DD’s birthday was an utter disaster

[bendmeoverbackwards]

It’s DD’s 19th birthday today. She’s ASD and has been out of education for a few years.

Last couple of birthdays have been disappointing to her and I know this one brought up a lot of emotion not just about birthdays but also her situation in general.

I asked her a few weeks ago if she wanted to see a particular show and a meal at a steak place. She just said no but gave no other suggestions. I then asked last week of she wanted just a meal out and where - no response. So I decided to book a local restaurant just in case as Saturday nights get busy, with the option of cancelling if she didn’t want to.

When I told her, she wasn’t happy and said she couldn’t do it now because I’d chosen it (autistic brain). I asked where else she’d like to go but didn’t get a reply. I suggested a takeaway, took hours of questions about this, she didn’t see a takeaway as a birthday celebration. She eventually decided on pizza.

I also got her a beautiful personalised cake. Last year for her 18th, I got her a nice chocolate cake with her name on but it didn’t have the same personalisation as her older sister’s 18th birthday cake (which was celebrated in lockdown so I pushed the boat out a bit). Also the board base was accidentally thrown out when there was a tiny bit of chocolate left on it. She complained about this for months. I said I would buy her an extra cake (cheapy supermarket cake) but I forgot.

Now she says she can’t have this year’s cake because of the lack of the other one and it would be in the wrong order (autistic brain again).

Choosing presents is also difficult for her so I chose a few small gifts and paid in £50 birthday money into her account. She didn’t like this either, she wanted to choose her own presents (but from past experience she takes ages to choose, months and months, so I thought I’d make it easier by giving her money).

Written down, I realise she sounds like a spoilt brat. But I didn’t do some things that I said I would eg buy her an additional cake and take her for a belated birthday meal (from last year).

The evening ended with her sobbing in the kitchen and me losing my temper 😢

My Glaswegian mother had a saying when we were being moany teens: ‘och, you’re never bloody happy.’
I think the same could be said of your daughter. She’s always going to find something to bitch and whine about, so don’t feel bad at your perceived lack of perfection/failings.

Bloody hell this thread is exhausted. OP this is the side of ASD families that no one sees.

I have a PDA’er, and he’s the same with Christmas and birthdays. He expects The World and yet doesn’t ever bother with anyone else’s. I have given up with it, and make sure we book to go on holiday over Christmas each year and “that’s your present” because I cannot stand the pressure.

Did/does your daughter have an EHCP? I’d encourage you to explore without delay. For her to have missed so much education and then rule the roost whilst simultaneously blaming you for everything, is just not on.

I mean this most kindly, but does she ever get the chance to explore the consequences of her actions?

I think it's really important you both keep a united front. Subconsciously, your DD will be learning from you and your reaction (or lack, thereof) in her repeatedly telling her dad to fuck off. Would you have tolerated that from her sibling(s)? All it's teaching her is that she can raise the bar and escalate her unacceptable behaviour.

It's the same with my relative and birthday presents from her mum. . Her mum can do nothing right. She wanted a particular mug for Christmas, fine. But it had to arrive on a specific date, from a specific company. It wasn't possible for her mum to arrange this, because she's not a wizard and can't control the post; she bought exactly the same item from Amazon, so that it would arrive on time. Result? She was screamed at because Amazon is on her ever-expanding list of verboten places. Presents from us always go down with a polite thank you (because she knows any nonsense from her will result in us dropping the rope).

@Starryfloats post is super helpful.

Time to kick her out and let her stand on her own 2 feet. You’ll only sabotage whatever she does (or doesn’t do) next, after all. She sounds like she deserves complete freedom, without her mother there to ruin everything (which of course you’re not doing, but that’s how she sees it.) let her crack on.

She could do an access course. It’s free to resit her maths and English GCSEs if she needs to. There’s nothing to stop her. She could speak to college Monday. It’s not for you to sort.
What is she living on financially Op?
I wouldn’t entertain rehashing things from years ago.

No. DBT is a psychotherapy often used for personality disorders in particular. The patient has to agree to it and actively engage in it for it to be effective. They have to attend sessions and want to work on change.

Behavior analysis/pure behaviour therapy is more of a technique or approach one can use to change behaviours, the subject doesn't need to be aware of it or agree to engage. The analysis needs to be done by a professional behaviourist, but the approach is carried out by people around the patient, such as family, teachers etc.

My DS started ABA when he was 2 He didnt have the capacity at that time to engage actively in any kind of therapy (non-speaking, limited language, distressed to the point of frequent self harm). The approach still worked, amazingly well. You can use it to train any conscious being, at any level of cognition, not just humans and certainly not just autistic people. It basically "rewires" behavioural responses at a deep level, if dome well enough and for long enough and, very importantly, consistently enough.

