Scared of having children?

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I know that I have Asperger's and I really do struggle with many aspects of it and when I have approached my partner to speak about children before: I can't give voice to my greatest fear.

What if they turn out like me?

I have read a lot to suggest that Autism is hereditary (from the father's side) and I notice now that my father shows similar signs to having AS like I do. My biggest fear is any child I have could inherit AS from me or worse. Pleae don't misunderstand: I am not saying that AS or ASD are bad (quite the opposite sometimes) but I already worry that I may not make a good father as it is because of my inabilty to communicate to people in the flesh, but trying to communicate to an AS child as an AS adult fills me with dread.

Anyone else ever feel like this?

sometimes; although i'm in no position to need to make a desision about this yet.

however, there are 2 things you should know if you ask me:

firstly; apperantly your father managed to raise you quite well, you are doubting to have chindren, so you have the ability, that is better then can be said about many on this site.
if your father managed, so can you.

secondly; by wondering about whether or not you will be a good parent, you are a good parent in my book, the ones that are afraid of doing something wrong will not do it wrong, sub-optimal at the worst.

I well understand your fears. Not to minimize or make light of them, but pretty much every prospective parent feels the same way, AS or no AS. Everyone worries about being a good parent. Everyone worries that their bad characteristics (and everybody has something) will show up in their kids.

Obviously, only you can make the decision to have kids or not, but I'll offer my own case as just one example. By luck or design, my twins turned out beautifully. They just recently graduated from college and are now on their own (well, one is in grad school, so "on her own" has a somewhat different meaning). Neither showed signs of inheriting my AS, although they are not necessarily "typical" young women, either.

In hindsight, having an Aspie mother was actually beneficial to them, I think, because it gave them compassion for those who are different. They grew up with the idea that it was normal to help me out when I needed it. For many years, they were often my best "coaches" in deciphering social situations. If you think it's funny that a 10-year-old could explain to her mother why people acted the way they did, I would agree with you! As I say, they thought nothing of it, and today, they are fine young women and I'm enormously proud of them.

I wish you the best of luck

I'm not actually scared of that. I mean, I'm autistic and my life is OK; why shouldn't a child of mine have an equally OK life if they're autistic?

But, for the most part, I don't think about it, because I don't intend to have children; I'm single and will probably stay that way for a good long time; or, if I marry, it will be an asexual relationship. If I have kids, they'll be fosters, though, so I'm pretty sure eventually I'll get an autistic child staying with me, because with a degree in human factors engineering/psychology, I'll probably have the basic information needed to learn to take care of special needs kids.

If you are not scared of the thought of the responsibility of having children then you should not have them.
And by you I mean everyone NT’s N-NTs, rich, poor or average. Anyone on this ball of wax we call earth should be scared by the lifelong commitment that is having children. I’m 47 with one child, my father is 84 and he still keeps an eye on me, as he does for all of his kids. It’s what being a family is all about, as I will do so when my daughter grows up and starts a family of her own.

To be completely honest; I wouldn't inflict on anyone what I went through growing up. I suppose when I was younger AS/ASD were fanciful ideas that had no relevance in the UK and it was easier to assume that I was a quiet, unsociable, underachieving but sometimes brilliant child. I suppose with all the testing and support in place now for AS/ASD it would be diagnosed quickly. I don't know...

You're all given me food for thought at least.

I should at least get my own formal diagnosis done and dusted before I worry about anything else

This is my biggest fear too. I don't want kids, yet my biological clock is ticking, and I don't want to adopt. Other Aspies say, ''oh if you have an Aspie child, you will be able to bond with it better''. No - that is not the right answer. My mum is NT, and I am very close to her, and I can read her like a book, and she can me too. I have plenty of NT friends who I can relate to aswell, and I am close to all of my family too. I want an NT child. I want a normal life - I don't want a child born severely Autistic, then I have to treat him like a baby for the rest of his life (see this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZFwl5TQtcs). I just have not got the right state of mind for all this. I know all children bring problems, and you worry about them, but at least those are normal worries, what you could share with other parents. I know NT kids can be awkward and demanding, but that is to be expected when you have kids. But I don't want all this extra s**t. Just having AS alone has brought me extra s**t, without passing it onto my children, only it probably being more severe. f**k no!! !

If you don't want kids, it's better, IMHO, to not have them. Your biological clock is no imperative. I used to think it was but not any more.

