How to deal with 21YO male relative around 11 and 13 YO DD's...

[RupertsFriend]

Where to start? Long post – sorry. And have name-changed for this.
I have 2DD’s, 11 and 13.

My cousin is a similar age to me and she has a son, aged 21. Let’s call him Lucas. He has some additional needs – think Aspergers – so is socially awkward. This may or may not be relevant. My cousin is always keen to encourage – almost micromanage - her son to have a social life, right from when he was quite young, and I think part of this was from her seeing that he was awkward socially.

He works, drives, but has few friends locally, if at all. They all seem to be online friends - which I appreciate is a thing.

Anyhow, as a family, my DD’s see my cousin on a regular basis – think days out to local attractions etc, and coffees when passing the house etc.

This is really hard to say, but I am becoming concerned about the way Lucas acts around my DD’s. For someone who is generally quite withdrawn he interacts with them physically in a way I have not seen him do with anyone else. Granted, I may not see him too regularly but I have known him all his life.

Things I have been concerned about:

1. For example, at a family get together at Easter the “youngsters” – Lucas, my 2 and some other family kids - were in the snug playing computer games and Lucas had DD2 sat on his knee, bouncing them up and down. This made me uncomfortable and I said something along the lines of “come on, don’t be bothering Lucas” and he said “oh I don’t mind”. I had to insist to get DD2 off his knee. Later I went back in and he had DD1 on his knee. The same thing happened. They were then not left alone again as we all went to eat and then they never went back into the snug.

2. He plays tickle and rough-houses with them. We were at home a month ago and as soon as DD’s walked in the room he started poking them in the ribs and “tip-tapping” with them. Again this made me uncomfortable. I said “leave Lucas alone” and one of my DD’s replied that “he had started it” so I said “perhaps Lucas wants to stop doing it then as a grown up”. It did stop but he wandered off and said “I don’t know why I am here”. I don’t know if this is because I made him feel awkward or if I had correctly called him out.

3. On an another occasion Lucas was stood behind DD1 and with his arms crossed in front of her, his head on her head and his hands touching the tops of her arms. Again, very uncomfortable as hands so near her chest. I took the same approach saying to Lucas / DD’s that as a grown up Lucas might want to stop leaning on DD.

4. My cousin has suggested taking my DD’s to another local attraction in the New Year. There is nothing there to interest a 21 man IMO, but my cousin has said that Lucas would also like to go, and I heard him say that. Part of me thinks that is very odd, part thinks my cousin is trying to organise Lucas again. I am not keen on them going now but they know all about it. This I think is the ticking time bomb (as I can manage Christmas).

Writing them down, I have come to the conclusion that it does not matter what his intentions / motivations are. He may be immature, he may have boundary issues, he maybe a lot worse. HOWEVER his behaviour around my children makes me (and my husband) uncomfortable. In fact me and DH sat down at the same time after incident 2 and said we were concerned. They have not seen Lucas since so we have not addressed it (how on earth to do it?)

How do I manage this? We are going to see Lucas over Christmas. I have no doubt that he will start rough-housing. My DD’s like it, they are active kids.

In the first instance I want to have a word with my DD’s about boundaries. We are quite open as a family talking about sex, consent, feminism, equality etc. That all seems ok in theory, but it looks to me that they are not applying some of the boundary stuff to the relationship with Lucas. Once I say something though, like ”I do not like the way Lucas does xyz”, or “do not sit on his knee or tickle him or let him lean on you from behind and put his arms around your shoulders”, are they going to link that with me thinking he is possible predatory.

I do not know how that will affect how they behave around my cousin (who I love very much), or Lucas.

I am worried about losing the relationship with my cousin if I have to sit down and say to her I do not like the way your adult son touches my pre-teen and teen girls. That’s never going to go well is it.

On the other hand, my DD’s are the absolute priority.

Has anybody been through this / had the same thoughts about a family member?
Any ideas on where to start?
And I absolutely will be making sure there will be no unsupervised access to the DD’s over Christmas.

How well do you get on with Lucas? Could you have a little chat with him?

