JT78

New Member
I had no idea this site existed, I actually Googled "when you can't stand your child" and this popped up. So I guess I'm not alone :(.

I have an almost 15 year old son diagnosed on the spectrum (aspergers), depression, he's definitely has ODD. He makes our daily lives basically a living hell. If he doesn't get his way in every single instance you might as well take cover. He begins yelling, hitting, throwing, destroying anything he feels like. He's on 3 different medications, we have tried countless combinations to no avail. Many have only made him worse. I have three daughters who are 11,9, & 5 who are generally terrified of him-they have been victims of his rages, both of our dogs are scared of him. We've done therapy, impatient, outpatient programs, nothing seems to get through to him.

He is completely unreasonable to just about everything. Will not take no for an answer. Every single thing is an argument. It has deeply affected my marriage as my husband and I don't always see eye to eye and he works a lot leaving me to deal with this. I don't know a single other person in my life who has a child like this and often feel like it is something I have done wrong. I feel like a terrible mother for subjecting my daughters to this, there are so many things we can't do or that are ruined because of his behavior.
 

BusynMember

Well-Known Member
You are not a bad mother. You didnt cause this. He has some disabilities. They cause him to be unpleasant and lose control. It was never about your parenting. Your girls are fine, right?

Have you considered residential treatment where he can get more supervision and con-trol than you can possibly give him? He probably should not live at home with your daughters. And pets.

The type of residential treatmrnt center is tied to his diagnosis and if you can afford a high fee or must use a state facility. Since your husband is rarely around, this is dangerous to you as well. Fifteen year olds are often the size of men.

I am so sorry for your pain.
 
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pigless in VA

Well-Known Member
Welcome, JT78. No, you aren't alone. No, it isn't your fault that your son is so difficult. I think sometimes the professionals like to point finger at our parenting, but they don't usually know what it is like to live in a war zone with your own child.

My daughter has been through a lot, too. She was attacked by her brother many times over the years. We've finally gotten that under better control, but it took a long time.

You're in the right place here. The parents understand and can offer ideas that parents with regular kids would never think of. :notalone:

Here is your official welcome basket. :easter_eggs:
 

Praecepta

Active Member
...my husband and I don't always see eye to eye and he works a lot leaving me to deal with this...

Well there is the problem right there!

If I'm reading that your husband does not have the same rules for your son as you do. And will not work with you to have the SAME rules and ENFORCE them the same, then you are going to have these behavior problems! Period!

Leave your husband, take the daughters, and let him have the "son/monster he created"!
 

BloodiedButUnbowed

Well-Known Member
Not sure if I agree with the above advice, which is somewhat harsh, perhaps especially to a newcomer. At the same time, I do suggest that OP consider getting some distance from the situation. I also highly recommend contacting your state's social services/human services division and start a trail of documentation so that your son can get the help he needs (that's the way to look at it). He is not a typical kid and he is out of control. He is destroying your family and you need help. It isn't your fault that he was born with a brain that isn't able to cope with daily life.

The 'help he needs' could range from outside therapy for him and the rest of your family; an IEP if he doesn't already have one; an alternative school; or even as someone else suggested, residential placement where he would no longer live in your home. Whatever it turns out to be, you can't get there without taking the first step. Even though it may seem that he 'gets what he wants' and is getting the best of the situation, he's hurting too, and it's important for ALL of you to get help and stop things from getting worse.

It's possible to relinquish your legal guardianship over such a difficult child. A horrible decision to have to make; sometimes, though, it might be necessary, especially if other kids are in the picture who are being harmed and damaged by the uncontrollable child.

So sorry you are here. Keep posting - it helps!
 

pigless in VA

Well-Known Member
JT, one of the rules here is that you take what advice you can use and disregard the rest.

Over the years, I had many people tell me to leave my mentally ill husband. That was not the right choice for me. I made the best out of the situation, because I believed that my kids needed time with their father, even if it wasn't perfect. It was far from perfect, but I don't regret that choice.
 

runawaybunny

Administrator
Staff member
I had no idea this site existed, I actually Googled "when you can't stand your child" and this popped up. So I guess I'm not alone :(.