So if she disputes her diagnosis, how does she explain her not being in education, training or employment? Her horrendous behaviour to her and her dad? The bullying of her siblings then?

She has good enough GCSEs for the next stage. Not 8s and 9s like she wanted but mostly 6s which is fine. She thinks she ‘failed’ them all which I’ve pointed out that isn’t true as a 4 is a pass. She’s an academic snob and has turned her nose up at any suggestions of courses I’ve made to her. She’s acting like a petulant toddler saying she ‘must’ go to university (and a good one) without having the critical thinking skills if that route is right for her.

I don't think any of this is DD's fault. However her having autism doesn't turn you into a mind reader or decoder. I think, in future, you just have to say to her "You don't seem to like me to suggest what we might do, do we'll only do what you suggest". Keep the day free. There are lots of things you could do that don't need any planning, including picking up a store made cake, shopping, many activities don't need booking or you can book an hour or two in advance. Give her money and on the day she can decide what she wants to do. Or if the idea comes to her in advance she can tell you.

She explains it by being sabotaged by me when I discussed her diagnosis with school (‘lies’). This triggered some attention on her/offers of support which she hated and made her reluctant to go to school. I’m amazed she got the GCSEs she did with 50% attendance.

She seems to blame you for everything. I don’t think anything you do would be good enough tbh.

What the actual fuck??? Are you joking

It wasn't an "utter disaster" at all, OP. You bent over backwards to make it nice for her but, due to the specific circumstances which are nobody's fault, it just didn't go to plan.
Would it be better just not to bother about her birthdays in future? It seems to put huge pressure on her to have a good time. Don't worry about a cake, and just buy her something during the year when she thinks of something she wants.

Your posts come across as you feel it’s for you to sort out like she’s a child. I think if you mentally move on (via therapy if needed) it will really help you both.
If she wants to go to uni it’s within her gift.
I wouldn’t constantly rehash things.

She could sign up at the local college for an access course with her GCSEs. If she wants to not declare her diagnosis as she disagrees with it that’s her choice. She’s an adult she doesn’t need you to be involved and if you stay out of it you can’t be blamed in any way.

It was presumably her decision not to go to college at 16. Reading between lines her preferred choice of school sixth form didn’t want her due to grades but she had other options.
Do you ever challenge her back rather than constantly appease? So if she is adamant she is not autistic what her is explanation for not doing anything since leaving school in June 2023 and presumably being financially supported by you?

She's not a helpless little child anymore.

It is up to her to figure out how to navigate the world with her disability, and that means seeking help, and being clear with people what accomodations are necessary and accepting that sometimes, they won't be possible.

Sometimes she is going to have to accept that things may be difficult and may not have the outcome she'd prefer. We can acknowledge that thats hard, its not nice... but that is the way it is.

Stop arranging birthdays for her - she can tell you what she wants as a gift x months prior to birthday. If she wants to arrange something she can do that, or ask for help with that.

But she cannot expect you to guess what she wants, 100% accurately, without any sort of input/feedback from her.

There also has to be a time limit on letting things go - saying she can't have this years birthday cake because there is a situation with last years that is not resolved in her mind is fucking ridiculous - I am sure it itches her brain, Im sure it doesn't 'feel right' ... but thats for her to deal with, not for you to bend over backwards to resolve. You've offered a simple solution 'here is a 'make up' cake' - she needs to get a grip over which order which cake came in.

I do think you both need to sit down with her and explain this pretty firmly - she must take responsibility for herself because ultimately no one else is able to do that, and very few people will want to bother!

This is sad to read. My DD was a bit of an intellectual snob too, though she did get 7-9s in GCSEs but she dropped out of 6th form twice. Perfectionism, constantly comparing herself to others/her peers and, at that point, a belief that it should be Oxbridge or bust. She did eventually realise 18m ago that she was getting nowhere whilst her friends were on their 1st or 2nd year at uni and finally agree to at least try an Access Course. In her cohort, several DID go to Oxbridge and ones like my daughter ended up at the top uni for her chosen course (a Russell). Of a cohort of about 43 students ages 19-30odd, every single one went on to their first choice uni, more than 30 of them to RG unis.

The RG unis highly rate Access students - a fact my DD wouldn’t believe and took a while to come around to given she could not offer A Levels. In fact given the academic rigour involved in the assignments (research, critical analysis, etc leading to undergraduate level quality essays) she now realises the Access course was a better -and quicker - route into uni.

You mention your daughter resents the ‘label’ autistic. My DD resisted it for ages until she came around to her brother’s perspective of it being like a glasses’ prescription rather than a label. It’s information not a straight jacket. Her report is ‘more’ than just ‘Autistic ✅’ - it is a personal profile which enables her (and my DS) to select the correct tools and support for each social or academic context.

