What’s going on with my adult son?

[Ooonafoo]

I have copied this over from MH as not getting much traffic:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/feeling_depressed/4776243-whats-going-on-with-my-adult-son?reply=125112485

He’s 24 - moved home last summer. Graduated 2 years ago and stayed in uni city after. Trying to establish a freelance creative career. He has his old school friends a pocket money job in a local pub and does loads of sport (solitary stuff - running / climbing). He doesn’t smoke, drink or do any drugs now. He is passive aggressive and hostile in the home. Doesn’t speak just a dark moody cloud - but chipper to his colleagues and friends. He makes his younger sisters walk on eggshells. He has this thing recently where when he is told to do something (reasonable house related) he descends into this whooping crying fit. I walk away as I see it as manipulative and he then rings his Dad at work screaming at him that I am mocking him and bullying him - which is not true - I will have said for instance do not use the jack and Jill shower at 2am use the main bathroom as it wakes your sister who has to go to school.

He screams that I am mocking his mental health by asking him to be considerate to others.

Is he being manipulative or is something deteriorating with him? Could he have something undiagnosed MH / ND that would cause this volatility and rage. My DD is scared of him physically although he has never been violent.

This is my gut but I am fearful of his outbursts and if this would lead to him taking his own life.

He self harmed as a teenager (repeatedly cut his thighs) which he only told me about and showed me recently. He had significant emotional issues when a GF left him and he had to resit exams and ‘didn’t want to live’ - we gave him loads and loads of gentle support and he had some therapy.

His behaviour was very challenging as a teenager at home and we rowed and clashed then. Our relationship was fine when he was living out - but his mood towards the family unit was hostile and volatile when he returned in the holidays.

He has a particular fixation on me and I have apologised for allowing the situation to escalate to become fractious when he was a teenager. I now don’t ever raise my voice with him but any simple request in a calm tone of voice sees him flip into this bizarre screaming state which I walk away from.

This recent (last 6 months since he has moved home) extreme screaming / crying is bizarre - I can’t work out if it’s a very significant symptom of an undiagnosed MH/ND issue or highly manipulative and abusive - so I don’t know if tough love would exacerbate the issue.

We have set him up for psychotherapy sessions as well as private assessment for ADHD but he is not taking these up.

Its causing huge distress in the family especially with my DDs. I don’t know who I am pandering to or protecting. The girls want him out - I am terrified he will take his own life.

The eggshell cycle is the abusive cycle - everything seems ok, then tension mounts, then an abusive incident, then apologies or at least silence, then a honeymoon period/everything seems ok…and you walking on eggshells trying not to provoke the situation - you’re already doing it by not speaking because he’s said your voice triggers him.

Your DH is enabling him, so either chuck the two of them out or leave with your daughters, this is only going to stop if you make it stop.

There is no changing this dynamic. Even if you 'get help' for you son, your husband is far too invested in how it is now. For what ever reason he thrives on it. Put your dad's first and get them out. How can you live like this?

DD's ffs

DS age 19 was like this. I had to have the police remove him when he bashed in my door. He now lives with his equally abusive and mentally Ill father. I love him and feel bad for him but life is so much more peaceful for me and my daughter. His father was useless and abusive to me and him so it was like I was the cause and the solution to all of DS's problems. He had a very strange view of what a mother's role is, and no particular view on what a father's role is. The role of mother, even if the father is around and not abusive, is so loaded.

Solid stance by both parents.
You son has mental health woes.
Your son goes to the mental health appointment with his father and continues on with advice or treatment that he is given .. or he leaves to live elsewhere.
Set a strict date. Set other parameters that mean him living with you is sustainable. If not, once again.. he moves out.
Consider moving his room so that he naturally does not use the bathroom near his sister. She should not have to cope with him.
None of you should but she is young enough to be very affected by him.

I also think he shouldn't be living with you. Your husband is the original problem, though.

I find it a bit odd when people semi-diagnose people based on a few things. No. The boy has basically become an attentions seeking spoilt brat enabled by his Father who also sounds insufferable. Doesnt alwys have to be mental illness or a diagnosis rather then just plain old bad behaviour.

