Resources for Adults Who Don't Know How to Adult?

In My Humble Opinion
1

This may be better suited for GQ, I don’t know, but I’ll trust whoever to put it wherever.

I’ve got a friend, we’ll call him Rick. Rick’s a year older than I am, almost, but we’ve known each other for basically our entire adult lives. Rick is a mess.

See, he came from a horrible early childhood, ended up being a kind of de facto head of household for his aging grandparents in high school, suffers from depression, anxiety, and has self-diagnosed as having Asperger’s syndrome. His birth mother has been schizophrenic and institutionalized for years.

Rick also seems to have the worst luck of anyone I’ve ever seen, just stumbling from catastrophe to catastrophe - by the time he recovers from one, the next one’s ready to smack him in the face. If the guy played Russian Roulette, he’d manage to shoot himself twice.

Rick’s problems have become my problems for many years now, due to our friendship - I’ve provided money, storage space for stuff, time and effort helping him get places or move stuff. But I’m at my goddamn limit.

See, I can’t blame him for his bad luck. But I do perceive that he has a tendency (perhaps justified by his anxiety) to just sort of… latch on to whatever solutions seem easiest for the problem at hand, rather than finding the most effective ones. And once a crisis is over, he doesn’t start preparing for the next one - he relaxes, loosens whatever spending restrictions he’s made, and just sort of drifts along until he smacks face-first into the next disaster. I mean, he’s not a big spender - if I thought he was wasting a bunch of money, I’d have no problem letting him twist in the wind.

Rick has a good bit of personal debt, as you can imagine, and the maintenance of that debt is one of the things keeping him down. I suggested bankruptcy. He pursued it partway, talked to a lawyer, and then when he found out he could squeak by on his unemployment benefits at the time, he just abandoned the process.

His current disaster streak is automotive. His old vehicle was wiped out in an accident, totaled. He started living off the payment from that (jobless at the time) but I (and several others) pointed out that if he let the payment get too used up, he’d never afford another vehicle, so he got himself a crappy used car and that worked okay for about a year. He even survived getting dropped by his insurer (Rick has been in more accidents than I can count - never his fault, but he has horrible reflexes and I imagine most drivers would have been able to avoid many of the incidents) - but a more serious problem cropped up. Just as he was settling into a new job, the engine block blew out on his vehicle.

His employer gave him a personal loan to get that replaced, a couple thousand bucks. He uses the bus system to get around while it’s being fixed, working short hours with his employer’s permission, at a reduced paycheck. The day he gets it back from the repair shop, he discover’s there’s a hole in the radiator. He gets a few hundred bucks from “an unexpected source” (that’s all he told me, and I’ve learned to stop asking) and gets that fixed, and gets warned by his boss that he may not be retained after his trial period without reliable transportation.

Then yesterday, the starter failed, prompting him to call me at the last minute to get him from work to home, whereupon he’ll start using the bus until he can get it fixed.

And I’m done. I know it’s not his goddamn fault, but I cannot be responsible for someone else’s life without having the authority to fix the problems that crop up, and I cannot criticize him without provoking a frustrated, defensive response. I can offer advice, but usually it doesn’t get used, like the bankruptcy.

I think the problem is that, despite having taken care of his grandparents, he has never learned basic life skills. The psychological issues don’t help, but they’re not enough to get him on disability or anything like that. He knows how to budget, in theory, but that’s not enough.

(Hell, I took a ride with him a couple of weeks ago to buy him a tank of gas, and his windshield was dangerously filthy. I pointed it out, and he said he couldn’t take care of it till he got home - no money. I had to inform him that there’s a free window-cleaning squeegee stand at basically every gas station in the country.)

(In his previous vehicle, he drove around for a time with two broken side mirrors until I suggested his insurance carrier might pay for that, since it was done by vandalism and they were necessary safety equipment and all.)

So, are there any resources that take care of people like him? The area is northern West Virginia, if that helps. I don’t want him to end up starving on the street, but I also don’t want him to end up dead by my hand if I finally snap.

