social skills help for young adults

[everythingisfineyeh]

Hi all, has anyone got any good links or advice for helping a young adult who has mental/social difficults ? I have a 26 yr old son who had multiple difficulties as a child , we got him support at schoool so he was able to get thru and in the end managed to get a degree.

Now he has a job but remains very isolated (no friends at all) and I know he finds the office environment very challenging. The problem is he doesn't seem to understand the importance of social signals in letting people know you he is amenable and wants to be included. He seems unable to intiate these signals, and I suspect his blank face and taciturn manner mean colleagues just decide he is unfriendly and unsurprisingly they reject him. Deeper down he has a narcissitic streak, where he believes he is entitled to have friendships with out having to make any effort and he blames everyone else ('the world') for his isolation.

I try to explain this to him but he just doesn't seem to get it. How do you go about improving the social skills of a 26 year old who seems unable to recognise that their own behaviour is possibly in large part causing/contributing to the problem ? I do wonder whether he has autistic and narcissistic traits , but very hard to pin a single label on him and not sure it would help. At a bit of a loss what to do with him and I worry about how he will be able to function in life when we (his mum and dad) are 'gone'. Any advice or links on helping 'older kids' with social skills appreciated.

Bumping for you-sorry am no help

Do you think having an assessment for ASD woukd help him understand himself more? If for instance he did have ASD would he join a local ASD group?

Oh and you might want to ask @MNHQ to move this over to the Parents of Adult Children section, you might get some pointers or at least sympathy in there

Unfortunately if he's 26 then you've probably missed your chance. Would he even go for support with his social skills or attend the Drs to look into an autism assessment? It has to be him that makes the move and doesn't sound like he will.

I think the only thing you can do is join a group like ramblers, park run or similar and invite him along, but it takes time to build friendships. I think it always takes at least 6 months before you stop being the 'new' person and start being brought into the wider group, but will he stick it out for those 6 months?

My autistic godson’s parents helped him a lot in his teens by explaining social cues (things like how to tell if you’re boring someone, indications someone is uncomfortable, and rehearsed conversational cues). He’s now at university, doing well, with friends, and good at the self-care he needs to compensate for masking.

Speech and language therapist would help.

My son had similar issues with social cues as a child and he worked with a salt.

It was tagged social communication difficulties.

He might also benefit from doing organised activities where there is the opportunity to talk to people - so cooking classes, walking groups, music groups etc.

He sounds like he may well be autistic.

Does he have a fixation? A hobby that totally absorbs him? If he does he could look for a group that also does the same hobby. If all he is doing is talking about something everyone in the group enjoys, then there's less need for social cues and general chit chat.

My DD struggles with face to face friendships but has some online friends she talks to most evenings. Somehow she can keep conversations going if it's online. She says once you've had enough it's easier to say you've got to go and just hang up. Her online friends are also mostly autistic.

He's not "an older kid". He's a man.

He has to decide to engage with a plan himself. A proper assessment and diagnosis (if there is anything to diagnose), and appropriate therapy or counselling to help him navigate the things he finds difficult.

Try the Princes Trust and they have programmes that can help https://www.princes-trust.org.uk/how-we-can-help/get-job

Thanks for all the responses. When I call him an 'older kid' I do understand that he is a man, but he is still our 'child' in the 'offspring' sense, and he needs help and guidance. Yes it is very difficult to help a grown-up, especially when they seem to repeat the same 'mistakes' that cause them the resulting difficulties of which they are very much aware, yet remain unwilling or unable to see how it is in a lrge part of heir own. He is so desperate to be independent and successful and so resists any kind of activity/assessment/therapy/group that could be regarded as showing some weakness in that respect. It is a tough situation, and I wonder whether things won't have to get worse for him before he accepts help and hopefully gets better. Thanks again all. I will have a look at the Princes Trust link, thanks for that too.

If he's so resistant do you think he may have PDA? He might be unwilling to engage but you could use techniques for PDA and see if that helps him?

Dear everythingisfineyeh I am reading your post I am facing a similar situation with my 24 years son… I am wondering what you have done … something it is working ?? Looking forward to hearing from you