To urge you to teach your children to be genuinely inclusive, not just polite?

[gingerginger2]

My kids are back at school this week (Scotland) and after a summer of seeing them without the context of their peers it’s a sadness again to see them interacting with other children.

On their own, they are sweet, silly, funny, kind, playful, interesting, creative, chatty. They are part of the world, full of wonder and learning and play.

But in the context of kids their age, they are different. They both have learning disabilities and dyspraxia.

They don’t know this though, they don’t quite realise they are “different” yet. They are little, they learn slowly, despite the constant lessons from society’s exclusions. They run up to their “friends” in such a carefree happy way, eager to talk, play, connect. It doesn’t seem to occur to them not to.

And when they do they mainly encounter silence. Uncomfortable polite looks. Or polite confused monosyllabic mumbles followed by eager escapes into actual easy friendships groups. Or at best a short conversation in a humouring tone, a tone learnt by imitating the tones adults take with small silly children.

There’s not really any unkindness. There’s just a refusal to actually engage, to get to know, to connect. An embarrassment and unwillingness to spend time with my children’s lack of social skills, messy clothes, an uncomfortableness at their invasion of their personal space. So a brief hello before getting on with actual friendships and relationships and life. An obvious desire to politely not engage. A smile with the lips not the eyes.

I’m amazed they don’t seem to realise that they’ve been snubbed again. But they din’t Mainly. Learning disability means everything is hard to learn I guess. But it’ heartbreaking to see they just carry on and continue to fling themselves at people, wide open, encountering boundaries wherever they go. I worry that soon they’ll start to realise and feel the pain of these rejections.

I worry too that maybe they do feel the pain. Maybe it goes somewhere deep, and maybe they are learning day by day that people don’t like them. That society isn’t for them.

I hate it.

Please can you teach your children to be more than polite and kind to their peers with disabilities? Please can you urge them to actually get to know them, to actually connect and include them? Even when they are messy, annoying, noisy and a bit weird. Even then?

The fair enough was to the idea of not forcing children to be friends with (but not friendly to) people.

Butchyrestingface have you rtft? Did you then miss the posts from her saying if her DD didn’t want to be friends with a black child because of the colour of her skin she wouldn’t do anything about it?

Yes, I have read the thread. She is saying she would not force a friendship, and in the post I responded to, that is what you objected to.

You can’t “force” friendships with anyone. I would certainly “do something about it” if I had a child evincing racist or disabilist views, but that doesn’t mean I’d force a friendship, as much for the other child’s sake as for my own.

What else could you do? If your DD didn’t want to be friends with a child because they were a different race to her, you wouldn’t force it but you’d do what? Tell them how awful and wrong that attitude was? Explain how we can’t treat people differently because they aren’t the same as us? Talk to her about hurt and upset that child must feel?

I doubt it.

I doubt it.

You doubt what? You have just described what I would do, but you have some other problem with me that I can’t work out.

I do understand how you feel. My son has ASD. All through primary school after the whole of class parties of reception had finished, he was the one who never got an invite to parties, sleepovers or to play. Absolutely no friends. It would never have occurred to me to try and make others include him.
He just wasn't like the other boys. Very immature, not sporty, very very different. One boy did target him. This child rubbed my childs pens on his genitals and pinched his nipples. I complained both to the primary school and had to go to the high school to ask that under no circumstances should this child be allowed in the same room during the residential. The one child who was 'inclusive' was a danger.
High school has been a breath of fresh air. He actually has friends. I suspect that some also have ASD and they 'get' each other. If your children are happy at home the best thing you can do is expose them to as many different social settings as possible. Watch and wait. Even after being on the receiving end of exclusion I would always teach my son to be kind to others but I won't force friends on him.
As an adult I have very few friends, but the ones I do have a very dear and valued.

While I genuinely feel for your children OP. My children must have their boundaries respected. Always. Your children’s rights/feelings do not trump my children’s.

But we are talking about behaviour that makes my child feel uncomfortable or unsafe. That doesn’t mean you would always agree with her that the behaviour is distressing or unsafe. But if she feels that it is, what should she do?

