AIBU to think my 11-year-old is not to blame here?

I do think the 13 year old should apologise, however I’d expect most 11 year olds to know not to push a glass door and shatter it. They’d wait in the kitchen and shout out for some one.

I’m sorry but “needing the support” is not a good enough reason to inflict your mother’s hatred on your 11 or 7 yr old. Sure, she might do some babysitting for you but that’s not justification for completely fucking these poor kids up into adulthood as well as seriously jeopardising any relationship they might have with each other as adults. You need to woman up and keep all of your children away from your mother, they didn’t ask to be born after all.

I’m not trying to blame you but you were well aware that they fight so badly that you have to separate them but yet let them both go to your mums.

You keep saying your mum doesn’t like having your other kids - but look what happens when she does.

I feel you’re putting a lot of blame on your mum when you admit this sort of thing happens regularly at your own home.

Obviously your mum is probably going to favour your eldest. Of course she shouldn’t show it but he is the odd one out of the 6 kids.

He would have been less than 2 years old when you got with your new DP and started having more kids, so she probably felt a bit sorry for him not having his dad so gave him a bit of extra attention and then it carried on from there.

You say she didn’t get on with the ex and so it is reasonable that she didn’t have his 5 kids whilst you were with him.
And now that you’re not with him, she will likely be accused of playing favourites if she just took a couple of them.

Gently, some of your kids seem a bit of a handful and she is only going to help you out with the ones she can cope with.

Both kids are to blame but you seem set on trying to blame the eldest and your mum, like it’s them against you and your other DC.

It was a silly sibling squabble and both are to blame and both should apologise.
They should not be going back to your mums house together until they start getting on better.

I agree with this. It wouldn’t have happened if he didn’t lock him out.

Your 13 year old was the arsehole in this situation. My sister did similar things to me on a regular basis and my arm went through a glass pane because of her. I have a permanent reminder in the shape of a keloid scar on my elbow. I also have cPTSD for all the shit she put me through. You need to read him the riot act, not to the one who got injured.

Your 13yo needs to seriously up his brother game or he’d be losing a lot of privileges. He knows his brother is easily wound up, knows his autism means he finds it hard to cope with unpredictable situations, and still locked him in. It was bullying and he needs to be punished for it,

If this happened at school and they weren't siblings, who would you blame then?
This is bullying in its purest form and the 13yr old should be punished accordingly. He should be ashamed of himself and so should your mother!

Your eldest probably doesn’t want him hanging around with him and his friends though!! I used to get this too- can I go bowling take your brother - no tell him to get his own mates he can’t hang around with mine!!

a good brother doesn’t mean he has to be his keeper and protector! It seems to me here that the 13 year old is sick of the 11 year old and the 11 year old wants him to be hands on. So I don’t think either was to blame, there needs to be different expectations set about their relationship. Ie 13 year old needs to be nicer but 11 year old can’t force them to be best friends and needs to form his own relationships

13yo is a bully. 11yo panicked, which many people would do, autism or not. As PPs have said, your 11yo will remember how you reacted to this situation and whether you stood up for him or not. 13yo needs a proper dressing-down, and the favouritism from GM needs to be knocked on the head.

Your mums treatment of your children is damaging them and is actively causing a divide. You are letting it happen if you let the relationship with her continue. Your poor 7 year old. Her comments and behaviour will scar them and really affect how they are when they grow up, especially with how they are with each other.

He is punished by the consequences. Dont think he needs any aditional punishment. While what he did was bad, its not his fault his brother put his hand through the glass. Dont think anybody would predict that if we take the SEN out of it. We dont know your 11yo so cant tell if anyone could reasonably predict that this is what could happen to him.

My kids ended up hating their grandmother for favouritism and different treatments. Even the favourite couldn’t stand her, she was so blatant. He had to tell her himself to acknowledge the least favoured and treat him the same. Not that she did, but in the end , she was the loser. Their choice. My own mother was also showing preferences at a very early age so none of my children would recognise her now if they met her. I barred her from our lives. Nobody makes any of my kids feel less than. Now she makes victim comments to me but tough. You need to advocate for your children. They can’t help who their father is and she needs to do better. Your eldest should not be running to her to avoid consequences . You are the parent, so parent . 11 yr old is not to blame. There’s no reason to believe he’d expect the glass to break while in panic mode.

You can deal with a difficult situation by concentrating on how do we fix this/what constructive things can we do or your can concentrate on who do we blame. You've chosen the least helpful one.

I wouldn't blame anyone for their actions whilst panicking, let alone a child.

13 year old would be grounded here and made to apologise. He'd also not go to his grandparents during being grounded so there would be nothing nice for him from them.
Kids who don't listen or respond to punishments usually don't because it's not consistent. Sometimes it can take months to get to a point where they respond and change their behaviour.

I can sympathise with your Mum not helping matters though - mine was very much "Poor X! Why is he in trouble again? Don't worry baby, Granny will make it all better."
Used to drive me up the wall and one day I exploded at her over it. Not my finest moment but things did actually get better after that.

Hope your 11 year old recovers soon.

He is not to blame, but of course if he had managed keep a clear head, the outcome would have been much better for him. This is a really useful realization for him to make, so I wouldn't be too quick to discourage him from arriving at this conclusion. Just because he could have chosen a better course of action, that doesn't mean his older brother isn't also at fault.

In my house the natural consequences for the 13 year old would be using pocket money to help pay for the glass, and doing the 11 year olds chores until he’d healed enough to be able to do them again.

11 year old would absolutely be reassured that it’s not his fault. Whatever grandma says.

It is completely within the realms of ‘normal’ for siblings to fight and fall out.

Yes, you’d hope drawing blood was an extreme rarity but it’s naive to think the 13 year old in this narrative is the evil psychopathic bully who orchestrated injuring his angelic and perfect autistic brother. The truth, as they say, is most likely found somewhere in between. They were most likely bored, winding each other up and glass got in the way.

Nobody’s fault but the adults who didn’t anticipate, risk assess or prepare for normal sibling discontent.

This is your older child’s fault

To say someone shouldn't have panicked is stupid,being put in a position which makes you panic is squarely the fault of the person creating that position.
Your mother piling in on the side of your 13yo is clearly simply favouritism,there is no way this situation can be seen as the fault of your 11yo.
You need to read the Riot Act to your 13yo the kind of injuries he caused are serious and could even have been fatal- you need to make sure nothing like this ever happens again.

Was there a reason why the 13 years locked the 11 year old in the kitchen? Not condoning but maybe some understanding of what had gone on before.
Coming from a family were my younger sibling had high function Autism, sometimes (and I am not proud of this) I would do stupid stuff cos he would be annoying/piss me off and it was always yeah but his autism and when you are a teenager it feels like they can do no wrong and it gets you back up! And my sibling used to purposely do things knowing it would wind me up, I’d flip and then I’d get in trouble cos you know he’s has autism