Should I seek a diagnosis for myself?

[Richelle-H]

Excuse the intrusion, but some of what you have described suggests to me that your wife is suffering from a deep and long term depression. One that she is masking from everyone including herself. Explaining her actions and reactions as being anxiety driven or something else.

I offer this from my own experiences and I do not envy your situation, for anything you try to do to correct it is more than likely going to trigger her in ways that will cause a shutdown in you.

In light of all that, the best thing you can do is seek help for yourself. You can't keep all of these runaway emotions, I sense in your writing, bottled up inside. It is not helping either of you.

I wish you all the best.

 

[AndrewMiller]

It's no intrusion at all. I appreciate it.

She knows she's in a long term depression. She cries a lot, everyday. I wish I knew how to comfort her. I've learned you give a hug to someone that's crying, but she doesn't like that, and I get it. But I don't know what else to do either. I ask her: Can I help in any way? And she says no.

She does has to mask it, in order to be a mom. So the kids don't see her crying a lot. And that's hard because they make her cry very often. Just yesterday, S16 has a phone addiction, and she was telling him it was time for bed, and to give the phone so she could charge it for the next day. The charger was 4 feet from his face, but he was still looking at the phone when he said: I knew you had stolen the charger. (And then he added with a lot of hate) Pig!

She's always busy with their stuff, and S16 doesn't move a finger, he lives like he's at a hotel and we are his servants. So she is spent, fighting doctors to get him help, fighting school inspectors to give him another chance, trying to come up with cool things to offer him so he wants to do something else... Shopping, cooking, cleaning after them...And she gets that contempt in return (kind of what I get from her in less graphical terms, but at least mine is not everyday).

S12 has some moments when he expresses gratitude or wants to help. Mainly to ask for something he knows he doesn't get a chance otherwise. But for one of those moments he has 5 that he's incredibly cruel to us. Most of the time he's demanding a different thing every 2 minutes.

I haven't seen a day without drama or violence since I live with them. So it's beyond depressing.

Can you explain what you mean by "runaway emotions"?

 

[Au Naturel]

1. An official diagnosis from an autism-competent therapist does not threaten those who already have the same (unless that person has secondary issues).
2. An accurate diagnosis, whatever it might be, can help you to better manage your coping skills.

It is only those who proclaim self-diagnosis not in good faith that make trouble for us.

Yeah. That last part is a real problem.

 

[Au Naturel]

If they are like ours, these people might be able to point you in the right direction,...
https://autismo.org.es/Avoid Autism Speaks, though.

Amen to that!

 

[Au Naturel]

It's no intrusion at all. I appreciate it.

She knows she's in a long term depression. She cries a lot, everyday. I wish I knew how to comfort her. I've learned you give a hug to someone that's crying, but she doesn't like that, and I get it. But I don't know what else to do either. I ask her: Can I help in any way? And she says no.

She does has to mask it, in order to be a mom. So the kids don't see her crying a lot. And that's hard because they make her cry very often. Just yesterday, S16 has a phone addiction, and she was telling him it was time for bed, and to give the phone so she could charge it for the next day. The charger was 4 feet from his face, but he was still looking at the phone when he said: I knew you had stolen the charger. (And then he added with a lot of hate) Pig!

She's always busy with their stuff, and S16 doesn't move a finger, he lives like he's at a hotel and we are his servants. So she is spent, fighting doctors to get him help, fighting school inspectors to give him another chance, trying to come up with cool things to offer him so he wants to do something else... Shopping, cooking, cleaning after them...And she gets that contempt in return (kind of what I get from her in less graphical terms, but at least mine is not everyday).

S12 has some moments when he expresses gratitude or wants to help. Mainly to ask for something he knows he doesn't get a chance otherwise. But for one of those moments he has 5 that he's incredibly cruel to us. Most of the time he's demanding a different thing every 2 minutes.

I haven't seen a day without drama or violence since I live with them. So it's beyond depressing.

Can you explain what you mean by "runaway emotions"?

The trick is not to let them get so far out of hand. This didn't start just now; it started many years ago when they learned that they were in charge, not the adults. Parenthood is extremely difficult for people who can't do confrontations. Along with all the love, there will need to be limits, negative interactions, and some discipline. Positive and negative reinforcement. Children do not raise themselves.

You need family therapy on top of individual therapy for everyone. You all need it very badly and probably antidepressive medications on top of it. Your kids are out of control and you have both surrendered your authority as parents. We raised two teenagers to adulthood, and while each was a real handful, neither one came close to being so gratuitously disrespectful.

You aren't describing an angry child. You are describing a bully slipping the knife in and then giving it a twist.

 

[Richelle-H]

Can you explain what you mean by "runaway emotions"?

