'If I had her for the day, she would soon behave'

[GhostofMammaTJ]

Said about my DD2 who is in the process of trying to get an ADHD diagnosis.

Now, I brought up my DStD from the age of 8 and my own DD who is now 17 and I coped with them. Even with the 'you're not my mum, you can't tell me what to do' and teen years with both of them.

I can cope with my DS age 6. I just cannot cope with my DD age 7 and neither can anyone else. Noone else will look after her for me at all (except DP but like mehe has no choice but to get on with it).

What makes this woman, who knows my DD1 quite well think that her behaviour is a failing in my parenting rather than a genuine condition?

I know my friend had all this with her DS before and after diagnosis and I am going to have to get used to this kind of comment, but it is infuriating!!

[Triggles]

Yep. You'll hear it A LOT! Ignore ignore ignore.

People who say that have no idea what they are talking about. If you must respond, I'd go with the tried and true MN response of "Did you MEAN to sound that rude?" or a simple "I wouldn't leave a pet rock with you, let alone my child!" Take no prisoners.

[boredandrestless]

I found I used to be really upset and hurt by these sorts of comments and would go home and cry, then I got to stage of silently seething for days, now I usually find I give back a short sharp response similar to triggles's suggestions -and then still seethe for days.

Some people are just twats.

[Strongecoffeeismydrug]

My fil and mil said this about DS when he was just 3 years old,and I'm glad to say we haven't had any contact with them what so ever since that day.
They just tell everybody in the extended family that they don't know why we have snubbed them out of our lives.
When DS was later DX with severe autism it got back to me they had said autism doesn't exist and DS just needs a good beating and made to behave, how dare these people call themselves grandparents.
It hurt at the time now I just think their loss not mine

[insanityscratching]

To be honest have had this said to me many times about ds in fact I used to say "Go on then, take him , I could do with a break, bring him back when you have cured the autism" They used to run away because they knew damn well they would handle him worse than I could.

[GhostofMammaTJ]

I have often offered to let people have her for an hour if they think they can manage her better than me, funnily enough noone has ever taken me up on that.

The only real help I get, apart from DP is my DD picks them both up from school for me one afternoon a week.

I work nights, DP works days. He does the morning and night routines, because he does it when I am at work so when I am at home he says I am interfering. That suits me!!

I bumped in to this woman in the supermarket where I was buying essential wine veg for tea, so a particularly stress inducing environment.

I wonder if I could sue if DD hurts herself on the wheeled basket holders they leav out for the home delivery baskets!! I get sick of the sound of my own voice sometimes, shouting at her to get off them.

[GhostofMammaTJ]

Do we all know someone like this?

[ouryve]

DS1 had a teacher who thought like this. She thought he needed a firm hand and lots of rules.

Yeah. That worked out

[GhostofMammaTJ]

I'm sure it did, just as much as my thinking that a firm fair hand would work with her as much as the others!!

[Ineedalife]

Yep, I know someone who thinks she could cure my Dd3.

Cant say who it is because I might out myself but she does try to make Dd3 do join in with social stuff on fairly frequent occasions and then wonders why Dd3 turns her back to her

[GhostofMammaTJ]

Ha ha,and they think our DCs are the crazy ones!!

[cornykrueger]

Can I add these old chestnuts...

If he was my child he'd eat it

I wouldn't give him the choice

He'd wear what he was told to wear if he was mine

And my personal favourite:

He's got to learn that...

[DameMargotFountain]

my ears have started to heal up when my own 'D'M opens her mouth now

'DD just needs to be given a meal, and nothing else, then she'd eat it'

and my personal favourite 'you need to tell her like you MEAN' it'

[moosemama]

Oh yes, I had this for years - from a very close relative.

I called her bluff, she babysat and we had to come home early because she simply couldn't cope. Won't go into details, suffice to say it was a total disaster and she went home in tears saying she must be ill, because she'd normally have handled things much better.