Not me. My four children are doing just fine. And the 5th is on the way.

I have numerous fears and reasons why I don't want to have kids. One of the biggies being the risk of them inheriting my AS or becoming lower functioning.

But in the case that they are NT, I would not be able to provide to them the proper mother-child relationship as a result of my Aspieness getting in the way. Yes, I could try my ass off to give them necessities, but I would still fail to give them the proper emotional and social needs and I really don't wanna mess up any kids like that on account of my nature. You hear about NT kids all the time who didn't get the right amount of affection and social interaction as a kid and it messed them up in a whole lotta ways. If NT parents out there have problems with this, then there is no hope for me.

Finally the big reason why I don't want to have kids, is the attitude that comes with becoming a parent...the old "I'm a parent, I can do no wrong" attitude. Children shouldn't be treated like idiots incapable of independent thought and deserve to have their questions answered and their concerns taken seriously. But too often I've seen parents become cynical and just dismiss it all because not doing so would spoil the kid into becoming a brat. Children deserve to feel as though their thoughts and feelings do matter instead of being belittle on account of their age and lack of experience. There are children out there who are far more wiser and more experienced than even seniors. I was raised with the idea that my thoughts and feelings are not to be taken seriously and that I didn't know what the hell I was doing or thinking. The very thought that someday I could grow up to be that a**hole parent who thinks their age gives them superiority mortifies me. I would become a hypocrite of the worst caliber. Yes I could work my butt off to avoid this too but I can barely tolerate people my age as it is. I wouldn't be able to tolerate children, especially when they don't know things that I do. I would just lose it and call them stupid or something like that. They don't deserve that kind of crap treatment, especially not from people like me who will probably be unable to control it.

This is why I avoid people so frakkin much.

I'm not entirely sure if I want a child, but I know I can handle it if I do. (And I'm also too young)

I fear having kids.

I have many reasons to have issues, but regarding autism, if my kid was born autistic, I don't think I could handle it. I know how difficult it's been for me, and to think my kid might come to resent my being "selfish" and choosing to procreate knowing my kids might have the condition as well....

On one hand I kinda want to be a father and have a kid. On the other hand, the thought of taking care of a kid sounds like more work than I would ever want to put myself through. But to be honest, I couldn't care less if my kid turned out to be autistic. Although this is probably a reflection of my opinion on the effects of autism in general.

I think if you are scared of having an autistic child, you should not be having any children. That is true whether you are NT or Aspie or autie or even if you have no reason to think you have an increased risk at all. If you are not ready to do what it takes to take care of any child you may get, with any disability, then you're not ready to be a parent. I don't mean you have to be an expert or that you wouldn't feel scared and overwhelmed when you found out--just that you have to be willing to learn, to accept and raise any child. IMO, the hardest part and the biggest thing to learn is probably being a parent, period. If you can do that, then you can handle the extra things you have to learn if your kid has a disability. Being a good parent is really difficult. I have never been a parent, but I watched my parents parent me, and I'm pretty sure raising me is the hardest thing my mom has ever done.

Regarding a kid having to "go through what we did as kids": This will not be the case, because five years from now we will have more acceptance for autism, and ten years even more, and twenty years even more than that. Think, for example, if you somehow knew your child would be born homosexual: You'd be scared that they wouldn't be accepted, scared that they wouldn't be able to find work or have a family. But acceptance is increasing at a pretty good rate, so that if you got pregnant right now, your kid wouldn't have to deal with what homosexual people deal with now, but only with the more accepting society that will exist in the future if the current trends hold. The same thing is true of autism. There are an awful lot of us, and now that we know what makes us different, we're getting pretty hard to shut up when we demand equality.

I know of somebody who's got a 2-year-old son who's just been diagnosed with severe Autism, and she's been crying her eyes out for weeks, and the father has said, ''f**k this'' and has walked out and left her to raise this disabled child on her own. He is now with another woman, who has a 4-year-old girl, who is (as far as we know) ''normal''.

Having my kids (the eldest is now in university) is magical. Watching them grow up and develop their own attributes and personalities, and trying to be a supportive parent is very rewarding.

A lot of the difficulties that I had as a child and teenager related to the environment (the type of school, and the social structure of the neighbourhood), and I have tried to avoid the things that made me miserable, and to provide them with a social environment where they have the maximum opportunity to choose their own relationships - and they do go and choose things that I would not choose, and they seem happy with their choices.