to think attitudes to disabilities in a themepark should be better...

[LunarRose]

We have exit passes for DS with ASD.

AIBU that "I'm going to kick their head in" cos they're "queue jumping", was neither clever nor original (especially after the third time my DP heard it during the day)

AIBU that pushing DS out the way (in the chest with some force) because he failed to respond instantly to your demand he "get out of your way" (whist waiting at the disabled exit) was just plain unpleasant (I was bending down to move him at the time)

So many more similar incidents through the day.

I normal circumstances I wouldn't want to wish my son's disability on anyone, nor the days over backache that a themepark trip entitled before we knew about exit passes (from carrying DS through Queuelines kicking and screaming) however....

We shall retreat to Chessington where we have always found people lovely!!!

Perhaps a stint working amongst the more vulnerable within our society which lacks way too much in understanding would do you the world of good and make you a nicer person. Why not give it a go, there's always room for volunteers in these fields of work.

Please nooooooooo! unpa1dcar3r, don't you think our children have enough to put up with, without being exposed to the likes of Spiderpig?

Oh God claw3 don't read the TES forums you will just get depressed by some of the ignorance and imcompetence that they sometimes spout there! They are of course not all bad posters but sometimes the fuckwittery on those forums belies belive!

*incompetence (sticky keys grrr kids!)

I wouldn't want him/her near any of my children.

Wassup, the sad thing is i should be surprised or shocked, by the level of ignorance from some teachers, but im not. Im not sure whether the level of ignorance or my lack of surprise is sadder. I was told at the start of my SN journey that i would need to develop a thick skin, i didnt realise then at just how thick it would have to be!

Exactly claw3!

I dont believe for a minute that Spiderpig believes the crap he/she is spouting. He/she is out purely for a wind up.

On that note im off to bed. Good night

I don't know my brother in law and sister in law REALLY are that thick ignorant!!

NN :)

.I liketo point out that theme parks infact could do more for disabled people

In the Usa There is not a problem allowing time for wheelchair user to transfer and have a larger space that they can .and have lifts available for when there is stairs

Yet in this day and age a lot still have bloody stairs to get up including at the exit.Last time we went to a theme park one ride was all i could get on yet I had to pay £30 for the privalge so i could take my dc in

Spiderpig: "Anyway i'm done now.As a community of mums of SN need children you are not helping your cause at all. You appear to be very beligerent , looking for things to take offence at !"

I am not a mum of a child with SN, at least not so far as we can tell at the age of 2. I am normally an able-bodied mother of an able-bodied, NT child. I have experience of disability from the point of view of the disabled child as I spent large amounts of time in wheelchairs as a child recovering from multiple operations to correct a congenital deformity - my foot and part of my ankle was missing. I was spectacularly lucky and a series of fairly experimental operations got me to the point where I actually managed to participate in the vast majority of normal childhood activities, in between surgery. So I do have the memories of doing all the "normal" school and childhood stuff, albeit missing out on quite a bit due to being in a wheelchair for 3 months at a time. Some children will not have any of those memories and will not be as lucky as I was to reach adulthood with relatively few problems - although bloody pregnancy has kicked off a long-standing back problem and I am having a salutory lesson at the moment in not taking able-bodiedness for granted.

But I don't have to have a child with SN, or even have the memory of childhood problems to allow me to understand, to some limited extend, the difficulties faced by some parents on a daily basis, and to be delighted that places such as theme parks are trying to include disabled children in that part of "normal" childhood. Unfortunately, their efforts are clearly going to be made that bit more difficult due to the horrible, begrudging attitude of people like you, Spiderpig.

Mums of children with disabilities don't need to look for things to take offence at - I would imagine they would be pretty damn happy for a break from offence being rammed down their throats every other minute. So why not bugger off and find someone else to offend and give them a break?

Please nooooooooo! unpa1dcar3r, don't you think our children have enough to put up with, without being exposed to the likes of Spiderpig?
Haha yes Pixel; that's why i also wrote Habloody ha at the bottom of that statement.

No I would defo not want my kids exposed to such blatent ignorance and intolerance.

Anyway i'm done now.As a community of mums of SN need children you are not helping your cause at all. You appear to be very beligerent , looking for things to take offence at

Well, I have the great fortune not to have a SN child, and I think the mums of SN children on this thread have been unfailingly patient, incredibly diligent and eloquent in explaining the issues involved, and brilliant spokespeople for their cause.

It wouldn't in a million years occur to me to begrudge someone for the huge enormous unthinkable privilege of Not Having To Queue In A Theme Park anyway. But having read all of these posts in detail, I do now have a greater understanding of the issues faced by ADS children. And every time I read one of these threads, where mums of SN children explain and educate and bang their heads against wallies, I understand more.

It's no-one's job to educate me but me, but I'm thankful that these wonderful women do anyway.

ASD, even. I knew that. I knew that!

kungfu I know where you are coming from. I spend some months on crutches then sticks as a lad, following an accident from which I could expect to and did recover fully, and as I said upthread my father was blind; so I have what you might call collateral experience.

Crutches and sticks in the sixties, let me add, was even less of a joke than it is now; fewer buildings had lifts (and then as now there were many where that is not physically possible) and there was less understanding around; the attitudes of our friend with the arachnid-porcine nickname would have seemed "normal" (guess whose choice of word :o) then.

