I have a 12 yrs old functioning autistic step daughter

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I have met the love of my life, and she has an autistic 12 year old.
I met her 3 years ago, so i met the daughter when she was 8 going on 9. at the time she wasn't diagnosed autistic but i noticed some behavior to be concerned about. Almost a year afterwards we had her diagnosed high functioning autistic with high anxiety.
There has always been "bad blood" between her and i. She was very trying in the the beginning and shot down by my responses. Her attempts appeared non sincere and robotic. they appeared to be not because she wanted the positive attention but because she wanted to replicate what me and my children have. I have tried to explain to her numerous times that our relationship will be different that theirs because we are different people. but the father daughter relationship will be similar.

Over the years we have this strange relationship where if I am the only one around we are fine. but let there be others and she becomes stubborn and argumentative with me.

there is always comparison to others and a struggle to make things "fair" but she doesn't follow the rules either, so we have a classic case of pot and kettle.

this really concerns me because I don't want our relationship to stay the way it is. it is not healthy for anyone in the house for us to be this way. Honestly she is this way with everyone except her mother.

so there is constant drama in the house because she becomes fixated and loses control of her emotions and then makes a big deal out of a mole hill.

the only way she is satisfied is when she gets what she wants.tell her something she doesn't want to here and the fits and "whys?" don't stop.

what do i do? I am very frustrated in the house and feel it is a constant source of tension in my family.

forgot to mention she has one older sister and a younger step brother and younger step sister.

Have you thought of family counseling? This could just be the normal reaction that you can sometimes get when a step parent comes into the picture.

yes we are setup for family counseling. All of the kids go right now and I go on friday. I am the stepparent here.
I am very confident that our counselor will help me learn to build a better relationship with all of the children. I do admit maybe its me. I am very provincial in my thinking. very old fashioned father.

today i got attitude because i pointed out her lack of wearing a belt and the fact her zipper was undone.
the belt wearing rule has been in place for the last 3 years. but somehow she forgets almost every day.
then when questioned why she forgets theres attitude. when i suggest she make a reminder in one of her electronic devices she catches more of an attitude.

how do you not get angry with a child that constantly breaks the rules of the house and constantly gets an attitude with you EVERY time you tell her something she doesn't want to hear?

its like she is autistic and hypocritical at the same time and has the attitude of a grown woman.

my concern is that there is no way any 12 year old child should get under my skin like this.

What have you done to educate yourself about ASD? I ask because I don't think it's possible for you to have a successful or healthy relationship with her unless you do eveything you can to understand how differently she perceives and experiences the world from the way you do. Does it ever feel like you are speaking two different languages? It's because, in many ways, you really are. I'm sure some of the parents on this forum can recommend some excellent resources if that would be helpful.

I'll preface this by saying that I do, like the majority of the members of this site, have an ASD diagnosis myself. So, take my comments with a grain of salt, if you feel you should, but when I was reading your posts, I was concerned at how cold and hostile you came across. (Read back and look at the way you described her and your feelings towards her). Even if you don't make those types of remarks around her, she is bound to pick up on your feelings towards her and respond to them, just like anyone else would. Truthfully, if I had a step-parent who viewed me as a being insincere, robotic and basically a huge problem in his life, I don't imagine I would warm up to him very well myself.

I think it's wonderful that you are pursuing family counseling and hope that helps. I also hope you chose a counselor with some background in ASD because, otherwise, I'd be concerned they might not be able to help you and your family with these issues as well as they should.

I don't know much about step parenting other than having known people who have had them. Take what I say in that spirit.

I think NT kids have a psychologically normal resentment for new people who get to order them around because of their relationship with the parent. The child has no say so in this and they resent it. I think this is a normal feeling. I am not saying it is right, but it is normal.

In my mind an autistic person would have even bigger problems with this than NT. Autistic people HATE change. This is a huge change. Autistic people do understand rules and hierarchy and are I think are acutely aware of when another person gets to jump in front of them in the hierarchy.

Family therapy will be useful assuming the therapist is a good fit, and understands autistic people and can develop credibility with the child.

You are not married to her mother, yet, right? Are you co-habitating? Do you do childcare that is independent of the bio-mom's presence? Is it possible for you from a logistic standpoint to let your gf do the disciplining while you work to develop a better relationship with the child.,

Also a young (autistic) girl who has just entered or will soon be entering puberty probably does not want a man who is not related to her commenting on her clothing ---belts, open zippers, etc. If you can punt nothing else, please try to have her mom tackle that stuff.

