Hello everyone. This is my anonymous account that I have been using for advice on my child with autism.
I have lurked a while and reading other peoples experiences and posts has put some things into perspective. I am starting to notice and see disfunction everywhere. I am hoping for some advice.
OK so first I'll start with my nuclear family. I'm a married wife with two and soon to be three children. My oldest (12) is on the spectrum and has also been diagnosed with oppositional defiant disorder. He's such a sweetheart until something causes him issues. He then gets extremely violent both physically and verbally. We have discussed having to place him in a 24 hour facility recently due to some seriously scary behavior.
My toddler (17m) is a typical toddler. She seems to be neuro typical. We don't have any real concerns about her although I believe she is the catalyst for me wanting help. I'm also 34 weeks pregnant with a little boy.
My husband BTW is mostly awesome with some very occasional passive aggressiveness when we fight. He is not my oldest sons biological father but has taken him on as his son and is really great with him. He also unfortunately has had to physically restrain my oldest for his and our protection on a pretty common basis. I am concerned this will get to be too much and I feel it's not fair for him to have to do this. If anyone is super interested in my thread about my son, I don't know how to link it but it's the only other thread my profile has posted and commented on.
Now for the part I know DWIL is going to hate. We currently live with my mother, her wife, and her wives mentally disabled brother. There is definitely enmeshment issues but I also don't think either of our families would do well financially without the other one. I also help my mother who has severe chronic back pain caused by several busted discs. She is not able to do much because of her pain, and my mother's wife does her best but is older and already deals with all of my mom and her brothers Dr appointments, prescriptions, and bills. My mother and her wife are both recovering alcoholics of decades. My mom's wife hits 35 years clean and sober in october. My mom has 22 years sober but because of the pain she is always in , she takes narcotics and will abuse them if allowed. My mother's wife controls her pain pills to prevent her from using the whole prescription within 2 or 3 days. My mom still manages to drug herself up with her muscle relaxers and sleeping pills though. My mom's wife pretty much raised us from when they got together. It's been 25 years. My mom worked for the postal service and her wife stayed home with us. Growing up we (me and my sister) resented her wife because of her being super strict where as my mom would let us do whatever we wanted for the must part.
My dad is a fairly terrible person. I have a lot of resentment towards him for his obvious and blatant favoritism of my sister. I've always been overweight while my sister has always been thin. I got Bs and Cs in school while my sister got As. I never could do anything right. He used to always say things like I didnt have half a brain because I'd mess up. Also (trigger: he put me and my sister in a position that led us to be molested by his friend. He then made us promise to not tell anyone. I sadly listened in the effort to please him. My sister told our mother though. We did the court thing and he was found innocent. The prosecuters said we led him on. Because a 9 year old and 6 year old are really responsible for a grown mans sexual feelings. I blame myself to this day for not protecting my sister. End trigger) My dad only got to see us every other weekend growing up. We'd always look forward to him picking us up. Most of the time he'd show up but sometimes he didnt. And he wouldn't call and let us know either. We'd sit next to the phone for hours waiting on him to call. If/when he did it was always an excuse aND blaming someone/something else. For example we were told the car broke down. Or we were told that his boss made him stay late. Even at that age we knew it was just because he was drinking/using. Fast forward to now and now he tries to do the same stuff to my kids. Say he's going to visit and then call and bail. Always with the excuse he has the flu or his car broke down. I don't even tell my kids he's coming at this point until he is actually in town because it upsets my oldest.
My sister is very independent and kind of looks down on me. She's in college while I'm not. She has no kids while I have soon to be three. She lives with her boyfriend while I live with my mom. She also hates both of our parents but puts up with them. I'm slightly jealous of my sister and hold some resentment at her being the favorite. It's not her fault really and we are pretty close actually. She hasn't been like this her whole life though. She was very promiscuous in middle and high school. And the after for several years. She was wild and my mom didnt do anything to stop her behavior. She says she didn't know what to do.
Anyway I know this is long so I'll wrap it up with what I'm hoping to gain from this post. I am starting to worry that I will turn into my mom and want to hide in my room all of the time. I have fairly bad social anxiety and really low self esteem. I do not want to effect my kids the way I have been effected by my parents. I don't want my kids to grow up feeling like I showed favoritism to the other. I really worry about this because with my oldest his issues are something that can become wearisome. Also (and I know I'm a terrible person for this ) I slightly resent him because he means I'll never have a clean house (he destroys things and still has bowel movements on himself and then sits in it). I'll never have the chance to see him drive, get a job, get married, so many things that I hoped for while I was pregnant with him. None of this is his fault at all by the way. This is a completely me problem. And I know it's not about me but I'm trying to be super honest with my feelings here. How do I improve myself and my children's quality of life? What can I do to make sure I am never like these bsc in laws and FOOs? Or am I already bsc? I know I need therapy and it's something I'm hoping to get very soon. I feel so anxious at even creating this post. I huge part of me is telling me to just delete it and just keep doing what I am doing. I'm going to try to be brave for once in my life though and hit the button.