What you should do as a parent is help your child navigate their feelings and understand the difference between feeding discomfort because someone is behaving n an unsafe way, and discomfort because someone behaves / looks / is somewhat different to them.

If your child is uncomfortable because another child is touching them without their consent, that’s a very different scenario to being uncomfortable because another child talks differently, struggles with eye contact, etc etc. These are the things we are talking about, not forcing children to tolerate unwanted physical contact etc - but even then, helping your child to understand why some people act differently / makes them uncomfortable is a valuable lesson which will enhance their personal safety, not diminish it.

While I genuinely feel for your children OP. My children must have their boundaries respected. Always. Your children’s rights/feelings do not trump my children’s.

ODFOD. The comments here are so insanely offensive towards disabled people. I am stunned they’re being allowed to stand.

There’s a difference between having boundaries and discriminating - otherwise all manner of bigotry could be excused under the guise of protecting boundaries.

These are the things we are talking about, not forcing children to tolerate unwanted physical contact etc - but even then, helping your child to understand why some people act differently / makes them uncomfortable is a valuable lesson which will enhance their personal safety, not diminish it.

Actually, no, we are talking about unwanted physical contact. Not only that, but behaviour that includes that. Read the thread again.

And while I am perfectly happy to talk to my child about why people look and act in different ways and why difference is often no barrier to friendship, I won’t be forcing them to tolerate situations that make them feel uncomfortable. Of course I will help them to analyse that discomfort and try to understand that feelings of awkwardness aren’t unsafe for them. If, after I have done that, my child still doesn’t want to be friends with another child, I won’t force them.

The comments here are so insanely offensive towards disabled people. I am stunned they’re being allowed to stand.

I can’t see what was offensive about what the poster you are addressing said. The opposite inference must be that you think the OP’s children’s needs and rights do trump those of her children.

What you should do as a parent is help your child navigate their feelings and understand the difference between feeding discomfort because someone is behaving n an unsafe way, and discomfort because someone behaves / looks / is somewhat different to them.

If your child is uncomfortable because another child is touching them without their consent, that’s a very different scenario to being uncomfortable because another child talks differently, struggles with eye contact, etc etc. These are the things we are talking about, not forcing children to tolerate unwanted physical contact etc - but even then, helping your child to understand why some people act differently / makes them uncomfortable is a valuable lesson which will enhance their personal safety, not diminish it.

I agree with that wholeheartedly. I’m not sure, tbf, that Hercule ever said or implied she wouldn’t take such steps?

But, at the end of the day, say the parent does do all of the above and their child still doesn’t want to be friends and wants to keep all interaction to a polite minimum, what then?

Not interested in being told my children’s boundaries don’t count, no. So you really don’t have to talk to me. I’ll fucking live.

@Yabbers

I don’t think I explained very well.

As I have mentioned DD often played games she didn’t like a couple of times a week, chose to sit with this girl rather than her close friend.

This trip was the first and last where they would have been two to a room and the only trip where they had picked who to share with. Previously they’d been in larger groups of roommates and who was in what room was decided by the staff.

I can’t see what was offensive about what the poster you are addressing said. The opposite inference must be that you think the OP’s children’s needs and rights do trump those of her children

No, the ignorance here is the assumption that disabled children are being excluded for behaviour that’s disturbing, boundary-pushing, etc. In reality, disabled children are usually excluded because they don’t have the same level of social skills as their peers and are obviously different, not because their behaviour is threatening in any way.

Not interested in being told my children’s boundaries don’t count, no

Of course boundaries count. The reasoning behind those boundaries is worth exploring.

My mum always reached out to people (kids) who were excluded or in need of a bit of help. It didn't make me any more likely to do so i'm afraid, as she put me in really uncomfortable situations with no skills or tools to make sense of it.

I started being seen as a bit kooky as a result, which was hard socially in primary school. I am not proud of this but it did make it hard to maintain my own friendships. Obviously not as hard as it must have been for those kids, but I didn't see their hardship as my problem to shoulder. I'd love it if other kids thought i was just really friendly and inclusive and fun as a result, but it was the opposite.

