feeling depressed and anxious
I'm feeling depressed and extremely anxious. I'm getting absolutely nothing done. I don't want to go anywhere, or do anything. It is so frusterating as I have alot of things I need to get done. I have appointments that I have canceled, meetings( volunteer stuff) that i haven't been going to, I don't want to even think of a garden, as I have no money for it this year. My allergies is one thing that has been bugging me. I love opening the windows to let the fresh air in, but my allergies has gotten alot worse recently, and I can't do this. Even going places, I have to keep the windows up, and the vents closed. I feel trapped. April is a stressful, but usually enjoyable month for me. Everything happens in April. I have a Section 8 inspection this Thursday( rescheduled from last week), and I can't get myself to do anything. There is plenty that needs to be done. If it fails, we loose sect. 8 assistance. I just feel I have no energy at all left to do anything. I am worrying about so many things. My list of things to do is getting so long, as I am not doing any of them. One is to reorder my allergy medication, but that requires picking up the phone and calling it in, and I can't organize myself to even get this done. Tomarrow moring, I am supposed to get my sons blood drawn for fasting test. uggg. I am NOT a morning person. Maybe I'll get my husband to do that. doubt it though. My aunt went home today from the psych hosp. She seems to be doing much better. I hope things run smoothly, as I can't take another thing right now. I am also not feeling comfortable in my own skin. I gained a couple pounds, and my shorts DO NOT FIT RIGHT!!!!! and it is getting me depressed. I feel like life is going on all around me, but I am being restrained from participating by some invisible chain that is tying me down. Seasonal changes are hard for me, but Spring is my favorite time of the year.
Genisa, this is reminding me of my husband's parents when he was growing up. He (the oldest) said his two brothers sided with their father and that he was tired of his dad's game playing and sided with his mom. Years later, the family is still divided over which parent stoked the conflict that led to a very messy divorce when the two youngest were teenagers.
It was very hard on my husband, and he picked up some polarizing behaviors from this, such that he behaves rather like his own father at times. He is aware of this, thankfully, which lowers his self-esteem. Our kids are sometimes quite angry at him, and my son likes to say, "He is autistic like me, he acts all autistic. But he gets mad at me for being this way. He's a hypocrite." This pains me, as I know how hard my husband is trying, and it disappoints him that his children should have similar feelings for him that he did for his own father.
I guess my point is that sometimes our spouses do things they were taught by their own parents. My husband does best when he is in psychotherapy and can discuss these things with someone other than me. But he strongly dislikes anyone telling him what to do. And he doesn't like anyone telling him he has Asperger's, which he sometimes accepts and sometimes does not. (Interestingly, he does attend an AS support group.) So it's a struggle.
You mentioned in other posts that your husband has responded to psychotherapy. Would he be willing to return to it?
Its a matter of trying to get it scheduled so that I have respite. My respite only comes on Friday, and my Dr. doesn't work on Friday :-(
I set up an appointment for my son to see the other Aspergers psychologist in the office that I go to. Maybe she will finally diagnose him correctly. As of now, His psychiatrist has him diagnosed as: some attachment disorder( which my Dr. explained to me, and I summed it all up that his Dr. is pretty much saying that Jaden didn't connect to me emotionally( due to refridgerator mom syndrome. remember in the ancient days of autism discovery. Cold uncaring moms caused their childs autism. this is about what his Dr is saying in a round about way.... I DON'T THINK SO....
Anyway... His psychiatrist last said that he has some kind of psychotic affective disorder, and never diagnosed Aspergers. Well.... I found the paper that she wrote her diagnosis on after we first started seeing her and it says the attachment disorder and Aspergers. How can you trust a Dr. that can't keep her story straight. He would have fit Classic Autism if he was refered when he was 2. uggg
I also wish my son was diagnosed as a toddler. He does now have the autism diagnosis, along with the bipolar diagnosis (he also has very dramatic mood swings, including mania), but it took several years of practically turning myself and my son inside out to get it. It really is shameful that the refrigerator mom stuff still comes out, such old school. There's no excuse for this ignorance!
In my son's case, he is adopted. They just love to diagnose RAD in adopted kids. Unfortunately, sometimes it really isn't RAD. Valuable time is sometimes wasted on the wrong diagnoses. So frustrating!
