AIBU to think the sunflower lanyards aren't to be used as an excuse to be a lazy parent

[Namechange2715]

At a science museum today with my 2 LOs. It was manic (obviously) as half term. Lots of boisterous children (mine no exception) so I was watching them closely in a building area with large lego blocks (think the giant ones). Little boy about 4 running around causing carnage, wallopping kids with blocks, destroying all the kids building and at one point beating up a very patient older boy by pulling his t-shirt etc.
I kept watch to make sure my kids weren't trying to join in with the mayhem and also wondering where the kids parents were but no one seemed to be looking out at all. About 15 minutes into the chaos Mum called LO over and threw a sunflower lanyard around his neck before merrily sending him off to play again and she resumed her seat away from play area to continue chatting to her mates, oblivious to the whole thing.
I'm pretty fuming really that these lanyards seem to just be thrown round kids necks as if to say "oh yes my little darling has additional needs so excuse them just beating the crap out of everyone". Surely this isn't the point of them! I recognise they are there for a very important message that the child may have hidden disabilities and needs and to try and be more accommodating but surely if you are aware your kid is going to be like this in certain situations you'd keep more of a close watch over things.
Believe me I am no angel parent or helicopter Mum. My kids can be little shits as much as the next kid, hence why I keep watch in places I know it might kick off. But this Mum today just seemed to make a mockery of the whole sunflower lanyard system?!

You can't buy them to get queue pass at theme parks.
Nor do queue passes at theme parks get you extra rides.

Theme parks request a letter from the GP or consultant stating the child's needs and that as result of those needs they would benefit from a ride access pass.
They will not accept any of the 100's of pages of letters you have or dla awards (unless it mobility issues)
They will only accept something dated within the year. Most surgeries will charge for this service and it costs £30-40.
And when you arrive you do get a pass but if the queue for a ride is an hour long you have to wait an hour after using the access before accessing another ride.

This has nothing to do with the lanyards and it’s really bad to make it about the lanyards or parents of children with additional needs. They have enough troubles. It’s about one parent in one situation failing to parent. Nothing more.

YANBU about this one specific anecdotal experience

But YABVVVVVU and judgy in your generalisation otherwise

Having children with AN is hard enough steady without this kind of mistrust added

I feel quite sad reading the comments. I saw the lanyards as a signal to others that they might need to be more patient or accepting of a difference. But it feels like some people are jealous someone might get a shop assitant to go a little more slowly for them or that someone might need a bit more space around them. Its just being a respectful human but so many people treat people with hidden dissbilities as less than human that someone came up with a lanyard to jog peoples memories. Its downfall will be associating it with being fast tracked. It will have to move away from that. Noone would wear a lanyward to be treated how they are automatically treated anyway because they arent disabled.

I thought you didn't use to provide proof at airports to get a sunflower lanyard ?My son is severely autistic and has learning disabilities non verbal etc we have,nt been abroad with him yet, but adv rising to my local disability group you just have to ask for one??So if this is the case you can kind of see it's open to abuse.

Lanyards are great at places like Heathrow and on BA flights (no-where else seems to have heard of them apart from some supermarkets). I clipped one on ds's bag and one round my neck when taking kids on a flight and it certainly cut down the 'can't you just lift your arms/stand on one leg' etc to one question.

In places like the Science Museum there's going to be a bunch of exhausted parents, and parents of kids with sn will be more exhausted than most, who have taken the kids to the wonderlab as a safe place the kids can't escape from while they collapse. Possibly the parent had their own health problems. You have no idea whether they are a crap parent or a great struggling parent on a bad day, but my guess is the latter is much more likely.

If a kid's disturbing others, tell the kid what to do or not do, and if that doesn't help, tell them to find their adult or find a member of staff. Whinging here doesn't help anyone and just smacks of thinking any disabled kid should be out and about.

@ahenderson270 To clarify for a third time I did not call her child a little shit. Please read the thread, I used it in reference to my own children.
And before any other out cries no I don't call it to their face.
I find the suggestion that my post is similar to the whole Flack headlines frankly absurd. The whole of MN is full of threads that if the person in question read it they'd be upset/outraged/hurt. If this thread is about you personally then I'll happily ask a admin to remove. But the whole of AIBU should be shut down if you are suggesting people shouldn't be able to come on here and discuss things that have happened to them in day to day life. And for clarification if the woman in question today was you I would have happily thrown you a sympathetic smile or eye roll or comment had you been present at the play area for more than 15 seconds rather than the 30 minutes or so event that I had to witnes the "small lapse" in parenting shown. As would the poor older lady who demonstrated both calmness and patience towards the child when the mother was no where to be seen.