I just don't think it's the job of kids to struggle socially. School is hard, kids are cruel, i don't really know the answer. But i am sorry there are kids out there who have it really hard.

That wasn’t what I said sinkgirl, so why question my comment?

The comparison of the girl that walked the long way round to a woman excusing herself from a creepy stranger is weird. Makes me realise some of you really do have no idea at all what families like mine face on a daily basis.

A more accurate comparison would if a man you knew, had known for years, that you’d worked with in the same room, been in the same social group as for years, came up to you to start a conversation and you instantly cut him off because you found him annoying because he had learning disabilities. Fair enough you didn’t say “fuck off spastic” , you did it politely, but the effect was the same. You couldn’t even spare 5 mins of your time.

The girl who walked the long way round has been in the same class as my son since preschool. 6 years or so. They are in the same classroom everyday. He is not some weird potential predator. He is her peer, saying hi and telling her about his summer holidays . Now he probably does this in a slightly annoying way. He’ll blurt our some anecdote about his holidays as a starter, rather than saying “hey, how’s it going? How were your holidays? “ He’ll have a bit of drool on his chin. He’ll be falling over his feet a bit trying to keep up with her.

So you’re really all suggesting that she should take her obvious feelings of discomfort at his lack of social skills as a good reason to lay a hard and fast boundary and get away from him? Rather than be able to see past that and have a five minute chat with him on the way to school ???

I’m really upset that people see a conflict with teaching their kids to have boundaries with teaching their kids to be inclusive. There is a nuance here, there is. People with learning disability do have personality traits that can require more effort to understand, that can make us feel uncomfortable, it is true. In teaching your children to have hard and fast boundaries that don’t make allowance for this, then you are then contributing to this exclusionary culture that my children/my family have to endure. You do need to teach nuance and exception too surely???

The continued insistence of some posters, and frequent new posters popping up to say that their child’s choices, comfort and boundaries trump my child’s ability to experience basic human interaction and connection is distressing.

As is the continued desire to misrepresent this as “forcing friendship” . Asking for inclusion is not forcing anyone to be friends with anyone. It’s asking for interaction, for effort, for the opportunity for friendship to happen. Not for it to be constantly shut down with a polite tolerance, and a move on to your real friends who don’t dribble, wobble and stutter.

Not sure why Hercule is getting such a bashing she hasn't said anything controversial but some people are repeatedly looking for a bun fight. Not sure how you expect to make friends with such hostility. Do you come across like this in real life? Some of you seem unable to accept anything that's being said that doesn't 100% agree with you.

I think you're preaching to the converted on this thread. If people are bothering to read and post on this thread it's because they do care and think about these issues and generally apply what you're asking in teaching their DCs. No one can guarantee a perfect outcome though. Sorry.

While I don’t think friendships can be forced, I found once I joined my drama group and there were kids there from school who had to work closely with me, a lot of them were able to overlook my differences where they hadn’t before, plus I made some friends in different age groups. Then at school the awkwardness wasn’t there so much.

I really feel for the OP but I’m not sure what the answer is. A few of the people that at school were just polite and not willing to include me in their friendship group now post on Facebook about their own children’s social exclusion for their learning difficulties.

Vile. No one is saying that any child’s boundaries don’t count. You are saying that a person’s right not to feel slightly uncomfortable because of social differences (not dangerous behaviour despite the way PPs have pushed the discussion) is more important than disabled people participating in society.

My children would never hurt another child, they’re far less aggressive than most toddlers in fact. They’d never invade your personal space - if anything, they’re the recipients of unwanted touching all the time from children impatient with them taking time to do things, or showing affection my boys don’t want. They are not excluded because they make others uncomfortable - they’re excluded because the other children don’t understand them, and engaging them is more difficult.

The assertion that disabled children are excluded because their behaviour is negative or even dangerous is what’s REALLY FUCKING OFFENSIVE and inaccurate.

Girls boundaries can change whenever and must be respected. I know it is hard for your child, but just as I teach my children tolerance and inclusivity, so too must you accept other’s boundaries.