Now our daughter did have beginning stage RAD. She was ten months old when we brought her home and suffered from an anxious attachment. Those first nine plus months were spent in an orphanage were she was not allowed to bond to anyone, as her South Chinese caregivers said they didn't want anyone to compete with us for her affection. Horribly flawed reasoning. (We now sponsor a foster child in her birth city through a local charity, to spare one child at a time from that horrible institution so that each little girl (no boys yet) is allowed to develop normally until she is adopted. Our daughter was terrified to be without me and had to be touching me at all times. The worst part of it lasted about six months and we weren't out of the woods until she was five; until then she was morbidly shy. I still see signs of it from time to time, but her issues are far less severe than they once were.
RAD can look a bit like institutional autism. It can affect socialization. I once wondered if my daughter has AS. But no. The older she gets, the more NT she is. At the age of 10, she is far ahead of where I was socially at that age. Her teacher describes her as popular and a leader. She has several friends and an active social life.
RAD is pretty obvious when it's evident. My son never had RAD. It still angers me that his specialists dithered around with this and gave us such horrible advice to follow.
Hope you can schedule something for your husband to get some counseling! Sounds like he sure could use it.
My son was diagnosed with Sensory Integration Disorder at 3, then Diagnosed with PDD/NOS when he was almost 4. then with partial epilepsy(irregular brain activity in the right parital part of the brain(the area that recieves and makes sense of sensory intake)at 7; and Then a couple months later, diagnosed with the attachment disorder and Aspergers. He fit the criteria of regressive autism by age 2.
Genisa, how odd, with your son's history of regression, that it is so difficult to get your son diagnosed with autism.
My son didn't manifest signs of the classic regression, and to everyone but trained speech therapists, my son sounded precocious. Started speaking at 10 months, seemed fluent by 3 years, began reading at four. We were told he was "highly intelligent" when he was two, possibly gifted, and also likely to have ADHD due to the stimming behaviors. When his IQ was measured the following year, he was average with many gaps, some scores in borderline, some scores near gifted. These scores have held constant every year since then.
He was doing a lot of scripting and mimicking, but he was doing it so well that he was getting by without really understanding school or much of what was said to him. By the time he was five, one specialist wondered about Asperger's and was shouted down by others in favor of ADHD. By the time he was seven, we'd hired a specialist who said he is fully autistic and had simply been perseverating on communication, as some do. Our school district adamantly disagreed, so we hired another well known specialist who said my son is "moderately autistic" and that the only area he is "high functioning" in is expressive speech. (Receptive speech is significantly delayed.) The district is still resisting us, despite the fact that this particular psychologist's opinion is highly regarded.
I think in my son's case that his seemingly advanced expressive speech seemed to negate autism and point to other reasons for his behavior. This has made it very difficult to get approval and funding for services and support. We have them now, and they are a godsend. When one arms oneself with attorneys and lives in California, one can potentially get fairly good services and support.
My son was also diagnosed with sensory integration disorder; he was 30 months old. No clear signs of epilepsy yet. He has very sensitive hearing and responded well to auditory integration therapy when combined with sensory OT.
husband is yelling at me again. This time it is because he didn't give me an important phone message that I got yesterday. It made me miss a family picnic for families with preschool age kids. It was free and we go to it every year. Well, this year, I signed up late, because Jerry never gives me any papers that Tayler brings home, and I ususally find them after the fact. He hates going to these things, so I figure he does this purposly. My Head Start person called and talked to Jerry, and told him that we got okayed to go even though I signed up way after the dead line. This is a fun thing, and this was the last year that we would be able to participate, as my youngest is going into Kindergarten, and would be too old next year. They had mini train rides, pony rides, inflateable bounce house, dinner catered by HyVee, all free. it makes me so angry that he never lets me know who calls or relays any messages...ever. Then when I point it out to him this morning, after I found out, he starts yelling at me for his mistakes. I am wishing that he would just pack his bags and leave, as his yelling at me is getting very old and I am getting tired of it. I can't discuss anything with him, because he just starts yelling at me. I guess it is his way to get me to back off, but it would be so much more peaceful around here without the yelling. Also, a couple days ago there was an incident that really bothers me. I had just told the kids that they can draw with their chalk out front in the driveway, and not on the patio.That is when my husband immediately told them not listen to me and that they can draw on the patio. GRRRRRRR!!!!!! I am so tired of him undermining my authority. My kids are learning to disrespect and disobey me.