To think my son and his partner were very rude here?

[JaneY1970]

I'll start by giving you the background details.
I have 2 sons, the oldest is 26 and the youngest 24.
My oldest son has been in a long distance relationship with a woman from Norway for the past 3 years and will be moving there to live with her at the end of the month. He has aspergers and has been adamant his entire life that he doesn't want children, he had the snip 5 years ago (which he proudly told me about). His partner also feels the same way (and is also 8 years older than him so time would be ticking for her if she did want children) that's how they connected when they met online. I am sad about this but I have to accept it because I love my son. My other son and his partner have my 4 year old grandson who has severe autism and is nonverbal. I invited both of my sons and their partners over for dinner just to spend some time with them before my oldest moves abroad, his partner is also visiting and joined us. A few hours go by and we're just having a nice chat when my grandson starts having a meltdown and screaming. My oldest turned to his partner and loudly said "I'm so glad we'll never have to deal with this shit" and his partner laughed and said "I'd probably shoot myself if I had to deal with that" and they both thought that was hilarious. My other son heard that and stormed off in tears. My oldest son and his partner left shortly after and I've spent the past hour consoling my son with his partner. They really struggle with my grandson and his needs and that comment tipped my son over the edge. I'm disappointed in my other son and his partner but I don't want to sour our relationship just before he moves away. I don't know what to do.

If they’ve met through the online child free community then they’re probably both familiar with people online getting positive responses and attention when they say unpleasant things about young children and their parents. They might not have successfully determined that in real life it’s pretty much the opposite and people will think extremely, potentially terminally, badly of you for behaving like that.

The comment was way to inappropriate and very OTT.
He is going abroad anyway, and the interaction with your grandson will be none or very minimal.

Just keep supporting your other son and your grandson in any way you can.

Have a quiet word with your elder son and suggest it would be a good idea to apologise for his comment before he leaves. But it does sound like standard sibling tactlessness.

This is one of those times when not saying anything is saying something, something your younger son will never forget.

You need to tell your older son he and his partner were rude, way out of line and really caused hurt.

You sound like enjoyable company.

Please don't tell me you sat there and let them say that about your grandchild in your own home? I'd have thrown the pair of them out, especially after her disgusting comment.

You need to do nothing between the two of them because they're grown men. What you should do however is apologise to the son with the child and tell the other one he's a fucking arse.

I don't see what you could do at all.
Just that your other son should respect his brother's decision to have children, just as you respect his choice

I disagree.

I am autistic, as are my 2 sons. None of us would say such a thing! As if often mentioned on Mumsnet being autistic is not an excuse for being an arsehole!

I imagine he could still have framed it as not wanting to pass autism to his children. There is a lot of talk about genetic links with autism so it wouldn’t be seen as an unreasonable request.

I think that female sterilisation is more complicated but I also think that there are far more contraceptive options available to women than there are to men such as the implant, and while no contraception is 100% effective, an implant is far less likely to fail than a condom, that’s literally a split second thing and you’re potentially pregnant.

I agree that your son's behaviour was very rude but, just to give him the benefit of the doubt:

Are you sure he expected everyone to hear? You say that he said it loudly but perhaps this wasn't his intention?

If he was expecting to spend some time with you and his brother before moving abroad (not unreasonable - a scary thing to do at any age) was it a mistake to invite both partners if you knew your grandson would then also have to come? Was there a topic he wanted to talk about? It must be very difficult for your other son and his partner to meet their severely disabled child's needs, especially when they are such young parents, and I'm sure you offer a lot of support. Were they both 20 when he was born? But you also need to be able to spend time as a family. Neither of your sons is very old (I was still a student at that age, as were many of my friends) and may be looking to you for a kind of support that people in their 30s and beyond don't usually need.

Your younger son needs you to be clear what is and isn't acceptable in your house so he knows he can comfortably bring his child to family gatherings.

If you don't challenge what your elder son said he may say the same or worse in the future, which will distress your son and possibly grandson when he's older.

He may have said it due to his lack of filter but it doesn't mean it's okay. My son is autistic and behaving like an arsehole is not something we enable.

Well those two seem well matched - rude, socially incompetent and lacking in any type of compassion or ability to think before they speak.

Gee, could that be because they have Asperger’s? If they were socially competent and had what you describe down pat, they wouldn’t have been diagnosed with Aspergers. I have an adult child who has it and sometimes they come out with ‘facts’, and it may well be in such a case it’s very simple to their factual thinking that this is a reason they have decided to have kids, it’s a fact. Unfortunately sometimes they share these facts, and it results in a socially awkward situation. So circling back to diagnostic criteria and why they were diagnosed ….