As for my father, he was a teacher and after he lost his sight he had training then went on teaching in a sighted school, which sixty years ago was a very courageous attitude in him and the council - but he met some opposition from parents and colleagues who should have known better. And some of them learnt to.

I don't understand spiderpig8 unless s/he is trying to bait the forum. In which case, I fear, full marks for success!

And you Tortoiseshell make us realise that there are some very decent and good people in the world too!
Thank you

I rarely comment on these threads, because what am I going to say? "hi, I am a Good Person who is nice to people who struggle with things I do not"?

But maybe I should, because otherwise it can absolutely feel like you are just talking to the bigots and there's no-one else out there.

I hang out on the feminist section a lot, and it certainly feels like that there, too. And hey, guess who pops up in that section frequently?

Oh come on people. Spiderpig is like the gift that keeps on giving.

Too dim to follow sensible or reasonable comment he/she gets increasingly unpleasant and then complains that everyone is being mean. He/she then bleats about how it is the responsibility of parents and carers of sn children to behave in an endlessly patient way so as not to upset the general public.

It is like a short pithy enactment of all the twats we encounter wrapped into one. I think the thread should stay to show what some of us are up against.
And that there are worse things in life than having sn.

Spiderpig you didn't understand my point -again.
I will try and explain it again using little words.
My dd has private lessons. I get odd looks when I am poolside with her because my ds has special needs. A conversation with a belligerent woman made me understand that she assumed that her lessons must be some kind of 'perk' because of ds. She found it impossible to process that someone with a disabled son could also have money. Because we must always be taking money from rate payers - you know, exactly the same judgement you made - equally wrongly

The people who object to special access are also the people who want and expect people with disability to be on benefits and living off the state. It suits their bigotry.
Because they are bigots

Can I also say that just because spider pig talks about 'the general public' does not and should not make any of us feel that the people we meet feel as she does.

We go out and about and it is easy to feel that any eyes turned towards us are looking through her eyes.
Mostly they are not. The vast majority of people begrudge nothing and wish us well. It is easy to allow a few vocal twats to make us think the world is filled with twats. It isn't.
Just a noisy bigoted few.

Loving the why should they wait..

becuase what else do you do when waiting?

In principle the turn up take a ticket and wait thing would work (personally i'd be mroe likely to accept a q-bot than the indignity for very aware ds1 of the SN examination anyhow, not so much the others) but what does one do when waiitng?

Becuase youc an't just go to the play area or they get scared and kick off / retreat into themselves depending on their SN

Chances are they can't eat most of the food in the cafe

Stand in a fenced area marked 'kiddie zoo' mayhap?

Thing is it actually doesn;t matter what the odd person thinks. My sense of shame at needing help has already imploded with teh potential dx of DS4, I am Not Coping anyway through my own judgements, other people's are really insignificant comapred to the voice in my head. but simultaneously I also know that I am better aplced than most people to understand the needs of my kids- what with 2 / 3 with the disorder AND an almost-MA in that same label. And having used to work in the field.

Why would the catcalls of the ignorant worry me?

We do what we need to do to make our kid's lives as positive as possible same as anyone else, EXCEPT that whilst with ds2 I know he will grow up, leave and fly I know that with most-severe ds3 these re the golden days: whilst we are alive and well enough to offer great quality loving care. For a child like him childhood is as good as it gets. there will be no graduation, no wedding day, no children (if you ask what he wants to do as an adult he says be a dad so we stopped asking ), no promotion... best outcome is enough indpendence to go to the Spar, a shared care flat and a decent work support scheme- teh chances lessen every day.

So frankly Spiderpig spout on all you want, it's just another little squeaky wheel emitting annoying noise and not much more.

And as everyone says the equation goes:

Would you be prepared if it were possible to have the kid's Sn placed into your child if you got the benefits atatched (not just cash, access to TAs etc)

if teh asnwer is no then STFU

Goodness spider pig is an interesting one. I love that ds1 filters people like him out of our life (bliss - perfect). We couldn't possibly offend him because even with exit passes ds1 can't manage the wait/queue so we don't do theme parks (for ds1's sake, couldn't give a monkeys if a bit of noise upset the general public). Ds1 surfs. With excellent 1:1 instruction (and no waiting) which we pay for (although hopefully that'll get cheaper as we are seeking funding) I run a small second business solely to raise money for ds1's surfing and am looking at ways to give more people with ld's access. If anyone knows of funding a not for profit can apply for please let me know.

Sort of relevant to the cost discussion/benefits on this thread.

But maybe I should, because otherwise it can absolutely feel like you are just talking to the bigots and there's no-one else out there
Yes tortoise sometimes it does, but we know really that the majority of people are either really nice or at least tolerant.
Sadly the bigoted attitudes far outweigh the good because we do experience these everyday of our lives in one way or another. Even within the medical profession and with social services who are 'there to help' but often do not (my eldest has been refused basic medical care because he is disabled on more than one occasion) so when we hear blatant negative comments like the ones expressed here re: our children, we do despair.
Thank you again for being insightful and one of the good ones!
And as for Andrew and his father, fair play to them too! His father fighting to be heard and doing so well despite others attitudes and not because of them.

As for the TES there's a nutty ex clinical psych or ed psych on there who can't eat in restaurants in case she sees a severely autistic child. (because er of course a restaurant is EXACTLY the place you're going to see a severely autistic child isn't it? . so as well as being a bit delicate she's also slightly confused about the condition. It was laughable if it wasn't so utterly ignorant!