The thread was created to discuss and debate the use (or mis use) of the sunflower lanyard. What I have read has actually reaffirmed for me what a fantastic and all encompassing job AN parents have to put in to help their children in situations. For no minute am I trying to imply that I have a tougher job with my NT children and my hats go off to the majority of parents who have posted and the experiences they experience day in day out.

Unfortunately the ease in availability of these lanyards (to pick up in a bowl at a supermarket) is going to lead to the lanyard being abused in the wrong situation, as some other posters have already discussed.

I understand what I saw yesterday is no judgement of the whole AN parenting community as a whole, rather just a poor parenting window witnessed for that period of time. And as others with AN children have echoed, having AN is no excuse to let your children hurt and upset other children. It does not matter what else has happened in your day, you watch your child in those situations full stop. You don't know what the situation of any of those children in the play area or their parents was and no one should be left to run amok and hurt others.

I thought you didn't use to provide proof at airports to get a sunflower lanyard?

As I understand it, the sunflower lanyards are more of a general indicator that someone needs support and they don't give very high-value services like avoiding queues in amusement parks. So their distribution doesn't need to be carefully controlled.

With or without lanyards anyone can ask for disability support from an airline, you usually just have to arrange it in advance. My very elderly grandmother got pushed through the airport in a wheelchair, she didn't need official letters saying how far she could walk. There are different levels - in the days before lanyards we once booked full disabled boarding for DS but that was overkill so after that we just rocked up and asked to join the ordinary pre-board because that was the main tricky point. No-one demanded evidence or gave us any grief about it.

So if this is the case you can kind of see it's open to abuse.

No-one has described any abuse of a lanyard, the mother correctly put a lanyard on her DS because he is disabled. Whatever else she did wrong it has nothing to do with the lanyard.

@Namechange2715

No it wasn't me thankfully but then I'm thick skinned enough to have just let your judgment roll off my back.

You've clearly proven just know that you could have raised your concern over the potential abuse for the lanyard scheme without being personally offensive about a complete stranger. You are obviously articulate and can be sensitive in raising a delicate issue - you obviously chose to write your first post in a sensational, derogatory way. Excellent. So yes that is where your post falls in line with them online bullying of vulnerable people.

You made a choice to address an issue regarding what has the potential to involve a very vulnerable member of an already vulnerable community in a way that was intentionally inflammatory. Just all like Flack's trolls and abusers. Just because you were one woman posting in what you thought was an anonymous manner doesn't make it any less potent.

I cannot tell you how relieved I am for you that you cannot fathom a situation where you'd ever be so snowed under by the bull shit of your life that you'd be so 'crap' a mother that you take a 30/60 min time out of being perfect and your child is a terror.

You haven't dealt with the constant uphill slog against professionals to try and glean some semblance of diagnosis or support for your child, you've never had the moment where you've watched your baby with other children and the grief of realising the future you envisioned when you held your baby the first time will never happen hits you square in the chest and destroys your whole sense of self. You've never had to endure the slow disappearance of friends and family as they distance themselves from your grief, difficult child and chaotic life. You're relationship hasn't broken down because you simply cannot jiggle the needs of anyone else beyond that of your disabled child.. to just name a few of the literally hundreds of things that AN parents endure that you can't begin to fathom that ultimately may lead to someone checking out momentarily.

You chose yesterday to be anything but kind yesterday because you cannot understand or empathise with her situation. It doesn't matter how flowery you write it now .. your original intent was clear - 'saw a shit parent today with her awful child and I'm going to relish in writing a goady post and the replies from others validating my bitchy moment'.

Ohhhhh wait I missed one thing from my list of things AN parents have to endure that sometimes lead to them losing the will to keep going - snide judgement from strangers that have LITERALLY no idea what they're talking about.

My point was a general point about the Sunflower Lanyard being open to abuse as other posters have described incidents of abuse not that mother in the situation the Op describes was abusing the lanyard ave!e

Lanyard scheme

YANBU at all. Additional needs isn’t a free pass to be a twat, the Mum should have removed him or at least monitored him closely.

YABU to describe children as being little shits.

Why? Some children are little shits! And they often turn into adults who are also shits. There are plenty of arsehole adults going around the place. They weren't little angelic children.

@ahenderson270 I'm not really sure how this post has descended into some kind of competition of how shit your life is and how amazing my life is due to not having a child with AN. Well done, you win, is that what you want to hear. I'm not going to explain the in and out details of all the things going on in my life as its not relevant. It's not really relevant that you went into all that detail but hey ho. Apparently because you have a child with AN you win. Nothing I say is going to bring you down from that soapbox and I'm not going to start engaging with tit for tat on an online forum of all places. Take at look at your responses and see how goady you are being to me and maybe apply some of the sensitivity and tact that I so obviously don't possess in my own thick skull to your own messages.

