minutes from madness

The careers advice

2010-04-29T14:30:00.000-07:00

Pip has been turned down for next year's college course. It's not good news.

He was studying a first diploma course in computer software development, whatever that means, on a college day release course. His tutor, Ali proudly boasted his ignorance of Asperger's, which was surprising given his own poor communication skills.

We spent most of this spring listening to Ali changing his mind about Pip's ability in software development. Finally he told Pip that he was capable of the course and should sign himself up immediately, which Pip did. A month later, when it came to interviewing Pip for the course, Ali refused him a place, arguing that Pip was too disabled and recommending a design course instead.

Maybe Ali has discovered a talent in Pip which everyone else is ignorant of. Maybe Pip has some latent design skill waiting to be discovered but somehow I doubt it.

We are now left to search for a new course for Pip. And the courses are filling up fast so there is no time to lose. I spent this weekend with a college prospectus trying to find a suitable course.

Computer courses? He might come across Ali, and end up screaming at him.

Uniformed services? He likes the routine and order but can't cope with people telling him what to do.

Catering? He won't let his sister eat Haribo sweets because they contain gelatine, how would he cope with preparing meat?

Childcare? He wouldn't understand the needs of a small child and is too selfish.

Car maintenance? He couldn't work in a garage with other people.

Accountancy? It's mathematically based, he could work from home but he doesn't even understand the basics of finance.

Beauty? He doesn't even wash his face, hates the smell of perfume and dislikes women with make-up.

Tourism? He hates holidays and is too bloody selfish.

A levels? He's barely got any GCSEs.

I'd crossed out every course.

I picked up another copy of the prospectus and another pen and started at the beginning again, arguing that I was being too fussy.

On Monday I drove over to our local Connexions office in the nearby big town, to meet up with Susie, Pip's dedicated disability officer. The reception area was busy with posters, radio 1 blaring out from a tinny radio and the inevitable sexual health advice given prominent place. I looked around the walls, hastily searching for information which could be useful. Susie walked across the room, a young, fresh faced hippy with long, blond hair and no make up. Maybe Pip could cope with her, if he could just manage her simpering, patronising voice.

She led me into a prison cell, with high windows which filtered out the warm strong sunshine. I perched on an awkward chair pushed into the corner of the room, trying to balance a folder on my knee. 'Why've they not offered him a place on the course?' she simpered. I handed her the college letter and she argued the points one by one. 'No, you don't understand, it really isn't the right course for him, the lecturer doesn't like him and can't be bothered to help him, Pip won't ask for help and doesn't understand what they are asking of him,' I reasoned. She went back to arguing against the decision of the college. I tried another tack 'isn't there some software that can tell you what he is suited to?' 'The internet's down, I can't show you. But, there is a drop in centre in your town, he could go there and access it. Hang on,' she made a quick call, turned her beaming smile on me and announced that he could attend the centre on a Wednesday afternoon. 'Thanks, I'll make an appointment for the summer holidays,' I quipped, 'in the meantime is there something we can do sooner? I have to find a college course as soon as possible before they've all filled up.'

'What about this?' she triumphantly plucked up a flyer printed on glossy paper for a computing course in the nearby city. I looked at the paper in horror, trying so hard to look interested and enthusiastic. My eyes fell on the title 'Customer Service in Computing'. Without comment, I turned the page to discover that she was seriously suggesting that I take Pip out of his caring, organised, specialist school and throw him into a 20 week course training him up to provide support and excellent customer service. How could I explain to her that Pip couldn't provide support to anyone? How could I tell her that Pip didn't want to work with other people, let alone work for them? I put the flyer in my folder, mumbling 'very interesting, I'll contact them tomorrow morning and ask if they can modify the course so the emphasis isn't on support and service for a customer.' If she recognised the irony then it didn't register.

Bugger it, I'd have to solve this problem myself.

That evening Pip came home and I broached the subject to him. 'Oh, it's easy, I know exactly what I want to do. I'm going to study politics at A level, go on to University, then join the army for a few years. I'm not physically fit so I'll chose a non-combat role like intelligence. Then I'll work as an investigative journalist for a few years before becoming an MP. I think I'll be an MP in the North East. I can see myself settling down there.' I took a deep breath, ready to explain to him that he couldn't study A levels without five GSCEs, he had never written an essay in his life, couldn't see the other side in any argument, wouldn't be accepted by the army, had the wrong temperament for a journalist and had such poor communication skills that he would never make an MP. Apart from that, it was a cast iron plan. Hell, I couldn't upset his plans so I just left it.

Two days later I was on the way to Pip's school, to an appointment with a real Connexions officer, with a bag of notes and plans beside me.

Glenn sat there in a corner of the sixth form centre, confidant in his knowledge of the children and their disabilities. 'I've already spoken to Pip, he's a charming young man who knows exactly what he wants to do. Very communicative, considering his disability.' I handed him my sheets of half baked plans and ideas, he scanned them before the room suddenly flooded with sixth formers. 'Let's go outside and have a walk round while we discuss his plans' he suggested.

The school grounds are surrounded by trees, some remnant of an ancient forest. I confidently trotted around at his heels as he poured out his valuable advice. Damn, I couldn't make notes out there. 'What are your ultimate plans? Have you looked at life skills colleges? He's a fine lad but he could do with some intense independence skills.' I nodded in agreement, glad to show I had done my homework, worrying about finance. 'Of course you would have to get your home Connexions officer to plan out a case for Pip to attend college. That's why it would be best for him to study politics at A level, don't let him study too many A levels or he will be considered too able to attend a life skill college. One, maybe two A levels should be enough. Did you say maths as well? Is he good at maths?' 'But..but... he's useless at essay writing and he hasn't got the GCSEs for A level and the college says he has to sign up for four A levels, which he really can't do.' 'Don't worry, he's keen on politics, your education authority is paying for the course so results don't matter and you are right, he can't do four A levels, I'll get his teacher to negotiate about that and if they still say no then we can sign him up to four and cancel two of them the next day. Don't worry, leave it with his head of department.'

By that time we were halfway round the field, coming up to the group of dyspraxic teenagers practising their running skills. 'He won't make an MP of course but it's good to have a plan and he can always work in politics without becoming an MP. We can get him supported employment. I'll send a report to your Connexions officer, detailing our plans.' We were walking back to the sixth form centre by then 'just time to fill Pip's speech therapist in with the details, then I'd best be off.'

Minutes later, Pip and I were walking back to the car. I had a spring in my step and the sun was beating down on my back. I suddenly realised that all my worries about Pip's future were somehow sorted.

The next morning, as I was tidying up the table I came across my folder. As I lifted it up a sheet of glossy paper fell out. Picking it up, I shook my head, how was I going to tell Susie that this boy isn't going to take up her kind offer of customer service training?

The Man of Straw

2010-04-24T14:43:00.000-07:00

The madness continues and I'm getting sucked back into it. I live it hourly, I dream it and I can't escape. I hate it, I long to close the door on it and compartmentalise it but I know that this time it won't go until my financial settlement is over.

Pip is still incandescent with fury over his proposed re-assessment. He blamed me for allowing it to happen but my other children are only too painfully aware that when their father demands something, I haven't got the emotional strength to refuse him. He has a strength of will which is awesome.

My solicitor, Mr Harker, is getting increasingly frustrated with the demands of my ex-husband, Jay. It started simply enough, we had to prove that a four year old diagnosis of a life long affliction was still correct. Within days Jay had changed his existing demands, Pip had to need 24 hour care, seven days a week. I rang up Dee, who ran a care home and a care agency. 'Don't be stupid, he would have to be in intensive care to be classed as needing twenty four hour care. If he needed that level of support then social services would have to provide a proportion of it, you couldn't ever go to bed. You would only have to prove that you provide an average of thirty five hours of care a week, just like the Carer's Allowance specifies. And you do that easily.' But I knew that Jay Asperger would demand more.

As the days wore on, I became increasingly angry with myself for being sucked back into his demanding world. I could feel his control and it made me sick. Then the nightmares started.

It would start simply enough. I would be standing by the window in the sitting room, it was early evening and I was alone in the room. I heard a noise behind me and turned to find Jay sitting on the couch. I would find myself crying as I watched him, inert and unresponsive, sitting staring blankly ahead, just like he used to. I tried to shoo him out of the house but he carried on, staring into the distance, cold and rigid. As I tried to make him leave the children would suddenly appear, stare aghast at their father and start screaming that I had let them down, how could I let him back in again after all he had done to hurt us? The spell would break and I would find myself alone in bed, my eyes wet with tears, my mouth shaping my apology to the children and my heart racing. I would lie there, too scared to fall back to sleep, listening to the sounds of Pip screaming out in the night, until the first light of dawn would creep under the window blind and I would fall asleep, secure in the knowledge that Jay wasn't part of my life anymore. But the dreams would carry on. This time I would be lying in bed and my arm, numb with tiredness would stretch across the bed, until it hit something solid. It was Jay, getting into bed after hours of watching TV, I could tell by his responsiveness that he sensed I was awake and was edging towards me. I could feel his breath on my shoulder as he pulled back the bedclothes and I knew his next words would be 'fancy a bit of anal?' as he reached over, feeling for my breasts. I felt sick, his skin was sweaty and his breath was alcohol fumes. I would wake up, bolt upright in bed ready to run away, my heart galloping.

The Sunday following the court case I arranged to meet a group of friends and acquaintances in the pub. Pip ran home, scared at the idea of meeting up with so many people. I went in to apologise for my absence, walking straight up to their noisy, lively corner without buying a drink. Alison beckoned me over to an empty seat beside her and I stumbled through my apology, knowing she would understand about Pip. 'You look tired, how are you?' she gently cooed. I was halfway through my story, with tears burning my cheeks before I realised what I was doing. I sobbed for half an hour, faces desperately trying to look away and spare me the indignity and embarrassment of knowing I was being watched. Caroline reached over with a packet of paper handkerchiefs, pressing them generously into my soggy hand, worried that Pip had been hurting me. The mother of an acquaintance, a nurse, tried to calm me down and between them, they carefully dried me out and gave me the strength to walk back out of the pub, ready to face Pip's anger.

That evening Nina walked into town to meet her friends. Alex, bored with the TV, went to bed early with Pip, the two of them squabbling in the bathroom, their mouths full of toothpaste lather. I sat down in front of the computer, ready to research more life skills colleges for Pip but the tears which I had managed to hide from the children started rolling down my cheeks. I sat there in the half light, too tired and upset to use the computer, too miserable to move to the couch. Eventually I went upstairs and washed my tear stained face, but I looked in the mirror and saw the sad, lonely women I was becoming and the tears started afresh. I turned and found Nina, who had quietly crept up on me, expecting to chat about her evening. 'What's wrong?' her face contorted in concern and the whole sorry tale about how I was feeling trapped and controlled by Jay came tumbling out. 'Don't worry,' she whispered as she led me to the edge of my bed, 'we've come so far since he left, we've managed so much now he isn't a part of our lives. We are so much happier now he's gone. Do you think I'd be like this if he was still here? We're no longer scared of him. It's just a temporary thing, it's the last burst of his power, it will soon be all over and he'll never come back.' But I knew he would do everything in his power to keep that control, he'd already argued about everything he could think of in the previous mediation, in letters to my solicitor and in previous court hearings. He wasn't going to relinquish his power so easily. That night the nightmares continued and he was within a hair's breadth of touching me before I woke up.

The next morning the mental health worker phoned to arrange an appointment to see Pip. I burst into tears, much to her surprise. I sat there, incoherently babbling to her about Jay and she tried to restore order into the conversation and bring the appointment forward. I sobbed my thanks to her, put the phone down and found I couldn't stop. For hours the tears flowed, allowing Pip the joyful opportunity of accessing the computer without fear of me seeing him. He spent an idyllic morning signing his father up to random, eccentric political party emails, offering his father's support for minority candidates, requesting a personal visit, asking for details on direct debit giving.

Nina and Alex became concerned about my tears, taking it in turns to comfort me. Pip, aware that we were all otherwise occupied, turned his attention to the kitchen, ladling huge spoonfuls of sugar into weak coffee and gulping it down thankfully, making himself plates of noodles, gleefully adding handfuls of salt. I continued sobbing.

I tried to distract myself, playing stupid, inane games on the computer but the tears kept flowing. I tidied up the kitchen after Pip's recent attack, throwing away the empty sugar bag and wiping up the spilled salt, but it made no difference to my tears. Pip walked in, to find me sobbing, 'are you cutting onions or are you upset?' he said mechanically. 'I'm sorry, I'm upset, I feel as if Jay is back, controlling me and I'm scared.' 'I hate the bastard. He's evil and he won't buy me car insurance! Let's drive over there, I can put a bat through his car windscreen and we can steal his wife's car to get away in,' he laughed but I know that when Pip says he will use a baseball bat there is always the threat that he really will. That evening we ate pizza.

The next morning I was up early, ready to bundle Pip into his taxi. He mumbled retribution through his breakfast, watching to see for the taxi. As we walked to the door he was reminding me that he needed to phone back Jeremy Kyle and tell him Jay's office number. 'Don't contact him, don't sign him up for anything, don't get him any angrier than he is, please.' I begged him, but Pip was already planning a daily dose of emails and text alerts. 'I could sign him up for the London Underground texts alerts, they cost twenty pence a go and on a bad day he could get tens of them' he eagerly chattered as he ran off up the drive.

I shut the front door and busied myself, taking care not to turn on the radio and listen to sad news. But the tears were soon rolling down my cheeks. Damn! And I needed to take Alex to the shops to buy some more PE trainers. By midmorning the crying hadn't stopped, I reached over to the phone and dialed the number I had carefully written on the note pad.

'Hello, is that Women's Aid? This sound so stupid but my husband left five years ago, I was absolutely fine, then I had to see him in court last Friday and he shouted at my solicitor and accused me of saying hearsay when I was describing my son's disability. I dream he's come back in my life and he's controlling me again. He used to shout at me all the time, he didn't hurt me, it wasn't proper abuse but I hated it.' The words poured out, remembering past hurts, fears and worries. I sat there sobbing for an hour as she quietly listened to all my woes, gently reassuring me and affirming my story. 'B..b..but he's a lecturer in a university, he's remarried. I'm unemployable and I'm not even in a relationship. He used to say I was the one with the problems, not him. Professional men don't abuse their wives.' 'It takes all sorts, we have wives of highly paid professionals on our books. And besides, research shows that these men don't stop abusing just because they have moved on to another wife.' she sounded so authoritative but understanding that the crying continued afresh. Within minutes she had arranged for me to receive counselling. 'Do you want to tell me more, or do you want to rest now?' she gently questioned. 'I'm fine now,' I blubbered 'but I will look forward to the counselling.'

I stopped the crying long enough to get Alex into town and buy him some trainers.

By Friday Pip and Alex were both back in school and Nina was enjoying one last day of freedom. I arranged an appointment with my doctor and the normally placid and self-controlled Mrs Asperger blubbered her story to him as he calmly made notes, politely ignoring the damp mark which was growing on his desk and the increasing humidity in the room. 'You won't take drugs, I know you,' he briskly stated before booking me in with Natalie, the surgery counsellor 'we can't leave you in this state, she'll help you.'

On the way home, I took fifty pounds out of my bank account, not noticing I'd lost it until later that evening. I arrived home in time for a phone call from the head of Pip's sixth form, Aaron, anxious to explain to me his side of the sad story of the day. Pip had been invited on a filming trip to a local ruin, bored and unable to cope with the lack of structure to the day, he had entertained himself by throwing stones, shouting abuse at his teacher, goading the other children and finally running off, to be cajoled back into the car and driven back to school as he accused Aaron of paedophilia. By the end of the day, Aaron's crimes had been increased to finger wagging in Pip's direction, one of the most evil crimes anyone can be accused of. Between us, we laughed it off, or rather Aaron and I did, Pip was clearly in no mood to forgive and forget.

Nina told me a complicated story involving the class bitch, a party in one of the worst restaurants in the town and no friends she could sit next to. Within minutes I was arranging a meal in the nearest Wetherspoons, only it couldn't be the local Wetherspoons, in case someone saw her and was wondering why she didn't go to the bitch's party. It had to be far away, but nearby, so she could walk up to meet her friends after the meal. Before I knew it, Jordan, the neighbour's son was deciding what he would eat and Alex was deciding on a car seating plan. But it just wasn't my day, the pub was busy, we couldn't find a table, it took ages to be served, I discovered that my wad of notes had fallen out of my bag, then Pip had to leave the pub because it was too noisy, preferring to sit in my car outside. We rushed through our meal, anxious to see what Pip was getting up to and drove home in time for Nina to go out.

The next day Pip phoned up his father thirty times, telling him he was a bastard and he hated him. Each time the phone was put down on him. By lunchtime his dad was threatening to come round. 'You can't, we are all under police protection,' came Pip's reply. 'Why? Who's done that, I'm going to phone them up and tell them it's wrong, I'm not allowing that. I'll sort this nonsense out' said that increasingly agitated and angry Jay. But Pip was a match for him 'hang on a second, I've got the non-emergency number for the police, just ask for the domestic abuse team.'

By two o'clock Jay was threatening Pip with the police. I ordered him to leave the man alone, taking care to station myself between him and the phone. My order lasted until four o'clock, when I turned my back and heard the familiar click of the phone. That night Pip emailed his new step-mother to tell her that Jay lies and kicks me.

On Tuesday Pip argued with Aaron at school again. It was all a storm in a teacup which Pip could recite word-perfectly by home time but I knew Aaron would be at a loss to tell me what had caused the argument. The phone call came later than usual and I sat down, ready to laugh at Pip's antics but Aaron was in no mood for laughing 'I'm sorry Mrs Asperger, it's the call I hate making and I don't know how to say it really. Pip applied for the follow-on course at college for next year, we had a meeting with the staff at the college yesterday, they've refused him a place. It wasn't just because of the incident when Pip hit the other boy. They said he couldn't cope with the study.'

I sat down numb, the following two years of my life had been built around Pip going on the computing course. I knew it would be hard for him but he had so wanted to do it, his college tutor had recommended him for it and now he was turning him down. We chatted about the implications, my hand shaking as I wrote down hurried, meaningless notes, repeating that he had been told by the college to apply. 'They suggest he changes to graphics.' 'But, but he can't do graphics, he's the least artistic person in the universe. He's not up to it, he'd get bored and he wouldn't understand what they wanted him to do,' I reasoned. 'Well yes, I thought that. We need to meet up and discuss his options. I'll phone you tomorrow and arrange something. I'm sorry about all this, will you tell him?' 'He's got an interview at the college tomorrow, I'll have to tell him before then, he'd be too disappointed.'

I went to sit beside Pip, took a deep breath and told him the news. By the next morning he had emailed a formal complaint about the tutor to the college, written a death threat on facebook (I breathed a sigh of relief that the tutor couldn't read it), shouted at me, threatened to confront the tutor the next morning and flounced out of the house.

That morning Pip's speech therapist phoned me, could I come over in about an hour and a half and we could all meet up and discuss what to do with Pip? I drove like the wind, stopping off at Alex's school to drop off the front door keys and a note telling him I would come home later that evening.

We met in the headteacher's office and I made a conscious effort not to cry. There were four of us, huddled together. As we talked through Pip's problems, a hooded head appeared through the window, stared at us then sloped off. 'That's not one of ours, what's he doing on site?' the headteacher walked towards the window 'are there workmen on site?' In one movement she was on the phone, questioning what he was doing. It was clear that wandering children, strange hooded figures and suspicious activities were all part and parcel of a special school and it was clear that the staff were well prepared. Within minutes, the man was escorted off site by two insistent men but the headteacher was watching every move on the field, talking to us with her body turned to the window.

The meeting over, Aaron guided me to the sixth form area, chatting away as we went. 'He's one of our two most difficult students, I have to be honest. Do you remember when he stood outside, refusing to come into school for two days, and I can't even remember what he was protesting about.' My mind flashed back to cold days in winter, with Pip phoning me up, breathless with excitement, he was on a protest, what was it about? I had vague memories of him complaining about one of his teachers, was it Aaron? Bright, funny, charming Aaron, so friendly and chatty, sociability coming so easily to him. No wonder he and Pip didn't get on, one couldn't understand how you make friends and the other couldn't understand how you couldn't make them. Aaron guided me to his office, 'we spent an hour together with Pip's speech therapist, listing why Pip was angry with me and deciding what I had done wrong. He says I wagged my finger at him, is that a particular crime to him?' 'Punishable by the death penalty,' I laughed, enjoying his light hearted company but my mind skipped back to Dr Asperger's incredible demands. 'You know his father is accusing me of making up his diagnosis just to land a meal ticket. He will have to be assessed' 'I know, he keeps on telling us. But you've got a diagnosis, it's for a lifelong condition, it can't be cured, he's got it for life.' he reasoned. A cloud passed over head and I felt suddenly cold, 'I know, ' I shivered.