I understand that circumstances may not allow that, if you are doing childcare by yourself before she heads off to school. If you have to do this try to do it sensitively even if it is a daily problem. If she doesn't have more personal female issues yet, she soon will, and that is another thing you will want to try to not be involved in. If your gf has to change her schedule to make sure she is the one handling that stuff, then I strongly recommend that happen.

I have lots of sympathy for you... That kind of thing happens even when it is an NT child. She feels like you are replacing her father. Plus Autistics don't like change.

What i'd like to know, HOW do you point it out exactly? A friendly way? Or a "you're an idiot, i can't believe you forgot your belt again" way?

How can you question WHY someone has forgotten their belt? It's not an act of disobedience. Aspies live in their heads and they're very single minded, forgetting things is 100% normal. The attitude is probably due to you picking up on a fault that she can't do anything about, how would you react to being drilled on something you have no control over, again? Point things out like you're helping her and not just getting at her.


No offence but i had a step father and I was one of the best kids you could possibly have and he still managed to find endless silly reasons to just grate on at me all day and night. I don't know the full story obviously, i know i could be wrong, but are you really enforcing the rules of the house or do have a dislike of the girl that means you're constantly looking for something? Really? You wouldn't be the first person to be that way with an aspie, nts seem to have an instinctive dislike for aspies and it's almost like they can't control themselves.


One things for sure, she'll never do what you want if you she doesn't respect you and if you don't sort the constant conflict out you're going to really mess her up. Living in a house where someones going on at you all the time and you can't escape is a horrible experience, even more so for aspies who tend to live in the moment and are a LOT more sensitive than they let on, it probably seems to her that she's can't ever remember a time when home meant anything other than conflict. I know it's hard to earn the respect of someone that you don't like but you're the adult, you have the control even if you don't realise.

This girl sounds a lot like me. I understand the strong compulsion to make everything fair--when people say "life's not fair," it makes me want to remove myself from life. This is the only thing that can make me so depressed, so I can understand completely why she would want fairness so much.

I also understand completely the "why" questions. I don't like having to blindly follow whatever someone wants me to do without knowing what's going on. I suggest that if there's no time to answer why right at that moment, you tell her that you can't answer right then and you will tell her later. Also make sure that she knows that because of her young age she may not understand the reason even if you try to explain why.

There's another thing you should be aware of--there is no "why" to forgetting. It's chance. She can't magically make herself remember something. If people could do this, everyone would get 100% on every test and quiz. She can make herself more likely to remember something, but she may still forget in the most favorable of circumstances. Don't push her on this type of thing.

Also, YOU'RE NOT HER DAD!

Okay. I hope you got that; this will help her if you recognize that and don't try to pretend that you will ever be her dad. I have a stepmom and a stepdad, but they will NEVER replace my real parents no matter how much I like them. Don't act like you're her dad.

Also, you need to become a lot more open-minded about autism and Asperger's Syndrome. You need to understand that her brain is fundamentally different from your brain and the brains of her daughters. You cannot treat her like a Neurotypical, nor can you treat her the way you want to be treated. Treat her with the Respect with which you would want to be treated; this means you should treat her the way SHE wants to be treated.

You should also make sure that she knows how you want to be treated--and you may need to explain more than you think for her to truly understand. Give her concrete rules, and understand that some days she may be more anxious and have trouble remembering that you want to be treated a certain way. She may also have trouble controlling herself on these days.

Part of Asperger's Syndrome/autism involves anxiety-related meltdowns that seem like temper tantrums to the uneducated. These meltdowns are different, though, because they don't always immediately go away when the original problem is rectified. If she has a meltdown like this, she is probably feeling HORRIBLE, and the best thing for you to do is leave her alone if she asks, or help her if she asks. Don't try to punish her in the middle of these meltdowns. If she does something wrong during the meltdown, then maybe her mom or her REAL dad can discipline her, but you need to stay out of it, since you know nothing about the way her brain works. Only her parents, mental health professionals, and other people with ASD have a chance at knowing the slightest bit of how her mind works.

Most, if not all, people with ASD have these meltdowns. Try to be sensitive to her needs, even if you don't understand them. It's the least you could do since all of us autistic people are working our butts off trying to be sensitive to the needs of Neurotypicals, even though they seem completely insane to us.

My daughter also does very well one on one but less well when there are others present. I say this to try to help you understand that it's not YOU that is the problem. The fact that the two of you do fine one on one tells me that perhaps the issue is when another person is added to the mix, things can become overwhelming and/or confusing for her. I don't really know how to explain it...

When my daughter is present she wants all communication addressed to her-it's almost like she wants to be the "center" of attention, but that's not really it. She has trouble understanding the give and take of communication-so when two NT people are communicating in her presence she becomes agitated. Most likely, when it is just her and one other person, the person changes their communication to what she understands. That stops when two NT people are conversing in the presence of someone with ASD, and that causes distress.