If it is at all useful, you can tell her she doesn’t need to accept it, but ‘use’ it - my DD has been given £1000s of tech and software to support her at uni, including her own printer and a paper/ink allowance, a laptop etc. It meant that a personal inclusion plan was automatically given by the uni: with extensions on assignment deadlines and extra time in exams, all without question or the need to go cap in hand to tutors - why not make the most of these and just take what’s on offer regardless of whether she agrees with the diagnosis? And absolutely NO ONE at uni needs to know. She is not required to declare it to peers or even tutors if she doesn’t wish to, so she does not have to carry the ‘label’ with her into every context. It can be her secret as it is totally private information.

Not sure if any of that helps but I do recognise the railing against the diagnosis and the idea that she was disabled and would never be independent. My DD is finally coming around to understanding that this is not the curse she thought and beginning to let go of the anger - which I think fuels her negative attitude, her spikiness, her rudeness. your DD can also have ASD/ND mentoring at uni which has been really useful. She is not there yet - she is definitely operating at a 15/16yo’s maturity level. but we opted to the ‘why not give it a go and see what happens?’ approach, and made sure we were on hand to catch her if it went/when it goes pear-shaped… which it does and will from time to time.

What about options I’m thinking PDA too? So also I find with my 11 year old options work best…

eg:

swimming
baking
cinema

as party options )l(tbh you could suggest that to a 19 year old like :

cinema and restaurant then pick a couple of options.

I use a sheet or tick boxes or text! It’s like texting is less of a demand.

Did you ever take her to therapy? Because it really sounds like you’ve literally done everything on her terms, and haven’t dealt with any bad behaviour. Has she ever had consequences for anything?

She’s in trouble now. 19 with no education and no job, with no path ahead of her and no plan in place and all she does is play the woe is me card, blame everyone else and throw tantrums. Are you willing to support her forever? Because unless you start parenting her, actually parenting her, then she’ll be your dependent forever. And what happens when you’re gone?

Someone once said to me- if you keep repeating the same actions, you will get the same outcomes. It was like a light went on in my head. And I wonder if you are moving towards this?

You understand that whatever you do isn't good enough. By blaming you for everything, she is able to step away from accountability. And do the whole circle begins again. You know that you will never be able to meet her demands, so maybe birthdays need to be different from now on. Maybe you don't actually celebrate on the day. Maybe she chooses 1 thing to do that's special (e.g. breakfast out) and then they day continues are normal.

I suspect a lot of this attitude is to actually avoid taking the next step because she is afraid- which is understandable. But the longer she waits until the perfect situation is handed to her, the more difficult it's going to be. I understand that she isn't able to see that at the moment, but it's the truth. It's a difficult situation but equally, you can't keep being an emotional punchbag for the rest of your life.

I both agree with this instinctively but also (as the mother of a potentially ASD child) worry about where that leads. Because only 1/3 of adults with ASD do work, and many never live independently.

Now we know more about it we think my DH is autistic too. He crashed out of A Levels and didn’t graduate until he was 25 as a result of his immaturity in his late teens. I am over a decade younger than him but when we met we were so similar because it basically took him til 35 to reach the maturity of the average 25 year old.

I think that she does have to take responsibility - but also she might absolutely fail to do this for quite a long time yet until her brain finally catches up with her body.

It sounds as if your DD's go-to response to a difficulty or to a disappointment or to anything that makes her feel bad is to get angry and blame someone else. Especially you. And your response to being blamed is to try to fix things up so she will stop blaming you. That doesn't work because you can't make her life perfect and over-compensating will encourage her to blame even more.

I've been in a similar position when my DC was much younger. Luckily DC blamed me for something that couldn't have been my fault (I wasn't in the room!) and the child-psych explained that blame was one of DC's (poor) coping strategies. But I still felt badly about being blamed. I was seeing a counsellor at the time and we talked through strategies for me to cope better as a parent without either flipping blame back onto DC or blaming myself and trying to over-compensate.

@Springisnearlyspring her explanation is that she is traumatised from the diagnosis and subsequent discussion about it (‘lies’).

@SargeMarge every suggestion of therapy/counselling has been met with a fat ‘no’ and ‘I’m not a freak/retard’ even though she knows that the rest of the family have all had counselling at one stage or another. I can’t force her into therapy can I?

Totally agree.

OP, I voted YABU purely on the basis you're taking responsibility for how things panned out.

I think ND traits are used too often to cover bratty behaviour. I'm not saying the diagnosis doesn't have merit but it shouldn't be used to excuse appalling behaviour.