I would be considering leaving the husband and boy to it, move out with my daughter. The pair of them sound like absolute horrible dickheads.

I actually think it is because he doesnt have MH issues. He has just learnt that this behaviour is a way of upsetting you, getting what he wants, a sort of power play. The behaviour also keeps him trapped in a sort of Peter Pan like existence, never has to really be accountable for himself or grow up - Dad is enabling it, it is a win win. For some young men having any kind of power is attractive especially is they have low self-esteem. Kick him out, id also kick the Dad out as well, they can live in a flat together and see how that works!

Absolutely this. I have a friend who has been through similar, the husband and son used to gang up on her, treat her appallingly, pure misogyny, they were nice as pie to other people. The role of mother is so loaded. Its actually really sad all of this.

I’m so sorry about your situation; I was rather taken back when I read this thread because it is so similar to mine a few years ago. I was a single mum (but he saw his dad a lot) but from the age of 18 my son started treating me really badly, I call it psychological bullying. He picked arguments out of thin air, nit picked everything about me, criticised the way I brought him up (although he had a very good childhood and he never complained when he was younger). He got a maths degree but doesn’t work more than a few hours a week. He no longer lives with me as I had to ask him to leave for my own sanity. He has told people he had an abusive and traumatic childhood which is absolute rubbish but how can I prove it to people who don’t know me. Friends and family who know me and saw him growing up are in agreement that he had a great upbringing and childhood. During the last few years when he lived with me I dreaded coming home from work and used to stay in my bedroom out of his way as like you I was walking on eggshells. I’ve bought books on this type of subject and it appears very common. The word entitlement keeps coming up. Basically I think we maybe were too good to them as children who didn’t get much seem to have grown up to respect their parents more. But when our children are young you just want them to be happy and think you are doing your best. Hope it all works out for you (I’m no longer in contact with my son).

You really run the risk of loosing your daughters if your son makes the home like this. When they move out for college or just moving on in life why would they visit a miserable house? Of course they will want to see their parents but if he is always there being whingy/manipulative/bratty they might be unlikely to go often or to just pop in. They also may harbour resentment that they were always the ‘good kids’ and yet didn’t get the same attention etc that their brother did.

He is incredibly manipulative. I almost think you should go into therapy so you can set things straight in your mind and decide your boundaries. Lots of manipulative people threaten self harm/injury if they don’t get their way- I know he’s your son but it is not your responsibility to make him feel better by being an emotional punching bag. Don’t let your daughters see you letting the men in your house walk over you and treat you like dirt. I think you need to leave the house with your daughters even for a short while. Re-evaluate your relationship with your husband and decide if you want to stay together, if not divorce and sell the house. Your son is grown. You’ve done your best by him. It’s time for him to make his way in the world instead of living back with mummy and daddy treating everyone like crap. No wonder he wants to be self employed/freelance- he probably thinks he’s above a 9-5.

Are you able to take your daughters on a break? Get them (and you) out of the house so that you can all have a breather from this horrible cycle?

The current living arrangement is untenable and you cannot effectively parent with a DH who is working against you at every turn.

I am so sorry you have lived through this @Poodles23.

I know he had to leave.

I am fine with that my DH isn’t.

This has been going on for years here in reality and come to a head now that he has moved back home after being gone for 6 years. On reflection we wrongly tolerated his moody nonsense during the Christmas and Uni holiday breaks.

Entitlement is accurate and the inability to reflect or compromise - just doubles down, DARVOs and escalates with volatility until I go silent or walk away. But he was not like this with his housemates - quite the opposite - very conflict averse.

He also has that raging narrative that he had a terrible upbringing (just by me not his DF) - he had a very privileged upbringing where he was heavily supported in his education and interests which he did very well in.

He doesn’t do body building - he does climbing and runs.

He has become more critical of different friends over time and more withdrawn with a much smaller social circle.

He doesn’t ever initiate social meet ups. He developed a stutter / clutter a 6 years ago. This seems to have got better since he moved home. Some would describe him as awkward, shy, hard to communicate with. Maybe even sense a sadness and brooding. Whilst with others he works hard to connect to and be sociable.