It really doesnt sound like he means any harm, it seems like his really comfortable around your dds and finds it easy to interact with them. But he does need a reminder that they are no longer children.

As a very rough guide young people with Aspergers can have emotional and social development of about 2/3 s their actual age, a generalisation but I have found it useful when dealing with my DS. So, his social and emotional development is actually close to your daughters' own, which is probably why he is relaxed with them.

Your girls are at the age where you are going to have to talk to them about appropriate behaviour with their own peers, so I would talk to your cousin about that and suggest asking Lucas to desist with the rough-housing as it sends mixed messages to the girls about how to behave around boys in general and what is acceptable behaviour from boys.

Mother's instinct and gut feeling are paramount in this situation though, and even if he stops tickling, will it solve everything else?

As a mother of a 12 year old I have had this uneasy feeling about men interacting with my dd twice and have avoided or extremely limited contact.

Why should the girls have to display "appropriate behaviour", though?
Even allowing for anyone else's SN, the girls are innocent of everything and surely should not have to modify their behaviour?
I'm not being goady, I really understand the difficulties involved ( I do, really I do) and I still don't feel comfortable with the idea that has been expressed up thread that the DDs need to modify their behaviour, somehow. :(

It's the long term issue that needs a solution as they will be around each other for year s to come. I would explain to the girls to discourage him as he doesn't understand what is not suitable behaviour for his age.

"The girls are getting a bit older now and I don't think it's appropriate to be tickling anymore. You are an adult and they are still children."

This is a good statement however remove the "i think" I have a brother with Aspergers and he is emotionally immature but also very black and white - he would interpret that as "that's what you think you don't know the kids are having fun, I am having fun therefore it's ok"

Conversations that went more along the line of "DB this stops now, these are my boundaries don't break them" resulted in a curbing of behaviours that were not appropriate even if I am then the fun killer boring person (he loves me really)

Hello rupert what a tough situation.

It made me feel uncomfortable reading your posts. This is how my uncle managed to sexually assualt me when I was a child as he gradually pushed down my boundries through tickling and rough housing to the point I wasn't even sure if I'd just been assaulted.

I would defanatly listen to your inner voice and talk about this to your girls, Lucas and sister and I agree with the post upthread about being prepared for your relationship with your sister to change - but ultimately it's your dd that need prioritising. The girls need teaching that boundries are not to be crossed even if anybody has SN. SN is not a reason to allow someone to cross your boundries.

Good luck

I came on to say the same as sobersarah. This isn't about the girls modifying their behaviour - although the OP is wise to alert them of course.

They are potential victims of unwanted and potentially unlawful behaviour. The adults around them, including Lucas's mum, need to
protect them from that as a priority.

I recently saw a poster aimed at children in sport which said 'if something doesn't feel right, it probably isn't' and it sounds like the OP's instincts are spot on and she needs to speak to her cousin as well as being more direct with her concerns with her daughters, and certainly never leaving them alone with Lucas (or with Lucas and his mum).

The circles idea looks like an excellent one.

One thing that strikes me is the fact that you seem to blame your DDs for Lucas' behaviour, as in "DD, leave Lucas alone". This sounds like it could be quite damaging. It's not your DDs' fault how he's behaving.

I'm not trying to blame my DDs although I can see how it might sound like that when I've said "DDs leave him alone". Just my way of immediately trying up diffuse the situation and give some thinking time as to how to deal with the potentially more sensitive aspects.
This all is related to the points made above about the girls modifying their behaviour and should they have to and the dangers of making them responsible for the actions of others. They need agency though and to be able to recognise the "not quite right". And absolutely it is a long term issue for them. Both in this context and the wider world.

I have been doing a bit of research (google) around this and one key point is how tickling etc normalises touching and then makes predatory touching easier. I am still not saying this is definitely the case here, but it is interesting /scary to understand how barriers can be broken down.

People with and without disabilities abuse children. I think you've to be careful of excusing shitty behaviour with a asd or similar behaviour. The other sad reality is noone wants to believe their child is capable of abuse. Hence all the excuses

Trust your instincts! If both you and your husband are concerned listen to what your mind is telling you. Your priority is your daughters, if your relationship with your cousin has to end so be it.