She has stopped implying she could do better now. Instead I get a constant stream of stuff about how perfect her own child is and how he is so sociable and independent even though it's blatantly not true.

The other one we get from certain quarters is "Don't let him dictate to you - you are the parent, not him. " Er, yeah thanks for that I had no idea we were supposed to make the rules.

It used to bother me a lot, but I have grown a thicker skin over the years and it's water off a duck's back to me these days.

[insanityscratching]

Oh yes have had the "He doesn't eat what the rest of you eat because he knows you will make him something different"

They seem to forget that he was admitted to hospital to address his eating issues and the paed gave up and discharged him because he was wasting away and he hadn't eaten a thing in 5 days. He was three and had no comprehension of if he held out long enough they would give in.

[swanthingafteranother]

however....there is the small problem ....that ds2 (10) does behave better for some people that others...which they would put down to the fact that they handle him better.

But possibly they are just nice sympathetic people which is the difference between an interfering idiot who says rude things to you in a supermarket and people who genuinely go out of their way to help.

Perversely, I have a very kind friend, who is unfortunately not so good at handling ds2, although great with most other children. She subscribes to the "he'll behave in my house and if I had brought him up he would know better" and she doesn't get that he is in a state of anxiety in her house and behaves especially badly there due to various triggers (other children not playing with him, feeling left out) However kind to him she is it makes no difference as he associates her with something negative.

[swanthingafteranother]

The problem is that a lot of these "well meaning" comments have a grain of truth in them, but because they are said in such an arrogant, unsympathetic, Pharisee-etical manner, that nugget of helpfulness is completely wasted.

Yes of course children have to learn rules, but in some conditions the way you apply those rules or introduce them, is going to be completely different for an NT situation. It is going to take more time, it is going to take more sensitivity.
Moose I had a similar situation when ds2 was 6, and I arranged a very kind local girl to pick up the 3 children from school, and give them supper (due to some unavoidable appt) Supper was shepherd's pie, which I had pre-cooked, and ds2 refused to eat it. There was complete meltdown, and I think she just assumed he should eat it. Normally he would have eaten the top bit, but as his mum I suppose I would have just been used to faddiness and adjusted what was on his plate, but SHE just was completely floored, and she had been brought up in the school of eat everything on your plate. He wasn't diagnosed then, and I suppose it was my fault, but I never left him with anyone he didn't know (except school or parties of course) from then on. It was too much of a tinderbox situation, other people's expectations.

[sc13]

I've had that from my mother - she quickly changed her mind though after I took her at her word, left DS with her for a WHOLE day, and came back to find her hair literally standing on end. The memory still makes me

[insanityscratching]

Ds had a SENCO as his teacher once. She started the year believing that she would be able to show me how to deal with him. It took a matter of weeks before she realised that she needed my help to get ds to do anything In actual fact she turned out to be great once she realised she really wasn't an expert and by asking my advice and looking to me for support she could make a difference to ds.

[Sneezecakesmama]

"DS just needs a good beating to make him behave"



Speechless

[GhostofMammaTJ]

Yup, we should all get the whips out and use them daily and that will work and make them all behave

[StillIRise]

Maybe if the beating stick was a magic wand it would work?

[MsNg]

I'm so much happier since I started retaliating verbally. I used to go home and feel lousy but now I just go for the kill whenever someone throws something like that my way.

[neverputasockinatoaster]

I was once having a discussion with my ILs about behaviour. They were talking about smacking and how they used to smack their DCs. I said we didn't smack DS for various reasons, one being that it didn't work. (To my shame I have smacked him, in utter desperation, when nothing else was working, pre diagnosis. He just took it as a license to wallop me when I wouldn't do as he demanded).
My MIL's response? 'You just haven't hit him hard enough yet'.
My mum is of the school of thought that DS behaves the way he does because I am a poor parent...... And, to be fair, he is usually OK with her BUT she doesn't have him all day everyday and she doesn't deal with him when he has been at school all day and is oozing stress.....