Hi guys.My daughter is 12 and has aspergers. She had (i thought) settled well in a main stream school, however struggles with social interaction, and will sometimes say she is being bullied then when you finally get out of her what happened it is, to someone without aspergers, pretty trivial stuff we wouldn't call bullying (eg being splashed by some boys stamping in puddles , not directing it at anyone)Anyway, this week she had lost an important letter from school so I went through her school bag and to my absolute horror found a page long suicide note. It made for grim reading. Saying nobody loves her she has no friends etc and cant do anything right. Even self harm. In her homework diary she had written "reminder to self: drink bleach".Now I work in a school, particularly youth mental health and am a mental health first aider and an advocate for self harm prevention. So I do this stuff daily with other kids. But feels totally different now it's my own.Rather than say I'd been through her stuff I just started a conversation with her about her internet use and whether she had ever seen things online she felt was inappropriate like drugs, self harm etc as she often goes on tumblr to look at memes and funny pics, but I also know that there are areas of sites like that where self harm is a thing....after talking for about half an hour, if it had been in my professional situation, I had no concerns. She did not seem depressed, stressed or anxious. So I let her chill.Today I rang her school and alerted the senco about what I had found and he was great and called me back later to say he had checked on her throughout the day and she seemed ok.Anyway. She came home from school in a good mood, but I just feel terrible. I'm on my own and I have tried my best to give her a good life. I work 2 jobs but always try and spend some quality time with her each day, whilst I dont have much money, she has plenty of good experiences such as going on holiday with her mum ( we coparent, but I am the main parent as her mum has alcohol issues), she goes on holiday with my mum, and we have tried to give her hubby's such as horse riding and swimming buy she never stuck at anything like that, preferring to play mine craft and watch youtube. I thought I was a good parent. I work with kids with special needs, and have done for over a decade. Prior to that I worked for the leading charity for autism, so I have a good understanding of her condition.I just feel confused and blame myself. I've tried to be the parent that I didn't have. I grew up in a fucked up family where my dad was chronically mentally ill, and my mum was over focused on her religion. There was a lot of physical discipline, and I have always treated my kids better than that.My other daughter who is 9 is thriving, and it must be hard for her sometimes as the eldest can be very demanding!I dont know. I just feel shitty. via /r/Parenting http://ift.tt/2gLTnmK
No comments:
Post a Comment