I spent the rest of the afternoon at the college, asking the special needs department for advice. I found myself laughing as we discussed some of Pip's eccentricities, the insistence upon routine, the inability to entertain himself, his sensory issues and his refusal to ask for help. Pip must have heard me as he skipped out of the college, 'I texted you, didn't you get it, I told you the tutor was a bastard. Why didn't you reply?' he gushed, unaware of my companions. I changed the subject, apologising to the receptionist who stared in amazement at Pip.

On the Saturday morning Pip called me, his voice squeaking with excitement, 'come quick, I've got a response from Andrea. But it doesn't make sense, she says lots of things which aren't true. She knows they are lies and she believes him. Come and read this:

Dear Pip,

I needed some time to think before I replied to your email.

I am not sure why you know details about your parent’s financial circumstances or information about their current court hearings. The fact that you do worries me. Under no circumstances would I dream about asking my parents what their financial circumstances are. The fact that you are writing to me about such information is of deep concern to me.

What is happening between your Mother and Father in relation to their finances is their responsibility and for them to sort out between the two of them.

Your Father and I have discussed starting a family.

I know that you have educational needs. At the moment this means that your Mother chooses not to go out and earn a living.

I have worked with young people who are severely disabled (in wheel chairs) and their Mothers went to work. I have disabilities but these do not stop me from going to working either.

It is very sad that you blame your Father for everything that has gone wrong between your Mother and Father. There are always two sides to every story and nothing in life is black and white. Perhaps one day you will bother to find out.

I know that your Father is a kind, caring and loving man.

Your Father and I have a very happy life together and we do not row or get angry with each other.

Pip, it important to remember that nothing in life is straight forward. Showing forgiveness and compassion for both your Mother and Father is important; they are going through a tough time.

We can only do the best we can… we are all human.

I know that your Mother will read this email.

Regards,
Andrea

By the time that I got to the computer Nina was already there, her face getting redder and redder. 'This is so annoying, I can't believe she wrote that. How can she say that about there being two sides to every story when she's never heard ours. She's never had to live with his temper, she's implying that it was just as much your fault that he hurt you and shouted at you. Did she get left outside bookmakers? Was her father drunk? He's threatening to stop paying maintenance for me in three months time, I've applied for university and she's saying that I have no right to know that. How many times have you had to say to us that you can't afford something because you haven't got any money. That woman had no right to write that to us. And she's rude to poor Pip. I'm going to reply to her just to put the record straight.' I had visions of years of emails going back and forth with Nina and Andrea writing increasingly indignant messages to each other, Nina anxious to protect her own sanity, wanting someone to admit what we had suffered and Andrea carefully protecting the man she loved so fiercely.

For one brief moment I looked at Pip, scowling at his computer and I thought that's what I want, I want a woman like Andrea for my son. Then I remembered that I had been that woman for Jay. I had anxiously protected him from criticism and denied the truth, that he wasn't a man, he was a two dimensional cut out, a man of straw.

LIfe on Pluto - a morning revisiting my old life.

2010-04-10T16:17:00.000-07:00

We went to court and Jay Asperger had his day of glory. Well, at least that's what I assume he thinks happened. In truth, he was his usual pathetic self.

It started late on Thursday evening, with a phone call from my solicitor. 'Hello Mrs Asperger, it's Paul Harker here. I'm sorry to disturb you so late but I was wondering if you have any recent evidence that Pip will need lifelong care?' 'I'm sorry, I haven't but it's a lifelong affliction. Even the Department of Work and Pensions assumes it is. Even the NAS website says it's lifelong. I can print out the web page if it will help.' 'Thanks and I'll meet you at quarter past nine tomorrow.'

It sounded ominous, Jay Asperger was obviously coming out fighting. I didn't sleep a wink that night.

The next morning, I drove to the court in the nearby city and met a breezy Mr Harker in the foyer. We went to a small room and set to work. Jay had emailed a financial offer the previous evening. I scanned the document and I would have cried for him, if I had recognised an iota of truth in it. He detailed his depression, which had started the minute he left the marital home, kicked out by a selfish, callous wife. It had peaked in 2008, the year when he remarried, necessitating six weeks of recuperation. There aren't many men who marry a rich, younger woman and feel depressed, but this one managed it. Her honeymoon must have been as disappointing as mine. Poor sod!

He wrote that his new marriage was in dire straights because I repeatedly refused to sell the marital home and give him half of the proceeds. His new wife's extended family were so concerned about his inability to provide any cash that it was causing friction in their little feathered nest. Besides, at 51 and 44 respectively, they wanted to sell their three bedroomed home and buy something bigger, so they could start a family. I gasped in horror 'Asperger's is genetic, it's hereditary and it is more likely in older fathers. Besides, she's 44' Mr Harker replied 'at 44 it's still theoretically possible.' I was piqued, so quipped 'at my age it's still theoretically possible, I'm more concerned what they would breed.'

We went back to our study. I ploughed through his assertions that I was letting the house go to rack and ruin, which clearly indicated that I couldn't look after the family. The house needed to be sold immediately, in order to protect his investment. 'That hurts,' I said 'the house was a mess when he left. In fact, he was the one who took the double glazing out of the sitting room window. I've spent a fortune on the things which count, like the plumbing and the central heating.' Mr Harker duly noted my comments then walked towards the door 'I'll just go down and have a chat with him, I won't be long, I'll leave all the paperwork here and be back before we go in.'

He wasn't long, he came back almost immediately after, sitting down and hastily writing with his usual fountain pen. 'He won't talk. But he has got a nasty temper on him. He appeared so polite and relaxed, I asked him something and he immediately became angry. Litigants in person are always trouble.'

Time passed quickly and soon we were being ushered into the court room, a large, bland office. Within minutes, Jay had started his tirade. 'I've never seen any diagnosis for Pip, I have no proof that he has Asperger's Syndrome.' The judge looked at me and I quietly confirmed that Dr Asperger had been sent a copy of the diagnosis after it had been made. I offered to show him the relevant part of Pip's speech therapy report, where he was described as have a high degree of Asperger's Syndrome. Jay snatched the report up and sneered 'there's no date on this, it isn't valid' I timidly said 'it was written for his SENDIST tribunal, in 2006.' 'Yes well, it's out of date. He may have had it when the diagnosis was made but I don't think it is current. He phoned me last year and told me he attends army cadets and has friends. He hasn't got Asperger's now.'

I sat and listened in shock. He was using his ignorance and indifference to argue a pathetic, stupid case. I took a deep breath and squeaked out 'May I just say a word about that please?' The judge nodded.

'You speak of friends, he doesn't understand the meaning of the word. He thinks they are friends but they shout down the street at Nina and Alex 'Your brother's a retard!' One of them was so persistent that I had to complain to the local high school and he was excluded for two days.

He's in a special school, the second one in four years. The last one couldn't cope with him and he had to leave. He wouldn't speak to his teacher last term, having to be excused from lessons. He has been on a behavioural management plan for three of his four years at specialist schools. He regularly runs away and has to be kept away from some children because they bully him. He recently hit a boy in college and has a black mark on his record because of it.'

'Well, that's enough evidence to convince a court that Pip will need support in adult life' said the judge.

'Yes, well' droned Jay, in his best keeping-his-temper voice 'I'm sorry but I'm an engineer. I deal in facts and truths, that is just hearsay. I don't deal in hearsay. I need evidence.'

'Do I understand that you object to the evidence Mrs Asperger has just presented, which would be enough to convince a court?' questioned the judge. I was beginning to warm to his common-sense.

'I only deal in facts and truths, this is just hearsay, there is no evidence.'

'So you are suggesting that Pip undergoes further assessment. He must have had quite a lot of assessments over the last few years. I'm rather concerned about the effect of this on Pip's mental health. I don't think it will be good for him.'

But Jay could smell success, he was inches away from stopping me from applying for maintenance, as the previous judge had ruled. 'We need an up-to-date, correct diagnosis.'

'Very well, I will direct that Pip has to be reassessed,' the judge shook his head and started writing 'Mrs Asperger, will you pay half the costs of the assessment?' Thus I found myself agreeing to pay for an assessment, by a second rate psychologist, for a diagnosis I didn't dispute. Bastard!

The case was postponed for another six months, so that Pip could meet another stranger. I knew I was lining up trouble for myself, so I made a last ditch effort to limit the damage. 'When Dr Asperger insisted upon a further valuation, Pip became very upset and I had to calm him down for a week beforehand. He was very distressed by it all and he took his anger out on me. It seems unfair that I have to bear the brunt of his distress and I know how much this will upset him. Could Dr Asperger write to Pip and explain to him why he is insisting upon the assessment, please?'

'Oh no, I cannot insist upon that,' said the arbiter of justice. Mr Harker concurred. Jay moaned 'He won't talk to me, there's nothing I can do' and that was that, male arrogance ganging up against me, the only one who really cared about the child's well being.

Within seconds we were out of that bland, horrid room, bustling amongst the throng in the reception area. I turned my head to Mr Harker 'I told you Jay Asperger was a wanker'. 'Don't waste your compliments on the man' came the instantaneous reply.

We walked back to the shopping centre; me loping along in ridiculously high heeled shoes and the petit Mr Harker walking neatly beside me. I cursed my choice of shoes, damn, I should have chosen some which didn't highlight the height difference. I needed him to feel sorry for me and it isn't easy for a short man to feel sorry for a huge, galumping woman who towers above him. 'Don't think he behaves like that because he hates me, that's what he was like when he was supposedly happily married' I moaned, rather deflatedly. 'Yes, he's not a nice man, you were wise to get out.' he replied as we parted.

I phoned Nina, to prepare her for my return, the financial settlement no further advanced, begging her not to tell Pip the news.

The drive back was a relief, time to recharge my batteries in preparation for Pip's reaction. I drove into the drive and Alex opened the door immediately. 'How are you, did you see him? Was he nasty? Are you ok? Was it awful?' His arm went round me and he guided me into the house. Jordan, the neighbour's son was hovering in the sitting room. 'I dunno what's wrong, but come here,' he said as he wrapped me in a huge bear hug. I started crying but Pip came over, launching into the swearing which is becoming increasingly common in him 'The bastard, what's he said, why hasn't he made an agreement, the evil bastard, I'll go round and smash his face with a baseball bat.' 'You'll do no such thing,' I warned 'we didn't make a settlement because he's disputing your disability. He wants you to have another assessment.' I looked up at him anxious for a response. I got it, he ran out screaming abuse at me, along the path to the drive. I stopped to talk to Nina, then marched out after him 'Pip, I'm sorry, it's not my fault. I don't need the assessment, I've already got the diagnosis.'

'You've got to give it to him, then he won't need to have me assessed. He shouted, tears running down his face 'it's all your fault, you didn't tell him.'

'I gave him a copy of the diagnosis when it was done, back in 2005. He's already seen it, he doesn't believe it, he says you are cured now.'

'It's not true, I hate my life, I hate having Asperger's, I hate being like this and now he's saying that it's not true and I'm normal. The bastard!' he gripped my arm, squeezing it tightly until I gasped with the pain. I sat down beside him, holding his shoulders in my arms and gently rocking him. 'Don't worry, we can have it done here and I'm sure they will be very nice.'

'Very nice!' he spat in anger 'you said that about the last ones, that woman from the LEA, she was nasty. Then you made me go and see that nasty man in Bristol. He was horrid. I knew it as soon as I met him. He wasn't nice to me and he was so, so, so what's that word that means that he thinks he's better than me?'

'Condescending?' I hazarded a guess, the sharp stones in the drive beginning to rip my tights.

I negotiated a return to the house, calming him down as we walked. We got as far as the sitting room before he exploded again, shouting that he was going to run away, that I would never find him, that East Midlands Airport was only a few miles away. This time he ran up the stairs, he was almost at the top before I reached him and we sat on the wooden floor, cramped into two steps as he swore at me, accusing me of collusion with the enemy, his father.

Slowly we uncurled and walked down stairs. I sat down before I saw him dialling his father's number. Tired from lack of sleep, the emotions of listening to the man I had once loved arguing to save money at the expense of his own children, from quietly sitting in that dull, characterless room whilst three men, all ignorant of special needs but delighting in their over-inflated opinions of themselves, elbowed me, the one person who knew about the subject, out of the conversation, I left Pip to the call, confidant that his father would have switched his phone off, to avoid the awkward questions. But he hadn't and I listened to Pip questioning him why he had demanded the assessment when he knew it would cause upset. We had reckoned without the glibness of Jay's lies and he dismissed the accusation for what it was, a minor upset caused by a vulnerable child who he could easily dominate. Pip turned to me and told me that Jay had not made any demands at all, it was all at the insistence of the judge, totally out of the hands of Jay. Normally I would have let it go, but this time I couldn't. Jay must have heard me as I screamed that it was all a lie, 'because that was what Jay Asperger does, he lies.' He'll use it against me, he always does. I can almost hear his thought waves 'she just shouted abuse, she's like that, just screams for no reason at all.' and for one horrid moment I felt I was back in that nasty, evil little topsy-turvy world he had invented and lived in.

The Solicitor Calls

2010-04-03T04:41:00.000-07:00

'I've just been putting a bundle of papers together for the court and there are a few questions,' came the measured tones of Mr Harker, the solicitor. 'Dr Asperger says that he is not employed by any internet betting organisation and never has been.'

'But his name is on their website, I showed it to you last time I saw you. Technically, he isn't employed by them but he is a training associate. He doesn't get paid by them but he does earn money training other people.' I blubbered, shocked at Jay's nerve. He was playing this game right to the line, staying just this side of honest and back to his usual tricks.

'Can you send me the website address please? And another thing, he says you had a trial separation of four months in 2001. Is that correct?' Mr Harker sounded surprised that I had the strength of character to separate from Jay for an appreciable amount of time.

'Does it make any difference?' I gasped in fear.

'No, don't worry, he just wrote it and I was checking with you. It really doesn't matter for the financial agreement. Did you separate?'

'No, there was no trial separation in 2001, it was in 2002.'

'Are you sure? And was it for four months?'

'I can check, I'll have it in my diary, hang on a second. I'm sure it wasn't four months and I'm sure it was in 2002.' I reached over to the shelf of old diaries, plucking up the diary for 2002. 'Anyway, I can easily prove the date, the police would have a record. He was chasing me around the house, pushing me around and threatening to kill me. Nina was so scared that she phoned 999 and the police came over.'

My mind rushed back eight years, to one winter's night in 2002. The children were in bed, asleep, we were sitting drinking wine in the sitting room. I had planned the whole evening carefully, children to bed early, favourite dinner, glass of wine to calm him down, reassurance about how much I loved him, how much I was concerned about his stress levels. He was almost taken in, at least until he realised I wasn't going to spend the evening extolling his virtues. I brought the subject round gently 'Jay, I'm a bit worried about you and Nina. You haven't spoken to her much now for months. She's getting really upset, would you like to talk about it?' I was initially proud of my subtlety. I hadn't mentioned that he was shouting at her on a daily basis, that he was pushing her out of the way in the hurry to get away from her and that I was calming her down every day, trying to stop her from crying, reassuring her that he still loved her, in spite of the evidence which was obvious to everyone. He sat up straight, staring me out, his mood suddenly changing from self preening to his silent anger.

My calm, measured approach was clearly not working but I was determined not to give up. Nina was too upset for me to let it drift on. 'You have to talk to me about it, you can't treat her like that anymore. It's cruel' He remained sitting there, motionless, angry and silent. We sat there, polarised in our respective attitudes for ages. I tried again to get him to talk but he wouldn't. I began to feel angry at him. I had spent time and money planning a cosy chat which would solve Nina's current misery. I picked up my glass of wine and threw it at him, missing him but hitting the cream curtains. By now I was upset, our voices rose, waking the children. I could hear Nina walking towards the stairs and anxiously calling down into the dark hallway 'Please don't shout at each other!'

'It's ok, Daddy and I are just having a chat. It's really not important, go back to bed, I'll be up in a minute,' I tried to reassure her but walked into the kitchen, reaching out for a coke bottle and pouring it on to the floor. Jay had followed me in and watched me, silent and angry. 'I'm going to wreck this kitchen until you talk to me, you can't just ignore it like this, we have to talk!' my voice raised to the silly, high pitched squeak I always manage to resort to when I'm angry and upset. Jay watched me as I poured the bottle on the floor, his face contorted in a grimace of hatred. I reached out to the olive oil bottle but Jay snatched it off me, screaming that he would kill me. I ran out of the room, in time for the children to come downstairs and watch him pushing me. I ran out of the house towards the car, my eyesight blurred by tears. I could hear Nina crying at Jay 'I'm going to phone the police if you don't stop, I mean it' as I jumped into the car. Jay came out and loomed over the windscreen, 'She's phoned the police, they are coming over, you'd better come indoors' he calmly said, turned and walked back in. I followed meekly, to be greeted by the children anxiously holding on to me. 'I'm so sorry, I shouldn't have done it,' sobbed Nina, 'I was so scared he was going to kill you. I'm sorry.'

The police arrived to find Jay sitting quiet and composed in the sitting room and me holding myself together, ashamed that someone had finally discovered my sad little secret. They spoke to Jay in the sitting room whilst I went into the kitchen and loaded the dishwasher. I heard them talking, with Jay's indistinct voice rising in a complaint. I was in the far corner of the kitchen when they came to talk to me. I looked away from them, unable to make eye contact. They asked me what happened and I brushed the incident aside, I tried talking to him but he couldn't talk, things got out of hand, our daughter was upset, she called the police.'

'Would you bring a prosecution with our support?'

The words shocked me, my hand shook as I shut the dishwasher door, 'He's my husband, I can't do that to him, he's going through a lot of stress at work, he can't help it, he's not normally like this, he usually just shouts, I..........'

'But that's abuse, just as much as hitting you. It's emotional abuse, you shouldn't have to put up with it. He'll only stop when you bring a prosecution and he moves out.'

But I couldn't do it. If I admitted the abuse then I admitted that I was abused and that's something that happens to pathetic, weak women. I wasn't abused, I was in control of the situation, I was strong, it's just sometimes it got a bit too much for me. I could feel the tears welling in my eyes. The policeman put his arm around me. I struggled to get free, I must not let anyone be nice to me, then I'd feel sorry for myself, be honest about the relationship I was in and give up. But there was something so kind and caring about that shoulder, and the tears started flowing. For sixteen years I had kept those tears back and finally they were released. I sobbed uncontrollably into the uniform of that nameless policeman, the corner of the room becoming a humid micro-climate of tears and strings of mucus. I knew that by acknowledging the true facts of the relationship, I had sounded its death knell, I also knew the policeman would have to put his jacket in for dry-cleaning. Here I was, a nuisance and a failure, the tears flowed more.

I dragged myself back to the present, to hear Mr Harker's voice 'Was he prosecuted?'

'No, they asked me to press charges but I couldn't, he was my husband, I couldn't do that to him.' My mind lingered on that damp, uniformed shoulder, which I could never thank enough. 'Ah, I've found it in my diary. The police came over on the first of February, he would have left on the second. He was back by the middle of April. Here, 14th April, we were in Ireland, on holiday. He organised it.'

Dublin, Spring 2002. Cold weather, hot coffee shops, the Book of Kells, the Barracks. Back to the hotel. The children falling asleep in their bedroom, the door between the two rooms slightly ajar so I could hear them if they disturbed. Nights of physical passion, me trying to wake some vestige of love in him, him merely scratching an itch. Too late to back out, having to perform my wifely duties, meeting his needs, searching for some hint that he loved me, that he cared for us, that he wanted to be with us. Continually pushing that vision of a damp, uniformed arm, a man's voice ' It's emotional abuse, you shouldn't have to put up with it.' out of my mind. Jay rolling off me, falling asleep, fulfilled. Me lying on the bed, tears slowly dribbling down the sides of my face until my hair was damp and my eyes gritty.

'About the house valuation ....'

'Ah yes, he wrote again, demanding a valuation, stressing that the judge and said he could change his mind.'

'But she didn't, I'm sure she didn't.'

'No, I don't suppose she did. But don't worry, he says she did so I've written to him, telling him that we had preempted his demand and enclosing the latest valuation. He's played straight into our hands, your new valuation is significantly less than the previous valuation.'

The Internet - a powerful communication tool

2010-03-26T05:32:00.000-07:00

I've got another hearing of my financial settlement at the beginning of April. I'm getting nervous because I know that Jay, my ex-husband is still questioning Pip's disability. During our last hearing, in October, the judge dismissed his arguments and stated that I was entitled to financial support from him in my own right. Four months on and he is still going back over old ground.

One of the other issues cleared up during the last hearing was the value of the house. We both agreed to a valuation of £200 000 before we left court. Two months later, Jay wrote to the court, demanding a revaluation, because it had just come to his notice that a similar house along the road was for sale for £240 000. The other house doesn't come with a dyspraxic son, who breaks things and wipes him dirty hands along the walls and besides, Jay knew about that house for over a year before the court hearing but no matter.

I went to see my solicitor, the quiet and thoughtful Mr Harker, who suggested I get the house revalued to appease Jay. As I sat there, in his mahogany lined office, an oasis of calm in contrast to the rumble of traffic outside, my mind drifted to the chaos which currently fills Nina's bedroom and the cloying smell of unwashed bodies in Pip's room, 'Do we really need another valuation?' I smiled. But the charming smile of a middle-aged woman doesn't sway Mr Harker 'He's repeatedly demanded one and you don't want to delay the settlement any longer' he declared in his no-nonsense way. That was settled, I had to have the house valued within the week.

