Single dad looking for advice about birthday party issue.

'honestly don't understand many of the posts suggesting he should be invited'

Most are saying don't just exclude one.Try to #BeKind and fgs don't message parents of kids with sens with an unwanted opinion on their dc's behaviour.

We had a kid like this in my DD’s class at that age, we all used to issue the invite and hope they didn’t come! Mostly they didn’t, but it sounds like the mother will bring him for sure.

I would get your DD to make a list of 10 people she’d like to invite and leave it at that. You’re kind of past the whole class party stage anyway, time to narrow it down to the actual friends.

I would say do not invite him on 2 grounds: 1. It will wreck the party for DD and all the others and 2. He will not enjoy it ... it is clear that it is an overload for him and he should be spared going through that again.

I am agog that such people exist. What happened next? Did you manage to get her to leave or did she just park herself and her son for the duration of the party??

A firm word is had at the party and she is told to leave immediately. Not that difficult... I hardly think anyone would insist on staying when asked to leave directly and particularly when expectations are set ahead of time

The problem isn’t the boy, it’s the mum. She’s not managing him, if he’s not coping, they need to leave , go outside. Not spoil it.

Saying that DD had an autistic friend in primary. The only boy in their friendship group. He would cause a fuss at parties because it wasn’t about him/what he liked. His mum even suggested we did something specifically he would like, it’s not his birthday!!

I had a ds (undiagnosed at that point ASD/ADHD) who couldn't cope with parties, especially soft play types.
With each invite I assessed it as either;

1. He won't cope at all - decline invite with a polite excuse
2. He can cope with a shortened version/some of it - I'd have a chat to the parent if I knew them well enough and see if they were happy for him to arrive late or some other adaption
3. He will cope fine - accept

But even with 2 or 3 I would stay. I'd often give him breaks, so I'd call him off after 15 minutes or so and take him "to the toilet" which often meant 5 minutes outside, give him a drink and let him calm down.
If I saw him getting out of hand it was straight removal - tbf I only had to do that once, the threat of having to do it again meant that he was compliant with calm down measures, which might mean a longer break or telling him to go to a different activity/keep away from another child.

He got a fair number of invites so I assume we managed it reasonably successfully (full class parties weren't a thing at all so it wasn't that he "had" to be invited).

If I'd just let him get on with it, then I'd have thought it totally reasonable for other children not to want their parties dominated by his behaviour and not invite him.

If the boy ends up not coming for whatever reason, eg the M won’t promise to manage his behaviour etc., is there an option to have him round for a playdate?

Secondly, just wanted to say how impressive the parents of ND children are who are posting saying don’t invite unless the M promises to manage his behaviour. It can’t be at all easy to have your child missing out constantly, and you are putting the other children first which is very decent of you. X

In the adult world in general and definitely at work, if a colleague hit me I would be phoning the police.

Have a boy who has been repeatedly violent to DD round for a playdate? Bonkers.

yeah that's what OP & the other kids need, an awkward interlude in the middle of proceedings 🙄

Based on what the OP has said, I wouldn't personally be confident that this particular mother would leave when asked.

This. Let’s not teach our girls to accept violence.

I think you'd be surprised. Especially a parent who has already seen her child ruin someone's birthday party and didn't seem to do anything about it.

Plus by the time she's asked to leave, her son has already hurt someone or ruined something and I wouldn't want to take that chance.

It would be different if she was at least trying to manage the situation, taking him out for breaks, acknowledging that he might not cope with some parties etc but that doesn't appear to be the case.

I think you've done the right thing, including sending the email.

Doing it by email means she can process that without being expected to give an instant reply, which is fair.

If she really pushes the matter I would respond with 'actually Susan, the issue isn't so much X's autism, though it concerns me that clearly he is unhappy and not enjoying a party environment, it's your handling of his behaviour in that environment that is the problem!'

Obviously that would be dropping a shit-bomb on the situation so only do it if she gets REALLY arsey.

but do you just shove them in at the deep end or do you help them by teaching them strategies to cope with minimal discomfort and then gradually increase?

At my children's Primary School parents would give the teacher party invites and they'd then put the invites for the ones invited in the book bags. Maybe you could ask the teacher if they'd do this?

Editing to say, if my adhd/asd child, who's now an adult, didnt get invited because of past behaviour Id have understood and been relieved to be honest. He was once invited bowling, and my god did he not cope, the noise, flashing lights, and all sorts of other things were too much, if he was invited bowling again I'd just say look, you don't enjoy the atmosphere at bowling do you, we can invite little Johnny round for tea a different time instead.. if that caused a kick off at home then we'd deal with it. Dont beat yourself up about it.

Why on earth would OP's DD want him around for a playdate when he hurts her? Or OP for that matter if he does have a parent who refuses to manage his behaviour.

You simply cant invite him. I dont think he will be aware by the sound of it so dont beat yourself up.

If we take autism off the table - if your DD was being bullied by 1 child, you wouldnt expect her to invite him to the party. She doesn't like him, he's been hitting her - so he shouldn't be there anyway. It's that simple really!

I can see why this child might be difficult at parties, and why a 7YO might not want them there, but to exclude one child is pretty cruel.

Could DD invite 10 kids from the class and make the rest up out of relatives/ kids from extra curricular etc?

I wouldnt have sent a message but I also wouldn’t have invited the boy. While I can empathise with how difficult it must be for his mum and how it might upset him not to be invited, a birthday party for my child is something that my child should get to enjoy. That means being able to invite whoever they want with a reasonable expectation that they’ll have fun. They shouldn’t have to limit who they can have to avoid upsetting someone else and they shouldn’t have to accept the likelihood of their party being ruined by another child’s behaviour.

Just to address your second point, this ‘missing out’ narrative is often driven by the parents: many ND children like completely different things to NT kids and the rapid acceptance of this would be to everyone’s advantage.

My (ASD) boys like different things. Older loved parties and friends and is very sociable - lots of parties hosted and attended. My younger? Would rather play with a weighted helium balloon (which he did on his last birthday for 6 hours). He’s not left out - he likes different things and if I pushed him to parties etc it would be for me.

Yes,I take your point, thank you.

Obviously with the M and under supervision.

Is your daughter incredibly popular or can she be a bit selective with her invitations. If she can not invite the whole class then it won't look like you are excluding him. If she must invite everyone but him and the mother asks why, do not say autism but explain some of the specifc behaviours you have described here, hitting, throwing, screaming. She can't ignore its happening and if she can't control him it's only going to get worse. I do wonder of he even wants to go to parties or is she making him go. My brother is autistic and though his behaviour was not on this scale he rarely wanted to go to parties anyway. He flatly refused to attend my 16th, wasn't invited to my 18th and when i held a small moving out bbq when I left home, my mum had to bribe him to leave his room and join in.