Certainly! What I mean by that is emotions that feed on themselves and you cannot break free of them. They persist and grow in ways that you cannot predict or control. They can lead to rage, hopelessness, and deep depressions. Your wife is locked into a cycle and her emotions runaway with her, which results in her deep depression, crying, and the sense of hopelessness that I am quite sure she is feeling all the time. What I believe she is seeking and sorely missing is a solid support mechanism and I am concerned for her and you. As someone already pointed out, it is a problem that may require the family to become a unit instead of a group of individuals and quite possibly strangers, seeing as how there is a lot of what seems like anger boiling beneath the surface in each of you.

It is a difficult place you are in, for I can assure you that trying to solve her problems on your own will just tear you apart (I sense it already is). All you can do is just be supportive and surrender yourself in part to everyone else in an attempt to take some of the burden off her. It may not work or be of any help. She may even resent it as something it is not, but that is the minefield you find yourself walking through. Both you and she need a quite place where you can recharge and only think of your own needs. Maybe together, if you can get her to talk and express interest in her needs.

Forgive me, you may already have tried some of this. But if it has been rejected in the past, keep trying. Let her know just how much you care and are there for her. I sense her stress levels are through the roof, and she might benefit from some medical intervention (i.e. medications that might offer some help though no cure.

All that she is experiencing: the pressure, the anxiety, the uncertainty, the seeming hopelessness of the situation, is taking its toll on both her mental and physical health and she is most likely exhausted all of the time because she cannot get a restful, stress free, nights sleep.

I have been where your wife is and also where you are although through much different circumstances. Unfortunately I am not qualified to offer anything beyond what I already have. I send all my best to the two of you. May you and your family find some peace along the way.

 

[Rodafina]

Hello and welcome. I realize you have been here for a couple months, but I would encourage you to stick around. Perhaps post a little bit more to discover more of yourself and the side of yourself that relates to other autistic people’s experiences.

I think there is a large issue that will need attention based on your significant other’s reaction to all of this. Feeling unique because of autism and not wanting that taken away sort of makes sense, if I try really hard, but feeling insulted by realizations that you are having about yourself and learning that you have found a way to explain many of your troubles suggests some bigger issue is going on in your relationship.

As much as possible, I would say focus on yourself at the moment in learning about where you may fall on the spectrum. Whether or not you decide to go for an official diagnosis, learning more from us here on the forum and trying to understand as much as you can about it will give you a better sense of yourself. I think that is the most important thing right now – for you to understand yourself for yourself and for the chance at happiness in your life.

 

[Crossbreed]

I think there is a large issue that will need attention based on your significant other’s reaction to all of this. Feeling unique because of autism and not wanting that taken away sort of makes sense, if I try really hard, but feeling insulted by realizations that you are having about yourself and learning that you have found a way to explain many of your troubles suggests some bigger issue is going on in your relationship.

@AndrewMiller, that is likely part of why you two hit it off so well, in the first place.

My wife is ADHD, which is a next-door neighbor to autism.

 

[AndrewMiller]

The trick is not to let them get so far out of hand. This didn't start just now; it started many years ago when they learned that they were in charge, not the adults. Parenthood is extremely difficult for people who can't do confrontations. Along with all the love, there will need to be limits, negative interactions, and some discipline. Positive and negative reinforcement. Children do not raise themselves.

You need family therapy on top of individual therapy for everyone. You all need it very badly and probably antidepressive medications on top of it. Your kids are out of control and you have both surrendered your authority as parents. We raised two teenagers to adulthood, and while each was a real handful, neither one came close to being so gratuitously disrespectful.

You aren't describing an angry child. You are describing a bully slipping the knife in and then giving it a twist.

Hi,

we haven't waited till he's 16 to try and start raising him. Their biological father was abusive and authoritarian with a military background. I'm, in the words of their mother, an ax#@le, because I insist on them finishing their duties, and when I set a consecuence, I keep it. Of course, when they see she disagrees, my authority goes down the toilet. But our parenting is not all bad. It doesn't explain everything. There are plenty of awful fathers out there. We've been searching for tools since they were very little. Sometimes we've been told we ask too much of them, sometimes we're told we don't ask enough.

Lately we've found a diagnosis called PDA (Pathological Demand Avoidance), and all parents there have exatly the same experiences as we have with the kids, that previously didn't fin any other explanation (Except "I'm having a nightmare" or "I died and I'm in hell"). The problem is that here in Spain they haven't heard about it yet. And even in the UK is a young discovery.

So, as of today, all professionals see his social mask, which is a polite shy boy, clumsy, frightened...That agrees to everything and promises whatever he is asked to promise. Any Autism professional knows that that's not him, and that of course he's gonna behave like that with 20 doctors and nurses around. They also know that he's not faking conciously, trying to fool everyone. It's just a switch to cope with strangers. Well, the doctors in charge are not Autism specialists, and they think "nothing is wrong with him, he's a delight". Then they send him home, with homework, and he has no intention of keeping any promises, or reaching any goals. He just needs to distract himself and not think about it. And we are the ones in charge of making him think and trying to get him to do any of his tasks, or fullfil some of his promises... So he panics and lashes out at us.