ETA my paragraphs didn't work... I'll try to fix it
I have lurked a while and reading other peoples experiences and posts has put some things into perspective. I am starting to notice and see disfunction everywhere. I am hoping for some advice.
OK so first I'll start with my nuclear family. I'm a married wife with two and soon to be three children. My oldest (12) is on the spectrum and has also been diagnosed with oppositional defiant disorder. He's such a sweetheart until something causes him issues. He then gets extremely violent both physically and verbally. We have discussed having to place him in a 24 hour facility recently due to some seriously scary behavior.
My toddler (17m) is a typical toddler. She seems to be neuro typical. We don't have any real concerns about her although I believe she is the catalyst for me wanting help. I'm also 34 weeks pregnant with a little boy.
My husband BTW is mostly awesome with some very occasional passive aggressiveness when we fight. He is not my oldest sons biological father but has taken him on as his son and is really great with him. He also unfortunately has had to physically restrain my oldest for his and our protection on a pretty common basis. I am concerned this will get to be too much and I feel it's not fair for him to have to do this. If anyone is super interested in my thread about my son, I don't know how to link it but it's the only other thread my profile has posted and commented on.
Now for the part I know DWIL is going to hate. We currently live with my mother, her wife, and her wives mentally disabled brother. There is definitely enmeshment issues but I also don't think either of our families would do well financially without the other one. I also help my mother who has severe chronic back pain caused by several busted discs. She is not able to do much because of her pain, and my mother's wife does her best but is older and already deals with all of my mom and her brothers Dr appointments, prescriptions, and bills. My mother and her wife are both recovering alcoholics of decades. My mom's wife hits 35 years clean and sober in october. My mom has 22 years sober but because of the pain she is always in , she takes narcotics and will abuse them if allowed. My mother's wife controls her pain pills to prevent her from using the whole prescription within 2 or 3 days. My mom still manages to drug herself up with her muscle relaxers and sleeping pills though. My mom's wife pretty much raised us from when they got together. It's been 25 years. My mom worked for the postal service and her wife stayed home with us. Growing up we (me and my sister) resented her wife because of her being super strict where as my mom would let us do whatever we wanted for the must part.
My dad is a fairly terrible person. I have a lot of resentment towards him for his obvious and blatant favoritism of my sister. I've always been overweight while my sister has always been thin. I got Bs and Cs in school while my sister got As. I never could do anything right. He used to always say things like I didnt have half a brain because I'd mess up. Also (trigger: he put me and my sister in a position that led us to be molested by his friend. He then made us promise to not tell anyone. I sadly listened in the effort to please him. My sister told our mother though. We did the court thing and he was found innocent. The prosecuters said we led him on. Because a 9 year old and 6 year old are really responsible for a grown mans sexual feelings. I blame myself to this day for not protecting my sister. End trigger) My dad only got to see us every other weekend growing up. We'd always look forward to him picking us up. Most of the time he'd show up but sometimes he didnt. And he wouldn't call and let us know either. We'd sit next to the phone for hours waiting on him to call. If/when he did it was always an excuse aND blaming someone/something else. For example we were told the car broke down. Or we were told that his boss made him stay late. Even at that age we knew it was just because he was drinking/using. Fast forward to now and now he tries to do the same stuff to my kids. Say he's going to visit and then call and bail. Always with the excuse he has the flu or his car broke down. I don't even tell my kids he's coming at this point until he is actually in town because it upsets my oldest.
My sister is very independent and kind of looks down on me. She's in college while I'm not. She has no kids while I have soon to be three. She lives with her boyfriend while I live with my mom. She also hates both of our parents but puts up with them. I'm slightly jealous of my sister and hold some resentment at her being the favorite. It's not her fault really and we are pretty close actually. She hasn't been like this her whole life though. She was very promiscuous in middle and high school. And the after for several years. She was wild and my mom didnt do anything to stop her behavior. She says she didn't know what to do.
Anyway I know this is long so I'll wrap it up with what I'm hoping to gain from this post. I am starting to worry that I will turn into my mom and want to hide in my room all of the time. I have fairly bad social anxiety and really low self esteem. I do not want to effect my kids the way I have been effected by my parents. I don't want my kids to grow up feeling like I showed favoritism to the other. I really worry about this because with my oldest his issues are something that can become wearisome. Also (and I know I'm a terrible person for this ) I slightly resent him because he means I'll never have a clean house (he destroys things and still has bowel movements on himself and then sits in it). I'll never have the chance to see him drive, get a job, get married, so many things that I hoped for while I was pregnant with him. None of this is his fault at all by the way. This is a completely me problem. And I know it's not about me but I'm trying to be super honest with my feelings here. How do I improve myself and my children's quality of life? What can I do to make sure I am never like these bsc in laws and FOOs? Or am I already bsc? I know I need therapy and it's something I'm hoping to get very soon. I feel so anxious at even creating this post. I huge part of me is telling me to just delete it and just keep doing what I am doing. I'm going to try to be brave for once in my life though and hit the button.
ETA my paragraphs didn't work... I'll try to fix it