I have an almost 15 year old son diagnosed on the spectrum (aspergers), depression, he's definitely has ODD. He makes our daily lives basically a living hell. If he doesn't get his way in every single instance you might as well take cover. He begins yelling, hitting, throwing, destroying anything he feels like. He's on 3 different medications, we have tried countless combinations to no avail. Many have only made him worse. I have three daughters who are 11,9, & 5 who are generally terrified of him-they have been victims of his rages, both of our dogs are scared of him. We've done therapy, impatient, outpatient programs, nothing seems to get through to him.

He is completely unreasonable to just about everything. Will not take no for an answer. Every single thing is an argument. It has deeply affected my marriage as my husband and I don't always see eye to eye and he works a lot leaving me to deal with this. I don't know a single other person in my life who has a child like this and often feel like it is something I have done wrong. I feel like a terrible mother for subjecting my daughters to this, there are so many things we can't do or that are ruined because of his behavior.
Welcome. I am so very sorry you are working through such a challenging parenting journey. There is hope that your life will be better. Hang in there, take good care of yourself. You are not alone.
 

Copabanana

Well-Known Member
JT. I want to say Hi. It is late here. I am sorry there is not more time to reply. And I am sorry for your suffering which you do not deserve and never deserved.

It is not your fault.

If he needs Residential Treatment Center (RTC), the school district should bear the cost, I think. Or your health insurance. You need an advocate. There are free attorneys depending on where you live. Disability Rights is the group I used. There are remedies even if there are barriers for payment. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

The other kids do need to be protected, as do the pets. It is not good for your son to be in the situation where he could cause harm. He needs to be protected, too.

The first priority is safety. The second is an emergency IEP, to address his needs NOW. And getting on the same page as your husband which is essential. No relationship is unscathed from this kind of situation.

You must, must forgive yourself. First, it is mean and cruel mother-bashing. Which has to stop. Second, you need to be whole and strong to get through this. For your son, your daughters, and yourself.

If he does need residential treatment it would be best for HIM that he have this opportunity where he will learn ways of self-control, self-awareness and self-soothing. I know adult kids who went to residential treatment who are are fine now.

To get support, I would start a thread for every single one of these issues and to get the problem outside of you onto the page. Believe me this helps immeasurably. For you to see and to respond to what you think and feel.

I think many of us found this place by desperate google searches. Mine, I think was: mentally ill homeless adult child.

Today was a hard, hard day for me and I googled: I want to die. Sometimes it gets to the point where I have to get those words outside of my head. (I read that everything I put in a google search is collated somewhere and it never ever disappears. Hi Google. I am beyond caring, sometimes.)

You are not alone. Remember that.

PS You might ask the IEP or your pediatrician for a functional behavioral analysis. I will explain tomorrow if you want. I would ask for a referral to a child neurologist at a Children's Hospital or University Hospital near you (Medical School) where you can see a faculty member in the Neuropsychiatry clinic, for children. I would also request from the pediatrician an evaluation from a neuropsychologist. You can find those in the Child Development Clinic in a Children's Hospital. All of this if requested through your doctor in circumstances such as yours will be paid by insurance. All of these things will help in the IEP.

I want to tell you why I think it may be important to get the neurological consults. There is a type of seizure activity which is associated with the autism spectrum. Seizures which are undetectable or unrecognizable as seizures even by physicians. I found a citation of a book by Caren Haines Silently Seizing: Common, Unrecognized, and Frequently Missed Seizures and Their Potentially Damaging Impact on Individuals With Autism Spectrum Disorders. She is a RN and her son is on the spectrum.

He had different symptoms than does your son (staring out into space, etc.) but she explains if they go untreated they can cause serious psychological illness. That said, when children feel something is going on inside of them that they do not understand they cannot communicate it to their parents. They expect that their parents make it go away. When their parents do not, the child may get angry. Or conversely they may feel that the distress they experience but do not understand signifies that they are a bad child and deserve to suffer. And this makes them mad, too.

All of this that I typed below I am tempted to erase, because it sounds to me like it is too advice-giving. And impossibly hard to do. For you and for me. But I am leaving it because in my better self, I do try to strive for this. Except the problem is that striving so hard to do this aspirational thing makes me vulnerable to the deepest despair. Because in striving to do the best I can, I leave myself unprotected and then feel desolate and destroyed. I am leaving this part in, because I want you to see how heroic you are. And how you are holding yourself to the most impossible standard. So please recognize that NOBODY could do what I suggest. Not one person. In particular, me. I try and I fail.