He often has that ‘1000 yard stare’ where he looks dissociated and doesn’t give eye contact - to family members at least.

I think he is deeply frustrated / unhappy - probably due to undiagnosed MH / ND and chooses to externalise that stress by projecting blaming and act out on me and my daughters.

Any family holiday, meal, birthday meal out / Christmas Day etc is dominates and ruined by his mood, brooding and picking fights. We were out last week without him and it was so much better.

We are hijacked by the suicide ideation. My DH minimised it yesterday by telling me he only has thoughts of not wanting to live rather than actively having a plan. Then this morning when I challenged DH role in this dynamic as a result of this thread he justified it by escalating it to now saying that DS planned to take his life on the train tracks in walking distance of our home - which is where my younger brother did this 2 years ago. So we are all heighten to suicide here and my son was especially impacted by that. I don’t know why my DH withheld this important information if it’s true as that’s dangerous to my son if his risk is that high.

I called an ambulance when he was having his screaming fit on Sunday night - they wanted to speak with him - he went silent, refused, then jumped out of a window (ground floor) - they couldn’t then come because he had left the building and said I needed to alert the police and then they could re-engage. My DH went after him and got him home where he was quiet and went to bed.

Next day he then said I had called the ambulance to humiliate him and that he isn’t hostile. He said he jumped out of the window because we trapped him in his room. That didn’t happen - even my DH confirmed that (when pushed)

He has a job interview this morning which he has calmly gone off to and an appointment this afternoon with GP.

You poor thing, he is essentially holding you hostage and DH is supporting him. And to use your brother’s suicide is the lowest of the low…it works well as an abusive manipulative threat but I doubt it’s more than that (my X was like this). Get yourself and the DD’s away from this, even if just for a break, you must be exhausted…

He also has that raging narrative that he had a terrible upbringing (just by me not his DF) - he had a very privileged upbringing where he was heavily supported in his education and interests which he did very well in.

To be fair if he has undiagnosed neurodiversities then he has been let down by both of you which isn't a very privileged position to be in. You failed to notice that he was self harming which indicates he was in significant pain in his teen years and received no help at all. He went through a lot, alone. It sounds like some very core needs were not met when he was younger and the results of that are showing through now that he is an adult.

I'm not saying this to be nasty just to show an alternate side to this that perhaps you haven't considered. My own teen has autism and we failed to spot that he also has adhd until he was 15 and he has suffered as a result of that. It isn't nice to think of because obviously we all try our best but sometimes we do let our kids down and they might be hurt, suffer and be resentful because of that.

Thank you for this perspective - it’s important to reflect on as well as painful.

I agree that we didn’t see any ND traits as a child or as a teen - I can potentially see some currently though but maybe I am just clutching at straws to explain/understand or even reconcile / excuse his current behaviours - hence the constant encouragement for the last 3 years to initially seek talking therapy (for low mood) and then assessment for ND and/or other MH issues which he has not picked up.

Even on reflection to his teenage years I can’t see any traits but these may have been masked by his busy social, sporting and school life - also didn’t see this at Uni - where he was v v popular, independent and successful in his chosen field.

We just saw difficult behaviours which we ascribed to typical puberty disruptions. I was devastated when he showed me the scars on the tops of his thighs a few weeks ago from when he was 15 and I am excruciatingly conscious that I didn’t know about that or sense his despair at the time. I am aware that those teenage years were fractious and I didn’t handle them as well as I could. I have acknowledged this with him many times over the years and apologised repeatedly for that time and I now don’t raise my voice.

Last night he told his DF that when he showed me his scars recently that I said he was only attention seeking - this is absolutely untrue.

OP

I have just read your thread and I am going to be very honest with you.

Your DS is extremely controlling and abusing you and the entire family on a massive scale. The reason I know this is because my DD has been doing the same things for the past two years,

The one thing that is very specific is ; its only primarily you and your family that is on the receiving end of this abuse.
When I observed my DD with her friends she was as chirpy and outgoing as ever, but the moment she didn't get her own way on something all hell would break loose.

