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

This. My ASD son hits me most days. Today he pinched me extremely hard on the arm and hit me with a water bottle. He is very strong for his age and it hurts a lot when he does this. It is sometimes very very hard not to instinctively defend myself physically in response. We have never smacked him, so this is not learned from us, but is a symptom of his dysregulation and inability to cope with what he perceives as frustration/rejection/failure/criticism. I feel I am walking on eggshells constantly at home so as not to do anything which might set him off, but it can be unpredictable. I can see how intensely frustrating it would be for your DH to work hard to make a nice meal for the family and constantly have it rejected. It is exhausting.

@DeftWasp

"I don't disapprove of corporal punishment so long as it is moderate"

This is the 21st century, the law in England, you are obviously correct permits an adult to cause the reddening of their child's body because they've (the parents) lost control and do not have have the wherewithall to restrain their ire.

In which universe should it be permissible for a grown adult to administer corporal punishment to someone one a quarter of their size.

Zero excuse whatsoever, law or no!! Numpty

edited; sp.

If this is what they said about your marriage, I'm not sure they were telling you to focus on your marriage so much as pointing out that your husband is taking out marital stress on your son.

If your husband is choosing not be the parent your son needs, or to even acknowledge that he has a part to play in ensuring his safety, then I think you know that you can save your marriage or save your son, but not both.

Can you not see from this that he is uncaring and controlling? His anger comes from you and your children not doing things his way when he wants them done.

This is no way to live OP. He needs to leave. He doesn’t have compassion for you or respect.

I can see how intensely frustrating it would be for your DH to work hard to make a nice meal for the family and constantly have it rejected. It is exhausting.

@Breadandbutta He threw a six-year-old boy to the ground over a chicken nugget. Sorry but I don't care how 'exhausting' it is to have your 'nice meal' rejected. He put some fucking chicken nuggets in the oven and then assaulted his infant child.

I really don't give a fuck how 'frustrating' it is for him, a grown man who has repeatedly refused to engage with any kind of advice and support in favour of using verbal cruelty and physical violence, to have cooked a dinner his kid didn't want.

It's very concerning that anyone thinks this is remotely okay.

I completely agree

You are advocating and championing child abuse. You really are morally bankrupt aren't you.
You're not the only child abuse excuser on here though. I've seen a few posts condoning slapping/ hitting children.
Shame on you all.

Your child is 6 and has Asd. Your H is in his 40s. He's trying to hold your 6 year old to a higher standard than he holds himself. He is unable to control himself and self regulate. How does he expect a 6 year old to.

Your Hs behavior was very unsafe. He could have left the room. He chose to pick put the chair. He chose to tip the chair upside down. He chose to thrown your child on the floor. He couldn't predict the outcome. Your child is okay because he got lucky. He could have just as easily landed on his head /neck or fallen funny and done some serious damage.

What I find worrying is... this is the shit he's doing in front of you. What do you think he's doing behind your back?

Also, he isn't sorry! He's trying to minimise it. He's trying to justify it. He isn't mortified or trying to repair things. He isn't trying to access support, learning or therapy. Your H isn't engaging.

I think you need to priorities your children's safety over maintaining a family or relationship. I think you need to leave or ask him to leave. If he's prepared to do the work to learn how to support his child, work on his parenting, self regulation, anger management and engage in therapy your relationship has a chance. If not then you need to walk away. If not for your sake for the children's.

Just wanted to send some good wishes to you Op. It sounds like such a difficult and stressful situation. You need a partner who is going to work with you and get themselves informed about parenting a neurodiverse child. You have clearly tried and tried and he's not budged a millimetre towards you. I think the poster above must be right in their interpretation about the helpline's comments on your relationship - as a context for understanding what happened rather than them instructing you to work on your marriage. I think you can talk until you are blue in the face and he won't hear or understand you. A professional might get through, but he's so far refused to put himself in a position where he could hear from one.

Draconian.

You can't fix this situation alone, and you can't carry the marriage alone. You need the other adult to see the need to change and to make the effort, if you want to have any chance of fixing things. Unfortunately it's as simple as that.

Parenting is exhausting even with children without ASD, they all test the limits!

I can only tell you what I would do in this situation. First recognise DH isn’t coping and is making situations with children worse.
Second show him this if he isn’t listening to me. I’d tell him he has the week off from all children / house duties. His job is to just chill out after work, watch TV or something. I’d do all the cooking and look after the kids. I’d get the 6 year old to help prepare the food that he’d like to eat and let the kids eat their dinner - without adults eating - but with me sitting at the table chatting to them. Adults can get together later. I’d be in charge of everything; bath time, reading time and bed time - no help from DH for one week, keeping my cool when challenges arise.
Fingers crossed - a much calmer week and DH learns how to keep the peace.

I understand that this may be easier said than done. It’s just what I’d try.

@Auhdandme but she did protect her son! 🤷‍♀️

I think the H needs to be more supportive and help you. The boy has anger issues, but the care and effort he needs depends on how he usually is, is it a mental health issue, or is it just impluses.

You would reward a grown man who works part time for abusing his son? Wow.

