Is there any way to get DH to SEE that I am not insane about DD and AS?

[Flamesparrow]

She is his first born (and mine, but will expand on that), the only child he has ever really known before DS came along.

For me, again, she is my first, but I grew up with an AS sister, and only discovering what made DSis like she is as an adult gives me a very different perspective. I can see it from several angles iyswim.

DH just seems to think that I am making up random stuff. He has no interest in reading anything on AS (I don't know how much is due to us not having a proper dx). He is noticing now that she isn't quite like her peers, but still doesn't seem to grasp soooo much.

Her chair is my biggest argh thing with him right now. When her and DS have dinner, if we are eating in the lounge, she has the blue chair. She has the blue chair facing the fireplace wall. It is where she sits. We don't have much from her in the way of ritual things, but that is her place. DS keeps attempting to put his chair in her place and sit there.

To me, I don't think that having her chair in a certain place at all times is a big thing. Yes, she needs to learn to live in society and conform in some ways, but a chair position? No, to me that is something that there is no reason at all to deny her. But DH seems to be under the impression that she can't get her own way and lets DS sit there if he wants to - resulting in tears and upset.

Where he knows sod all about AS, he sees it as her being selfish and "getting her own way" whereas I see it as a quirk that doesn't hurt anyone. DS only does it to wind her up.

It sounds like I am making a big deal out of a chair , but it is just the focus iyswim. He just won't read up on it. I can't see any way to make him do it (stubborn git over certain things) unless we get a DX which is a brick wall situation.

I have ordered Cats Have Asperger Syndrome, mainly for me because I found it in a shop a while back and have never forgotten it, and partly for DD because even if her father is being awkward, I think that she needs to be able to understand herself soon with or without a doctor's stamp.

How old is she?

I can completely understand what you say. My DS is an easy going guy and he understands in his heart of hearts that DS has issues (possibly AS but certainly something along the social/communication disorder lines) but he still feels as if he has to 'put his foot down' about silly things -e.g. the other day DS (who is 6) wanted to be alone to write a note to us - he likes doing this- but his younger brother was coming into the playroom all the time and he got hysterical.

DH's response was to tell DS1 off and tell him he couldn't expect privacy which resulted in screaming and meltdown.

I intervened asked them to leave the room for 5 mins, let him do his note as he likes to and then they could have the room. Big deal! All that distress for nothing.

DH can see what I mean about accomodating little quirks and routines and need for space etc but I think his instinctive reactions as to how to solve a problem haven't changed and they need to.

My reasoning with him is that to accomodate is a counsel of perfection and is the way we should act with all children and people really - allowing them to act in a way that makes them comfortable unless it is hurting others in some way. If you have to resolve a dispute about chair positions, or use of pens or anything else, I try to get him to see that sometimes these things mean more to one child and so you have to take that into the balance while trying to respect them both by diverting or distracting or accomodating the other in another way so they don't get left out.

I think he likes that line of reasoning more!

That should be 'DH is an easy going guy....'

ooh..i could have written your post a few years back.
Dh just wasn't having it at all.
It puts you in a really difficult position doesn't it? Honestly between dh and pils, at one stage, i almost started to believe that i was actually going mad and perhaps was indeed making it all up.

Seeking and getting a formal dx for ds (12 aspergers/HFA and dyspraxia) was a turning point for dh (and therefore for us all) tbh. I'm not 100% sure we would still be married if i hadn't pushed it.

Lol..there is still a little part of me that feels resentful that he only took it seriously when he heard it from a professional but hey..we take what we can get

He still will not read up on it. He doesn't read at all tbh so not surprising. I have booked him on courses...he was willing to do this and this is how he has learnt about his boy. Or i've made him watch stuff on tv. Sometimes i read to him and bits go in.
Part of our problem is that dh is very rigid in himself..and shows traits himself (which he admitted to at ds's assessment for the first time).

How old is your dd? Dh has also improved as ds has got older and the differences between what he can cope with and what his peers can cope with has become more apparent.

Would your dh be willing to go on a course do you think? Nas 'Help' courses are good as an introduction.

Good luck

Ooh the handling of the note would be excatly what DH would have done! DD is 6 too

It was her birthday party (he was pretty much in charge of amusing her and 5 other friends the same age) that he suddenly realised that she wasn't the same as them.

I know how hard my mum found raising my sister, and I feel like I want to shake him because it doesn't have to be like that for us. My mum is very envious of all the information that we have now, how we can know more, and try to resolve things easier.

I only realised yesterday that when she is completely overwhelmed with things is when she starts stroking me/standing very very very close (but without enough pressure to make it nice iyswim). It has always been the one thing that drives me insane and annoys me, and the realisation that it is her cry for help made me very and I remember her doing it at toddler groups on the few occasions I tried to take her to them. She has never been interested in my for physical affection (she tends to want my mum for that), and I think it is partly because of that that the stroking annoys me.

Oops - this started about DH and has moved onto my guilt

crossed posts.

I can't see me getting him on a course tbh. I think that if we could get a dx then he would probably start picking up some of the books lying around.

I've not even mentioned it to PIL (or to my dad tbh), knowing how they are with everything else in life, they will be the type to think that ADHD kids just need a firm hand, and that AS is just pandering to whims. It is the conversation that would go nowhere, so I just let them think that my parenting is weirdy and leave it at that.

I need to get past pregnancy and new baby and I will get pushing for the dx again. I stopped seeing the comm paed as he was just incompetent. Kept telling me that she wasn't autistic (which I hadn't suggested) and that AS is language based so they won't be able to even consider it until she is 7/8. Will try and sort out seeing a different one!