2

I’m not sure about specifics in Virginia but there should be social services he could take advantage of. Some states will even assign a worker to check in and help you with tasks for those who need the extra accountability.

The key is going to be his asperger’s and depression/anxiety. If those are severe enough, he should be able to get on disability for those and he should qualify for lots of extra help through social services. They usually offer free counseling and career advice.

I have a similar situation with a family member, but he is on disability. Without disability, I can’t imagine how he’d get along.

3

Since you’re looking for advice, I’ll move this to our advice forum, IMHO (from MPSIMS).

4

West Virginia. We’re a whole other state now. :slight_smile:

I’m not sure there are traditional social services he can access. My mother is a retired social worker, and I’ve asked her for ideas, and we’ve pointed him towards things like low-income housing before, but to no avail.

I floated the idea of disability over a year ago, and he indicated he’d asked his therapist, but that she said the severity of his ailments would not qualify him. Now, that may have been the anxiety/depression alone; as far as I know, he’s never inquired about the Asperger’s officially - but I assume she would’ve noticed the symptoms.

5

I have no advice, but this is what my therapist calls a “failure to thrive adult.” I’m guessing some sort of therapy would be indicated so he can get an official diagnosis (self-diagnosing Asperger’s is just stupid) and social services if warranted.

6

I’m not sure why self-diagnosing Asperger’s would be stupid. As far as I know, it doesn’t qualify you for special assistance - he just read the literature that was published around the time it started to be recognized apart from mainline autism, and said “oh, hey, that’s me.”

7

I’m afraid you can’t help him forever. He has to get it together himself.

8

It might not be popular on this board, but has he connected with a church? There are small groups at virtually every church, and many encourage what mine calls an accountability partner. Essentially, this is just another person who checks in with you to make sure you have your temporal and/or spiritual act together. Usually you hold each other accountable, but my guess is that if your friend went to a church and said “Help!” most of them would find a way to hook him up with a willing volunteer member.

They’d also probably help with some of the materials needs too.

Of course, churches may expect that he be a believer, and they’re not going to have some kind of legal authority to hold him accountable. If he needs more than a helping hand and some kindhearted guidance, it probably won’t fit.

9

Because diagnosing yourself ends in failure. Rick is not a qualified mental health professional nor is he a licensed physician. A lot of people can look at a list of symptoms and say “I have that” but it doesn’t mean they are correct. Anybody can read literature, but they can’t interpret it correctly.

Let’s not quibble. Rick obviously needs professional help beyond someone telling him “you can wash your windshield for free at the gas station.”

10

I have to agree; if he just disregards your advice, he’ll continue to do that and stumble from one failure to the next. What you can do is disengage from him; set some boundaries with him and keep them firm - you’ll be his friend, but not his lifeline.

11

This may be a really bad assumption. A lot of therapists have councelling licenses and are not doctors, psychologists, or psychiatrists. They haven’t been trained to diagnose or test for much.

This is true. He might also have ADHD or ADHD-PI. This can result in depression, anxiety, and problems dealing with people. And the second, especially, can be very hard to diagnose.

A proper diagnosis will require a specialist, not a therapist. But dispite the similarities in resulting situations, dealing with Aspergers and dealing with ADHD are very different things. Knowing if either is present, or if something very different is operating, would be very valuable.

12

I agree that he should get an official diagnosis of Asperger’s if he wants to pursue disability, but I still don’t get the contempt being shown for someone potentially recognizing a condition in themselves. I mentioned it here because I happen to agree with his self-diagnosis and thought it might be a useful shorthand so people might better understand his behavior and difficulty grasping social norms.

He has had contact with mental health professionals - his anxiety and depression diagnoses are official and he has medication for both.

With regard to the church possibility, I honestly don’t know. I believe he’s like me in that we are both nominally Christian, but don’t attend church.

I did get an update yesterday - apparently the starter fault was a loose wire and someone at work (or the car parts store nearby) helped him fix it without having to replace it, so he’s back on the road and may have a chance to retain his current employment. So the immediate crisis has passed, but I’m sure there will be another soon enough.