I went home and mentioned it to Nina, who was rushing through a flurry of final essays for her exams. 'I can't tidy my room this minute, I've got an essay to hand in for Friday!' I reassured her that estate agents don't run a 24 hour emergency call out service and I could book the valuation for the following Monday but she would need to tidy her bedroom over the weekend. The weekend was 48 hours away and teenagers don't have long memories, she waved my worries away with the flick of her hand, reassuring me it was all going to be OK. But I knew it wouldn't be, I still had Pip to confront.

Pip's taxi drops him off at the top of the drive and we can hear Pip before we see him, as he runs down the drive, bursting into the house exhausted and breathless from the exercise of running the short distance. I listened to his news, taking care to show elaborate interest in his problems, then I broached the subject 'I have to get the house valued next week, I need you to tidy up all the things on your floor. Would you do that for me?' He immediately exploded 'You mean someone is coming into our house to look at it? Will they go in my room?' 'Yes,' I soothed 'but don't worry, they will only pop their head round the door, they won't be long.' 'But you said no one else would come round again the last time that they came round. You lied! Why are you doing this when you know I don't like people in the house? I can't trust you! You lie!' 'I have to get a valuation, your dad's questioning the last one. He has known about the other house down the road but he's now making a fuss about it. I can't do anything else, I have to agree to the valuation. I'm sorry, I wouldn't have troubled you but I have to do this. It won't take long and they will come round when you are at school. You won't notice.' But he wasn't convinced and I couldn't calm him, so he rushed off to the computer to send his dad an email. I hoped against hope, his father hadn't seen him for five years, he might be feeling particularly generous, he might have mellowed in the intervening years, his new wife might see the upset in Pip's email and help Jay to understand that this was important to Pip. The next day I was brought back to reality with a thump. Whatever Jay had been doing in the intervening years, it certainly wasn't mellowing. The email was terse and to the point. He was taking me to court to get a financial settlement, he was giving me over a thousand pounds a month and the valuation was a legal obligation. I could feel the anger rising in me as Pip told me; Jay had always been dishonest but now he was excelling himself. I had taken him to court, he was giving me the statutory minimum amount of child maintenance, which the judge had said was insufficient and was certainly well below a thousand pounds a month and the valuation was at his repeated insistence, in spite of his previous agreement. I calmed myself down to speak to Pip but it didn't matter, he was still angry that his father was demanding the valuer came round.

In the past, I have always tried to lessen the effect of Jay's edicts, demands and selfishness, patiently trying to explain to the children that Jay has mental health problems, he loves them dearly but just can't show it. This time, I was tired of arguing the case for a man who was quietly trying to stab me in the back, so I left Pip to work his own anger out for himself. He was strangely quiet that night, which I stupidly took to be a good sign.

Pip had a smile on his face when he went off to school the next morning. It was still early, my neck was sore and I hadn't slept well, so I decided that all his problems were over and he was now just a normal teenager. How wrong could I be? When he came home he almost fell over in a rush to tell me his news 'I emailed Jay Asperger one hundred times today. He emailed me back to ask if you knew what I was doing, so I emailed him to tell him he was responsible for me as well, then he emailed back to say that as a responsible parent he was ordering me to stop. Ha, as if I would! Then I signed him up for an estate agents in Jersey, the'll text him every time a house comes on the market. Then I signed him up for another one on the Isle of Man, then one in Derby, then one in Nottinghamshire. Then I signed him up for some brochures about law, then for some hair loss treatment, then some tooth whitener, then some dog food and some cat food, I filled in the form and said he had 79 dogs and 69 cats. Then I signed him up for double glazing. They won't ever leave him alone, they'll phone him up constantly.' I sat and watched the smile on his face but I couldn't accept his behaviour without some admonition. 'I don't think you should have done that,' I muttered vaguely. 'What, sign him up for estate agents in Jersey? He didn't tell me where he wanted to live, so how was I to know he didn't want to live in Jersey? It's a very nice place, I'd like to go there this year. Can we go?' He was so chatty and happy that I couldn't tell him off, which left him with another twenty-four hours in which to sign his father up to yet more adverts. But by then, Pip's other parent had got wind of what was happening, annoyed that his command had been ignored, he threatened Pip, telling him he would regret his actions and accusing him of being manipulative and bullying. That raised my anger further, Jay was clearly now living in a parallel universe, where Jay floated on a cloud, with gossamer wings sprouting out of his back, secure in the knowledge that he never bullied or manipulated. Jay was beginning to scare me, yet again.

Two days later Pip emailed me, with a copy of an email from Jay, again threatening Pip. It was attached to an email from the Jersey estate agents, outlining the information which Pip had applied for. I emailed a calm, caring and reassuring email to Pip, taking responsibility for his behaviour and assuring him that he wouldn't get into trouble. I didn't need to, Pip was jubilant about the response, he had nettled his father, the Jersey estate agent had received his application and the tooth whitening kit would be in the post. But Jay has never lost a battle. What he lacks in common sense or empathy, he more than makes up for in amorality, self interest, determination, dishonesty and naked aggression. That night, I begged Pip to stop the harassment. He was cheerfully upbeat 'I hate him, he's mean, he lies, he used to make you cry and he used to kick you, which was wrong. But I've signed him up for everything I can think of. I've written to him and warned him that if he accuses you of any of this then I will go round to his house and beat him up. He'll be really annoyed in court....................... but he will have really white teeth!'

One of Pip's saving graces is that unlike so many of his friends, he will sometimes listen to reason and so far he has listened to my advice over this. He was clearly enjoying the fun, so I was surprised when he stopped the emails. But it isn't like that for all his friends; I still remember the night when Callum phoned us up. The calls started at nine o'clock and were still going at eleven o'clock. I eventually went to bed and left the phone downstairs. The whole house woke up when the phone rang but common sense told me not to answer, as he was just wanting a reaction from me. By eleven o'clock I suddenly realised that this was a child with both ADHD and Asperger's Syndrome. The Asperger's Syndrome would ensure that he didn't need the response of another human being in order to carry on the prank calling, the ADHD would ensure that he was too hyperactive to stop. At that point I stumbled downstairs and pulled the plug out of the wall, he could carry on calling all night, it wouldn't make any difference to me. Unfortunately, the next morning I completely forgot the excitement of the previous night and it was three days before I began to wonder why the phone hadn't rung for ages.

A Quiet Week at Home

2010-03-12T15:45:00.000-08:00

It's been an awful week, this week. A collection of random disasters hit the Asperger home and made my week busy and my life hell.

It all started last week, when I finally plucked up the courage to look in the mirror. Sure enough, that halo of grey roots was becoming increasingly noticeable, even without my glasses. Grey roots and auburn hair just don't mix. I waited a week before I corrected the issue, simply because I lacked the time last week.

You can buy a bottle of hair dye for a few quid, pour it on your head, rub it in, wait thirty minutes, rinse off and admire a beautiful head of hair, then go off and live your life. It's that easy; too easy for a woman like me, who seems to live on complications and difficulties. I decided years ago, to just go grey. Unfortunately, Nina wouldn't let me. That was when the trouble started.

I buy auburn henna in a block, which has to be ground down, mixed with water, applied to my head, then left for hours and hours and hours as it slowly drips down my neck, staining my dressing gown. Somehow, I believe that the resultant colour, similar to Robertson's Golden Shred, looks natural and attractive. Deep down, I know it does neither.

But back to Monday morning. I had carefully arranged to spend the entire morning at home, behind closed doors, dying my hair. I could tidy up the house, which was beginning to look like a scrap heap, with piles of newspapers, clothes and sweet wrappers liberally scattered around. This was going to be a day when I cleared my to-do-list and everyone gasped at my organisational skills.

I woke up early, knocked on Pip's door to wake him, slipped downstairs, made a pile of sandwiches for all of the children, then got the henna and the electric food mill out. But the henna was too hard and the food mill broke. I picked out the largest lumps of white plastic, poured warm water into the powder, then waited for Pip to get up, eat his breakfast, then trot off to school. The taxi was due before I realised he had fallen back to sleep. I ran back upstairs and told him to hurry. By the time he finally walked downstairs, the taxi was waiting and the henna was cold.

Everything was ready and prepared before Alex and Nina came downstairs. I started applying the henna to my head but big, fat lumps of it fell onto the kitchen table and the surrounding floor. A particularly large and glutenous clump fell down my cleavage reminding me that I was still wearing my favourite nightdress, which was already spotted with the tell-tale greeny-brown gloop.

By the time that the children were leaving for school, my head was tightly wrapped in a Tesco's bag, the handles of which were flopping around my ears. I bundled my head into a towel, in case someone came to the door, then busied myself around the house. By ten o'clock I received my first phone call, it was May; 'Can I come over?' I instinctively reached up and patted my plastic bag wrapped head, apologising that I was unavailable. 'I'm sorry, I meant that I am coming over now. Rory has just phoned me, the school boiler broke down and three of them are heading towards your house, I arranged to pick them up in half an hour.' 'But my head's covered in henna, I've run out of it, I can't wash it off and put some more on later. You'll just have to look at a head full of yuck, wrapped up in a Tesco's bag.' I warned her. 'That's ok, I'm sure Georgina won't mind.' she cooed back. Georgina, the school slut was coming over. Georgina, the girl who offered her sexual favours to her male classmates and wore thick make-up to school. Bugger!

As I put down the phone, I texted Nina for advice. She replied: wash the whole lot off and don't look like a retard! But as I read it I could hear the chatter of excited and lively children walking down the drive. As I walked to the front door, I could feel the cold wet dye slowly running down the side of my face, I wiped it off with my fingers. Georgina stood with the boys, open mouthed and wary of the dressing-gown clad figure which stood before her. I gave her my most winning smile and welcomed them in. May's car pulled up on the drive.

Within minutes, I was waving May, Rory and Georgina off. I ordered Alex off to tidy his bedroom and he walked up to the computer and switched it on. I carried on, pottering around the house, picking up the sweet wrappers, piling up the newspapers and sorting out the washing. 'Can I go over to Patrick's house?' he innocently asked. 'Is Patrick's mother at home' I queried. 'No, but she won't mind.' Patrick is the naughtiest and funniest child in the class. He rarely attends lessons, usually spending his days on the corridor, pulling funny faces and giggling at his own antics. I know because Alex spends most of his days in Patrick's company, sharing the empty corridor. 'Can you believe this, May has refused to let Rory go round to Patrick's because his mother isn't home' Alex looked up from his Facebook messages, to watch me as I became increasingly flustered explaining that I didn't trust the boys in an empty house. He shook his head at my antics and turned back to his computer.

By lunchtime the streaks of henna had covered a large proportion of my face, my hands were dyed brown and the clumps had glued my nightdress to my back. I decided I had had enough and retired to the shower-room. As I finished washing my hands, the hot tap came off in my hand. I called to Alex to turn the water off at the mains. He replied that he didn't know how to, but I didn't hear him, waiting patiently by the sink, with water gushing out of the tap. Eventually I realised he hadn't even logged out of Facebook, so I walked downstairs and showed him how to turn off the stopvalve.. Soon the flow had reduced to a trickle, I put the tap back together and turned the water back on, smug in the knowledge that I didn't need a man in my life. But the smugness was short lived as the water started to pour out again. I decided to phone up my neighbour and ask if I could use her shower but a quick glimpse in the mirror, as I walked to the phone, convinced me to stay at home. I resorted to showering with the hot tap running, then turned off the stop cock. Alex looked up from the computer as I warned him I was going to the builder's merchants in the nearby town.

As I walked into the builder's merchants, I could feel the grit of unwashed henna in my hair but it was the same colour as my newly dyed hair, I could get away with it. I walked to the display of bathroom taps, looking for sink taps which would look out of place in a public toilet. There weren't any, I looked again, reading through the 'bath tap' stickers. The assistant came up and helped me. Sure enough, there were no traditional sink taps in the display. She wandered off to her computer, then reassured me that there might be the odd tap in the warehouse. I waited with mounting anxiety, wandering over to the kitchen tap display, to keep myself occupied. One hundred pounds and bathroom and kitchen taps later, I drove home.

The hot tap was easy to change, the hardest part was searching for the tools in the garage. Emboldened by my success, I turned to the cold tap. It wouldn't budge. I sprayed it with WD40, until I became dizzy and intoxicated, but no success, it was locked tight. Never mind, I still had the kitchen tap to replace and this looked quite exciting. I reached under the sink and stretched towards the back of the unit, scattering pans as I did so. But the base of the tap wasn't there; I stuck my head in the cupboard to look at the tap but it was behind the sink, rammed into a tiny space, far too small to put my hand in, let alone turn the nut.

It was nearly four o'clock, time to collect Nina from her piano lesson. I drove to the teacher's house, reflecting on my lack of achievement. As I drove into the farmyard I could see Nina walking awkwardly towards me in a monstrous pair of Wellington boots. My heart sank as she climbed into the car and I screeched 'You've not just had a piano lesson in Wellington boots, have you?' 'Don't worry, it's a farm house, everyone wears boots here', she tried to reassure me 'I was over at Cannock Chase this afternoon, on a Geography field trip, I was in a hurry, I took the boots off as I walked into the house.' 'Oh yes, of course, how did the trip go?' I asked absent-mindedly. 'We didn't do much, there was a man lying on the floor, he's been savaged by an Alsatian dog and the dog's owner just ran off. We had to see to him and wheel his bike to the visitor's centre.' Nina was off, recounting the gruesome details of the incident.

The following day, Alex came home and muttered something about the class cover supervisor being sexist but I was too busy cooking to listen properly. On Wednesday he came home in tears, having been kicked off the football team. I listened as he sobbed that it was punishment for being rude to the cover supervisor the previous day. 'But you said she was being sexist. What happened?' and I listened to a long and drawn out story about the woman chatting to a group of girls at the front of the class, packing in forty minutes of fashion and style advice to the silly little girls. Alex, surprisingly well behaved and keen to work, asked her to keep the noise down, which she steadfastly refused to do. Alex put his pen down and turned to his friend, competing with the cover supervisor to keep up the most inane conversation. But by that time, she was keen to return to her role of behaviour manager and she told Alex to be quiet. Alex, my strong willed and determined Alex, was incensed and loudly accused her of sexism but she complained to his form teacher, who kicked him off the football team.

It took seven minutes to drive to Alex's school, park and loudly request a meeting with the form teacher, the head of year, or the head-teacher. The secretary, ready to pack up and go home, looked a bit bemused but rang round staff, desperately searching for someone who could appease this middle aged (and well henna'd) ball of fury. The head of year, clearly used to such experiences and diplomatic as ever, calmed me down and promised a full investigation. I felt almost calm as I drove home, meeting Pip's taxi on the drive.

Pip bounded out of the taxi and ran up to me 'what's wrong? Is everything ok?' he anxiously demanded. 'Oh, it's ok, I just nipped up to Alex's school. How was your day?' I casually asked him. 'I've punched another boy, they are going to kick me out of college. There was this teacher, called John, he was speaking to me, he said I could get kicked out. Kim wasn't there, she was looking after Laura, she took her back to school, I was on my own, I told them I had Asperger's, he wasn't nice to me.' it all came tumbling out incoherently. 'Don't worry, let's go in and discuss it over dinner.' I said as I put my arm around his hunched figure and guided him into the house. Within minutes the whole sorry tale had been recounted, plans drawn and labelled with his odd, dyspraxic handwriting, unclearly detailing their positions and relative movements in the minutes which led up to the punch.

On Friday, Alex's teacher reassured me that the cover supervisor had been sexist and inappropriate but would be attending a behaviour management course in the near future. Pip's teacher phoned me to tell me that there would be a full investigation into his incident and he would probably receive a formal reprimand but would remain on the course. Pip came home looking anxious and glum but Alex was crowing. 'I blackmailed a cover supervisor' he boasted, 'she was being sexist. She wouldn't tell a girl off for being rude but told us off, so I threatened to tell the head of year. She agreed to drop it but the girl was terrified I would blab and she would have to go to the head of year. She was wetting herself!'

I've set myself the task of turning Alex's behaviour around this weekend, it's going to be a long, hard slog.

An appointment with a psychologist

2010-03-10T02:55:00.000-08:00

I met a psychologist last week. At least, she told me she was a psychologist but in fact she looked and talked like a sixth former from the local school. Perhaps she was both, who knows?

I'd gone to a meeting of a group of parents with children with autistic spectrum disorders and this psychologist/school girl, to discuss the training these children need to get them ready for the real world. It was an informal affair and we sat around a large table. I carefully manoeuvred myself to sit next to her, so I could monopolise her attention. In the end, she had little to say, so my careful effort was wasted but it is always nice to confirm that I can subtly manipulate things to my son's advantage when I need to. It's a skill that only the most hardened and determined carer achieves; I like to think of myself as a black dan in proactive caring. Social workers probably do as well and leave me well alone, knowing that whatever support they can come up with will always be inferior to mine.

But back to the meeting. There was a new couple at the meeting, with that haunted look about them that comes from a life of coping with a difficult child and helpless caring professionals. Both of them were there and both of them joined in the discussion, which to my trained eye means that the father is not significantly disabled by the curse of Asperger's Syndrome himself or that the child is not his biologically. Years ago, I came to realise that people with Asperger's tend to produce children on the autistic spectrum. There are a few notable cases of mothers with a level of Attention Deficit Disorder, with or without the hyperactivity. They tend to have children with a degree of attention deficit in their disability. I include myself in this. It is incredibly mild and barely noticeable but it is there. It explains my early problems with paying attention to detail and finishing work but years ago I must have unconsciously realised the problem and set about correcting it. Generally, it is the father who shows the greatest degree of affliction with Asperger's Syndrome. It can be subtle, so for example I once attended a meeting for parents of children at Pip's school. One father sat at the back, facing away from the speakers and ate danish pastries throughout the meeting, actively ignoring the activity at the front of the room. That response would have been subtle but he then ruined it by asking a barrage of questions at the very end, which showed he hadn't listened to the talk. It can be more obvious, for example, I have seen fathers of children monopolising their wife's attention at significant meetings, demanding answers to trivial and unrelated questions they fired at their spouse, like a two year old child anxious for reassurance from its mother. In all the years that I have attended meetings and met parents of children with autistic spectrum disorders, I would say that I have met fathers who exhibit autistic tendencies in all but four cases. Two of them were unrelated to the child they called son. The experts put that figure at fifty per cent. I feel quite smug that I know more than the experts.

During last week's meeting, the father was incredibly normal and well tuned in to his son's needs. I assumed the boy had been adopted, but it soon transpired he was the father's step-son. It was the age old problem of a child with Asperger's, who grows up 'different' to everyone else, the parents make incredible accommodations for his behaviour (in this case he moved out to live with elderly and childless relatives very early on, to ensure that he was given plenty of individual time). Unfortunately, in my limited experience, these children carry on until one day when a relatively minor incident occurs and they suddenly explode. The parents are left shell-shocked, with the dawning realisation than there is something incredibly wrong. In this case, this child's explosion, in his mid twenties, led to a prison sentence.

John Bercow wrote a report on the state of support for communication disorders in Britain a number of years ago. I'm sure he wrote that the prisons are full of a huge number of people with these disorders, so I knew people with Asperger's Syndrome are far more likely to go to prison but I had never come across such a case before. Of course, the mother was ashamed of her son's record but she was so full of confusion and worries that she had to empty out all the skeletons she had accrued in her cupboards. Our psychologist sat quietly at my side. I tried to reassure this mild mannered couple that anger and temper tantrums go with the condition, that John Bercow's report had identified the likelihood of a criminal record and that most of the group, if they were being honest with themselves, could be telling the exact same story.

Our psychologist, with her mild, uncertain manner, girly looks and behaviour and ignorance of some of the characteristics of Asperger's, failed to impress the assembled group. I felt sorry for her, untouched by the pain of caring for an autistic child, embarrassed by our confessions, unsure of her knowledge and a stranger in a group of people united by a common experience. I turned to her and asked her about her qualifications, expecting her to reel off an impressive list of degrees, experiences and in-depth knowledge. She told me she had a degree in psychology and had helped out in a nursery for children with autistic spectrum disorders. I was surprised by her honesty but needed some reassurance so I probed deeper. Was her manager more experienced? Did she have support from experts? What were her views on some of the books written by experts? She simpered through the questions, replying with half-answers. I moved to the problems people with Asperger's Syndrome face, their difficulty in recognising their limitations, their inability to formulate solutions and their slowness in adapting their behaviour to camouflage these problems. I cited the example that Pip has had the same class target for the last four years; not to call out in class, and how, after four years of rewards and consequences, support and feedback, he still insists upon disrupting classes with inane and random announcements. How could any organisation invest the time and the money working on life skills which could take years to develop? She told me she sets a target and gets her client to commit to it and provide their own feedback. Simple really, and well within the capability of all the women present. I asked her how long she had been working with the clients, she replied a few months and no, she hadn't successfully completed a project yet. I could see my fellow group members rolling their eyes significantly, but she was looking so earnestly and anxiously into my eyes that she missed their response.

