SN Son shouted at by woman in cafe

[missmama12]

My family and I recently went out for a meal and my youngest DC has autism which causes him to be very hyperactive and agitated in public spaces and as a result of this, the woman on the table beside ours leaned over and shouted at my son due to him being too loud! I am at a loss what to do because I don't want my DS to miss out on days out with the family due to his disability. Any advice would be greatly appreciated, thank you!

I wouldn't do anything OP. If your son was causing no harm to other customers, not running around the cafe etc then I don't see the problem. If someone spoke to my 3 Y/O like that I'd suggest they moved - strangers don't get to discipline your child! Especially when he has SN, obvious or not. Enjoy your family meals and days out, forget about these silly incidents xx

@rainbowbash 🙄 Yes, that’s clearly what I said, wasn’t it. It was txtbreaker’s absurd post I was laughing at.

If you bothered to read my previous posts you’d know that I’m disabled and a Mum and that I have never or would never shout at anyone else’s child; SN or not. But no, go ahead and put words in my mouth, eh.

It's a real shame you posted in AIBU

.....in amongst good advice (planning where, having a tool kit if stuff to soothe and distract, a card if things go really tits up and you have to get the hell out of dodge).....sensible perspectives (she may have had sensory issues, dementia etc herself) and people who get it ().......
there will unfortunately be those that just don't get it, and these are probably the same people who will make you feel a little bit shit about stuff over and over again.

Ignore those people, go over to the sn boards, get strategies (different for everyone and never failsafe IME!) try to develop a thick skin and the ability to wrestle and calm an overwhelmed smallish (then biggish) person whilst packing up stuff, keeping other children you happen to have happy and making sure the entire restaurant/cafe/leisure centre/supermarket/park etc etc has a good show whilst you try to retain a shred of dignity (actually fuck that....dignity is a thing of the past.....sanity, that will do).

There is no perfect solution, and we don't live in a perfect society, we all have a place, sometimes there may be conflicting needs at play, but we are a society and we all have to rub along together.

for you, op.

It sounds hard for you OP as you are coping with your son's autism and coupled with that, he is only 3 which can be a tricky age anyway.

My son doesn't have autism but when he was around 2-3, eating out was a nightmare as he constantly wanted to be up and about which we didn't allow in restaurants. No amount of toys/crayons etc would distract him for long enough either. In the end we stopped eating out and he is fine now at 5.

For you, could you go at quieter times (so lunch around 11.30am or dinner around 4.30pm)? This way, there are likely to be less people and most will probably have young kids themselves.

You mention he got upset during the meal? Did he like the food? Maybe too many textures/smells/flavours? If this might be the case, speak to the place in advance - most will be happy to make alternatives that suit.

Will he watch an iPad with earphones? Might help with distracting him.

Maybe he got fed up with the wait for food ? could you try somewhere like a carvery at a quiet time so that you get the meal instantly and can choose exactly which things you want?

Has the OP said where they were eating? That would be relevant to me.
If it was a vaguely expensive restaurant then I probably wouldn't want to hear a noisy toddler, autistic or not, as a meal out would be an extremely rare treat for us so I'd be annoyed if it was spoilt because of someone else's behaviour.
If it was an ordinary local cafe, then knock yourself out.

I know how you feel because my son has autism and when he was younger some people were the same towards us but having my son has helped me to be more empathetic. We often can't tell by looking at someone that they have autism or some other learning difficulty. Often we can tell something is not quite right by looking at their behaviour. When I see a parent with a difficult child I'm much more understanding and not so quick to judge the parent or the child.

Fancy saying "If person can’t cope with noise why are they dining in public" and calling other people ableist in the same post. Oh the irony.

Ds can cope with the normal level of noise is quieter places. What he can’t cope with is unexpected additional noises so before now he has been known to shout “turn peppa pig off” when someone at a nearby table has an iPad without headphones.
Sounds like the perfect response to me!

I’m a mum to an 18 year old young man who is Autistic with severe learning difficulties and is non verbal, he can be very loud at times especially when play his music or gets excited.

If we go out I tend to sit him away from other people like in pizza hut he sits next to the window so he can see whats going on outside and I sit next to him, sometimes he looks at pictures of things I know he likes on my phone or I take a favourite book of his for him to look at.

Unfortunately you always get some people who are not very understanding but there are a lot of people who are, I found when my son was very young people thought he was just naughty, but now he’s older it’s so obvious that he has learning difficulties that people seem to understand and cut him some slack which makes it easier to some degree.

There are some places we wouldn’t go with him as it wouldn’t be fair on both my son and other people but it certainly doesn’t stop us doing things with him.

Try not to get upset about the woman she may of thought initially that he was just a naughty kid, I bet now she feels bad about it after all Autism is being diagnosed earlier and earlier these days I’m sure her path will cross someone again with the condition.

Just draw a line under the incident and try and move on and most importantly don’t let it stop you doing things with him especially as the summer is coming you could take him to the park or zoo the seaside is always a big hit with my son.