Real world - What is right thing to do here?

[IcecreamDaze]

My DD is 22 and has ADD with possible ASD (not yet diagnosed).
She’s on her 1st year at Uni doing a Law & Criminology degree. She goes to Uni twice a week and when she comes back spends the remainder of her time in her room writing. It’s her thing and she loves it. She tells me if the Uni doesn’t work out she’ll want to write for a living. I’m not sure how as this will be something very hard to get into and making enough money to live from it may not be viable.

Ive suggested she do a part time job but this was met with a defensive response that she would nota have the time given she goes to Uni and writes the other times. Also she says customers are at times vile! The money she says isn’t good and she hates dealing with people.

Is this me being unreasonable or her? Her dad agrees with her and says she is doing her best. I don’t doubt she is, but worry she is not in ‘the real world’.
We have a very small family, who live over an hour away so it’s mainly myself and her dad who she sees. How do I give her the best opportunities to thrive in life? Anyone care to share what they do/did? Thanks 🙏🏻

It seems that your DD understands herself and knows her limitations and strengths. There is no reason she couldn’t try to make a career of writing if she doesn’t follow the degree path she has chosen.
That’s a very cool degree she’s doing though and could lead to all sorts of interesting work. Is it part time if she’s only going in twice weekly or just the way that course is ran?

No matter how academic she seems, that won’t help her if she has social communication difficulties- but it sounds as though she understands that and is saying she doesn’t want to work with people.

Our son is 17 and is autistic. He’s super shy and has 24/7 anxiety to the point it makes him physically poorly and so for him, he probably won’t be able to go out to do a job, but understands that and is happy to work from home online….at least to start with.

Our main goal for when our son finishes school next year, is to help him learn how to live independently. So we will go on bus trips, get him to order in restaurants, go with him to a food shop etc. He knows how to do all of those things now but he refuses due to anxiety. He likes a mental ‘script’ in case someone says something and he can then have a good idea of what to say back to them. It’s very exhausting but we hope that in time he will have less anxiety and be more able to live independently and at the end of the day, we just want him to be happy, as I’m sure you do your daughter.

For ds1 we told him to concentrate on his university course rather than getting a part-time job. He did , however, have a summer job which actually although was just cleaning has given him some confidence that he can actually do a job and get paid. I think he hopes to get something more long-term career / course relevant next summer.

ds1 missed out a lot on social stuff in his teens because he was at a special school and them, when he did go to a mainstream sixth form & just started to make friends, covid hit. So we thought it was more important for him to be able to mix with his peers and join a few university societies rather than have a term-time job as well.

If writing is her thing why don't you encourage her to send off some short articles / stories to see if they are good enough for publication or encourage her to write a blog. If you are good enough you can make money from this and, if she got something published, it would surely boost her confidence.