I turned to the new couple; 'are you interested in getting support from this organisation?' 'We're desperate, we need help from everyone who can provide it.' I brokered a firm commitment on behalf of our under-age psychologist, to phone the couple up within the fortnight, to offer help to their son or explain why she couldn't. I looked her in the eyes and explained how much they needed that phone call, dramatically recalling what it felt like to be let down by support services. She promised faithfully.

At the end of the session, she left to attend another meeting, apologising for going. I sat back and watched my fellow carers. The tension and shyness drained out of them and they became an angry mass of women. The room buzzed with questions, directed at anyone who would listen; 'who does she think she is?' ,'what experience was that?', 'what does she think she is going to achieve?'. But beyond all of this anger, I felt quite optimistic. In the past, I have dealt with caring professionals who have become jaundiced by their lack of understanding of this unique condition and their inability to spend the time and money. Here was a new kid, with all the optimism of ignorance. She had been so easy to control and so open and honest in her responses. Pip is too young to access her support, but when he becomes eighteen, I will contact her, give her clear instructions of what he needs and watch her closely, to ensure that she provides a service which is effective and appropriate. That girl shows promise.

As the parents slowly filed out of the meeting, I walked over to the kettle and made myself a cup of tea, waiting for the arrival of Gary. Sure enough, as the group dwindled, he walked in and sat down, as anxious to talk to me as I was to talk to him. Gary is my lifeline, a young man with all the obvious characteristics of Asperger's Syndrome; a technical degree, anxiety, a lack of social graces and an indifference to his looks which still staggers me. But underneath it all, Gary is a gem. He doesn't work, so has plenty of time to work through his limitations, reading up on his condition, contemplating his behaviour and identifying his oddities. He prefers plain talking, so I ask him painful, blunt questions totally unadorned by the niceties I would have to think up for normal people, occasionally explaining that I need to know how he thinks for the sake of Pip. He answers with the honesty and cruelty that Asperger's produces. I'm glad he doesn't mean anything to me emotionally but he is a brilliant friend. As we sat back in our chairs and dismissed the usual greetings as mindlessly as we could, I got to business. 'Did you see the psychologist, the young girl with the notepad?' 'Oh, yes, I was watching her.' 'What did you think of her?' 'She doesn't know anything, she is too dressed up and she can't help me.' That was it, my flowery and partially-formed opinions were condensed into a quick sentence. Pip wouldn't take well such a feminine and sweet-natured psychologist. I would have to beef her up a bit before she could be useful.

Gary had provided me with what I wanted, I wriggled myself comfortable and prepared to fulfill my part of the bargain 'Tell me your new computer's specification' I heard myself say, as I drifted into a dream world, ready to spend the rest of the afternoon listening to a shower of bits and bytes, RAMs and ROMs.

The Reluctant Scolar

2010-02-23T02:41:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was the first day back at school after the half term holidays.

I love the first day back, it's a chance to plan ahead, work out Pip's problems and plan strategies to deal with them. I diligently fill up my diary with dates for meeting the school staff and visiting colleges for his post-18 education. I fire off emails to the school and his day release college, listing my concerns and explaining his most recent anxieties. I prepare the evening meal early in the day, so I have the luxury of knowing everything will be ready when the children get home and I can concentrate on the minor emergencies which will occur. And throughout it all, I make myself pot after pot of china tea in an elegant china teapot, sipping the steaming brew as I plan my life, luxuriating in my sudden freedom.

Around about three o'clock I start to get anxious about Pip's day. Both this school and his last one used to phone parents at the end of the school day, to inform them of any problems. If the phone goes after three o'clock then I become a bit jumpy and I bark my phone number down the line. Friends and family know to avoid me just before home time. My response is illogical and stupid, as Pip always phones me during the day, to list his woes and worries. If things sound particularly difficult then I phone up his teacher, who always reassures me.

But Mondays are never a problem with Pip. Mondays are Pip's college day, where he gets to pretend to be a normal boy in a normal college, except that he studies computing so a number of his classmates also have Asperger's Syndrome. Monday is also Ian, Pip's learning assistant's day at college and Ian fills Pip with confidence and reassurance. He lets Pip slip out to the nearby shop at lunch time, he advises Pip on social problems and he makes sure that Pip understood the lecturer. Even better, Ian drives a Land Rover, one of Pip's most recent obsessions.

Monday is the day when I can concentrate on the other children, which means sorting out Nina's problems and collecting her from her after school piano lesson. That leaves Alex, my most emotionally independent child, to walk home and install himself on facebook for the evening.

Yesterday, I collected Nina from her lesson as usual. She had slept badly the night before and was tired and worried about her English exam the following day. We discussed the book the exam was on, until my head reeled with act and scenes; I was so engrossed in the play that I didn't notice I had taken the long way home. By the time we had driven back into town, Nina was becoming anxious so I changed the subject to the perennial favourite, did Alex remember his key, or was he sitting on the front door step waiting for us?

Alex has an incredibly poor short term memory and is too lazy to develop a strategy to overcome it, relying too heavily on his own charm and sweet nature. Unfortunately, teachers are inoculated against charm early on in their careers. I sent Alex to school at eight, anxious to avoid the disaster which characterized the start of Pip's education. He survived the first two years, then the problems started. Within a month he was attending school part time and I was finding my world collapsing around me. His problems were so similar to Pip's, lack of eye contact, not understanding the teacher, forgetting everything, over-anxiety and unhappiness. Why did I think that I deserved one autistic child and two 'normal' children? We limped through that and the following year, taking whole weeks off, carefully informing the educational welfare officer that things weren't working, then shooting off in the car to visit friends or glory in a walk on the Derbyshire moors.

When we reached the Educational Welfare stage I informed Jay, the children's father. He emailed me back to tell me that Alex's problems explained his recent dream that he was walking along Blackpool beach and could see Alex in the distance, with a strange woman. As he ran to them he could see that Alex's aura was all wrong but he woke up before he could reach them. I read the email, looking for a word of advice or encouragement and realised it really was just a note to tell me all about his own problems and anxieties, which were obviously very important. When I was facing the prospect of caring for two autistic children on my own, along came the funniest email, which entertained my friends and family for weeks. Every cloud, as they say, has a silver lining.

Eventually, I took Alex to see an educational psychologist, who diagnosed specific learning difficulties, verifying all the problems I had observed and listing strategies the school could try. I felt vindicated and confident as I slapped the report down on the reception desk and pompously declared that the headteacher would need to read it. If he did, then he didn't let on, preferring to send out a less than complimentary end of year report. But by then I was indignant and fired back with a three page essay on why the report illustrated the failings of the school. Unfortunately, the mild mannered head of year was in the office when I handed it in. I don't swear and I'm not rude but witnesses described me as very determined and forceful during the interview. At a subsequent parents' evening he winced as he saw me walking to his desk and greeted me with a sheepish 'I didn't think you had forgiven me.' The headteacher, in the meantime, decided to win me over and between us, we turned Alex's school life around.

Alex still has problems, he is a confident and clever mathematician, but always fails the mental maths tests, he forgets his lunch, books, pens and pencils and his behaviour is always only just this side of acceptable. However, in the general scheme of things I'm not worried. He doesn't shout abuse at his teachers, fight his classmates, run away from school or complain directly to OFSTED like Pip does, so what's my problem? Alex still achieves good marks, even though he spends a decent number of lessons working in the corridor and he brushes off detentions and teacher's comments in his organiser.

Three weeks ago Alex got his first comment of the academic year, which to be fair, was a silly mistake on the teacher's part. Her note in the organiser was liberally peppered with spelling and grammar mistakes, so I did what all teachers do under the circumstances – I got the red pen out and corrected it. Perhaps I should have been more circumspect, more accepting of her authority because Alex started collecting more teachers' notes. By that time, it was too late and Alex was already annoyed. Half term came as a relief to me, time to draw a line under the challenging behaviour.

I had totally forgotten about the problems of the previous few weeks when I walked into the house yesterday evening. Alex had remembered his key and had walked to open the door for us when he saw us arrive home. He was walking back to the computer when I asked him 'did you have a good day at school?' It was a mere formality, as I was still too worried about Nina's exam the following day. 'Yes, it was fine, loved the sandwiches,' replied the reluctant scholar. I could tell by his voice that there had been no issues at school, so I turned towards the kitchen.

'Oh,' he half turned 'there was something.' He was so relaxed and the story started so calmly and innocently. 'It was that Mr S. in English. Ben, who was sitting next to me, was talking to me. It was OK, mum,' Alex responded to my increasing attention. 'He was talking about the text we were reading. You can talk about your work. But Mr S. told me to go out and I told him it was Ben who was talking. Ben should go out, not me. I hadn't done anything wrong.' I held the kettle in mid-air as I waited for the reassurance that it had all ended well. Alex was standing by the kitchen door, hands defiantly on hips 'Mr S. said I was being sent out for staring into Ben's eyes. So I just said 'are you dissing my sexuality?' and walked out!' The kettle clattered on the hob and I started laughing out of shock. Nina had come into the kitchen to hear the tail end of the story and glared at me 'you shouldn't laugh, he isn't funny and you only encourage him. He was wrong, you should be telling him off!'

I soon stopped laughing, it's parents' evening tonight and Mr S. is the first teacher on my list.

How to be a Perfect Parent

2010-02-22T06:53:00.000-08:00

Oh dear, Pip has been in contact with his dad, Jay and it didn't go too well. It never does. I'm now left with a very upset and hurt young man on my hands. He follows me around like a large, lumbering shadow, throwing insulting comments about Jay, trying to get me to solve this latest problem. Unfortunately, Jay's behaviour is as incomprehensible and self-centred as Pip's is. There is no solution, one of them has to back down and as usual, I know I can work on Pip's self-obsessiveness but I can't do anything with Jay.

It started innocently enough. Pip wanted to learn to drive a car and asked me if he could add his name to my insurance. I can, but it will cost me hundreds of pounds and I simply can't afford it. Pip decided to ask his father for the money by email. The answer should have been 'no' but Jay is too sophisticated for that; he has to give a totally spurious reason for refusing, preferably one which can easily be satisfied. This time he excelled himself. Jay couldn't pay for the insurance because Pip is only 16 and doesn't have a license. Except, Pip can apply for and receive a provisional license now, it just won't be valid until Pip's birthday in 4 months time. Pip knew he could overcome this hurdle, so he wrote back to Jay. Jay then gave a more valid reason, he can't give Pip more money than he gives the other two children. By that time, Pip wasn't putting up with any more reasons.

In the meantime, Pip told me about this correspondence, I told him that Jay made an arrangement to pay half of the children's additional educational expenses and has been reneging on the agreement for Nina since January, 2009. He has refused to contribute towards Pip's and Alex's additional expenses since July 2009. By the time you include the short university taster course for Nina, Pip's travel costs, the school trip for Alex and the new school uniforms, I am already a thousand pounds out of pocket. 'Don't worry, I'll get it back off the selfish bastard,' Pip assured me. I laughed, Jay has a reputation for selfishness and meanness which would make the hardest skinflint jealous and he is an expert in punishing people by withholding finance. I've already missed two payments of the children's maintenance to force me to see sense and go back to work and he stopped my maintenance in case I was living with someone and they were benefitting from his generosity. I wasn't, I presented a sworn statement to the court, but it made no difference, the money, all £150 per month, wasn't reinstated.

But back to the clash of the titans. Pip wrote to Jay:

Jay
you only care about yourself you don't care about anyone else and you make up stupid excuses and never realy live up to them o and by thw way you owe me two football strips, an underdones lp and many more items and i doubt you will ever give them to me because you are a self obssesed git who only cares about himself all my mates at school who i can't see outside of school because i have got no money there pairents take them to football and pay for them do drive and give tham £80 a week and don't you say that they must be rich because yuo know full well where you put all you money yep betfair all i hear about is your health and your problems

o i have now got a provisional so i have got a licance but i doubt you will pay for insurance like you said if i got a licance

oh and by the way you probebley won't reply to this coz of your helth is bad
BLOODY TWAT

Pip

In the past, Jay has accused me of poisoning the children against him but I sincerely hope he doesn't think I would allow that email, riddled with errors, out of the house. All those years of additional spelling and grammar support and Pip is still unable to spell or construct a sentence. I can cross English teacher, solicitor, marketing executive and proof reader off the list of potential careers for Pip, damn!

Jay replies in one of his best, cold blooded replies. He emails from work, with his characteristic signature, jam packed with his many qualifications:

Dear Pip

I can see that this is quite an angry email.

I am sorry you are angry that I did not send you things – I remember you wanted helium once but I thought it was too dangerous. I did send a cheque once and you ripped it up and sent it back.

Its 5 years now since I last saw you. Your friends probably see their mums and dads every day or maybe at least every two weeks if they are separated. Maybe also your friends don’t call their fathers gits or tw___s as you have taken to doing. How do you think that makes me feel? Maybe also your friends say thank you occasionally for things. You your sister and you brother don’t even do that now. I took a lot of care choosing Nina’s and Alex’s last presents and what thanks did I get – none. I just had the phone put down on me. Some people would say that is being ungrateful.

I am sorry you are fed up with hearing about by health, but at least I can keep working and help keep a roof over your head while I am still fit.

I will send you something for your birthday to do with what you like. You may choose to put it towards car insurance. When you are 18 I will spend as much money on you as I did when Nina was 18 – it’s only fair.
Lots of love
Dad

I mentally repeated my mantra 'it's all about him' as I read the email. No mention of the fact that Pip does thank his father or that Jay promised lots of presents but never bought them, just reminders that his health is bearing up and that the other children are ungrateful.

I asked Pip not to reply but of course he had to, like a pre-programmed computer. From then on, the facts came tumbling out. Jay had a sports car when he was at university, but it was his father's old one which they hadn't got round to selling. Pip couldn't have his father's old Ford Focus because it had been exchanged for another sports car. This was to augment the other two cars which Jay and his wife now own. Jay was forced to start buying two seater sports cars because Pip and Alex refused to see him, so he had no need for family saloons. Jay's mother added Jay to her car insurance when he was at University, so it is written in stone that mothers have to sort it out. Jay already has to pay me over a thousand pounds a month (four hundred pounds of which never leaves his bank account). And finally, just to rub salt into Pip's wounds, Jay told him 'I know what it is like to be the poor person - it makes you appreciate more of what you do have.' I assume that his poverty refers back to the time when he had to manage with a second-hand sports car and free insurance – poor times indeed.

Pip, in the meantime, decided to change his surname to my maiden name and it had to be done that evening. I spent the evening negotiating a time delay before he changes his name but dashed off an email to his school warning them that it might happen in the near future.

Pip doesn't understand that Jay builds barriers between himself and the people who love him. He doesn't understand that Jay cannot understand the needs of others so will never be generous or thoughtful. He doesn't understand that Jay blames everyone else for his misfortunes, that he alternates between blaming me for his failed relationships with the children and blaming them. And Pip, similarly blessed with a complete lack of empathy, can see no parallels between his own and Jay's behaviour. His first reaction was anger, which has been so typical for both Pip and Jay but more recently this has dissolved into upset. He is slowly coming round to the idea that Jay will never be the parent he wants, that Pip is not an important part of Jay's life and that Jay will never be more than an angry, self obsessed individual.

We have spent over a week now, going over the same old story, gleaning insights into Jay's character, searching through his emails for signs of manipulation and of lies, we have discussed the idea of trusting someone who always puts his own wishes above the needs of others, we have analysed his thoughts and feelings, his desire to punish one child for the behaviour of another and his ability to blame me for all his woes. It all wrenches open old wounds and I find myself exhausted by helping Pip to make sense of his relationship with his father, calming his anger, listening to him as he drones on and on about how he feels and not least, by remembering the misery which characterised my marriage to Jay.

Some days are better than others but there have been bleak times, like when Pip seamlessly went from insulting his father to insulting and threatening his brother. Within minutes, Pip had thrown his glasses on the floor, the lens rolling under the coffee table, and stormed out of the house into the dark night, shouting abuse. I refused to follow him, angry at his sudden flash of aggression and furious that the new glasses were already broken. Our visitor sat there, open mouthed in shock and confused by the sudden outcome. I sank my head into my hands, pulled myself together then fell to the floor, trying to recover the glasses parts. I mumbled my usual apologies to the room and the visitor looked up and mumbled back the trite comments that people usually make. I felt the tears welling in my eyes and busied myself with the glasses. I was clearly so distressed by the whole matter that I couldn't work out how to put the lens back into the frame. I began to panic at my own weakness, then it finally twigged – the lenses had popped out before and Pip had put them both back, in the wrong sides. He must have been unable to see for the last few weeks, yet he never questioned why. Suddenly, I felt all my anger disperse, I stood up and announced to my bemused family and friend 'He's been wearing his bloody glasses the wrong way round! What bloody hope is there for him?' picked up the phone, dialled his mobile and barked 'You've been out long enough, get back here now and stop being so bloody theatrical!' Just like a little lamb, he came in, went to his bedroom and gave me a much needed night off from counselling.

The Bibliophile

2010-02-05T08:51:00.000-08:00

I met up with Dee and Lulu yesterday. I think it is the first time we have seen Dee this year but we speak regularly on the phone.

Dee had been strangely quiet on the phone front for over a week, so I knew there was trouble brewing. And it was obvious where the trouble was coming from.

Dee and I met years ago, at a school open day. She is the mother of Pip's school friend, Joe so we soon fell into conversation, both desperate to smooth over our boys' already difficult path to friendship. Within the first few minutes of meeting we both knew our sons' diagnoses, and more importantly, each other's marriage problems.

By that time, I was separated but Dee was still living in the same house as her husband, Mark. That, and Joe, was about the only thing they had in common. Mark had already retired from a public service career, on the grounds of ill health and she was recovering from a course of chemotherapy, to treat a slow growing cancer. When I met her, she was short of breath, couldn't walk far and carried a stick but underneath all these disabilities was a very strong woman, trying to get out. It was that strength of character which kept her going through many miserable years with a particularly difficult and manipulative husband.

Soon after that, Pip became the victim of the school bully, a new boy with a comprehensive set of bullying strategies suitable for all situations. I found myself battling with the headteacher as she wriggled her way out of her own anti-bullying policies. That was the point when Dee came to my rescue, attending meetings, arguing my case and giving me moral support. We started to meet up regularly, inviting other mothers as their needs arose and hence our coven was born.

At the beginning, when it was just the two of us, we were united by the two problems of a child with Asperger's Syndrome and a husband with misdiagnosed Asperger's Syndrome and our conversations reflected this. We were both living with the effects of years of abuse, neglect, confusion and distress and these were clearly problems which normal wives, in normal marriages, don't understand so we unburdened our souls to one another. It was quite early on when we developed our twin theories about Asperger's Syndrome – that something horrific and distressing happens on the honeymoon and that sex is miserable and humiliating. Her contribution to the theory goes like this:

Mark took Dee on a honeymoon to the Isle of Man, the holiday coinciding with the TT races which he was interested in. He had hired a bungalow on the island for a week. What he didn't tell her was that he had invited three other couples along too. Dee and Mark were the first couple to arrive, so had the choice of bedrooms, the choice being between two double rooms, a twin bedded room and a bunk bedded room. He picked the room with the bunk beds. Things deteriorated from then on.

With regard to the sex, his interest is in voyeurism. Hers isn't. It started innocently enough, with him suggesting they have an early night. He was a bit anxious that they get to bed quickly but she thought nothing of it. She still hadn't realised when the phone rang, or when he answered it during sex. However, the penny dropped when he carried on with both the sex and the phone call, taking care to let the caller hear her moaning.

Years later when she had just qualified in therapeutic massage, there was a knock at the door. She answered it, to find a rather mild mannered, middle aged man at the door, his eyes blinking behind thick spectacles. He introduced himself as Brian, who had come down from Birkenhead and was ready for his hot and sexy massage. She slammed the door on him and marched into the kitchen to confront Mark. Of course he had organised the appointment, it had been arranged through the sexual services website he had set up for her and he was charging £50, some of which she would be given. When she recounts this story her voice rises in pitch and volume '£50! Is that all you thought I was worth? You can service Brian yourself for £50!'

From then on, she made no attempt to pretend theirs was a happy marriage.

After a few of our meetings and much laughter, she decided that enough was enough and whilst she wasn't necessarily looking for happiness, she could no longer cope with the misery and humiliation and she asked him for a separation. He decided I was the cause and from then on my name was blackened in their house 'It's that Ailsa Asperger, she's putting all sorts of nonsense into your head.' But it wasn't.

That was the start of her most recent problems, all centred around finances. Kinky sex is one of his many interests, meanness is another. Mark, like my Jay, has a theory that everything is his and if he doesn't get sex off his wife then there is no need to support her. After all, even prostitutes don't expect that. He currently wants his pension and their mortgage endowment, leaving her with the house and a substantial mortgage. His argument is that she already runs a steamy massage business, her cancer isn't a health issue, Joe's Asperger's Syndrome doesn't affect his behaviour and he doesn't require support so why should Dee sponge off the husband she rejected?