If he hits another child at school he won’t be thrown off a chair by the teacher.

He’s six.

@Differentforgirls

I don’t see it as a reward. I see it as recognising things are not working and trying to find a solution. If it worked then

I would expect DH to then work with the same methods. The children would be happier, my husband then happier.

If it worked but DH didn’t/refused work to the same methods then there’s a real issue with his mental attitude towards his family’s needs, that definitely needs addressing - that could be medical help or separation.

If it was the other way around, I would expect DH to help me try to find ways to cope.

He is a grown man!

@Differentforgirls

Yes he is! But they need help sometimes too.

Don’t get me wrong - what he did was totally unacceptable but there’s an underlying issue there that may be easily resolved with a bit of understanding that he’s not coping.

I bet he doesn’t want to lose his family and would be mortified if he did. So anything is worth a try!

Ofcourse, only if this type of incident was a one-off and there’s no pattern of abusive behaviour.

His reaction afterwards is what I’d focus on. If I lost my cool and did that I’d be mortified.

However much support he gets elsewhere, your son is never going to learn to control his violent impulses if he's around an adult who can't control his own. Your husband doesn't have the self-awareness or emotional maturity to be a father, especially not to a child with additional needs. It's probable he never will. Yes, it sucks that he gets to escape his responsibilities and you can't. But you cannot risk raising any child in an environment this volatile.

Your DH sounds like my autistic DP.

I went through a period of hating him and wanting to leave him because he seemed so uncommunicative, I thought he had no compassion or feelings and after my mum died he seemed unsupportive and I felt like I was a nuisance for grieving.

To start with he refused to believe he was autistic but I treated him as he was anyway and used my knowledge from working with autistic adults and parenting autistic children and learned to communicate with him in a way he would understand and respond to.

I could easily see him saying something similar your DP said at counselling about wondering how you got onto the subject of a miscarriage and this would have deeply hurt me in the past.
I’ve had similar comments from DP when discussing an upsetting subject but realised it’s not that he isn’t hurting or doesn’t care, it’s just his confusion on not keeping up with how the conversation is progressing and questioning it.
I stay calm and explain why things like this hurt me now, I’ve had to advocate for my feelings a lot and be open about what hurts me without expecting my DP to just understand. He often doesn’t know why something hurts or upsets me but he will now apologise and remember for next time rather than being defensive.

It took me a long time to see how much DP struggled and masked and how his short temper and frustrated outbursts at times were due to autism and at times genuine meltdowns. He was never violent towards me but he would shout, slam doors and at times hit himself in the face or pull his hair if he was really agitated, this was usually when he couldn’t express how he was feeling and he was feeling defensive over me criticising him or being upset with him.

People make allowances for children with autism and take the time to parent differently and learn how to understand autistic children but that seems to stop and we have different expectations of adults. I don’t see why we expect them to grow out of it? If anything it’s just a case of masking longer and feeling like going through life and guessing the unwritten rules but then being unable to understand people who break the “rules” that were enforced on them growing up. It’s very hard to break the pattern of your own upbringing and what were your parents rules and values when they are ingrained.

My DP is like a different partner now. He started being honest and open about his feelings knowing I’d never judge or get angry and despite it taking ages to get the information I actually need I take the time to listen. I realise that the details that are irrelevant to me are important to get to understand what he was thinking/feeling.
In the past I’d interrupt or try to hurry him to get to the point when a story about a minor altercation in Tesco started from the moment he woke up!
I also never ask questions or for more information which means he’s more likely to offer it.
He doesn’t get defensive when I pull him up about something that upsets me anymore because I never challenge him or use emotive language, I have also worked out that trying to get him to imagine how he’d feel in the same situation works a lot of the time although sometimes he just can’t comprehend it.

My DP is open at work and with people about being autistic now (after walking out on two jobs over minor disagreements that were huge to him) and wears a sunflower wristband, this means instead of second guessing things or masking when he’s struggling he tells people so he is coping better and less stressed and frustrated at home.
I don’t give him lots of information in one go or ask him to do jobs round the house, I tell him how I feel and what needs doing and he cracks on.
I tell him how much I love him constantly, thank him for the things he does and this means he feels appreciated and does as much as he can to please me. I know he will never think to buy me flowers and resents any expectations like that because they wouldn’t occur to him (a friend and my sister once commented separately that he had never done it) but he buys me chocolate when I’m on my period, my face cream when I’ve run out, slippers because my feet were cold etc.

If you can communicate better with your husband whether you stay with him or not it’s going to improve you and your kids lives beyond measure. It sounds like your husband is struggling as much as you and I’m not defending what he did but I can also sympathise. I bet he’s feeling lost inside but you’d never know, I was so surprised at how much my DP feels and how much he goes over things that at the time I didn’t think he gave a shit over or affected him at all.
I also realised the more defensive he is and makes excuses for his behaviour the more he cares.

