Hi can I have an anonymous post please.
My daughter aged 9 i believe potentially has ADHD and Autism or potentially one or the other i am not sure. We have been to the GP and have been referred for assessments but the wait times are huge. School have never noticed any issues as she masks at school and the has outbursts at home. We have never had any problems with her behaviour until around age 7 when we noticed she struggled to regulate emotions and would have huge tantrums over seemingly nothing. As it stands we are struggling. Things can be fine one min then huge meltdown screaming, shouting stomping about the next. As soon as we say no to absolutely anything even with explanation everything kicks off. We have done so much research and tried changing how we approach things, giving warnings and time frames, re framing how we speak alsorts and nothing works. It doesn’t matter how calm I am, if I ignore her etc she will continue to scream at me. This never used to happen in public but this has now started at times, never on the same level but she will refuse to do as she is told, make a scene and stomp off down the street. I am at the end of my tether. All I want is to understand and help her but all I get is shouted at no matter what I do and I feel like I am grieving my child as she isn’t the same and I miss her so much. Please no negative comments as we are loving parents who are trying our best to navigate this and do the best for our child and their older brother who is finding this difficult also.
Has anyone any experience with girls in this way? How do you handle the temper and defuse situations? I don’t know what to do anymore and I wonder is it an anger issue or is it neurodivergent? I don’t know. But I do know at times her behaviour is not ok and I need some help in how to handle this and help her.
Can I also add that after a meltdown and she is calm she will be overcome with emotions and remorse which is devastating to see but I just do not know how to defuse it before it gets to this point.
Source
My daughter has asd and her anger is always aimed at me she is angry at something I have done i am like her punching bag as she knows she can take it all out on me and I am her safe person, it is hard sometimes being that person and you do feel like you are the problem or you are letting them down some how but really you are not you are being there for her whatever she needs x
After a meltdown if you ask her how she feels or why it happened what will she say ?
Isn’t the same she was always like that. So if was her old self you would accept her as been so called normal. It’s very hard been autistic living life at 110%.
Girls are great at masking for school. Have u asked for the right to choose pathway? That can speed up the wait times. Be mindful that if you want to consider medication at some point to choose the right place that does diagnosing and can offer medication too as i didnt know the difference and we are now 9 months after diagnosis and still waiting to now get to the medication side of that.
Has she always been like this? There would be signs from when she was younger or she’s been been heavily masking and now she can’t. Possibly struggling with school, masking then letting it out at home. Maybe these have been missed. Could she be hormonal? My daughter started her periods at 10. Does she have any sensory or social difficulties that could be contributing?
Have you looked at PDA. This is a profile of autism so not a stand alone diagnosis.
If you go through right to choose should only wait a few months. You need plenty of evidence and ideally some from school but not always essential. They will want to contact a family member or someone else that knows your daughter well and has known her for some time.