She has a more down to earth view of the situation: her cancer will come back in the next three years, she doesn't have a massage business, she is permanently ill with respiratory infections and Joe already receives considerable support, which won't lessen in the future.

Stalemate and it's making her depressed.

Meeting up was just the tonic she needed. She was so desperate to talk that she phoned me up on the way out, making me late. I raced to the venue, an old house with large squishy couches which looked out on the wilderness of a garden. I was the first one there and sank gratefully into a couch with my frothy coffee and cake, waiting for the others to arrive. It was still only mid morning and the cafe, although never empty, was quiet. The door creaked open and Dee came in, closely followed by Lulu. We talked briefly about our boys before finally broaching the subject. Lulu and I listened in silence as she ranted on about the unfairness of it all. Our coffee went cold, the froth dissolved into a scum and the windows misted over but Dee remained inconsolable. We ate sandwiches and sipped steaming hot chocolate but the unhappy atmosphere continued.

We ordered tea, a sure sign that things were getting too serious, the cloud of misery just would not lift. Finally, in desperation, I had a plan. I leaned over to Lulu, looking confidentially over my glasses and half whispering 'Dee and I have a theory that sex with a man with Asperger's is unremittingly bad, you say you've got a husband with Asperger's, come on, dish the dirt.' She looked at me in horror, every inch of the privately educated lady that she is, then I noticed a smile quivering tentatively at the extreme edges of her lips. It hovered for a while, whilst she made up her mind but eventually it formed a shy grin. 'He's so heavy-handed, do you know what I mean?' We nodded over the Earl Grey, knowing exactly what she meant but also anticipating there was more to come. It came out in fits and starts, each one precious to our little group.

I told her how I used to look at the clock and promise myself it would be all over in less than ten minutes. 'No, no, it isn't like that. He drinks too much, he takes ages and ages. I get bored,' the grin covered her face now 'I read a book while he labours on.' Simultaneously, Dee and I rolled back our heads and whooped out loud, our voices filling the room. Strangers lifted their heads from their lattes and stared at us but we were too enthralled to worry. With one final push, it was out and Lulu sat there relieved at her honesty and cleansed by her confession 'he thinks he's got an enormous willy and he's always complimenting himself on it.'

The cloud had dissipated, the misery had passed, here we were with a common bond, three women who had suffered on our own, in silence and misery for all those years. Now we were laughing at our own stupidity and sense of properness. It was all out in the open, we were free.

This morning, bright and early, Dee phoned me up. There was a sense of purpose in her voice. 'I've been thinking' she said. 'While Lulu reads in bed,' then Dee's irrepressible giggle, 'do you think she wears her reading glasses? And how does she turn the page?' The mood was catching 'yes, yes' I spluttered, anxious to join in, 'do you think she's reading a cookery book and making a shopping list at the same time?' 'Where does she keep the pen?' we were unstoppable.

Conjugal Bliss

2010-01-27T07:30:00.000-08:00

Lulu phoned up last night. It was quite late but Jimmy was still up, so her conversation was disjointed at first. She gave up on the first attempt, then phoned me back once he had finally gone to bed.

She had been drinking, enough to loosen her tongue but not enough to render her incoherent. She is always in control of herself, even when she is relaxed with us. I recognise the signs, I'm exactly the same.

She has just come back up north, I pronounce it 'oop noorth' to myself and giggle that she would need a translation. Jimmy had another hospital appointment at the end of last week. The appointment went well and she managed a long chat with the consultant, who put to rest a few of her fears. She deserves a bit of good luck.

Unfortunately, the good will didn't extend to her husband, Phillip. She had a long, cold journey back down south and had to make an unprecedented stop at a service station about forty minutes from their home. She rang home to tell him how close she was, I suppose she was idly hoping he would have the dinner on and turn the central heating control up a bit more. He didn't, in fact, he wasn't even in the house when she eventually arrived home. It never amazes me to wonder about the optimism of a woman married to a man with Asperger's. They are so different, so unfathomable, that we always think they will wake up one morning and behave normally. By the time that Lulu and Jimmy arrived home, the central heating remained off and the dinner remained on the supermarket shelves, Phillip had escaped to the pub, to treat his stress.

Every time I speak to Lulu, she slips another little detail of her life into the conversation. She's an old-fashioned woman, full of the notions of unity at home and supporting your husband. At first the tidbits were vague 'I think Phillip is very like Jimmy', 'we have money down south but I live on very little up here', 'Phillip spends all his evenings in the pub' but as she slowly relaxes in our company, we are beginning to get a clearer picture of life chez Phillip. This time her sex life came tantalizingly under the spotlight with a vague 'he thinks of me in terms of cooking and bedroom duties. He only touches me when he wants sex'. I roared with laughter; men with Asperger's can make sex a torture and 'bedroom duties' is too ephemeral a description of the perverted acts which we become so used to.

Let me explain, men with Asperger's don't like physical contact but they accept that some contact has to take place during sex. However, with a bit of ingenuity they can keep this down to the minimum necessary. I think they also tend to fantasize about prostitutes, who must be pretty near to their idea of the ideal woman since they don't make demands, they aren't there when you don't want sex, they do all that is required but don't expect any affection or enjoyment in return and they don't ask for extra money in between. What more could a man with Asperger's want? I suppose he would object to the fact that he has to pay, but at least he can negotiate on that.

I first realised Jay had a thing about prostitutes when he asked me to urinate on him, 'because that's what prostitutes do' implying that I was one. By that time, I had learned to do what he told me to do during sex, as his tantrums had become quite dramatic and significant. He's very logical, so I managed to get out of that rather unpleasant situation by telling him that I would wet the bed and hence the mattress. I had calculated my response brilliantly, he had clearly worked out the cost of a new mattress and I was allowed to just perform sex on him.

It wasn't the sleazy prostitution which was the real upset for me, it was the whole seedy act, from tea-time on Saturday until early Sunday morning, which was the real problem. Let me walk you through one of our typical Saturday evenings:

After a day in the company of the children, Jay would be getting anxious and bad tempered. He would usually manage two or more trips to the bookmakers and a pint or two, but the rest of the time he would sit in front of the television, watching the racing as it competed with the noise of three children, trying to tell him they were bored. Shopping with the children was always difficult and particularly expensive, so I would try to fit the weekly shopping trip into the afternoon, squeezing it between Jay's 'I'm just popping out, won't be long' trips to the bookmaker.

By about six o'clock, Jay would be like a caged animal, so I would take the children into the kitchen and sort out their meal. By seven o'clock he was nagging me to send them to bed 'because we want some mummy and daddy time together'. I always fell for that one, assuming that he meant what he said and actually wanted to be alone with me. I'd whizz through their bath, their story telling and their bedtime and come down to find the wine bottle was half empty and the Tesco Gobi Aloo Saag was already in the oven. Time to clear the dining table, get out the plates which weren't chipped and didn't have Peter Rabbit on them and to light the candles. Within minutes the dinner was on the table and I managed to snatch a half glass of wine from the bottle. I sat down opposite him and tried to remember how to flirt but I didn't need to. Jay always sat with his legs parallel to the edge of the table, crossed away from me, with his plate cradled in the arm nearest to the table, so it could protect his meal from any sudden attacks from me. Not that I would, I always served out his meal first and he would be stabbing the last few forkfuls into his mouth before I could pick up my knife.

As I asked him about his week at work, he would reach over to the wine bottle, snatch it and walk into the sitting room. I would be left to enjoy my romantic meal for two in silence and peace. Once or twice I would ask him to sit with me but the response was always the same 'I've finished my meal already'.

Tidying up and loading the dishwasher would always take time, so the bottle of wine would be finished by the time I collapsed on the couch next to him, curious to know which television show had been so important to him that he had to race out of the dining room. It was then that I came to realise that Saturday night television is always poor. I had problems keeping awake as I snuggled up to Jay as he sat unresponsive in the corner of the couch.

At ten o'clock, bored with the lack of conversation and disinterested in listening to a minor celebrity recount their memories of 1970s adverts, I would announce I was going to bed. It was already clear to me that Jay had not really been interested in a romantic 'mummy and daddy meal' and just wanted the children to shut up. I walked upstairs and sank into bed disappointed about the lack of interest in me but thankful that I wasn't going to be humiliated tonight. This time I would make a more determined effort to pretend to be asleep.

At eleven o'clock Jay would march upstairs, even he was bored with the TV fare. He would stumble about in the dark and I would mumble that I was tired and didn't want to be woken. That should put him off – but it didn't. Minutes later he would climb into bed and reach over to my right breast, kneading it thoroughly for ten seconds before announcing that it was amazing that I still turned him on. I would mumble back that I was tired, had a busy day ahead and wanted to go back to sleep, but sleep was the last thing on his mind and this was clearly the foreplay they described in the books.

Do you remember Wilfred Brambell, the dirty old man in Steptoe and Son? He had a horrible, vile, dirty old man voice which Jay used to reproduce when he talked dirty to me. Talking dirty is supposed to be quite a pleasant experience and I've since enjoyed it, but not from him. He would grunt 'fancy a bit of anal?' in that disgusting voice and wait for me to go weak at the knees. I would lie there rigid, unsure of how to react. I had already tried 'don't be objectionable, piss off!' but it got him angry and noisy. So did 'I'm tired, please let me go back to sleep', 'I'm not turned on by that and I'm not interested in sex until I am turned on', 'you ignored me downstairs and I didn't think you were interested', 'I'm sorry but you have to try harder with the foreplay' and 'I find the idea of anal sex disgusting and sickening'. I was running short of alternatives and I was too tired to think straight, so I would roll over onto my back, open my legs and look over to the clock, thinking 'I'll just give him straight sex, he will be happy and within ten minutes I will be fast asleep'. Sure enough, within less than ten minutes he was snoring, even accidentally leaning against me in his sleep but I was always wide awake, ashamed and upset, with tears quietly rolling down my cheeks.

But I wasn't the only one upset about all this. Nina, who's bedroom was across the landing, would be listening to it all. She developed an irrational fear of going to bed on Saturday night and would creep over to her doorway, shutting the door and lying across it, sobbing until exhaustion took over. I found out when Jay left, finding a note she had written to try and explain it all to me. To Nina, what was happening was little more than rape but I looked upon it as a selfless act which might just reduce Jay's anger and make him a nicer person to work around. It didn't but I always lived in hope.
As I sat there, curled up on the couch, recounting my innermost embarrassment to Lulu, I heard a sigh of understanding. She could so relate to my experience. Tomorrow we are meeting up at the art gallery for coffee, I know that with a bit of a prod, she will be able to tell me an equally miserable and hideous story. The problem is, are we both up to the emotional challenge of stirring up our own memories?

Another Quiet Weekend

2010-01-26T12:31:00.000-08:00

This weekend has been a total washout. I look back and the majority of our weekends since last September have been a total washout. Nothing new there, then.

Nina has taken the day off school and is trying to catch up with her sleep. This time, when I phoned the school, I didn't excuse her absence with vague hints about stomach aches or sore throats, I told the truth: 'Nina won't be at school today, her brother has Asperger's Syndrome and got himself into a state. We've had a traumatic weekend, Nina and I are both still upset and she is in no state to face school this morning.' It's the first time I have told the truth directly, which just shows how traumatised we really are. As I write this, I alternate between despair and anger.

So, what caused it all?

Pip has decided that he wants to learn to drive. He is only 16 but can already apply for a provisional license. One of his favourite all time fun activities is applying for car insurance quotes on line. Before, it was just a fun thing to do but now, with only six months to go until he can sit in the driving seat of a car, he is a man on a mission. He has decided that it will probably cost another £700 to add him to my insurance and was surprised and disappointed in me when I said I wasn't going to triple my insurance just so that he could learn to drive. I had already told Nina the same thing and she had accepted it with some grace but obvious disappointment. Let's get this straight, I'm a single parent surviving on child benefits and carer's allowance, it's a struggle to find the money for car tax, let alone splurging out another £700. Pip somehow managed to accept my decision with bad grace and moved on............. to his father, Jay. I begged him not to contact him, as Jay is like some Old Testament caricature of a father and will not respond well to a demand for money.

Of course Pip didn't listen, wrote the email anyway and was surprised when his father replied in a negative fashion, stating that he wouldn't give Pip the money as he hadn't got a licence. Pip was furious at being thwarted. I was furious because the refusal was based on the rather stupid premise that Pip didn't have a licence yet, so at some point, when that argument no longer applies, Jay would be obliged to either ignore Pip, or make up another excuse. I asked Pip to leave it, but Pip is obsessive, so he typed a rather well written response. I say that it was rather well written, meaning he wrote in sentences, most of it made sense and he used a spell checker. I don't mean that it was appropriate, polite, acceptable or inoffensive. I think any email which ends on the high note 'You are a selfish twat' is bound to cause offence and this one did.

His father, for once, wrote quite a sensible reply. He didn't detail his health problems or take a swipe at me, or even mention that I was taking up the majority of his finances (which I'm not, but he has never relied on honesty in an argument). He argued, quite rightly, that he would not give Pip more money than he gave to Nina or Alex. He also argued that Pip's friends wouldn't write such an offensive email to their parents. Now, there is some question about whether Pip has friends or whether they are just random people he talks at, but let's just pretend, for the sake of it, that they are real friends.

I know, from talking to the parents of other children in Pip's school, that verbal abuse is terrifyingly common. Most of the children describe their parents as 'selfish twats' on a daily basis. We learn to behave like the proverbial duck in water and just shrug it off.

When Pip read that bit out to me, I laughed and thought of Ella, who is known as 'that f****** bitch' by her Asperger's son. However, I took the opportunity to beg Pip not to write back, to accept that Jay would not send him the money and move on. But Pip wouldn't and spent Friday night worrying about it. He was clearly already working himself up for a tantrum.

On Saturday morning I drove Nina to the nearby town, to her voluntary work. I came back to chaos.

Jo, the neighbour's son, had been round and had accidentally broken one of Pip's darts. Darts is one of Pip's new obsessions and I had originally been quite delighted that he had taken up a new hobby which didn't involve stalking politicians or goading on children with ADHD. I walked in to find Pip screaming at Alex, who coolly reminded him that it was an accident and Jo would replace the broken dart but it wasn't enough for Pip, he wanted a proper punishment and since Jo had long since escaped, Alex and I had to pay the price in his stead. I dozed in between the bouts of verbal abuse, tired from a week of Pip's restless nights. By teatime he had remembered silly little events at school, where teachers hadn't responded immediately and effectively to name calling or offensive stares from other pupils. It was becoming clear to him that there was a major conspiracy against him.

By bedtime, he felt that I wasn't very supportive, I didn't love him, I couldn't be trusted and I was part of the conspiracy.

I went to bed, grateful for some peace.

Sunday morning dawned bright and sunny. Alex's football had been cancelled so he arranged to meet his friend at the gym. I looked forward to a late morning church service followed by an hour or two in the pub with friends. As the time drew near, Nina tentatively knocked on Pip's door and asked him if he wanted to come to church. The response was offensive but left us in no doubt that he wouldn't be leaving his room any time soon. A while later, with my coat and shoes on and Nina standing on the step, I approached Pip's door again. I used my most coaxing, reassuring tones 'Darling, I would like to go to church but I'm worried you are unhappy, will you be alright?' 'I won't kill myself and I won't run away but I can't trust you, you've let me down.' Pip barked in response, the bitterness and anger exuding from every word he spat out.

That did it for me. Pip was clearly blaming me for all his imagined misfortunes and the longer I left it, the more I would be expected to suffer. I calmly walked downstairs and informed Nina that she would have to make her own way up to church. 'I'm not going without you,' she wailed. I was torn between pleasing myself and Nina and pleasing the mad despot who was lying brooding in his bedroom. I chose the despot but couldn't resist telling him how much he had upset us.

'I'm not going to church because you are being stupid. I hope you are happy that your selfishness has paid off. Get downstairs now, if Nina can't go to church then I'm going to take you out for a walk, so she doesn't have to suffer you and your evil behaviour all day!' I screamed. He got up and came downstairs but I was too angry to look him in the eye. 'You'll have to wait while I make the lunch for Nina and Alex. It isn't fair that they have to starve, give up their activities and stay at home by themselves all because someone broke your dart!' I screamed. Pip just hang around the hall way, sullenly.

There was something so familiar about Pip's anger and his response to me. I was transported back to life with Jay, his anger, his aggression, his lack of empathy and his (erroneous) view that I couldn't be trusted. I suppose the years of abuse welled up inside me and I snapped.

For half an hour I screamed at Pip that my life was being horribly dictated to by his stupid, twisted mind, that Nina and Alex didn't have a life because he had to destroy their happiness and peace, that he always ruined the weekends for us, blaming me for every set-back he suffered. I was mean and selfish but months of stifled pain came tumbling out and somewhere I was having to accept the distressing truth that basically, he was no better than this father. Three years of therapy, years of providing a calm environment and what had I achieved? A bitter, twisted, paranoid man, just like Jay.

I threw the half cooked dinner on the floor, threw the kitchen knife into the table and started sobbing to myself. I was only half aware of Nina coming in, putting her arms around me and telling me gently to stop before I said something I regretted. That just made it worse, as I was aware of all the times I had allowed Pip's ego to dictate the family's lifestyle.

Eventually I sobbed myself quiet and I took Pip out. We drove to a lay-by out in the Peak District, parked the car and I pushed my seat back and lay there, alternating between sobbing and sleeping. By three, I was sufficiently calm and rested to make the return journey. Alex met me in the hall way and hung on to me, he'd been worried about me. I went to bed and slept through the night.

This morning I woke up with the alarm and dragged myself out of bed, to ensure that the despot got to school on time. I almost threw his breakfast at him, telling him that I was too upset by his behaviour and couldn't face sitting in the dining room with him.

He ate his breakfast and ran off to his taxi. He texted me later in the day 'School going well, hope you are having a nice day.' By that time hysteria had taken over and I roared with laughter, Nina rushed in, read the text and muttered 'Bastard!' before joining in.

Hecate, Queen of the Night

2010-01-19T04:53:00.000-08:00

Ella emailed me on Saturday night. She really has gone too far this time and I told her so (but made a mental note to act as a character witness, should it come to it).

Ella is funny and intelligent, with the most pronounced sense of justice I have ever met and I admire her deeply for that. However, she seems to have a misguided naivety which sits uneasily on her personality and an amazing courage which unnerves timid old me.

I first met Ella over a year ago, at our usual bookshop cafe. Her son, Steven went to the school I had recently removed Pip from and she understood only too well why I had taken such extreme action during his GCSE year. Both Dee and I had been openly critical of what we saw as a failing school with little discipline and an incompetent headteacher and we knew we weren't alone in that. Dee set about to find the other disappointed parents.

It wasn't long before she found Ella, the mother of one of the new boys, whose behaviour was an obvious cause for concern. One night, at midnight, Dee phoned me, her voice breathless and hurried, her words tumbling out as she told me about the boy and his bitter mother. Within days we were all tightly wedged in our usual corner of the bookshop cafe, listening to Ella as she recounted the deception the headteacher had used to get Steven into school, agreeing with Ella that the school was not appropriate for him, then turning up at a tribunal hearing to say that she could meet all his needs and offering him a place, promising he could continue studying for five GCSEs when she didn't have the resources to teach three of them and then demanding more and more money from his education authority and social services as his behaviour deteriorated until he became a danger to himself and his fellow classmates. As the afternoon wore on, Ella's stories became funnier but her anger became more naked. We laughed when she recounted her regular meetings with the headteacher, her blatant accusations of lying, her parodies of the woman's clothes, walk and simpering. We gasped in horror when she told us of the day when she had marched out of a meeting, followed by the simpering headteacher, then turned on her and threatened her, swearing in solid, uncompromising anglo-saxon, then ran down to the car park, to throw up and empty her sweet wrappers on the ground, as the ultimate retaliation of a powerless woman. Ella had a loud voice and a booming laugh as we soon fell under her spell.

By that first meeting, although we didn't know it at the time, the headteacher's days at the school were numbered. Her boss, a determined and uncompromising accountant had to protect the reputation of his company and school. Although he rarely acknowledged our complaints and never apologised for the distress and upset our children were clearly suffering, he was carefully entering our complaints into his spreadsheets, analysing them, quantifying them and assessing the damage. He resolutely hugged his complaints procedure to his chest, refusing to implement it but he didn't need to, he could already see the headteacher was a liability and within six months she had left. However, by that time, fed-up with my powerlessness and aware that Pip was missing out on his education, I sent Pip to another school.

Ella kept Steven at the school, determined not to upset his education further. One Sunday evening she phoned up the school, to be told that he was washing staff cars, to atone for some previous sin, and hence was unavailable. She later found out that he had been in the city centre, climbing up the down-escalator. One evening he ran off to the nearest town with a very troubled teenager and tried to break into a shop. Another Sunday evening was spent running to the nearest railway station. The staff had been told not to follow him, so rang the police. By the time the police found him he was calm and asked to be driven back, but the school refused to accept him. The headteacher later told social services that the school could no longer care for him, as he had tried to jump in front of a train. Ella proved that the trains hadn't been running that afternoon.

