getting diagnosed,we needed help .
I phoned social services a couple of times asking for help .
Each time they just said we were doing really well and no help needed .
Although my ds was the one being violent not a parent
I think from my experience,and my DH as a police officer at the time the bar for social services to get involved is set quite high
I don't think imho that your ds being tipped on to the floor is going to reach that bar
My DD was a pcso and saw DC with autism and not in school ,living with mattress on the floor no sheets or bedding and cat /dog poo on floor in the house .. social did not want to get involved.
The issue you have ..the problem you have is your DH ..he's not flexible enough to cope with being a parent to a DC with ASD ..it's his way or the high way ..

Just out of interest
Why are you paying all the bills ,why is your DH only working part time .
You are clearly a financially responsible person,and clearly very good at assessing your DC needs ..you seem to have a good grasp of autism ,you are on here taking on advice and trying to do what is best for your DC.
Your DH is massively letting you down ,both financially,and parenting wise .
As the DC grow up ,he's going to be a boulder round your neck , dragging you down ,deflecting from the importance of raising your DC.
Personally in your shoes ,I'd be issuing an ultimatum
He goes on an autism parenting course asap ...he gets to the doctor's to get an aessment himself..and he understands that if he ever uses his strength against your DC again,the marriage is over .
But that's what I'd do ...you have to decide what you will do

Thank god some people can look at these things rationally.

I disagree. OP's DH may be neurodivergent himself (although undiagnosed) but he must have been in many stressful situations throughout his life, including in his workplace, and he hasn't resorted to the sort of violent and threatening behaviour that he has used towards his 6-year old son.

This is a tricky one. Your husband will see any attempt to make him change his ways as an attempt control him, and nobody likes that - even though his ways do need to change. His reaction will probably be to dig in his heels. Even if he decides to try it your way, he will jump on everything DS does "wrong" as proof that your way isn't working and his way is needed.

When he was young, was he often forced to do what other people wanted him to do?

I mean, the key to dealing with a child like your DS is to keep potential conflict points to a minimum, and then police those conflict points with firm fairness. Food should never be a battlefield. But you already know that. The thing on which I think you and your husband can agree is that the rules for unacceptable behavior should be crystal clear, firm, fair, and applied with absolutely consistency.

Your husband absolutely should not have done what he did, and probably he knows it, but won't admit it because admitting it would make his position weaker. But let's leave that aside for a moment.

DS, out of frustration, raised his hand to another person. What should be the consequence for that? Perhaps that is a starting place for a conversation with your husband.

Maybe you all need to get examined for Autism and diagnosed.
It is not helpful to give pudding to a child who eats some cucumber. Your 6 year old has learnt no obedience to reasonable requests and keeps getting rewarded for half baked jobs.

It doesn't matter about diagnosis. He is six and will not be pleasant in any one's family home if he has not learnt to respect his parent's reasonable requests.

Some Daddy's do get over wrought by disobedient children continually testing a poor boundary.
Did you answer son - "Yes, and some boys never eat most of their dinner and cry and want pudding. They should not be at the dining room table for dinner unless they will eat some of every food."

Would it help to insist that the boys stop snacking an hour or two before meals? Including the boys in the cooking process is something your DH could try.

What will refresh your parenting energy?

Take some parenting of toddler classes together so you are both on the same page. Give each other a night off every few days.
Kids will push all the buttons. Parents need to read the room, the future, their own feelings so that they always react AS THE ADULT. Leave the room rather than resorting to violence.

That is easier to say than do - so taking classes and expanding the skill set is beneficial.

If you don’t mind me asking, what did you do to stop DS from hitting? A friend of mine seems to have tried everything with her young son and it just seems to be getting worse…

Poor little boy. Not just for the tipping out of the chair, but all the shouting and demeaning that went on before that and probably does every day. Your son probably has sensory sensitivities which it why he can't eat every type of meal out in front of him.
You're not being soft, you're being a good mum!

Your post makes me feel slightly sick. You excuse the violent adult and totally blame the six year old child. OP has taken parenting courses for the parents of neurodivergent children and parents according to their advice. Her husband refuses to attend these courses because he knows best apparently.

Her husband lifted the chair to a significant height and dropped it and you chastise the OP for comforting her son?

My son had a diagnosed eating disorder as a child and the advice from medical professionals was to let him eat whatever he wanted to ensure that he had enough calories. None of this would have happened if OP's husband hadn't made a massive deal of his son not eating his chicken.

I honestly think your situation is a horrendously stressful one and it probably was that your dh lost all control but at the same time him tipping the chair was nearly as bad as hitting. All of you are all fired up but when things calm, that’s when you talk as you’re all in this as a family and your dh and to a lesser extent your son need to learn what to do when everything gets super charged like that. Your dh went to blame you which was so wrong of him but like I said ye are all in a tough full time life situation.

He is a nasty asshole.I thought that before I even got to the crux of the post - 'he much prefers DS2' was enough for me.

OMG please ignore this poster OP. She condoned your husband's violence reaction in her earlier post. You are the stronger and more compassionate parent. You have done all the work to learn how to parent a neurodivergent child and your husband has done nothing.

The most appalling posts on this thread are the ones where the poster is excusing and sympathising with your DH as he is obviously neurodivergent even though he has never sought a diagnosis, but are putting all the blame on a neurodivergent child who is only six years old. They are holding your son to higher standards than his dad.

He accepts no blame at all. It's as though your son was suddently magically lying on the floor crying but he has said he's sorry so that's the end of it. There is no genuine remorse. He just wants you to stop blaming him and to brush past this unfortunate incident and pretend that it didn't really happen.

No doubt if you tell him that you can't just forgive and forget, he will turn on you and blame you for making a mountain out of a molehill.

I think he is a dangerous man and you should report him to the school's safeguaring lead.

JFC, here you come with the tired and clichéd refrain of 'we only have one side of the story'. That's all we ever get on Mumsnet. That's how this works.

Turning to Mumsnet for help has actually genuinely helped lots of women who are in abusive relationships. Many posters on here are very knowledgeable in this area, whether through personal experience or through their professional lives and many women have been able to leave their abusive partners safely thanks to their advice and support.

I hope that you can get you and your child somewhere safe - this is all completely unacceptable from your husband.

My children have ASC and I wouldn't be able to continue the marriage after something like this.

Your husband staring at DS was designed to trigger him into being dysregulated - your son asked him to stop staring at him and your husband continued, knowing full well it was distressing your child.

OMG, your husband said 'look what you made me do'? That is the abuser's mantra whether they are being violent to their wives or their children.

So you not force feeding your son chicken nuggets to pander to his frustrated chef's feelings is you actually making him drop your crying and frighted son from a significant height onto the floor?