How Do I Navigate Raising a 17-Year-Old Boy Who is Autistic and Can Be Difficult?

My 17-year-old is autistic. He's an excellent student, but struggles socially. He can be very rude when someone has an opinion that doesn't mirror his own and is very disrespectful to his parents. You know, uh, first of all, autism is something that we as a culture and society are, are learning more about. I think there's more resources that are going into it. Um, and, and so I, I, I guess my first thought is for the parent, thank you for reaching out, because autism in and of itself, understanding it requires a lot of education, a lot of time and, and understanding and working with teachers in school districts, it requires a lot of energy for everybody. And, and so thank you for being with us tonight. Thank you for asking your question. And, and now let's just talk about your child in general. Uh, eye contact sounds. If depending on the level and severity of autism, there may be certain sounds, certain energy that's, that's too much. Um, and, and so I think it's understanding what's gonna be best for the environment for your child, and recognizing that there's gonna be times where they are not going to agree, they're going to be, uh, opinionated. And I'm going to say that that's what we would expect. Now, with that being said, there are some things that as parents get more information, they, they begin to understand how to best understand their own child and how to help their child, so to speak, regulate something I was reading and studying about recently. I was talking, um, there's a, there's a, something called a safe and sound protocol. And that's something I mentioned earlier that we talk about with anxiety. If you could do me a favor and type in the safe and sound protocol, go, go. You don't have to do that now, but if you do that, you can read some research. It's called My Unite, U-N-Y-T-E. And if you go there, you're gonna learn about, uh, some research that they've done with children with autism. And, and what they found is the safe and sound protocol. It's the sound that they put on actually helps interact with the body's vagus nerve. Now imagine with me that the vagus is actually like the break, the vagal break, that's what it's often referred to. It actually helps all of us with the regulation. So when we push on the vagal break, it helps with anxiety, it helps with anger, it helps us slow down. So accessing the vagal break is something that was, is good for all of us. Children with autism also benefit, and there's research to show that the safe and sound protocol can be an effective resource for children dealing with autism, even with adults dealing with autism. So that's a resource I would invite you to explore and understand more about. The reason this matters is we are looking for more and more research to help children with autism deal with the difficult emotions, because as you were describing this, I I imagine that there's times where your child, if they, it disagrees, is gonna, is gonna be upset or angry because again, part of autism is, is a very focused mind and, and disruption, loud sounds, eye contact, too much contact, touch can overwhelm. And so it's being sensitive. And, and again, your child may not have all those symptoms, but, but is aware of what does my child respond to, what do they not respond to? And in some situations we avoid situations because they're so hyper-focused that once they get into that, that I'm gonna call that arena, it's really hard for them to think about something else. So those are some initial strategies. Um, I would suggest finding autistic experts in your area. Some schools like we have a local university, they have a whole clinic that focuses on, on helping families with autism. And it's just being aware and sensitive to the resources that are available to you. I don't know your specific area, but my hope is that there are, are either similar or there are resources in your area. If not, I would still go to the school, school administrators and get as much resource and ideas from them because honestly they also are dealing with this trying to provide the best education and support they can for the teachers and for the parents that they, with whom they're concerned. One of the, I just wanna say one more thing here. Over the last few years, Michelle, we've had the opportunity to work with school superintendents, teachers throughout the entire country. And I can just say across the board, I know this is an issue that they're concerned about. At least my interactions, uh, have been just what their desire is to help the best they can with children and families dealing with autism.