Throughout the spring term we continued to meet up in the cafe, Ella recounting all the problems Steven was having, the lies the headteacher was telling and her pathetic attempts to remove him from the school. I told Ella about Pip's new school, his new found calmness, his successes and his achievements. Then suddenly, soon after Easter, Steven was expelled for threatening to throw stones at the headteacher. It was sudden, it was out of the blue and it was mismanaged by her. Ella found out later on that evening, when a social worker rang her to tell her what had happened and told her to wait for his possessions to be sent home. Steven found out later, when he arrived back home.

We found another school for Steven, with more professional staff and a keen understanding of his problems. But by then the damage was done. A year of poor behavioural management and lack of boundaries, failed GCSEs and months without the routine of school had taken their toll and he was unable to attend lessons. He developed a cruel streak and his parents could no longer deal with his anger. Neither could the police and it was decided to put him into care.

The months went by and we still met up for coffee, joined by more dissatisfied parents. The head teacher left and took up another headship at a state special school in a nearby city. Only Dee and Lulu kept their children at the school, the other four children having moved elsewhere.

Last week Pip was surfing the net and told me that he had found his old headteacher on facebook. I grunted a recognition but it didn't register. I should know by now that whenever he mentions her name he is always planning some obscure revenge which neither fits her crime nor is legal. The next comment shocked me and saw me running to the computer 'She's a witch.' Sure enough, as I scrolled down the page, I saw her link with a Wicca organisation. I clicked on the link and there was no mistake. 'That must be the friend she used to visit' said Pip, pointing to the blurry photograph of a middle aged woman who purported to advise on spells. I laughed and emailed Ella and Dee with the link.

On Saturday I got Ella's response, a copy of an email to the vicar of the church which neighboured the school and the managing director of the company which owned the school. 'Rest assured,' she wrote, 'if I had any idea that that woman was a witch, I would never have allowed my children to cross the threshold.' I phoned Ella up, to tell her I thought she had gone too far, feeling responsible for her actions because I had given her the link. 'It's only my opinion and my views, anyone is allowed to have an opinion!' she boomed 'I always said she was evil and I was right!' 'Well, I just thought she was incompetent,' my voice sounded weak and timid after Ella's determined tones. 'Shall I inform her new school that they are employing Hecate, Queen of the Night?' she giggled. 'That's too far!' I declared, for once sounding like I had a backbone to match hers 'don't you dare!'

Teenage Love

2010-01-15T02:49:00.000-08:00

The snow is beginning to clear now and I’m willing to venture out more. Yesterday afternoon I walked over to the supermarket. As usual, I was late and met Nina walking home from school. She always appears in her own little world, her bag over her shoulder and her long hair flowing down her back. Sometimes I can persuade her to come with me and we enjoy the hour, without her brothers, wandering around the shops, talking about her school friends. This time, I couldn’t persuade her, she had too much homework and was already cold after the short walk. ‘I had to work with Christopher in French. I’ll tell you later, when you get back’ was the parting shot, which she knew would make me hurry back home, anxious for news.

Christopher is a tall, shy boy in her class. He’s from a large family and both of his parents have impressive jobs. He suddenly appeared in her life, as a peripheral figure, last year. This year, as the class became smaller and more intimate, they began to sit next to each other. By the end of last term he was texting her regularly throughout the day. Christopher’s humour was sufficiently weird that he soon attracted my attention. He would spend the rare free lesson making origami hats in the library or argue, in a good natured way, that he is cleverer than she is. That riled her, as she has a reputation for being a blue stocking and he, like many boys, is too lazy to work hard.

Last autumn I met Christopher’s mum at the school. I told her how much he entertains Nina and she appeared very surprised, he spent his evenings at home, quietly and soberly sitting in his bedroom, she didn’t recognise the comedian I described. The school hall was crowded and Alex was pulling me away, so we parted before we could say more.

By October, Christopher was looming large in our lives. Nina would come home daily and tell us anecdotes about their friendly rivalry and their running jokes. May, who knew the family, would raise her eyebrows and drop a stitch as we listened to the latest news. As Nina walked out of the room, May would look at me significantly and reiterate that there was clearly something going on there. If a boy showed a girl that much attention then it was obvious that he fancied her. Finally unable to keep it to ourselves any longer, May broached the subject of young love to Nina. ‘Oh, no, it’s not like that, Christopher isn’t like that. We are just friends’ Nina tried in vain to reassure us but we were women of the world, with a wealth of experience between us. Her protests became stronger and stronger but we would just look at each other across our knitting, in a knowing way. Finally, the truth blurted out ‘he’s gay, he fancies one of the other boys in the class. He told me.’ Sure enough, as the weeks wore on, we heard more and more about this. He showed some boys his diary, detailing his crush on the (unfortunately) heterosexual classmate, he was caught looking at the Gay Times (but was too scared to buy it), he followed a younger boy with a cute, snub nose around all day, he had even asked out a boy in their year (who had politely declined). There are plenty of boys in Nina’s school who are openly gay but Christopher wasn’t like them. Here was a boy who was still well and truly stuck in the closet, anxious that his mother shouldn’t find out yet confiding in not very discreet friends. It just didn’t make sense, so May and I developed increasingly far fetched theories to explain his situation away. But fact is always stranger than fiction and teenaged hormones can make the most sensible person behave like a prat.

One Friday the heterosexual Crush, Nina and Christopher sneaked out to the shops during the lunchbreak. Christopher had initially been excited at the prospect but became increasingly bad tempered as they walked. Finally, as the crush popped into the baker’s, Christopher hissed at Nina ‘why did you have to come and ruin it for us? We wanted to come on our own, you aren’t welcome.’ Then flounced off to meet the emerging crush. Nina was upset about the treatment but they are all still children and I assured her that everything would be back to normal on Monday morning. But it wasn’t. Christopher was still angry with her and pointedly ignoring her, worst still, he was sitting next to the Class Bitch in English lessons. Then Nina made the situation totally worse when The Crush sat next to her in the library and made her laugh just as Christopher walked in.

There followed weeks of frankly girlie spats. The emails stopped and he refused to sit next to her in lessons. She wailed that she had lost all her friends and that no one liked her. In a totally new twist, he started the ‘death by Facebook’. It started innocently enough, with him dropping her as a friend and posting that he couldn’t wait to leave home and make new friends. I emailed him privately, telling him I would do whatever was necessary to help them resolve their differences and stop my daughter from being upset. He responded by dramatically telling me that it was too late, they could never be friends and they had to just manage the next five months of living in close proximity as best they could. May declared that if an actress had written that then she would have accused her of over-acting.

Other classmates started to mention that Christopher was acting strangely, not only with Nina, but just generally.

Christopher clearly spent the next few weeks trawling through the more obscure clubs and groups on Facebook. I think it started with ‘I used to like you but I don’t like the way you’ve turned out’ or some other such twaddle. Within two months he had joined about 10 of these groups but they didn’t satisfy his anger. My post to Nina was pure retaliation, ‘Can you find the group You Behave Like a Wanker and Fight Like a Girl, I want to join!’ It entertained me for half an hour, until Nina read it and removed it. At New Year he became Nina’s friend on Facebook, but not in real life. He has started telling other classmates that she is a liar.

Nina has mentioned discussing the problem with a teacher. May and I are encouraging her because we both feel that Christopher is getting a bit mixed up and needs help. We are also concerned that he is going to say something stupid to The Crush and alienate most of the hot blooded boys in his year. I am hurt at the way that he is upsetting Nina but I can’t do anything about it, just provide her with support and love.

As for her news last night, she says he didn’t talk to her, just worked by himself. And no, the teacher hadn’t put them together because she knew about this bitch fight.

Back to School

2010-01-13T07:29:00.000-08:00

It’s my first day of freedom, with three children in school and the day, filled with unknown promise, stretching out ahead of me. I pour myself the perfectly brewed mug of tea, sit back and luxuriate.

Actually, that’s not strictly true. Monday was my first day of freedom, or would have been if Pip hadn’t had an anxiety attack at college, phoned me and begged me to let him come home before he was cut off over there. I managed thirty minutes of ‘getting used to an empty house’ time before the phone calls started. The next hour passed in an adrenaline fuelled haze, as I contacted his school, his day release college and finally his taxi driver to sort things out and get him home while I still knew where he was. We spent the next three hours sorting out his emotions and reassuring him that I wasn’t angry and that it really didn’t matter.

I put my freedom on the back burner yesterday, as the school had closed down again. We went to the gym for the morning, so that I could work out and he could sit on a training machine, gently lifting his legs periodically whilst staring vacantly at ‘Bargain Hunt’ on a mute TV. My unspoken fear that he will end up in a home seems totally misplaced when I see him sitting gormlessly, watching day time TV. At times like that he wears his body as if he has borrowed it, not totally certain what all the parts do but determined not to break anything through over use. My mind strays and I begin to believe that the fairies used to swap children with changelings. Maybe I should have kept his bedroom windows firmly shut when he was a baby?

We walked back hand in hand, like young lovers. I found it uncomfortable but he seemed to need it so we carried on. As we walked past the Catholic Church he slowed down and asked me if priests had to demonstrate a sexual interest in children before they got the job. I spent the rest of the walk trying to explain to him that no organisation would recruit anyone because they were child abusers. I didn’t need to think of my response, his question was rhetoric, he had already decided that all priests were perverts. I hope he never comes across one, I couldn’t face the embarrassment.

The rest of his day was spent on the computer, internet stalking famous politicians. He seems to have grown out of Martin Mcguinness and now follows my father’s MP. I noticed that Pip’s zeal for northern politicians has spread and half of his classmates are following the man. At least three of them are so fuelled up on the heady mixture of sugar and e-numbers that they probably don’t understand what an MP is. The MP has responded to his comment on Facebook and Pip is delighted. He emails Alex, his bright but scary classmate, a new convert to politics. Alex emails back that he is fed up with the lousy school, the deputy headmistress is beginning to ignore his daily meetings with her and he’ll have to arrange a meeting with the headmistress to explain all his complaints. I laugh, Alex is clearly unaware that Pip completely bypassed the headmistress and complained straight to the charity who run the school. The response had to be a disappointment, so he has been in daily contact with OFSTED for the last two weeks. I sometimes wonder if I should bother to tell them that the half-literate, badly spelt emails they have been receiving from The Most Reverend Pip Asperger are just the ramblings of an emotionally illiterate and disabled boy. Maybe I should warn my Dad’s MP as well.

Today dawned as my first free day and started quite well. By eleven the supper was made, I had informed Pip’s school of his imminent arrival, the washing was on, I had advised the mother of a similarly disabled child about education, welfare and benefits, knitted three rounds of my latest project – much needed gloves, when the phone rang again. It was the school, advising that the weather was closing in and the college would be shutting early, could I re-arrange Pip’s transport? OK, I’ve been thwarted again, but some day this country will warm up and we will be back to the usual routine.

Back to work

2010-01-08T04:04:00.000-08:00

I'm busy typing up a letter of complaint to Lulu's local hospital. It's tedious deciphering someone else's handwriting but she has no access to a computer and we both recognise the need to keep copies of all letter, so I offered.

Let me explain. Lulu is another mother of a boy with an 'autistic spectrum disorder' but he also has a number of health issues on top of the behavioural ones. In fact, Jimmy's health problems could provide the basis for at least a year's worth of medical lectures. He's had more operations than all of my friends put together, has a limited life expectancy and is doubly incontinent. Lulu has a theory that behavioural problems and incontinence are the least popular medical conditions, making Jimmy a social pariah. I've met him and she has a point.

Lulu is married, but suspects that her husband has Asperger's Syndrome. I've never met him but I have heard of him and she is probably right. They were married when she was about seven months pregnant. I'm not certain why either of them bothered, given what happened afterwards, but I suppose we must assume that they were both attracted to each other at some point.

I know Lulu as a carer, her life revolves around Jimmy, his social ineptitude, his malformed body, his bladder and his bowels but there was a time when she was a real person, with a job, aspirations and a social life. Then, she trained as a chef and when she isn't snowed under by Jimmy's needs I sometimes get a glimpse of the cook she should have been. Her kitchen is a wonder of ergonomics and ingredients and really reflects her interest. Physically, she is stick thin and worn with worry, but still clearly an attractive woman.

For really complicated reasons, known only to her local education authority, his school and Lulu, Jimmy attends a school in the Midlands but she has a home on the South Coast. Because of Jimmy's myriad health problems, Lulu spends term times in the Midlands, in the cutest little cottage. The problem with that is that Lulu doesn't fit in to the gritty Midlands. She probably stands out less than she thinks, but she is essentially a southerner and feels that we are all pointing at her, making assumptions based on her accent. I haven't the heart to tell her that although I've always lived between Birmingham and Edinburgh, I have visited the South, I've had friends from the South and I'm comfortable with people from the wastelands below my current home. Last month she was trying to decipher my northern dialect attempt at the word 'aunty'. Ok, so I pronounce it 'anty' but surely she has heard enough episodes of Coronation Street and Emmerdale to realise that I was talking about my uncle's wife? When it finally twigged and she unconsciously exclaimed 'Oh, you mean 'aunty'!' I laughed good naturedly and told her we'd make a proper human being out of her yet.

Anyway, here is Lulu, stuck in the Midlands with neither family or friends and a horrible, needy child for her only company. A member of staff at Pip's old school (one of the few I respected) phoned me up one day and asked me to invite Lulu for coffee. I like to think he recognised the empathy and kindness in me but it was probably just because I lived within an hour's drive. It took a long time for Lulu to respond to my invitation but as soon as I met her, I saw she was close to breaking-point, so I persevered. And thus began a strong, close friendship.

I try to be there for Lulu, to listen to her gripes, help her with her inevitable skirmishes with the care and health professionals and just to let her know that she isn't on her own in all this. She has parents, who live near her home, who I've never met. They are loving and helpful, but one is quite old and the other has other family with health problems, so they can't see as much of her as she would like. The rest of the time, certainly during term time, Lulu is stuck with Jimmy in a picture book cottage in a small Midlands town. Knowing Jimmy as well as I do, if I was Lulu then I'd either turn to drink or drugs. She already has.

Once a fortnight a group of mothers from Pip's old school meet for coffee. We call ourselves the coven, basically because we assume that headteachers, health professionals, social workers and education authority staff would look upon us as a difficult, bad-tempered cabal of bitter mothers. We are, but we also celebrate each other's good news, share in each other's families and support and listen to each other. For the last year, we have got each other through the numerous crises and disappointments which are the lot of the mother of an emotionally stunted child.

We have three venues for coven meetings, all of them hand-picked and all of them welcoming. The first of them is the bookshop. It's an old, rambling building stuffed full of books, with a tiny little cafe at the back. We squeeze onto a tiny pew, shuffling our ample bottoms ever closer as more of the coven arrive. We start off by discussing our choice of cakes, interspersing our deliberations with news stories which we can't contain any longer, polite questions about each other's children and rude observations about the officials who have thwarted us. We are noisy and lively, our conversations dominating the room, the waiters interacting with us, chatting and joking as the day wears on. Then suddenly, without any warning, we rush out to meet our homecoming children.

The first time I met Jimmy was a cold, winter's day. Lulu, Dee and I had already established our table at the bookshop, on our third pot of tea and reluctant to break up our meeting. Lulu rushed off to the school just down the road, then came back to introduce us to Jimmy. Jimmy has the high pitched whine so common to children on the autistic spectrum. I offered him a choice of cakes whilst his mum went back to park her car. His whine reached a crescendo as he found himself in an alien environment, with two caring, fussy women and a choice of cakes. Dee and I looked at each other and I mouthed 'ADHD' at her, she responded with 'and a hefty dose of Asperger's'.

A tiny, cramped cafe is no place for a child with ADHD and a generous slice of chocolate cake is of no interest to a faddy child, so when Lulu came back we let Jimmy wander off into the children's section of the shop. It was literally around the corner, well within hearing range. Within minutes we heard the whine now anxiously shouting 'It's my book, not your's, I found it first, leave it alone'. We ran out, to find Jimmy in the middle of a tug of war with a shop assistant. The magic of the place suddenly evaporated and we left, with the untouched chocolate cake in a napkin. Knowing Jimmy's lack of appetite, I expect it made a surprise and welcome tea for their dog.

After that, aware that Lulu is bored and lonely in the evenings and at weekends, I have tried to meet up with her. But it is difficult when I have my own disabled child. One evening I found myself in the area, waiting to collect Pip from a party, so I passed the time at Lulu's little cottage. Lulu already had a generous glass of whisky in her hand as she welcomed me in. We ate soup and warm bread, or rather, Lulu and I ate the soup, whilst Jimmy fretted about a board game he wanted to show me. Lucy filled up her empty glass with wine, offering me my usual glass of sparkling water. Eventually, after repeated reminders, we gave up on the untouched bowl of soup and emptied the board game onto the table. Jimmy reminded me of the official rules of the game, demonstrating some of the more difficult aspects, showing me alternative games, talking about the programme the game was based on, showing me some of the pieces which particularly attracted him then taking me over to the toy cupboard to show me yet more board games. The phone then rang, it was Pip asking to be picked up. I helped Jimmy tidy away his game, listening to him whining that I hadn't got round to playing the game and that I had to come back soon, so he could show me the game rules in more detail., Lulu poured herself another glass of wine and thanked me for coming, then I left. As I drove up to Pip's restaurant, I shook my head at the quantity of alcohol Lulu had drunk, then reasoned that I would have shot myself in her place. An evening of planning a board game with a child who is too hyperactive to settle down to the game, followed by a stomach wash out then patiently picking pieces of poo out of his bath was my idea of hell. On the way home I thanked Pip for being such a wonderful son, he looked at me confused but decided that was just the eccentricity of a neuro-typical woman and ignored the comment, preferring to tell me in detail about the meal he had eaten and his plans for when he became prime minister. I hugged myself in delight that we might be weird but at least our conversation was two sided and his interest in food hadn't diminished.

Jimmy had an operation last year. It was relatively minor for him and only required a few days in hospital. Lulu told me about the impending operation during one of our regular meetings, confiding in me her bitter hatred of most hospital staff. It's a bit scary listening to a woman who's son's life depends upon the expertise and kindness of nurses and doctors, as she proceeds to criticise them, but her dislike is understandable. Jimmy's autism seems to affect every aspect of his life, so that his pre-med drugs, designed to make him drowsy and comfortable have the opposite affect, making him noisy, angry and irritable. The anaethetist stands by in horror as Jimmy proceeds to shout and swear at anyone who will listen to him as he bounces on his bed. Jimmy's dislike of change makes every visit to hospital, every procedure and every interaction with hospital staff an embarrassing and humiliating experience for Lulu. She described how a doctor, in a child friendly moment, toured the ward, asking his patients how they were. The Little Lord Fauntelroy in the bed opposite, lisped his grateful thanks for the attention and generously showed the doctor his new toy. As the doctor neared Jimmy's bed, Lulu's anxiety rose. 'And how are you feeling today?' questioned the unsuspecting victim. 'How do you expect me to feel? I hate this bloody place, f*** off!' came the honest reply. Lulu can take these responses without even wincing now and, under the influence of the coven, is beginning to see the funny side of it all.

But to add injury to insult, Lulu loses Jimmy's Disability Living Allowance and her Carer's Allowance whenever Jimmy goes into hospital. In a marriage where she enjoys none of her husband's income unless she is at home and cannot work because of Jimmy's complex health needs, that loss is significant. The argument is that Jimmy's needs are all met in hospital, but in practise, few nurses are trained and experienced to meet his complex personal needs. Besides, since he is so talented in verbal abuse, few of them would welcome the challenge. Food is a similar problem. A child who can turn his nose up at the perfect chocolate cake at the end of a busy school day and who is significantly underweight is not going to be tempted by standard hospital fare. It takes all of Lulu's finances, ingenuity and imagination to keep that boy from inadvertently starving himself to death in hospital.

Lulu's most bitter criticism is directed at social services. It's one of the strange anomalies of autistic spectrum disorders that most mothers hate social services with a vengeance. After we have circumnavigated the bland 'he doesn't fit our criteria' argument we face the assessment of needs test. Emboldened by our coven, who egged her on, Lulu contacted her social services. Because of Jimmy's physical needs, Lulu managed to get to the assessment of needs stage quickly, so far so good. She was then handed a forty page questionnaire and left to fill it in. She cried to me as she recounted the experience, telling me she was too emotionally raw to fill it in. Always one to find a silver lining in all clouds, I told her it was a blessing as it would give us an opportunity to clearly demonstrate her need for help. She wasn't sure, so I arranged to meet her the following week to complete the form.