Of course I thought he was a bully, and rude and spoiled at the begining. But you can see a physical reaction, and the panic for things that shouldn't trigger a panic attack.

But you can imagine how I felt seeing those gratuituous shows of disrespect and cruelty towards the woman I love day in and day out. And she wants me to love them unconditionally (as in, even if we're not a couple) and say good things about them. When it takes all I got just to not be angry at them all the time.

 

[AndrewMiller]

@Richelle-H

I know I can't solve all her problems onmy own. And I'm not trying to. Her first obvious diagnosis was anorexia nerviosa. There I learned that anything I said could make things worse. And I started to educate myself. Then came another diagnosis that explained more. I did the same, read and read, and asked online and debated and questioned, and listened to conferences... And one day she told me "you talk like a F-king therapist! and I hate therapists!". I realized I went too far. My "job" is to love her, not to treat her.

I feel I've been in that minefield you mention, for a long time now. That quiet place we need is made impossible with the kids. A couple of years back, after a reconciliation, she started working, and thinking positive and things looked up for her and for us. But this required some autonomy from the kids, and S10 did OK (as much as he could), but S15 (then) crashed inward and almost never left his bed (didn't chaged his clothes in weeks, forgot to eat...). She had to quit her job to take care of them again.

The problem is that I'm no loger a stone where she can suport herself, I'm at the end of my rope. I pray for a terminal illness to get me out of here. I lose my patience with the kids. I get hurt at the smallest rejection from her... All 3 of them are medicated, and doesn't seem to make a difference. Maybe I should have something prescribed for myself.

I told her often, when she wonders if she takes things wrong and maybe the problems aren't as big as she feels them. I tell her that she never has any rest, any time to recover from the last blow before the next comes.

She's talking to a therapist now that works with adults with Asperger's. And she likes that a lot. I'm glad for her. Although I sense she sees me more and more as playing for the other team (as in the NT team).

Thanks a lot for sharing your experience, and helping me.

 

[autism-and-autotune]

I think life would be just fine if I lived alone. No meaning, necessarily, but not as much stress, and I can't think of anything better right now.

Your words are wise; there is nothing wrong with feeling that way. I knew from a young age that I never wanted or needed a family of my own, as stress turns me into a monster.

 

[AndrewMiller]

Your words are wise; there is nothing wrong with feeling that way. I knew from a young age that I never wanted or needed a family of my own, as stress turns me into a monster.

Nothing wrong, unless you ask the woman whose kids are going to be homeless if I chose to live alone. I've been told many times "that's not your problem", but I can't make myself feel like that.

I know if it happened, I don't think I'd try to form another family. Not be involved with someone with kids again. I don't think I have what it takes. Even if I did some time in the past, now it's all PTSD just to think about it. So many things can go wrong.

In my previous marriage we were approaching 40 and she didn't want to talk about kids at all. So I thought it would be pointless to think if I wanted them or not. Kids love me, for some reason, maybe they suspect I'm not a full adult. But I didn't enjoy being with kids too much. Babies are OK, but they don't stay babies. Sometimes I felt the instinct of wanting to be a father. And I commited to this RS wanting to be a good father, as well as being with the person I love.

As my parents both worked, and they didn't spend a lot of time with us (4 kids), the job of parent didn't seem all that difficult. I spent most of my time alone. None of my siblings posed any serious challenge. We obeyed and did our dutie, and helped each other... I wasn't scared of them, but never thought about saying NO to a request. Now it seems impossible to get a yes, and countless hours are wasted in order to have them do anything.

Some days ago S12 asked me if they ever hit me, my older brother in this case, and why. I said he did, and when? When I forgot to take out the trash, or to close a drawer, he would give me a small slap on the back of the head. He was horrified. "Just for that!!??" and I said yeah, but those are the kind of ofenses we made, that was our worst behavior, forget things. I wouldn't do something wrong when they were asking me to to the right thing. Didn't crossed our minds.

I didn't like brushing my teeth, or making my bed, or showering...And I would procastinate, and hope no one noticed... But once they told me, I did those things even as I didn't like them or understood why they were needed. I can't picture myself saying NO, or pass, or just ignoring the order. So it really puzzles me when they do.

And as a pragmatical being, I don't understand how they can refuse to do something that is mandatory and at the same time asking for something that's optional. "I refuse to do my homework, but can I play videogames?" Then go ahead and insult and give trouble to the person that can give you those videogames. Sometimes for way longer that it would take to do the task demanded. Example: Having 3 hours or discussion about not wanting to shower, and leaving slaming the door, and coming back, and name calling... Having the same response "you can play as soon as you finish your shower". 3 hours of that instead of 10 minutes of a shower.

 

[AndrewMiller]

It took me some days to realize that I was so concern about how much she wouldn't like it or be mad about it... That I didn't even think that I won't get any support, consideration or compassion from her.

It goes to show how much anything I do these days is measured against how mad she will be about it.

I don't want to live like this.