13

Asperger’s isn’t even an officially recognized diagnosis anymore is it? I mean, I’m sure he’s on some kind of spectrum but it’s a wide spectrum.

14

It’s really only a problem if he begins using it as an excuse without doing anything about it. Like if he just gave up on everything and said, “I can’t do X, I have Asperger’s.” I’d want to say, at least you should go to the doctor, get it identified, and find out where you can go from here to help yourself.

You are a good person to help him but as others have said, you will run out of patience eventually. I know that you got yourself on your feet really early - even those of us who don’t have Asperger’s didn’t manage that. Sometimes maturity just takes time. I didn’t feel like I really had my act together until I was in my thirties. Hopefully with help and some guidance he will mature…but he has to seek it out, and be willing to accept it.

15

He has a near-total inability to read other’s emotions based on facial expression or body language, a flat affect most of the time (except when particularly upset), a monotone voice, poor fine motor control/reflexes and awkward arm movements, and basically does not get unspoken/unwritten rules of behavior. His laser-focus areas of interest are history related, particularly military or science and technology.

He’s something, all right.

But he’s never used it as an excuse to avoid doing something.

16

I’ve run out of patience now. I know he deserves to live his life without all these disasters … but so do I.

17

Check out the list of characteristics of an ACA here. It sounds as though he was brought up in a very dysfunctional manner. Or more accurately, he was not brought up at all, just provided for.

ACA meetings are free, although folks generally throw a dollar or two int he basket at each meeting. If he chooses, he can ask someone to be his “sponsor” and that person will become a sort of life coach. Sponsors listen, advise, and lead the ACA through the steps toward a more functional life. Above all, they will teach him the habit and skills of daily self-examination. That’s almost always the skill lacking when people seem never to learn from their mistakes or move forward in their lives.

Meetings themselves would give him a wider fellowship and a place to “dump” all these problems without burdening you every time.

On your part I would advise strengthening boundaries and allowing yourself to be a friend, and listen without taking on the problems. It can be very difficult to face what our society does to people who fall below a certain income level (like when car trouble = unreliability = loss of job.) You can help him brainstorm and consider solutions and strategies without getting upset as if it were happening to you, or offering financial assistance.

18

I can say that Autism Spectrum Disorder (apparently Asperger’s is no longer the term in vogue) can be a qualification (or part of one) for disability. I’ve known a couple of persons who’ve basically drawn disability for being weird difficult personalities, though it might have been OCD or bipolar in one case.

19

The currently official edition of The Book, to-wit DSM-V, has defined Asperger’s Syndrome out of existence. There is no such disorder any more. Nobody has Asperger’s Syndrome any more. Just like that, they’ve all been “cured”.

I think all PFAWAS (Persons Formerly Afflicted With Asperger’s Syndrome) are now lumped together into some kind of generic catch-all “Autism Spectrum” or something along those lines. I think I recall reading somewhere that the scheme now is to diagnose “Autism Spectrum” (or whatever they call it now) along with some numerical measure of severity level.

I know nothing about how insurance companies, or government agencies, or social services managers, deals with this, and how they decide who is eligible for what benefits. As far as I’ve ever been able to detect, it’s all a crapshoot.

20

Many therapists or psychiatrists use High Functioning Austism (HFA) to replace the term Asberger’s. Some actually distinguish between the two, but that takes splitting hairs to a whole new place. Most use HFA.

I would strongly encourage you to encourage your friend to pursue the autism diagnosis. If his counselor is not equipped, find out who is. Once he gets an answer on where he sits, or doesn’t on, the spectrum, he may be eligible for help AND TRAINING. Based on what you’re saying, he’s likely autistic, but internet diagnostics are not reliable. :slight_smile:

Second, community colleges, I think, may offer life skills courses. Even some weekend offerings might really help him get some basic training.

Third, look for autism groups in the area. They will have meetings, and other resources that can help. Even just moral support.

My son was diagnosed several months ago, so I’ve been exploring this whole world myself. Good luck.