pixie

Thanks for your reply Karen. He is seeing the GP next week and the week after the psyhchiatrist. I expect they will be pleased as he is eating more than he was and is not suicidal but it's been a shock to me to see him regress so much and lose interest in more or less everything. I expect I will just have to be patient but just wondered if anyone else here had experience of this with their own young person and could give me a few pointers. Thanks for your help.

My son is now almost 19 and was doing so well but these last few months have been difficult, to say the least, and my son seems to have regressed over the last few weeks to what he was like when he was much younger. My husband became distant and cold and then left us back in April. He had his head turned by a younger woman and left us to be with her. Since then things have not been easy, having our family pet put to sleep due to illness, lots of arguments with the other woman on facebook between her and my son. Having to get a car, sort out the house so we could stay here etc. Most recently the death of his great grandma. My son is now hardly talking, finds it difficult to eat, is afraid of going out as well as being afraid of seeing his Dad and "her" out. When I go to hug him he pulls back more often than not and his eye contact is poor. He has lost interest in most things in life. This is a young man who was functioning almost at a level of any other 18 year old, having mates, having fun, drinking, dancing enjoying college, eating normally and experimenting with different foods, no real tummy problems any more etc. He has been put onto Prozac 3 weeks ago but so far no improvement. I know it can take longer to start working but I did think I would see something by now. Has anyone else any experience of this happening or any references to it please.

A little update on the bullying situation at my son's school. He has left as he, nor we can take any more. Even the staff are bullying him, including the head and deputy head. It has been a terrible time for him and for us. An animal would have been treated better than he has. I don't know why they all singled my son out but he is not a bad lad, he's HFA. He is the kindest and most thoughtful young person that I know. He would give anyone something to make them feel better and go without himself. He works hard and shows great promise accademically. We don't know why all this has happened but it snowballed so much that there is no way now that it will stop. So he did his last painful day today, thank goodness. We just have to hope now that we are in time for him to have not suffered too much long term damage. When he has rested up a while we will give him all he needs in the way of education and life skills that he needs. We will also start to write our letters of complaint as this school needs to be brought to book. --------------------

The staff have already tried to cover it up but we keep going straight to the head. I don't think the teacher is best pleased about that but I'm not pleased when my son comes home and tells us the staff tell him it must stay "in class". I don't think he will stand to go to another school. He has a friend at the school so it will be too difficult for him to move. The only other option would be a special needs college and as my daughter went there my son most certainly will not be!! They have no understanding of Autism at all. We have now decided that every phone call and every meeting will be recorded and letters of confirmation sent so that all this is then recorded properly and hope it makes a difference. I hope your son is now settled and happy in his new school. xx

Thank you, it does help to know my son is not alone especially in a special school or unit. The GP has said that our son's symptoms are caused by the stress of the bullying and that we are right to keep him home a few days. It's always a worry with breathing problems and chest pains so we wanted to make sure it was the stress and not his Asthma getting worse. We are all feeling a little less stress now but not looking forward to our son going back to school next week. I hope you manage to get something resolved for your lad and the bullying will stop or at least become manageable if that's the best that can be hoped for given the situation.

We have little idea what the school has done apart from we know they have spoken to the pupil/s involved. At one time the parents were informed. Every time it gets bad it's reported and appears to be sorted but then it starts up again a few weeks later. It has even come into our home with online bullying from the pupil/s involved. We downloaded the abuse our son received and it was shown to the pupil's parents via the head. The head won't tell us what he does as he says it's confidential how he deals with it. I am not sure if they have an anti bullying policy as we have never been offered any information about it. I might as well put a sticker on my son to invite the bullies as it doesn't seem to matter what we do it just won't stop. I am sick of it all, literally. It is also affecting our health as well as our son's.

My son is being bullied at his special school. It is an Autistic specific school and the bullying has been going on for around 3 years. We have him at home for a few days to chill and he's off to the GP tomorrow so that the stress is recorded in his notes. I'm not sure what we are going to do long term as my son wants to go back to school despite the bullying. He is almost 16 and was planning on moving up into the FE department of the same school. Now we don't know what will happen to him or where he will go. We have a meeting with the head next week so maybe we will have a better idea of a direction to follow then.

That's wonderful, congratulations. We did the same thing last year after being together 17 years. The only difference was that we told nobody, even the kids as the youngest (ASD) was not happy about any changes and that included us getting married. Today is our first anniversay so I wish you both many more years together as I'm sure we will have too.

My daughter bought her own as she liked them (she's 21) One said "Heavily Medicated For The Sake Of The Masses" Another was " I heard voices before it was trendy" There were several others but I can't remember what they were now. She didn't get them from the eBay seller but just in regular shops.

There is an eBay seller that sells lots of this type of stuff including T-shirts, badges etc. Here's her eBay shop: http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Autism-Awareness-...sQ3amesstQQtZkm

I slapped my son when he was about that age too. We had just seen the EP at the hospital and my son had kicked off good style. I was struggling to get him back to the car, which was parked miles away. I was half carrying and half pulling him along the hospital corridor. I'd had enough that day with the journey, the wait, the lack of DX and then this tantrum. He was hitting me, kicking me, screaming, pulling my hair and punching me. I just lashed out and slapped him, once, then sat on the floor in the hospital corridor and cried. Me crying seemed to have an effect and he stopped lashing out long enough for me to get back to the car. I still remember it and he's 15 now but I thnk we all get to that stage at some time or another. I've never done it since despite him having much worse tantrums but a set of circumstances which I couldn't cope with lead to it.

A welcome from me too.

It is heartbreaking and I feel so sorry that they are making you and your son go through all this. I did send you a pm a couple of weeks ago about someone who may be able to help but I don't know if you got it or not as I've not been on here very much. My thoughts are with you both and hope that a way will be found for you to stay together. xxx

My daughter was put on meds for her violence and it has helped. I don't think any of us like the idea though including the professionals but we all have a right to live our lives without violence in it and I'm sure Steven would rather not be violent. Good luck. Thinking of you. xx

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