We met up the following Friday, Lulu with the form and I with a note book and a stack of pens. We met at the art gallery, our second favourite venue and prepared ourselves with strong coffee and cakes. For the next three hours, amply fortified from the cafe menu, we ploughed through the form, writing and re-writing our responses, adding all the relevant details like her husband's drink problems, her depression and the lack of support. Even Dee and I got a mention, as the two local(ish) women who provide limited support in spite of their own problems (single parent of disabled child in my case, single parent of disabled child with terminal cancer in Dee's case). As we wrote the damned report we alternated between crying and exaltation at a particularly splendid turn of phrase. We left each other optimistically arguing that even the most stone-hearted social worker, work-hardened by listening to years of sob stories would be obliged to respond positively to this particular tale. I spent the next two days working well into the night, perfecting our case. A week later Lulu presented the report to her social worker and we sat back, delighted and proud of our work.

Months later, concerned that we hadn't heard from social services, Lulu contacted them and waited for the response. It came just before the end of the autumn term. As usual it came to her home address and her husband opened it. He phoned her up, annoyed about it and the coven assumed it was the allegations about his drinking. At our last meeting we all nervously told her to come back up north if he became violent and waited anxiously for news. Eventually she phoned me and assured me that his concern had been for his driving license, which he had lost after being caught drink driving. He had been in the process of reapplying for the license and was concerned that social services would read the report and block his application. Clearly, Lulu had spilt the beans to social services just to upset him and prevent him from driving again.

But what about the response of social services? Had our heart-felt plea for help, clearly worded and detailed, liberally sprinkled with true anecdotes outlining Jimmy's behaviour and physical problems melted some bureaucrat's heart? Would social services arrange for the necessary support and give Lulu the much needed break we had requested? I inadvertently laughed as Lulu explained that all of the family problems were caused by her poor relationship with her husband, that the pair of them were so selfish and antagonistic towards each other that their unhappy marriage was affecting Jimmy's care and that a series of sessions at RELATE and a positive attitude would solve everything.

We have arranged a coven meeting for next week, snow permitting, and before we have even sat down with our lattes we will have already started blackguarding the social work profession.

In the meantime, it's time to get back to that letter...............................

Merry Christmas!

2010-01-07T03:41:00.000-08:00

Well, it was a happy Christmas in the Asperger family. The happiest Christmas we have enjoyed in a long, long time. Pip doesn't like surprises, so I told him what his present was two weeks before the event. It was a shared present, a new, flat-screen, large (for us), family TV and I told him to keep absolutely quiet about it, so it was still a surprise to the rest of the family. As an extra Asperger's-friendly gesture, I gave him a copy of the specifications. There were enough technical words to keep him occupied and happy for days. The week before Christmas Day, I bought him an enormous TV aerial, to install in the loft. We spent the run up to Christmas cold, with an icy blast blowing through the house from the loft hatch, but with a really useful Pip blissfully running up and down the ladder, with screwdrivers, compasses and wires. The only slight upset was on Christmas Eve, when I banned access to the loft for the following day, on the grounds that I wanted to feel warm on that one day. Christmas Day was spent discussing the ban and how far it went, would it apply if there was a fire in the loft, if the roof started leaking or if Grandpa phoned up and demanded we all climb into the loft? But we were both too happy and relaxed to get worked up about each other and we took each other's responses in good heart.

It hasn't always been like this, even as a child, whilst I happily dreamed of presents, or sat up all night waiting for Father Christmas, there must have been tensions in the family. My mother was a wonderful, loving, kind hearted woman but she had an obsession about food and this could always lead to conflict. To her, Christmas was about food and being the perfect hostess, so there was bound to be a problem.

My father hated white meat and my sister and I were vegetarians. However, turkey is a traditional Christmas Day meal and traditions had to be observed. A huge turkey would be ordered months in advance and mum would take delivery of it in the days leading up to Christmas. Because my dad hated turkey, mum only cooked it once a year and wasn't very confidant. She also read every newspaper article about food poisoning, so she was only too well aware that under-cooked turkey can kill. In the week before Christmas, when other women were worrying about presents, my mum was panicking about the turkey. Dad used to preface most of his conversations with 'Oh my God, the turkey!' much to my delight. Mum didn't find it as funny.

The turkey had to be kept away from everything edible, to avoid cross-contamination. It would sit in the dining room, in splendid isolation on the table, carefully draped and with the door locked to ensure that it couldn't escape and run wildly about the fridge, poisoning us. The two days before the meal, my mum would regularly phone up the butcher, to confirm cooking times and temperatures. He was a distant family relative, so took mum's calls cheerfully, waiting until he next saw my dad, so they could both exclaim 'Oh my God, the turkey!' The meal was cooked with military precision, adhering to times and temperatures exactly, then adding another hour on, to ensure that all the bacteria, like the turkey, were burnt to a frazzle. Cooking would start at four in the morning, to ensure a good eight hours of high temperature roasting and for the rest of the morning, mum hovered about the kitchen, worrying about whether she had removed the giblets, if the silver foil was adequate, if some temperature-resistant bacteria had permeated the bird, if her timing calculations were accurate enough and if the rest of the meal would be adequate for the majority of the diners, who wouldn't be eating the turkey anyway.

My grandmother and great aunt would come over for Christmas Day, two very old, tiny ladies who both ate like birds, anyway. Their portion of this huge bird would amount to three or four slices between them. My mum, exhausted from the emotional upheaval of the cooking, was too tired to eat the turkey. My dad refused to eat the damned thing, so mum cooked a ham for him and we ate nut roast.

For the next week mum would dish up ever more imaginative meals involving the turkey, always having to include a 'dad-friendly' and a vegetarian option. Finally, fed up with all the turkey, she would hang out the remaining carcass for the local birds to gorge on.

And yes, we tried to tell her that none of us liked turkey, that she hated cooking it and that most of it was thrown out but she would always retort that you have to eat turkey at Christmas, it's traditional and besides, everyone else likes turkey so we shouldn't just think about ourselves. As we grew older, my grandmother died and my great-aunt was too frail to come over for Christmas dinner, but still she was adamant that everyone else likes turkey.

The turkey tradition was finally put to rest when my sister and I left home, the butcher died, leaving my mum with no-one else to reassure her and with her increasing ill-health, Dad took to cooking the meal. When she had done the cooking, food-poisoning had been a possibility but she decided that with dad it would be a dead cert, so she finally relented and agreed to a cooked ham.

My cousin, another neurotic housewife, maintains the family tradition. My aunt reassures me that in the past she has thrown the turkey away on Christmas morning simply because it smelt a bit funny if you shoved your nose right up its bottom and inhaled deeply. She now maintains an extra freezer full of emergency Christmas Dinner rations just in case she comes across another 'slightly odd' smelling turkey.

Christmas continued to deteriorate when I got married. My husband, Jay, felt awkward in social gatherings which didn't involve large quantities of alcohol and my parents felt awkward when their son in law drank large quantities of alcohol, ignoring everyone, becoming increasingly drunk, then falling into an alcoholic sleep on the sitting room floor. I found it easier to celebrate Christmas on our own, but it wasn't much of a celebration. My mother in law would send a Christmas card, including a present for Jay, my parents would send a card and presents for both of us. At first, I found it hurtful and expected Jay to mention it to his mother, then I told him he should mention it, then I just accepted it in mute, but increasingly bitter silence. He maintained that it could not be discussed with his mother, case closed. Over the years, I continued to buy my in-laws a Christmas present, but was never thanked and the present was always left, unused and unwanted at the back of a cupboard. The Christmas meal was spent in silence, like all of our meals and no-one ever came to visit.

When we had children, Christmas became more meaningful. However, I started suffering from extreme sleep deprivation, since none of the children slept through the night or even took daytime naps and I was continually fighting the desire to fall asleep. That problem was finally resolved when our youngest child, Alex became six years old and suddenly decided to sleep through the night. Jay also had problems sleeping and when he was asleep he was the windiest person ever. My nights were spent listening to, and smelling, his frantic guts whilst waiting for the children to demand my immediate attention. At four o'clock, Jay would wake up, wake me up, stomp downstairs, rush to an internet betting site, then wake up the whole household by a noisy trip to the toilet. Even now, two of his children call him 'the fart man'.

So, given that I was exhausted, Christmas was always a subdued affair. I would offer to make a lasagne for Christmas Dinner, since it was the only meal that the children would all eat which didn't involve tomato ketchup, chips and beans, Jay would grudgingly make a meal which the children wouldn't eat, then go back to nursing his whisky bottle in a quiet corner, then I would tidy up the chaos of wrapping paper, broken toys, half chewed sweets and plates full of dinner.

And all the time, I ached for Jay to talk to me, show me affection, tell me I looked good or that he loved me.

As the children grew up and Jay's behaviour became more isolated and anti-social, his need to drink and the obsession with horse racing became more noticeable. The last Christmas Day he spent with the family was enjoyed in a drunken stupor, making strange comments about how miserable I was, how boring Christmas was, how awful the children were and how miserly other people were. The next day was spent glued to the racing programmes, with regular trips into the town, to the bookmakers. I sat playing with the children, watching in disbelief as he shouted at them for making too much noise, for not sitting still, for having friends who knocked on the door and for breathing loudly. He left early in the new year, still angry with the family and still adamant that his behaviour was acceptable.

His daughter, Nina, celebrated him leaving but spent the next three years in therapy.

You would think that once he had gone, order was established, happiness was welcomed into the home, life carried on and I would start to enjoy Christmas. Sorry, I'm clearly too weird to do that. For the next two years, our Christmases were ruined by Jay offering the children wonderful presents, then demanding they see him, or keeping his sister's presents from the children because of some unspecified misdemeanor. I would be left frantically searching for the money to pay for a present which was so big and so wonderful that it took away the mean-spiritedness of Jay. Finally, I gave up, as Pip grew into the part of Scrooge.

Pip is incredibly self-centred and just forgets to even consider other people. He would contact Jay, asking for a particular present, then sit back and expect it. It never occurred to him that Jay regularly let him down and manipulated him through his presents. Two years ago Pip wanted a particular mobile phone for Christmas. He phoned up his dad and asked for it. He told me that Jay had agreed to buy it. I doubted that Jay would be so straight-forward enough to listen to Pip and act upon what he heard, but I left them to it and chose an alternative set of presents. At the time, Pip was interested in the army, so I bought everything from the local army surplus shop. He had an arctic sleeping bag, a tiny stove to fit in a rucksack, a water bottle, a penknife and the ubiquitous sweets. I carefully and lovingly wrapped them all up and placed them under the Christmas tree ready for the following morning. In the meantime, the present from Jay arrived and it wasn't a phone. Rather, it was sixty pounds worth of high street gift vouchers. Pip was furious.

Christmas morning arrived and Pip's alarm clock rang through the house. For the only time in his life, he got straight out of bed and marched downstairs. He opened his presents in record time, discarding them amongst the wrappings. His siblings and I woke up slowly and met on the landing to wish each other a happy Christmas, then started walking downstairs. Pip pushed past us on the way back up, announcing that he hadn't got a phone, the presents were shit and Christmas was shit. That set the tone for the rest of the day, as the weather was shit, the meal I had carefully baked was shit, his siblings were shit and I was shit. We dragged him to church and thankfully managed to keep him quiet during the service. When all the older members came up and wished us a happy Christmas and kindly asked what the children had received, Nina and Alex skillfully kept them occupied, chatting about sweets and toys whilst I ran after my incandescent Pip, grateful that most of the congregation was deaf, so couldn't hear the obscenities issuing from his cherubic mouth.

Looking back, that Christmas was painful but helped the rest of us come to terms with Pip's problems. We knew from first Jay's behaviour, then Pip's, that Christmas is a difficult time for people with Asperger's and we accepted that we weren't going to have that warm, fuzzy Christmas which other people seem to enjoy. We already knew that Pip couldn't accept life on our terms, so we couldn't expect him to behave any differently at Christmas. It was up to us to change and we did. Now, just as my mother managed to juggle three meals on Christmas Day, I juggle two worlds. They sit side by side and overlap periodically. I've learnt to enjoy and rejoice in those overlaps but not to expect them. I accept that Christmas involves change for Pip, which he finds painful, I accept that I cannot make firm commitments and arrangements in case Pip gets upset, I accept that Christmas has to be celebrated amongst our closest friends and family members, that he will probably sit in his room alone and that he will never appreciate the effort that we go to. However, on the occasions when Pip does interact or take part in something, I have to be thankful.

And as for Jay? Earlier this year I finally bought the last high street voucher off Pip and spent it on toothpaste I didn't particularly want. This year, Jay has decided that the children didn't even deserve a Christmas card and strangely, Pip is happier receiving no present than the wrong one. It really has been a blessed and peaceful Christmas here.

Musical Chairs on Christmas Day

2009-12-23T01:37:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, Pip broke another dining chair. That brings his total up to four and leaves us one dining chair short on Christmas Day.

This time, I knew the chair was broken and had been nursing it for weeks, so it wasn't too much of a shock. He stood on it, so it was and accident, besides it is weeks since the Great Chair Breaking Fest and I've got over it now.

It started off insignificantly enough, with an old chair, which could have broken for any reason. I wasn't unduly suspicious and my major concern was the fact that he was chewing the leg, which was varnished. The next one broke soon after. Within a week, I had four chairs glued and braced.

It was only when I caught Pip pulling a leg off, balancing on the remaining three, chewing the fourth leg and working on the computer that it finally twigged what was happening. I confronted him and he moaned that he had to chew the chair because I wouldn't feed him. Ella was on the phone to me and could hear the conversation. 'What's he doing?' she asked. 'Oh, it's ok, I've just discovered what happened to the chairs, he pulls the legs off and chews them because he is hungry.' There was silence on the other end of the phone, then that huge, warm belly laugh I love in Ella.

The fact is that Ella understands where we are coming from. Her sons have Asperger's (and probably a handful of other problems) and she is used to the behaviour, the eccentricities and the confusion which the Asperger's causes. We take it in turns to marvel over each other's problems, laughing at the surreal environments we live in. We discuss the response of 'normal' mothers, the ones who worry and fuss about homework, clothes, the state of the house and what the neighbours think. We joke about our shame, the reality of living with boys who are disturbed, who frighten people and who live in a closed, frightening world. Most of all, we don't judge each other. She knows that I am just a normal mother, in an abnormal situation, trying to make sense of the enigma which is my son. I offer the same safe haven.

In the meantime, a spot of glue and some strong twine should save us from hot-seating on Christmas Day.

An Early Christmas Gift

2009-12-22T03:30:00.000-08:00

I received a copy of a letter from the ex-husband, Jay today. It reads as follows:

Dear Sir/Madam,
I am the respondent in the above case and represented myself at the initial hearing before District Judge X on 7th October 2009.

The appointment for the financial dispute resolution is due for 19th January 2010 at 2pm. I am writing to request a postponement of this meeting because I have a hospital appointment (which I have been waiting 5 years for) on 18th January 2010 that requires me to undergo an anaesthetic. The documentation from the hospital directs me to not work or sign any legal documents on the day following the treatment.

As regards the valuation of our marital home, I notice that an identical property in an inferior position in the same street is currently on sale for £40 000. I therefore must insist upon an up to date independent valuation of my jointly owned property. When we have a correct valuation of the property we can proceed on other matters.

I have to date received nothing from the applicant's solicitors in terms of orders or offers.

Yours faithfully
Jay Aspergers
Dr Jay Aspergers

copy
Mrs Aspergers
Mrs Aspergers' solicitor

If I wasn't at loggerheads with the man then I would laugh at the lies and misinformation in the letter.

Six years before he left home, Jay's father died of liver cancer. I put it down to his drinking, he always started the day's drinking straight after breakfast and by nightfall he was grinning inanely. Within weeks of his death, it was decided that he had probably died from colon cancer. Jay decided that he could develop the same thing and arranged for testing. So began the Great Endoscopy.

I suppose there are a few perverted people in this world who look forward to and positively relish an endoscopy, but generally it is something no-one appreciates as an experience. Jay took this dislike to new heights. Months before the intended appointment, long before he had a date, he would start getting angry. This anger would grow and grow, until it had reached the most incredible proportions. Then the letter would arrive, with tablet to be taken the day before. His whole mind would shut down at this point, apart from that part which thought about the endoscopy. The family's activities and plans had to revolve around Daddy's bowels. Food was discussed in terms of its effect on the bowels, the shopping list had to be rewritten so that it met his bowels' needs, I had to stay at home, for the day before hand, so that he could discuss his bowels, nothing else, just his bowels.

The entire family (apart from Jay) was shouted at to the point of trauma.

After the endoscopy he was actually quite pleasant, in the same way as his father used to be a relatively happy drunk. I put it down to the valium. Unfortunately, the hospital staff never thought to give me enough valium to keep him in that state until the next appointment five years on.

These endoscopies happened twice, and it was the last one which proved to be the final straw which precipitated the separation. This time, Jay received the letter and the tablets after a particularly difficult six months. He had been exceptionally abusive to the rest of us and we learned to be quiet and mouse like when in his company. Nina, our rather spirited teenaged daughter, fed up with listening to him abusing me and shouting at the children for no reason, used to beg me to kick him out. I would try to reason with her that he was under a lot of stress of work and couldn't help the shouting and anger. Was he under stress at work? I don't know but it was an excuse I always used when his temper got to much.

He received the appointment details before Christmas, so he degenerated into an awful caricature of a bad-tempered, rude and offensive teenager. On Christmas Eve he suddenly demanded that I leave the children and go off to Midnight Mass with him. During our lunch on Christmas Day, he entertained the children with complaints about how boring I was because I wouldn't go to pubs, betting shops and racecourses with him, which wasn't strictly true, said that the only good Christmas was one spent sleeping off a hangover, then promptly passed out for the rest of the day, waking up at nightfall to tell me that the wine had gone off and made him ill. Since he had only had three glasses and was clearly drunk before the bottle was opened, it was unlikely.

The next few days revolved around his bowels, until his prearranged appointment. He had left the letter and tablets on the dressing table for a month and by the day before the appointment it had disappeared. It was clearly my fault and I had stolen it to hurt him. In the meantime, I already had an appointment to attend a pottery workshop with the children, which I had saved up to pay for, so I told him to take his bowels and get to the hospital by another means. He got someone else to take him but I picked him up. This time he was grumpy because I had waited for the hospital staff to phone me and tell me to pick him up. The valium didn't make him into the cheerful drunk I had hoped for.

Within days, the atmosphere at home was horrific, with Jay walking around bad-tempered and abusive, the children scared that he was going to attack me again and me scared but determined not to allow him to frighten me. I took to sitting him down in the evenings and asking him why he was so nasty to me. He would sit there for hours, imitating a dead man, then shout that he had always hated me, I had forced him into marriage and my only redeeming feature was that I was a good mother. It wasn't true and he was the one who had pushed the marriage, but he often tried to hurt me and he knew this would serve the purpose.

Days later he left but I took care to tell him he could come back if he returned to the therapy sessions he had originally been prescribed by the psychologist. I even arranged for marriage guidance sessions but he wasn't interested.

He has since got married. Or rather, he started seeing a colleague, a rather plain, fat spinster many years his junior. He phoned me up four months later, demanding a divorce because he had to get married as he was sleeping with someone else.

Last week I received the appointment for the endoscopy and to be honest, I laughed and hastily redirected it to his new address. He would have to attend the hospital and the new wife would see a whole new side of him, particularly his bowels.

So the endoscopy appointment of which he wrote 'I have been waiting five years for' is a routine endoscopy which he only has every five years. He couldn't make an appointment any earlier and it was so important that he never bothered about telling them about the change in address.

As for the neighbour's house being up for sale, he first told me about it over a year ago, so it is hardly news. Yet he agreed to a value on our home at the court hearing.

This is part of his plan to stall the financial settlement. At the moment he pays maintenance for the children but refuses to pay any maintenance for me because I should be going to work (the disabled child just being an excuse I invented with the help of a bent consultant psychiatrist). He has also decided that I am living with someone, so any additional expenses which relate to the children should be paid for by my live in lover. The fact that no-one else's name appears on the electoral roll just goes to prove my dishonesty. The fact that the children have never seen or heard the man who shares my bed just goes to prove that I have poisoned them against their father.

Years ago we attended mediation, in an attempt to get a financial settlement. I knew we were on to a loser there because he couldn't discuss things during the marriage, other than the odd, evil insult carefully chosen and lobbed at me to frighten me our of any ideas of talking. The mediation required both of us to provide details of our finances but he wouldn't. Instead, he launched into a careful, controlled tirade of insults about me poisoning the children against him. The mediators suggested that a court hearing to establish contact was a possibility. He took that to mean that they, or I, could take me to court and force me to arrange access. I tried gently, to tell him that the children didn't like him, one of them threatened to leave home if he ever came back and the police had told me they would contest any attempt at establishing visiting rights for him. He dismissed it as lies. In the meantime, I was paying £150 per hour for him to wriggle out of any hope of a financial settlement. The mediation suddenly fell down when I, devastated by Nina's recent diagnosis of an auto-immune disease, was repeatedly accused of having Munchausen's by proxy.

Mediation could never work because of his Asperger's Syndrome.

There then followed two years of my solicitor, Mr Harker requesting financial details, offering my financial details, making an offer, having the offer turned down because 'Mrs Asperger has earning capacity and refuses to work.'