I feel like you are putting all the hours into learning about autism for your son but not your DH. You thought his comment was strange about the floor not being hard and almost hollow, that’s his guilt and him trying to convey to you that he didn’t mean to harm your son, he’s obviously going over it in his mind and my DP once told me with a similar situation he tries to justify things to make it easier because apologising makes it sound like it was intentional and in his mind it absolutely wasn’t.
You say counselling didn’t work but it doesn’t a lot of the time for autistic adults as they won’t open up to someone they don’t trust and will just be masking.

Is it possible to have any time together without your kids? Would you want to try to reconnect?
I honestly felt I’d stopped loving my DP but I am so glad I worked on things now because I realise there was a completely different person inside him that I didn’t even know and is kinder and more sensitive then I could ever realise and has the ability to be supportive and understanding more then I could have imagined.
We have been together 15 years but I think it was 3 years in before I really even started to get to know him properly and it was only when we nearly separated during Covid that I felt I know him as well as you can ever know someone.
It might be worth trying just for your children or even just to improve your parenting relationship together so you are on the same page.

I can understand posting on mumsnet for advice but you’ll get a lot of advice when people only have one side of the story and don’t know anyone involved. It’s a good idea to be able to get things of your chest and talk but I think you need proper professional help and some people aren’t capable to seeing a bigger picture and will give you knee jerk advice to leave or tell you how awful your husband is when we really don’t know the full story at all. Your emotional response will be to protect your children which is obviously the biggest priority but I think leaving your husband without trying to work on things first might do more harm then good, he’s still going to be in your children’s lives and you will still be parenting differently.
I also think involving the school will be a similar experience and you need impartial support for everyone.

It sounds like you are struggling and have taken on everything yourself and are now resenting this. I think a lot of women do the same thing because we are better at seeing what needs to be done and cracking on with it.
Have you asked your DH and told him what you need or are you expecting him to help? Do you criticise what he does help but does things differently?
I took on everything because I wouldn’t ask for help and wanted it all done my way as I thought it was the most efficient (it often is!) now DP helps with a lot more and it might not be how I’d do it but I don’t feel as resentful and unsupported and if I need to redo something then I do. Now if DP sees my way works best he does it - to be fair I do often adopt a lot of his ways as well.
Take into account the things you have learned about autism for your son and imagine how you’d feel if he grows up and marries a woman who has the same expectations for him as a NT person.

I am also ND so I think this helps me to emphasise as I also struggle in a world that’s built around NT people. I’m not autistic but it did help me to understand a lot about how my DP feels as we have a lot of similar traits and experiences.

I know a lot of this post is focusing on your husband and not your kids but sometimes I think adults needs get completely forgotten or pushed aside when kids come along. I’m not excusing what he did at all but this is one incident and you haven’t posted about a long history of abuse or your DH deliberately hurting his kids or you.
If that was the case then I’d say in no uncertain terms to leave but other posters have also picked up on the fact that this seems to be an outburst from frustration and the inability to cope rather then deliberate cruelty.

I don’t know if you’ll read this as it’s very long (sorry) but I hope you get the help you all need and things improve. Please don’t listen to anyone putting pressure on you to follow their suggestions, they aren’t living your life and can’t really advise you on anything based on a one sided mumsnet post.

I also wanted to add that I have absolute respect that you are doing everything you can in a very difficult situation and that I completely emphasise as it sounds like I’m just championing for your DH in my post.
You seem like a strong kind wonderful mother and you deserve a happy and loving marriage, if you truly feel that you can never achieve that then I wasn’t intending to try to pressure you to stay with your DH.
I just wanted to give you my perspective as someone with an autistic partner who understands the challenges and frustrations that brings but also we got through a period where it hadn’t been for Covid we would have separated.

This sounds so hard, and I'm really sorry you're going through it. From what you've said, you've been pouring everything you have into keeping the family together and functional - You're the main earner; attending courses and being main POC with Senco; attending counselling; all while dealing with your husband's refusal to engage or active pushing back on your efforts to make things better. That's a lot of emotional and literal labour.

I think you're right to trust your gut. It doesn't sound like it was a one-off; it sounds like you've been stemming the tide of your husband's escalating behaviour for a long time, and now it's overflowed he's refusing to take accountability and is blaming you and his child. This is 100% abusive: the charity were right to tell you that events matter less than responses in any relationship - I imagine if his response had been 'o my god I'm not coping, I'm so sorry, I need help' and then followed through on working to repair the relationship with his son and you, getting help for his own issues and working to change his behaviour, you'd feel differently. But instead, he's blamed you, blamed a 6 year old, and seems to be having an ongoing tantrum about the fact you've taken it as seriously as it deserves.

You can only do so much - you've held up your end admirably and for a long time, but you can't make him do the same. If this is a red line for you - and in a similar situation, it was for me - it is OK to hand his responsibility back to him, centre your children and yourself, and walk away.

Bless you, our home life is the same. I worry for our teenage years when our DC is stronger and bigger. Your own body as a parent is constantly in fight and flight, and you have to keep your cool else your ND child will escalate as you escalate.
For those who don't have ND children - unfortunately it takes so much energy to keep that in check, that some parents struggle, so OPs DH could well have just tipped over into his own fight mode.

Spider woman you really aren't alone.