There are probably lots of things that you are thinking she "gets" when in actuality she is struggling. For instance, the belt issue. Why does she have to wear a belt? Why is there a rule that she must wear a belt? Even I find that confusing, so for her I am sure, to have to contstantly remember to wear a belt "or else" is difficult.

My suggestion would be to try to be a bit more accepting of her differences and not require her to live up to the same standards as your other children. She is different--not broken or damaged--just different. Those differences, while giving her amazing capabilties on one hand (and allow her to appear much more emotionally and socially mature than she probably actually IS), also present unique obstacles that prevent her from acting in a way that you find "appropriate". Dial back the "requirements" and work on each individual issue one at a time. Use positive reinforcement not chastising remarks. Show her she is ok the way she is. Accept her differences while carefully helping her be the best she can be.

I forgot about this part. I'm shocked that you don't know about this yet. I'm going to put it in bold and capitals with afro dudes around it so that it stands out and gets seared into your brain...

AUTISTIC PEOPLE SOMETIMES SEEM ROBOTIC WHEN THEY ATTEMPT TO USE SOCIAL SKILLS

This is because of lack of social skills, of course! When we use complicated social skills, we are doing something completely unnatural to us, so it's probably going to seem robotic! And, what is this?? Being percieved as natural is...*GASP*...A SOCIAL SKILL! Who would have thought it?

I'm sorry if I'm mocking you, but you should know that you're not going to get much sugar-coating or sympathy from us autistic people, because we've been where she is. Your stepdaughter going through life as though she were in another country where people were all speaking a foreign language. They can give her broken messages, but 80% of what they're saying to her and each other is unreadable to her. When she tries to get messages across to them, they have unpredictable reactions because she's constantly violating customs she doesn't even know about. I would even go so far as to say that it's like she's living with a different species and trying to figure out how to communicate with them. Whenever there is a miscommunication, these people punish her, and she doesn't understand why. They tell her she's stupid, or she's insensitive, or she's got "attitude," or she's pathetic. She's probably wondering if she will ever be able to form long-term friendships or romantic relationships.

She's probably being bullied in school. They see how different she is, and they try to provoke her and upset her. When she retaliates, she gets in trouble for something she may not have even known was wrong! You may think that she's not being bullied because she hasn't told you about it, but many autistic people don't know to tell people about bullying, or we're too afraid to tell. Sometimes, she may tell teachers about how the students are treating her and get no response from them! It's fairly common for teachers to ignore the plight of autistic students. I know what this is like--many of us do.

You've said she has extreme anxiety. She probably also has sensory problems. The anxiety puts her constantly into fight-or-flight mode, making it harder for her to react rationally to surprising situations. Sometimes, she probably feels like she's living in a literal nightmare. If she has sensory problems, then everything seems ten times louder; colors are so much brighter; and the slightest touch could bring horrible pain or discomfort. She could, like some autistic people, have a constant low-level pain throughout her body.

On top of all that, this creepy dude enters her life and tries to marry her mother, the one person of this different species that she can trust! She may or may not have access to her father, and her father may or may not have treated her well. If she has (or had) a close relationship with her father, she may feel scared that this guy will replace him. If she had a bad relationship with her father, she may feel like this guy will turn out to be just like him. If she hasn't seen her father in a long time and misses him, the pain is multiplied. Regardless, this guy is probably coming between her and her mother. Think how terrifying this must be!

There are probably many other issues that you or I don't know about. She may be questioning her (or his or its) gender or sexuality and wondering how her family will react; she may have a crush on someone at school and not know how to deal with it; she may have been hurt by someone; she may be going through therapy with an unsympathetic therapist; she may have any sort of problems that I haven't come up with yet. You may think that she tells you or her mother everything, but she probably doesn't. Even if she tells things that others may consider private, she probably doesn't tell everything.

I've tried to give you a picture of what it's probably like to be her. Don't believe that autistic people have no empathy! We know where she's been.

^That's very well said. Especially the part about empathy.

I also was a single father of two children prior to meeting my future wife. I started this relationship with open arms and a clear head. please remember she wasn't diagnosed autistic when i met her and her mother denied that she was. I was the one that pushed for her to get extra help. Yes i may seem very cold in my talking about my step daughter and if your were ET(new phrase for me) then after the three years i have been with her you would be quite frustrated yourself.