There then followed a strange flurry of letters between Jay and Mr Harker, as Mr Harker tried to establish if Jay had remarried. Yes, he had but he didn't live with his wife, so no correspondence must be sent to her house. Mr Harker said that a court wouldn't expect a newly married couple to live apart, I told him that Jay wouldn't live with me when we first got married because he already had a home with his mother and she wouldn't let me live in her home. Mr Harker's eyebrows have a way of rising up his forehead whenever I tell him about some of Jay's eccentricities. Poor Mr Harker, I sometimes worry that he will be forced to take early retirement after this.

Finally, in desperation, my solicitor warned me that Jay had no intention of making a financial settlement and we were left with no choice but to take him to court. Even now, he's playing for time. He requested a postponement of the first hearing on the grounds of his ill health, too much work and a holiday. I suppose he could have thrown in that his car didn't work, his breakfast wasn't made or his suit wasn't pressed. Now he has made up this little knot of lies.

So, I have an ex-husband who has a poorly understood concept of the truth, can't understand my lack of enthusiasm over his bowels and has thought up another reason for delaying the financial settlement.

Knitting for Britain

2009-12-15T02:10:00.000-08:00

May and I are busy knitting. She knits slowly, carefully and methodically, in her germanic way. She keeps her knitting carefully rolled up in a wicker basket, which fits so neatly on her arm. I hurry through mine, dropping stitches, missing patterns and sewing it up with a burning thread. I ram it into plastic carrier bags, dropping the needles down the side of the couch as I tidy it up. She knits to make herself clothes, I knit to calm myself down. She is still on her first jumper, I have a wardrobe full of brightly knitted socks, jumpers and hats. I still manage to sleep, I function as a responsible adult and I don’t jump when the phone rings, so it must be working.

On Saturday afternoons May comes over, with her basket over her left arm. We take out the growing handiwork and marvel at the colours and the textures, repairing any faults and discussing the pattern while the kettle boils. Saturday afternoons are her oasis of calm, after caring for an over-active toddler during the week. Her oasis is my chaos, as I rush around looking for teapots and clean mugs, sweeping children off the sofa, tripping over gaming station wires, sorting out Pip’s anxieties and listening to yet another of his hairbrained schemes, not agreeing to them but not refusing them, in a determined effort to keep his temper sweet in front of guests. After the tea is brewed I put the cup beside her feet, so that someone will knock it over before it goes cold. The coffee table is rammed against the far wall, with a lazy stack of Nina’s birthday presents covering it.

May and I then pick up our knitting and start putting the world to rights. What is it about women ? The older they get, the more political they become, the more they grumble and the more they seek out and campaign against injustices. I suspect I would just sit at home, quietly whining, if I was alone in this, but May and I goad each other on, planning our campaign of awkwardness and public moaning.

And we do make our moans public, anyone who hasn’t heard us must be deaf. We plan visits to our local MP, questions to prospective parliamentary candidates and petitions. May even confronted one in the vegetable aisle at Tesco’s. We perfect our arguments over our knits and purls, ready to unleash them on the unsuspecting public. And we are so careful to choose our grouses. Not for us some trite, Daily Mail, Middle England battle. Rather we choose some obscure government plan, made on the hoof, designed to placate the Daily Mail reading public, for which we feel we are especially knowledgeable, in contrast to the rest of the country.

So what is our most recent problem ? Home education.

We don’t have a problem with it, to the contrary, we love it. Both of us have used it for all of our children, in desperation, when traditional schooling just didn’t fit their needs. As we sit there knitting, our passion for home education exhudes through our pores, as we reminisce over the marvellous, dedicated earth mothers who make home education such a diverse, thriving community. They say that reluctant converts make the most rabid worshippers and we worship the ideals of home education. Both May and I chose home education when there was no alternative, when we could no longer placate our children or offer them any hope. I home educated for 6 years, saved Pip from the misery of mainstream school and met some wonderful and inspiring people. May continues to home educate her special needs son and he is a wonderful credit to her.

The government, however, sees us as a group of potential abusers, failures who want to brainwash their children and propagate their own disturbed views against schools. We are all keeping our children off school to hide our crimes and to prepare them for early and unsuitable marriages. Or maybe we are using home education to hide the most evil of crimes – a refusal to accept childhood immunisations ? Who knows, but we have to be identified, numbered, questioned, investigated and tested.

As with all games of chinese whispers, some of the message got lost in the telling. We started off as potential abusers, but the word potential seemed to disappear with the telling and retelling. Before long I had other mothers patiently telling me that home educators keep their children at home to hide their crimes. But in truth, home educated children are usually to be seen in the community, being educated in the streets, parks and museums which are available. The only time we stayed at home was when the home education inspector warned us of truancy patrols, which he knew would upset Pip.

I have a particular hatred of the new home education bill, which cannot be explained away just by happy memories of halcyon days, surrounded by my children as we discovered the marvels of the natural world. My dislike isn’t a salute to the friends I made during those times and it isn’t a snub to the teachers who ignored Pip’s obvious disabilities, accusing him of stupidity and laziness to cover up their own ignorance. I hate the home education bill with a vengeance because I’m fed-up with experts trying to put square pegs into obviously round holes.

My biggest gripe is that all of the experts I have met, for all their expertise, experience and qualifications, are not experts. They don’t understand the needs of children, they don’t understand the day to day upsets and anxieties of vulnerable children and they can’t appreciate that text book methods aren’t the only ways to bring up children and in some cases aren’t even an appropriate way of bringing up a particular child.

I could write about the dozens of children I know, who’s needs are not being met by the experts, but for the sake of simplicity, I will just mention Pip’s. Pip clearly had problems in nursery. While other children were happily dressing up, playing and listening to stories, he sat there in a corner, unable and unwilling to join in. The only time he became animated was during the story time. Rows of children would sit there, their heads raised, expectantly, at the teacher. Pip would grudgingly sit awkwardly, his pudgy arms folded but the hands in tight little fists, a scowl spreading across his forehead. The story would start and Pip’s anxiety would increase. He would shout out, walk towards the teacher and stroke the pictures as the assistants would reach out to catch him and control him. He couldn’t tell them that he hated stories, could only listen to facts and hated sitting down to listen to something new. The teacher thought she was setting a routine, with milk and biscuits quickly followed by a story but it wasn’t a routine, it was a different tale every day, a change from the familiarity he craved. The teachers could see that Pip came from a chatty family and that I enjoyed an easy and loving familiarity with him. His withdrawn and unhappy behaviour at school must have made them realise that he was having problems with the school itself. I look back at his old school reports at the time and they all describe classical Asperger’s Syndrome but no-one at the school thought to treat him like a child with Asperger’s.

The teacher and her assistant hatched plans to get Pip to conform. They brought out a star chart, explaining the logic, the research and the years of experience behind it. It lasted a week. Then they arranged for the assistant to sit beside him, that lasted for a couple of days. Finally, they arranged to teach him a lesson. An hour later, when it was clear he wouldn’t stop howling, they called me up to arrange collection. Over the next few weeks he sobbed out his experiences to me, of being dragged along the corridor, into the reception class, to be humiliated in front of the older children. The teachers denied it, but his sister had watched it all. The teacher, furious that I questioned her professionalism, came round to my home and harrangued me on the door step ‘Do you know how much you are ruining that boy without disciplining him ?’ ‘We were only doing what was best for him, he needs a firm hand’ ‘He was setting a bad example to the other children, we had to teach him a lesson’ ‘You are totally ruining Pip, he’s going to end up bad’ ‘Do you really want him to end up as some sort of scientist in an ivory tower ?’ Then, and now, I’d have given my eye teeth to have that sort of security about Pip’s future. Besides, I argued, his Dad was a scientist in an ivory tower and it payed the mortgage. As I slammed the door, my body slid down the wall and I sat in a crumpled heap, sobbing. I was the failure, they were the experts, it was just such a shame that Pip had to be so upset when they took him in hand.

Over the next three years, and three schools, I kept reassuring myself that Pip had to conform, that he needed the sort of discipline that schools offered, that he’d soon knuckle down and succeed. But he turned into a sullen, taciturn child who distanced himself from everyone, including me. I became used to teachers taking me on one side and explaining to me that I wasn’t up to much as a parent, somewhere amongst the school drop outs, child neglectors and drug addicts.

Finally, after some relatively mild event, which even I, in my downtrodden state, couldn’t accept as ‘good teaching practise’, I went home and asked my husband, Jay for advice. It’s never a good idea to ask Jay to take responsibility for anyone other than himself, I could see he was getting angry but I was desperate and I forced the issue. The next day he had told the headmaster that we would be educating Pip at home.

When I look back over the 21 years of marriage, I remember few things which Jay gave to me. He refused to buy jewellery as I already had a wedding ring, when he was the sole breadwinner he objected to wasting his money on me, besides, he gave me housekeeping money every month, which nearly covered our food bills. I look back at those 21 years and I remember he gave me fear, confusion, poverty, three children, a roof over my head, Pip’s home education and finally, my freedom. I will remain forever thankful for the last four of those.

Years later, emboldened by my success as a home educator, I fought to get Pip into a specialist school for communication disorders. After an amazing honeymoon period things began to go wrong. Staff began to leave, being replaced by inexperienced and untrained temporary staff who couldn’t maintain any sense of order in the school. Behaviour deteriorated, morale fell and chaos ensued. The headteacher sought to hide the problems by lying to parents who complained. Dissatisfied parents started meeting up to discuss the problems. We complained to her employers, to OFSTED and to the Department of Chidren, Schools and Families. It was a waste of time, as the latter two didn’t even listen. Her boss probably did and she looked for another job but not before she had written to our local authorities, accusing us of abuse, inadequacy, and cruelty towards our vulnerable children. I can honestly say that the accusations against me were totally unfounded and the authority took it no further. However, not all parents were as fortunate. Two parents were investigated and were asked to put their children into care voluntarily. One of them, already in a caring profession, stands to lose her job because of the accusations.

And these are the experts, the trained professionals, the caring and committed people who know so much about our children that they can rise above our unprofessional, inexperienced inadequacies and can meet the needs of our children where we fail them. These are the people who will be coming to our homes and inspecting and judging our provision for our children.

In the meantime, May and I just sit and knit, waiting for this world to calm down

A lesson in brevity

2009-12-09T04:11:00.000-08:00

This month's homework is to write a summary of P's disabilities and their effect on his life and mine. It's an easy task, I've already filled in enough diagnostic forms, special needs statementing reports and assessment of needs forms, but this time the problem is the intended audience.

Last month I took my ex-husband, Jay to court, to force him to agree to a financial settlement which didn't involve him getting everything. Still, that's a better proposition to the one he originally planned when we were newly married. The news had been full of a trial involving a man who murdered his wife and hid the body for years. When she was finally discovered he got a suspended sentence. Jay saw the possibilities in this and announced it was more sensible to murder me, keep the house and at worse spend a few years in an open prison nestling in the English countryside, rather than divorce me and lose half of his house. So that's what he would do if it ever came to divorce. It came out of the blue, it wasn't a threat, just a statement of fact and apart from my general grumpiness that he refused to live with me for the first year, I had never given him an indication that he needed to divorce me. But by that time, I had realised that I was married to a very unique man.

It started within 24 hours of our wedding. He wouldn't book a honeymoon. It seems such a minor little thing in itself, but that was the first clue I had to his real nature. Instead, he came to live in my flat for a week, sitting inert and unresponsive in a corner. I decided that he was annoyed that he had missed out on a honeymoon, so I booked all I could afford, four days in a hotel way out in the suburbs of Paris. The hotel was basic and functional but we spent our days in the city centre, relying on Jay's amazing ability to negotiate the streets back to the hotel. The route led through a red light district, which would be wakening up as we walked back to the hotel in the dusk. I probably pointed out the crudeness and directness of the adverts on the club windows.

One evening we discovered a small cafe tucked in a side street, with strong wine and a relaxed service, and came back to the hotel quite late. The meal had been candlelit, we had drunk a carafe of wine, we were newly married and I linked arms with him as we walked back.

Suddenly he dropped my arm and hesitated, then bent down to fiddle with his perfectly tied shoes. I waited for him and he told me to go on ahead of him, he'd catch me up. I felt stupid, the wine had made me confused, I wasn't sure of the direction of the hotel and I wasn't even certain of its name. I waited for him but he remained bent down, urging me to go on. I looked round and found we were in the red-light district, the clubs were beginning to open, the lights were going on and black-suited doormen were half-heartedly attracting the attention of passers-by. I felt cold and scared but slight ashamed that I didn't know where the hotel was. He stood up and waited, I tried to link his arm again and rekindle the previous mood but he pushed me away, 'I'll follow you on and meet you at the hotel'. I looked round, conscious of the doormen watching as another couple had an argument about his porn needs. But we weren't like that, we were just married, I was attractive and loving and he didn't need anyone else. I felt so ashamed and the cool air stung my burning face as I tried to wipe away the tears that were welling in my eyes. He finally agreed to carry on, but I had to walk ahead of him 'because I like to look at you walking ahead of me'. I walked on slowly, feeling for his presence behind me.

We walked past a sex club, a group of doormen surrounded him with offers of cheap sex but I knew that he wasn't interested and would excuse himself from the misunderstanding and run to catch up with me, muttering at their stupidity for thinking he was wanting that sort of thing. But he didn't. The doormen, surprised at his interest, led him quietly into the building as he looked expectant and relieved. I was completely sober by then, aware that I didn't know how to go back to the hotel and ashamed by his indifference. I sank into survival mode and ran back, shouting 'he's my husband, leave him alone, he's with me!' my face raw with embarrassment and shame. The doormen, unsure of the play that was unfolding on their doorstep and clearly sorry for this silly, english-woman, stood back and left him to me. I grabbed his arm, hung tightly to it and marched back to the hotel, only relaxing my grip as we reached the reception desk.

We never spoke about the incident, it was put away but never resolved. I was so ashamed and humiliated that I put it from my mind, denying it for years. He rarely spoke anyway, reserving all his conversations to brief recounts of basic facts or snapping a criticism at me.

Six weeks later he had gone back home to his mother's house. There was no break-up, no argument, it was just that his work was too far away and he didn't want me to look for a job closer to my home. He vaguely offered to look for a job for me at his place of work. In the meantime, he reiterated that I would be unfaithful if I socialised with my male colleagues, so I settled into a solitary existence. Within five months I had handed in my notice at work, packed my bags and told Jay I was coming home to be with him. He patiently explained that his mother wouldn't let me live in his home, there were no flats to rent in his big vibrant city and he couldn't buy a house because I wouldn't like his choice. 'You can go back and live with your parents', he argued, 'they love you, they thought they'd lost you when we got married, well now they can have you back, I'll visit you at weekends.' And so started the second, equally unsatisfactory, stage of our marriage.

But back to the present, Jay's problem is that he has decided that our son, P isn't disabled. Ok, he has a few quirks like his dad, but he isn't disabled. Whilst I agree with Jay's former statement, I have to accept that a psychiatrist has diagnosed those quirks as Asperger's Syndrome and mild ADHD. I sought the diagnosis, to get P the help he needed, but I still refused to believe it, arguing that P can just snap out of his behaviour when he pleases, it's just that he doesn't want to yet. Besides, as time goes on, he becomes increasingly like his father, who has a good job and a healthy salary. Ok, when I finally got Jay to go for help, he was diagnosed with a small selection of personality disorders, but Jay always argued that it never happened with such determination, anger and force that even I began to doubt it.

So here we are with a son so disabled that he cannot even settle in a special school, can't change his clothes and is abusive to anyone who challenges him. I spend my days organising his future, apologising for his present and shaking my head with disbelief over his past. His father spends his days stewing over my laziness and refusal to work and ignores my pleas for a financial settlement. Hence the recent court case.

On the day, the judge listened with a slight impatience as Jay argued that his son wasn't disabled. She wrapped up his bleatings with a terse 'do you accept the psychiatrist's diagnosis?', then declared that since the government considered P disabled enough to require a full-time carer, Jay couldn't argue further. But Jay came back with comments about how our son had been different but certainly not a challenge when Jay lived with us. By that time, garrulous old me, desperate to please the judge who had agreed with me, asked her if she wanted further evidence of P's disability. I mean, just describing our typical day would be enough to convince anyone. She declined but suggested that I could provide it in a letter to Jay, since he was the one who needed convincing. Hence the homework.

Now I'm left with providing a summary of P's disability, without giving away any details of the lives we now live or without hinting at the amazing people our other children are turning into. Don't get me wrong, I don't want him to be part of my life, I'm fed up with his control and manipulation, but I accept that he has to know what P's problems are. It's the other children who don't want him to know anything about their lives and don't want him to take part in their future.

Dear Jay,
As you know, P has a diagnosis of Asperger's Syndrome, dyspraxia, dyslexia and dysgraphia. He also suffers from mild ADHD. You are aware he has shown obsessive-compulsive tendencies for the last twelve years. As you know, he attended three mainstream schools before the age of 6. When his third placement failed and I asked you to help me complain to the headmaster you de-registered him and told me to teach him at home.

His extremely poor hygiene standards continued after you left and he now stinks. He blames it on my refusal to buy him anti-perspirant, so he can make holes in the can or spray it at his brother's face. He has sensory issues, which mean that he has a limited and inappropriate wardrobe, which we have to shop for in all-night supermarkets. I still take his rubbish directly to the tip, to prevent him from foraging in the dustbins.

When you left he couldn't use a knife and fork, choosing to eat his mashed potatoes and gravy directly from his grubby fingers. I've since taught him to use a spoon for sloppy food. If his brother sits nearby then he throws the food at him and I have to pick mashed potato out of a rush-seated chair. That won't be a problem in the near future, as he is slowly taking our dining chairs apart. He removes one leg, balances on the other three and chews the free leg. If I challenge him then he argues that he is hungry and I won't feed him.

He has an addiction to fizzy drinks, which propel him into a sugar-induced adrenalin rush. During his last one, I had to jump in front of his sister to protect her. However, the security guards at the airport were alerted to his behaviour by his shouting and were already on the way to see what was going on.

Our last holiday was ruined by a five day tantrum and I spent one night awake, checking that he hadn't run off. He started threatening me when I was negotiating a side road on a blind bend, so I hit him. Still, that was better than the previous one, when we were threatened with eviction from a camp site because of his foul language, screamed across the slopes of Mount Snowdon.

His obsession with knives continued after you left and he now has an impressive collection to go with the BB guns and the baseball bats. He uses the BB guns to shoot at targets made from photographs of the management at his previous school. Fortunately, the guns wear out reasonably quickly. On a more positive note, his fascination with fire burnt out soon after he accidentally set fire to the dining room.

I have learned to live with his suicide attempts. His sister hasn't and still gets upset when he self-harms. She never really got over the day when she walked into his room and found him with a rope wrapped tightly around his neck.

In the interests of my personal safety, we have banned parties, even when he isn't in the house. The one exception, our daughter's 18th birthday, was followed and marred by a five week trail of destruction and abuse of me. My closest friend's husband was a bit shocked when I walked into their house and burst into tears. It's not quite polite for a visitor. Still, he did insist that she keep the door unlocked at all times, so I can just wander in and claim refuge when things get tough.

P has attended two specialist schools for communication disorders in the last four years. He wants to leave his current school because they challenge his unacceptable behaviour. He has very few qualifications, is abusive when things don't go his way and cannot accept authority. When I say he is abusive, I mean in the sort of way that you were. Don't you remember our daughter phoned 999 once when you were chasing me around the house, threatening to kill me? It was the policeman who described it as abuse and it was the domestic incident team who asked me to press charges against you but at the time I was still in love with the idea that I could cure you.

Our local social services argue that P does not meet their criteria, but refuse to tell me what their criteria are. I suspect it is because he has a high IQ. Our local mental health services once suggested that I lock up all the knives because he tried to strangle himself. When things were really bad last year, a psychiatrist offered me a prescription for Risparadol, which I never took. They have a six week waiting list for new referrals, which they feel more than makes up for the fact that they will not tackle Asperger's Syndrome. All our consultations seem to take place on the phone and centre around my obvious distress. I think they think that my distress is the cause of all our problems and can be switched off by a few patronising words by a mental health worker.

Once, when he was threatening to kill me, I contacted NHS Direct, thinking they might have a magic cure which my GP didn't know about. They did, it's called the Police, who come round, arrest the child and take him away. My friend uses them as a respite service when things get really crazy. With luck, they keep her son in the cells overnight and send him home in a police car the next day.

And in spite of all this, I love our son and it breaks my heart to see him like this. He, like you, has decided that I have let him down with a stupid list of silly little events which prove to him that I am an untrustworthy liar. Everyone who knows us well, and knows the amazing support I give him on a daily basis, is shocked to see how he views me and how he treats me.
Yours sincerely,
Mrs Asperger

No, too much information, how about-

Dear Jay,
As you know, P has a diagnosis of Asperger's Syndrome, dyspraxia, dyslexia and dysgraphia. He also has mild ADHD.

Details of these conditions, and how they impinge on his life can be found in any standard textbook on autistic spectrum disorders.

Yours sincerely,
Mrs Asperger

Well, at least it's a start.