Our DD is 20 yrs old and has now settled in well in college, but can still throw a massive fit when she doesn't get her own way. Also I have noted when our DD has been out socially or drinking alcohol because she is tired or hungover her moods can turn foul. There is a direct link to alcohol in our case.

First thing you need to do is stop blaming yourself - I had a situation whereby my DD wasn't getting a new dress for an occasion and the drama that followed, I've never seen the like of it. At one point she threatened to kill herself. I said " You're going to kill yourself over a dress?"

Needless to say I didn't cave in and refused to buy her a dress. Also, she didn't kill herself. MH issues,
That squealing thing you mentioned earlier, I have experienced that a number of times.

The one bit of advice I am going to give you is:

Stop blaming yourself! Know that you are a good parent and you're doing your best.
If he won't leave ( which I guarantee he won't he has it too good at home)

The one thing I now do is detach myself away form the situation - don't react. I have on occasion got myself and the younger kids into the car and drove away from the house until they calm down.

I really do wish you the best of luck because it is extremely draining and has a terrible impact on everyone living in the house.

I want to say as someone who is very likely autistic, and who self harmed extensively as a teen, I utterly disagree with this. I hid my self harm from my parents, and I was broadly functioning, so why would they have looked closer than that? OP has already said that she was concerned for his MH and binge drinking, and did what she could to address both.

Don't self-flagellate over not knowing he self-injured in adolescence op. My parents didn't know I did and they were good parents. There's more to whether you are a good parent or not than any mistakes/ oversights along the way.

Thank you for sharing your experience and I hope your life is more emotionally calm and balanced now.

The cuts were on the tops of his thighs in the groin they are not visible in shorts or swimwear. But I am devastated he did this alone.

Thanks for your kind message. I do my best and I've mostly developed healthier strategies for managing my mental health.

I also empathise with your feelings about your son having harmed himself while alone; I'd be horrified if one of my kids did it. I just wanted you to be aware that lots of us hide it (deliberately)

It seems like he has insecurities within himself and is not able to verbally communicate to anyone about it, hence the bottled up frustration. He's calm at his work and friends because he is not that close enough to them to show them is real self. People are more likely to express anger and lash out at those who they are comfortable with or used to and that is most likely family. People may lash out for attention. The self-harm is a sign. His girlfriend left him. He needs to find a healthy outlet instead of using his family as an emotional punchbag.

This would have been a big blow for him. He would have gone through a lot of effort to develop a relationship with her and then feel a great sense of failure when she left.

A lot of valid comments here. I think he is depressed about where he is at the moment in life. He obviously wants to succeed on getting a job related to what he did at uni - not work in a pub. For male, it can be embarrassing to open up with friends, there is a limit to how much information they are willing to give out to friends/family. If he turns to his dad when he is upset, maybe the dad could help communicate to find out what the issues are. It depends who he trusts most or he won't say much.

This whole thing about having a supposed bad childhood. It’s an extension of lack of insight and blaming others and always having to be the victim. Yet he is victimising you. Total baloney. Explaining problems in this way because they can never be the problem. Yet common denominator is always them. They have a bad relationship with 100 people and you probably only have a bad relationship with that one single person. It’s awfully sad.

Parents can hardly ever see traits looking back. But others may have done. Think extreme sensitivities, needing to win. Lining up to be first. All these things are not massive red flags but add up.

I can see sensory issues with noise and smells from his childhood - not any of the needing to win or be first tho.

He was / is difficult to reason with in the home - but externally he’s quite passive and unable to assert himself. He was bullied as a teen which we resolved working with the school.

He got offered the job yesterday (excellent opportunity for him in his chosen creative field) and he went to the GP (don’t know the outcome) so he’s much more chipper this morning - and being actively nice to his sisters.

But he still needs to address his MH / ND and move out as we are exhausted with it. The new job will allow this.

it sounds as though his frustration at not being able to express himself externally or be assertive in daily life is causing him to lash out at you instead. Almost like he's transferring his frustration onto the only person he feels close enough to be able to assert himself in front of.

Google passive aggressive behaviour, passive aggressive children etc. He is going to have to find ways to better assert himself in a healthy manner in all of life. This may mean less pent up frustration that ends up getting distorted and directed at you.