Hyper fixation ,online friendship

[Threerandomword]

My daughter is 15 , in GCSE year and is autistic has always massively struggled socially. Fairly recently she started to chat on the phone to a friend she made online. This is of course positive as she really feels she has made a friend who understands her ( someone a year older ) . The issue is that she is spending all of her time talking to them. She gets up in the morning and has a chat before school, and then after , pauses for dinner and then chats again . We have a phones down stairs rule so by 9 I take her phone but then she goes online ( again during the week internet is off at 9 .30 , later at the weekend ). It is just absolutely over taking everything and anything else . She has been struggling at school for a number of years and she has always had a tendency to put work off and does not respond well to me getting involved . Any attempt I make to speak to her is met with, they are making me happy and they understand me , what's the problem . If she can't speak for any reason she gets very anxious quickly and worries about this person . This weekend that escalated because they had put a blank pic on tiktok and she was convinced it meant the friend had attempted suicide and was absolutely distraught. I dont think there is really a solution here and I probably need to let things play out but if anyone has an experience of anything like this I would appreciate it .

She needs real life friends, or meeting up with this person with you present. Does not go to any special interest groups?

Right now you don't even know whether this is a real person her age.

They chat on the phone , I have seen them on video call and I have heard them . I have no reason to believe they aren't who they say there are. I know their real name and that they are in college and the area they live in . She does have a friend at school but she is ND as well and does not cope well with socialising much outaide of school . She has hung out with various people before but she can have very high expectations from people , e.g wanting to spend a bit too much time with people and interprets people as not liking her if they dont want that .

Can they meet up in real life? You need to remove some of the illusion of this magical mythical being, and make them more human and normal.

What support has DD had with her mental health and communication and interaction?

Would DD attend a group IRL for DC with additional needs? Or would she join an online structured group?

I think you need to put more boundaries in lace around phone use and the internet. Difficult in the short term, but necessary IMO.

So. We live in Hampshire and they live in the North West . My daughter wants them to visit /stay. I have said that would not happen unless I had spoken to family and knew more and they knew more

She has had small group support at school in the past when she was younger about friendships and how they function . Some 1:1 work. Zones of regulation group work ( she hated that because she felt she was in there with the "difficult" children Has done Lego therapy with the friend I mentioned . Two bouts of attempts of therapy with child psychologists , refusal to engage both times. She liked a speech and language therapist I found but she was seeing her for a while but I could not afford enough sessions often enough to get progress. (Close to £200 an hour). Mind jam run some group sessions around shared interests online but she is not interested

What are her special interests? Is there a boardgames café with an after school session? Library with gaming afternoons/evenings?

I think DD needs more therapeutic support. I would speak to the school and the GP.

Does DD have an EHCP? If so, things like MH support, OT, SALT can all be included in an EHCP.

You can get SALT cheaper than close to £200ph. Same for OT.

It is far more likely to be can’t engage rather than a refusal. Instead of withdraw l of support, DD needs the support amended so she can engage. For example, instead of MH therapies that are focused around verbal communication, some find therapies that rely less on verbal communication works better e.g. animal-assisted therapy.

On top of this I would still put more boundaries in place around the phone and internet.

So agreed . Spoken to the GP , doesn't meet threshold for local NHS services . She is engaging with a therapy of sorts the mindjam team are trained counsellors which is positive I guess. Yes she does have an EHCP but it is very early days . Internet I do have boundaries around , it goes off at 9.30 and phone comes downstairs at 9pm. She is very adamant that nothing can change about her mental health. She regards therapy as too intrusive and asking personal questions. People she has had have been very gentle, building relationship for weeks , as soon as they try and get to the tricky bits she shuts down. Unfortunately a large part of this comes from her dad moving out when she was younger and that her relationship with him could be a lot better .
This is not me giving up but I have tried again and again and I am really struggling to know what to do next . I am sat up in bed now and I can already hear her happily talking to her friend .

Personally, I think you need more boundaries with the phone and internet. I don’t think your 9/9.30 rules are enough.

If DD’s has an EHCP, you don’t need to meet the threshold for local NHS services. You need provision in the EHCP, then local thresholds are irrelevant. SALT needs to be in the EHCP. You don’t have to fund it.

IMO, Mindjam is not enough. Nowhere near. DD needs SALT, OT and some form of MH therapy provision (both direct and indirect provision) in the EHCP. MH therapy doesn’t have to be intrusive and ask personal questions. This is where it needs to be adapted to DD’s needs.

You say the EHCP is early days, when was it finalised? Do you still have the right of appeal?

EHCP was only approved over the summer holidays. I have a meeting on Thursday with SENCO, I am planning to raise my concerns about MH situation. The dependency on this friendship has gone from 0 to 100% very very quickly. Which I am afraid is always how things have been with my daughter . Her anxiety around restriction of access to the friend when raised has been through the roof. I dont know what your experience is in this area but this is a very challenging situation for me to try and deal with .

If by approved you mean finalised, if the EHCP was only finalised in the summer, depending on when in the summer holidays, you may still have the right of appeal. If you do, I would appeal. If you don’t, you could see if SENDIST would accept a late appeal. They don’t always grant leave to appeal out of time, but it is worth an ask.

I have extensive experience with SEN, personally with my own DC and professionally. In my first post I acknowledged putting more boundaries in place is difficult, but it is necessary IMO. Everything related to SEN is difficult, doesn’t mean it isn’t necessary though.