You don't know what the situation of any of those children in the play area or their parents was and no one should be left to run amok and hurt others.

I'm sure you felt disappointed that she hadn't come in to intervene or take her child away, but if she was sitting at a distance or away getting the lanyard and no-one actually said to her "his behaviour is out of hand and dangerous" when she came up, then it's not as if you spoke to her and she said "he's wearing a lanyard so he can do what he likes". You seem to have making some pretty unpleasant assumptions.

To clarify for a third time I did not call her child a little shit. Please read the thread, I used it in reference to my own children.

There are things you can say about your own child tongue in cheek to a couple of friends in private that you should certainly resist the temptation to say on a public Internet forum. First because tongue in cheek does not come across to everyone and second because a lot of strangers will take it to validate their existing view that someone else's disabled child is just being a little shit.

@amaryllis yes I agree I could have spoken to her, but I felt by putting the lanyard round his neck it was as if she was giving a silent explanation for his behaviour. And if I had questioned his behaviour then I might have been met with similar onslaught to what I've had in here from certain posters. It is one thing to read vehemently aimed comments it's another to hear them and I don't like confrontation in real life, hence why I kept quiet. How am I meant to say anything in response if I'd had had the Mum reply what @aha said for example. You shouldn't use AN as a reason not to keep watch or be responsible for your child.

I think the original point was about the misuse of the lanyard. It's a great idea to support vulnerable people and their carers. If it's just used as a baby sitter and an alternative to watching and looking after your child then yes it will be devalued for its intended purpose.

I understand why you didn't feel able to challenge.

I've said before that my ds is autistic. I've also had to leave groups for children with send before because I couldn't stand the pack mentality that the children could do as they pleased because people should understand they have send.
If my ds was behaving in a way that out others at risk I'd deal with it or leave. But I would never stand back and watch him hurting someone and just shrug and say "well he has autism".

@itsgettingweird thank you that it exactly the point I am trying to get across

I could have spoken to her, but I felt by putting the lanyard round his neck it was as if she was giving a silent explanation for his behaviour.

Well, that's you.

And if I had questioned his behaviour then I might have been met with similar onslaught to what I've had in here from certain posters.

Again, that's you. Dealing with strangers is always tricky but as someone else said way upthread you could have asked a staff member to deal with it. That would have been appropriate. Coming here to say nasty things about the parent of a disabled child is not appropriate, and trying to blame her behaviour on the existence of a lanyard is even less appropriate.

You shouldn't use AN as a reason not to keep watch or be responsible for your child.

But you don't know that the one had anything to do with the other. That's just your assumption, and quite a prejudiced assumption.

I don't like confrontation in real life, hence why I kept quiet.

So you came on here to start an argument about lanyards instead? Not good.

I've never heard of this before?

My son has special needs , pretty severe learning difficulties. He has never once punched , kicked , bitten or thrown anything at a child . As a parent of a child with sn who will one day be an adult in the community I have made extra sure that he knows right from wrong and social boundaries etc.. also I'd never take my eyes off him in the local park let alone in London because he wouldn't be able to tell anyone who he belonged to etc .
I do know many parents of sn kids that just write everything off to their disability which frankly is terrifying to me and the child's future !

@Namechange2715, I don’t relate to ahendersons experience either, and I also have an autistic boy, yes, things are harder, but I haven’t grieve anything and nobody has abandon me, back to the lanyard, it’s very open to abuse, you just have to ask for it, it is only meant to be a warning for staff that extra help might be needed, and to be honest, I don’t care how hard your life is, or that you get up a five in the morning ( I do too, goes with the territory), you don’t live a vulnerable child alone where he can hurt themselves or others.

thank you that it exactly the point I am trying to get across

The child's mother didn't say that though. That's just what you think she would have said, and you think it because she put a lanyard on her child. That does come across as prejudiced. She could as easily have given him a cup of juice and sent him off again, and then you would not have been talking about AN as an excuse.

I've also had to leave groups for children with send before because I couldn't stand the pack mentality that the children could do as they pleased because people should understand they have send.

We stopped attending one particular autism support group for similar reasons. They had some private sessions at a local softplay venue for group members. One child, age 12, kept going after my then 3yo and trying to hurt him. DS was really upset and I was massively stressed out trying to make sure I stayed within sight and reach of DS in order to intervene as needed. 12yo's mum sat there oblivious the entire time and when I did say to her that her son was having some difficulty in the playframe would she mind helping him, I was told that he's autistic and doesn't understand the rules. A huge rant was later posted on the FB page, endorsed by the group leaders, saying that these sessions are for our children to be themselves, free from the judgement and restrictions of people who don't understand.

We go to a different group now and they also have private sessions at softplay but they are very clear that parents remain responsible for their childrens behaviour and they expect appropriate levels of supervision at all times.