I would try to start from the place of trying to see him as SUFFERING and unable to communicate it. And you are his advocate, not his victim. Of course this is very, very difficult. Today and yesterday I had a very hard time with my 28 year old son and I very much felt, and was his victim. For today. That is how I felt, and I really felt I could not take more, and I would not take more. Honestly I felt I did not want to ever see or speak to him again. I think I even told him that. He was afraid.

What you are going through is NORMAL for the situation you are in. And the way he seems to be acting, this angry opposition has to have a basis. This extreme hostility. The key here for each of us is to try to regain some perspective and objectivity. My own son is thoughtless and self-centered. But my sense today and yesterday, that he is cruel and trying to destroy me, is wrong. But the thing is, there are things that are not motivated by cruelty whose effects are cruelly felt. That is our problem. Your problem and mine too. Nobody wants to be hurt. You are only human. And you are trying very, very hard. So am I.
 
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pigless in VA

Well-Known Member
when children feel something is going on inside of them that they do not understand they cannot communicate it to their parents. They expect that their parents make it go away. When their parents do not, the child may get angry. Or conversely they may feel that the distress they experience but do not understand signifies that they are a bad child and deserve to suffer. And this makes them mad, too.

I see this with children at school who have autism. They fully expect all the adults around them to immediately fix whatever is bothering them. Many of them hate fire alarms. They want us to make it stop that hideous noise. We can't and sometimes they get angry about it. We had a school-wide contest. A different classroom won the prize of dinner at a restaurant. One of our students was insanely jealous and hit a bunch of people that day, because our class did not win.

I also believe that children with autism even when high functioning, have great difficulty finding the words to express how they feel about anything. My own son, who has never been described as being on the spectrum, has always been extremely angry. I call it his default emotion. Anything doesn't go the way he wants it to - instant anger. I found this site by googling "oppositional defiant disorder." At least the parents here understand what it is like to have an extremely difficult child to raise.
 

Saddmom

New Member
I had no idea this site existed, I actually Googled "when you can't stand your child" and this popped up. So I guess I'm not alone :(.

I have an almost 15 year old son diagnosed on the spectrum (aspergers), depression, he's definitely has ODD. He makes our daily lives basically a living hell. If he doesn't get his way in every single instance you might as well take cover. He begins yelling, hitting, throwing, destroying anything he feels like. He's on 3 different medications, we have tried countless combinations to no avail. Many have only made him worse. I have three daughters who are 11,9, & 5 who are generally terrified of him-they have been victims of his rages, both of our dogs are scared of him. We've done therapy, impatient, outpatient programs, nothing seems to get through to him.

He is completely unreasonable to just about everything. Will not take no for an answer. Every single thing is an argument. It has deeply affected my marriage as my husband and I don't always see eye to eye and he works a lot leaving me to deal with this. I don't know a single other person in my life who has a child like this and often feel like it is something I have done wrong. I feel like a terrible mother for subjecting my daughters to this, there are so many things we can't do or that are ruined because of his behavior.
You are not a terrible mother. Don't blame yourself. I have many of the same issues going on with my daughter. I use to blame myself but no more. Just so exhausted with dealing with her
 

Saddmom

New Member
I had no idea this site existed, I actually Googled "when you can't stand your child" and this popped up. So I guess I'm not alone :(.

I have an almost 15 year old son diagnosed on the spectrum (aspergers), depression, he's definitely has ODD. He makes our daily lives basically a living hell. If he doesn't get his way in every single instance you might as well take cover. He begins yelling, hitting, throwing, destroying anything he feels like. He's on 3 different medications, we have tried countless combinations to no avail. Many have only made him worse. I have three daughters who are 11,9, & 5 who are generally terrified of him-they have been victims of his rages, both of our dogs are scared of him. We've done therapy, impatient, outpatient programs, nothing seems to get through to him.

He is completely unreasonable to just about everything. Will not take no for an answer. Every single thing is an argument. It has deeply affected my marriage as my husband and I don't always see eye to eye and he works a lot leaving me to deal with this. I don't know a single other person in my life who has a child like this and often feel like it is something I have done wrong. I feel like a terrible mother for subjecting my daughters to this, there are so many things we can't do or that are ruined because of his behavior.
Hugs
 
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