I agree with this and have experienced similar. My SIL said something incredibly rude and hurtful to my DH. We are now NC and, while I don't expect MIL to take sides as such, I think she should have pulled her daughter up on saying such a horrible thing. It now grates on me that MIL carries on like SIL has done nothing wrong and she doesn't give a shit about how her own son (who does EVERYTHING for her) was spoken to.

@JaneY1970 I have told my (much younger) autistic child "your diagnosis isn't an excuse for rudeness"

this is something you need to tell your oldest

As someone with a son who has Aspergers you seem ignorant as to nature of the condition. They lack empathy.

He may have said it due to his lack of filter but it doesn't mean it's okay. My son is autistic and behaving like an arsehole is not something we enable

Problem is OP’s son would likely not think of this as behaviour like an arsehole. Your child may not be as challenged on this regard but many with ASD are.

A good example. My child sat there, at an age where ‘they should have known better’, and told his grandmother that he loved so very very much ‘you have told us this same story 3 times, we already know it’ with a genuinely quizzical look. Everyone else, including other siblings, is looking daggers at them. Unfortunately any attempt to ‘smooth it over’ by anyone else is met with a double down because, they are right, it is a true fact. Obviously later, I had a talk impressing on them they are never ever to do that again, specifying not only grandmother but any elderly person. They have a complete inability to do the ‘how do you think it makes them feel part’ as their true belief is ‘good that someone has pointed it out’. So it’s just a ‘rule’ that you can’t say it, you don’t need to understand, you just need to know it’s a rule. I can then guarantee that my child will never ever do this again to the day they die as they are happy to follow ‘the rule’.

The problem is you can’t proactively make a rule for every possible social fuck up, and you can never do a generalised thing with ‘if it will make someone feel bad’ as they genuinely have no concept why this would make someone feel bad. So they will never be an arsehole to an elderly person with failing memory again, but will be an arsehole about something else. Not wittingly, not because they are trying to upset someone, not because they don’t care if they are an arsehole or not, it’s just the way some people are. Honestly, while the OP’s scenario would most definitely sting, I can guarantee my child’s siblings would, whilst being hurt, not take it personally as such but would accept the exact same thing could/would have been said to anyone else. I would then add to ‘the long list of rules’ with ‘not to be said out loud, yes, understand you don’t understand but it’s A Rule’ and would get a satisfied ‘okay’.

This.

But also I agree oldest son was rude, as was his partner. He’s an adult - he must have learnt that this isn’t acceptable. I agree that he was literally laughing at a disabled child, which is about as horrible as it gets in the circumstances.

Its not for you to try to mend this though.

That's probably how my sister feels when I'm talking to her about my autistic kid but I'd think she was an insensitive prick if she said it in front of me while I was dealing with a meltdown. She wouldn't though.

"Lacking empathy" and laughing when a young child with autism is having a meltdown are 2 totally different things @Fingeronthebutton

One is a symptom of a disability, the other is being an arsehole.

That is exactly right and helps everyone.

“As someone with a son who has Aspergers you seem ignorant as to nature of the condition. They lack empathy”

Ive been told several time this is not true and that it is a harmful misconception. I don’t know how accurate that is.

I’d like to think that if someone hurt someone else’s feelings by an insensitive comment that they would like to know, if they are ND or NT.

A good example. My child sat there, at an age where ‘they should have known better’, and told his grandmother that he loved so very very much ‘you have told us this same story 3 times, we already know it’ with a genuinely quizzical look. Everyone else, including other siblings, is looking daggers at them. Unfortunately any attempt to ‘smooth it over’ by anyone else is met with a double down because, they are right, it is a true fact. Obviously later, I had a talk impressing on them they are never ever to do that again, specifying not only grandmother but any elderly person. They have a complete inability to do the ‘how do you think it makes them feel part’ as their true belief is ‘good that someone has pointed it out’. So it’s just a ‘rule’ that you can’t say it, you don’t need to understand, you just need to know it’s a rule. I can then guarantee that my child will never ever do this again to the day they die as they are happy to follow ‘the rule’.

I would have bit my lip trying not to laugh if I heard that because I would be thinking the same thing as your child and agreeing not staring daggers at them knowing they struggle with a filter due to their disability. My dad and DH’s dad repeat the same stories and I recite it in my head while smiling as if it’s the first time I heard it. I know it’s the polite thing to do but I’ll admit I get tired of hearing the stories myself.

This is a really good point. Autistic people learn by mimicking, and if they are immersed in a community where being rude about children like that is the norm and even celebrated, they may not realise it's not ok elsewhere.

Your son may lack empathy but that's not all of us.

Yeah, we don't lack empathy. We are often extremely empathetic in fact. That idea is based on old flawed research but seems to be quite pervasive unfortunately.