Our almost 18 year old son dropped out of high school in March a few months before graduation. The school was moving too fast, the pandemic was rough and he didn’t have enough accommodations (his father insisted it was the best school but that’s another subject). We think he suffered an autistic burnout. He didn’t talk about his stress/anxiety or see it coming and that’s part of the problem. We made the mistake of thinking that because he was so smart he would flourish in an enriched school. That worked until it didn’t. He was followed by a therapist who says he has seen similar situations and they typically take 6-12 months to recover. It has been 8-9 months. He also received the ASD diagnosis earlier this year. In September he started a slow self paced school where there is a lot of support. He said he wanted to go to school. Problem is that he is not producing any work and going as little as possible. The therapist says it’s better for him to go to school a few days per week than do nothing at home. He doesn’t want to work instead. Right now he’s attending only a few hours per week. The rest of the time he’s on screens a lot. He left all his classmates and hobbies behind at his previous school. This summer he tried sailing but since then has nor found another hobby but I am pushing him to find one. So we’re trying to be patient and understanding and wait this out while pushing him to keep a schedule. We hope we are not enabling. His thoughts seem clearer and he seems less anxious / calmer than before but probably also fed up of not progressing. He’s not opening up much. I’ve read through the material on the website and a lot about the subject. We don’t know what else to do. Our sons behavior looks like clinical depression (withdrawal etc) but he’s been screened for depression and it’s not that. We hope the school will keep tolerating this behavior and that there will be a turnaround in 2023. He was previously functioning at a high pace and this seems like such a waste of his potential. Up until a year ago we had all kinds of hopes for him. Any suggestions apart from working on our acceptance ??

Posted by Eve at 2022-12-01 01:03:18 UTC