Please remember what makes this further difficult is that we are a blended family. I have two ET children. She has one ET older daughter and one autistic child. The autistic child has never met his father and he died after she was born. the oldest daughter is a drug dealer and is not involved in her life at all. the biggest problems arise when as you say I have to see her differently and dial down the expectations. Then she expects to be treated and have the same liberties the other children have. This causes huge arguments among the children because she doesn't accept the rules we put in place for her and always compares them to the other children.
She appears to be very mean to her siblings. Attitude toward all of them. very condescending. but always ready to cry or have a fit when "her feelings are hurt".
this is very frustrating because the other children as children lose their patience with her.
The older blood sister literally avoids her younger autistic sister because of how her sister treats her.
these feelings were there between the sisters before i came into the picture.
I would spend time talking with the older sister explaining that she cannot be that way with her younger sister because her younger sister is different and really can't help herself.
After three years of living with them and watching the behavior of the younger daughter towards the siblings, I empathize with the older sister because the younger sister pretty much does what she wants with little reprecussion.
the other kids look at us when we discipline them for doing something wrong and say"alyssa can do whatever she wants and WE'RE getting in trouble?" this causes a lot of dismay in the house.

@diniesaur- So basically from what i am being told here is to pretty much release control to the mom because i am good enough a "father" to do everything else, go to games, go to doctors visits, go to class parties and field trips, go to lunch, sit in hospitals after surgery, stay home from work cause she is sick, spend countless amount of money because she just straight destroys everything from clothing to headphones to shoes, BUT when it comes to discipline I am not good enough to be a father then. Please keep in mind that my older child from my side isn't my biological which i won primary custody of and been taking care of since he was 8months. So i am his dad and will be hers. ASK MY SON. he also knows about his other dad. her older sister knows i am not her father and also speaks to her father from time to time and loves me for being what he never will be.

please think about what you are saying....please think about how frustrating it is.

@the_sleeper- also about the rule for the belt. she already has started her period. she is 12 years old at 193 pounds. she has always been on the heavier than average side. if she doesn't wear a belt we see butt crack all day. she gets teased at school for but crack. give her bigger better fitting clothes and she doesn't want to wear because thats not what the other children wear.
fly down, i have to tell her about that or she will come home crying because someone at school made fun of her.
her mom is in nursing school and cannot be late or miss a class so her flexibility is not there.

her classes are adjusted and made easier and less work is given to help with her anxiety. when she gets report cards she brags to her siblings about how she did better than them. we try to explain to the other children to not let it bother them but that is another effort in itself.

she is the bully in school, she just perceives it as her getting bullied. We have raised hell at the school for other children treating her poorly and the school showed us tapes after tapes and my daughter was the antagonist and the bully and the finisher.

I love this child and she is a beautiful child at times, and other times i get a jekyll and hyde daughter.

i have friends that i grew up with that is on the spectrum. good friends. yes they are different. but one thing they are is humble. my daughter is not. you are more inclined to help someone if they are humble than help someone who is downright rude. Yes or No?

the routines for the children are the same they all get the same attention, same hugs same kisses same money for school, same number of clothes, same everything.

she is always using other peoples stuff even though she was given her own stuff and was explained to her that she shouldn't use other peoples stuff because it is the exact same stuff. we write the names on the stuff. so of course the other children get upset. then she gets upset once reprimanded. now please keep in mind the other children get in trouble the consequences are way more stern. Her consequences are conversations and long explanations on why. She will argue until you have to just say because you are too young to understand and it is what it is.

I always hear autistic children don't like change. so if we do the same thing every day for 3 years, then why is she the one always breaking the rules if she has a schedule written down to follow? We are very careful when we do have to introduce change. most of the times we don't because we don't want to stress her.

Now, I am asking for help for myself, all my children, and the peace of my entire home, not just one child.

based on the comments i read here, don't parent just be there to pick up the pieces. pointless to make rules or safety measures because if she breaks them then, oh well she didn't mean to anyway. regardless of cost(physical, emotions, monetary). and this cost affect not only her but all of the children.

maybe i am reading this wrong and if so please explain differently.


Please help!! !! !

Why is one required to wear a belt in the house?

Concerning the attitude, I would ignore it. Children on the spectrum are often accused of being manipulative but in reality, most don't have the level of theory of mind required for this. Being manipulative requires being able to predict how an individual might respond to another's actions and behaviors, detect a response and adjust behavior accordingly. Children on the spectrum generally don't perceive or pay attention to the responses of others to their behavior at all. They are usually just responding to their emotions based on how they perceive the situation.

So when she becomes angry, she is likely actually responding to the situation and not you.

Only reason is because of plumbers butt. But usually not in the house unless she has on jeans. Or going out.

Thanks for the advice. I will try to keep in mind. I am literally going to apply any suggestions and update this board on how it goes.

Thanks again. And please recommend articles and books videos anything I can read.