My poor boy

[Sawit12]

DS is 4 and started reception in September. He has asd and adhd. At pick up yesterday I noticed that the children had party invites that they were holding (it’s only a small class so it seemed everyone had one) DS didn’t. I speak to 2 other mums that I met in September and both of their children had been invited. I looked in his book back when I got home just incase but there wasn’t an invite there😔

I understand that he isn’t your “typical child” (I don’t know how else to phrase that) but it broke my heart. The only thing that is helping is knowing that he doesn’t have a clue about it

That was heart breaking to read OP. If he is the only one who has been excluded I think that is really poor form from the parents.
It sounds like he isn't getting the support he needs at school if other kids are singling him out.

Let’s just hope one or two will have a whole- class party, once he’s old enough to be aware.
My dd1 always insisted on inviting the whole class - she wouldn’t leave anybody out. Luckily we had the space. She’s in her 40s now, but I still remember the little boy when she was maybe 8, saying, ‘Thank you for inviting me to your party, Philippa - nobody else does.’ 😰n

I think you are massively in denial.

You think his behaviour could be challenging means his behaviour is absolutely challenging. Both at home, and almost certainly at school.

You have heard he "jumps and throws things" so at school he is doing aggressive and dangerous things.

You have heard "oh no, he is there" meaning that children are worried or frightened of your child.

You should have spoken with the teacher the second you heard those words coming from children's mouths.

I just hope that you aren't at a private school, as they can exclude whereas Mainstream can't.

I agree with this too. It’s the way of the world sadly.

The parents should be ashamed.

We have a very small class of 10 (EYFS and Y1 combined) and invite everyone including an asd child who I know won’t come, but we always include him in the invites. We also include some traveller children who also won’t mix socially (not saying that applies everywhere before anyone jumps down my throat, but these particular families don’t) but I’d never exclude them either.

It’s fine in a class of 30 to invite 15 or just the girls/boys or whatever. But it is absolutely out of order to exclude 1 child completely. In fact our school wouldn’t hand out the invites in that scenario as it’s really just bullying tactics.

Ds loved soft play, but would get over-stimulated after about half an hour of play. So I'd normally speak to the parent and explain and say that I'd bring him after the start so he got around half an hour of play, and that normally worked well.

I think though it may depend on how he's been at school and how parents have seen your reaction to him. If he's coming out like a whirling dervish and you just letting him, or other children are scared of him, it's far harder to invite him.

What I'd work on is building relationships with other parents and having one to one time where they can see that if he gets wild, you immediately step in and calm things down or remove him.

One of mine had a child at reception who they had to evacuate the classroom often a few times a week. People were scared of having to deal with that at their DC's party.
Once people realised that mum and dad would come to the party and remove him quickly if there were issues he got invited to a lot more.
And he was sweet when things went right. But if things went wrong they deteriorated very quickly

It is awful when this happens, but sometimes we can feel it more than the child. There will be other parties. If he mentions this one just say ‘Most parties only have x amount of children so you won’t be invited to them all.’ Keep it breezy and he will forget about it. X

It's just the start. I'd be having a word each year with his teachers about being discreet about invites

I didn't have parties for my youngest as they don't turn up. What that does to a child is worse than not being invited. Celebrating his birthday needs imagination.

Just wondering does your child have access to supports due to his diagnosis. Does he have an individual support plan sna, access to a sensory room, movement breaks. My son is 6 and is currently in an autism class but they are integrating him with the mainstream class gradually. It's very hard you really have to develop a thick skin when you have a neurodiverse child. My chap is the same he doesn't get any invites or playdates. I'm hoping that changes once he's in the mainstream class a bit more.

@Millionsofmonkeys Do you have any support for him at school? My DS had a specialist teacher for communication and interaction who visited him a couple of time a year who was able to offer some training to the teachers. Something that really helped was a talk the specialist teacher gave to the whole class, (without my DS there) on invisible disabilities and how my DS found it hard to understand instructions etc. How they could 'help him to learn' in a kind way etc. It worked really well. The class became really protective of him all the way through primary school. I did have to be happy to have his difficulties out there in public, but I reasoned it was better that they know he's not being deliberately 'naughty' and have an accurate description of him rather than him being labelled as bad.

My DS is now 26 and a lovely young man, still with difficulties but his life at primary school was a really happy time for him.

So hard OP. And very unkind of the party child's parents if he's the only excluded.
I've been there with my autistic son. Primary was very hard for him. He's got other neurodivergent friends now so he's ok. I would try to find similar children for your son as soon as possible so he can "find his people". It took us a while and I found those early primary years lonely.

Really feel for you, must be really heartbreaking but hopefully he'll find his tribe in time.

To give an example of the otherside of the coin though, I must confess to excluding a classmate of DS who was diagnosed with autism as the child was prone to violent outbursts and my DS was absolutely terrified of him. My niece was in the same class (we live in a very rural area) and he attacked her when she had a broken collar bone with her arm in a sling resulting in her being smashed into a rough wall and scraping all the skin off her face. That was on top of her legs being permanently covered in bruises as he was constantly kicking her in the classroom.

I'm so sorry OP, in reception all children should be invited. If his behaviour is so challenging that its affecting other children to this extent then you should know this from school

My DD is in reception and I can hardly get what's she's had for lunch out of her so would be totally unaware of other kids needs and would never single a child out.

Oh @Sawit12 I'm really sad for you. I remember how much it hurt when my kids were left out. Unfortunately, it really is one of those things that happens and usually, it hurts us as parents way more than it hurts the kids. They bounce back quicker if they even realise in the first place!

I'm just picking up on something here - you said he stays back and only comes out when the other children are gone. Is there any chance that the parent was handing out invitations as the kids were leaving, or watching who belonged to whom? It's more likely, I think, that she couldn't find you rather than inviting 11 children out of 12?

Hopefully that is the case but if it's not, I would plan something fun for your kiddo on the day of your party. He won't know any different but you'll feel better seeing him happy.

Maybe the teacher can have a conversation entitled "It's okay to be different".

I wear the T-Shirt from Temu. I've been dreadfully bullied all my life. Maybe if I'd worn this at school it may have opened up a conversation about it.

And they say kids can be cruel......

This kind of thing really upsets me. I don't understand the parent who makes the decision to exclude one out of a class of 13 reception age kids - for soft play ffs!!

There was a hold in ds class years ago that was adhd/and and we invited him to ds party
Sorry my post at 12.31. I meant child, hopefully obviously!

This kind of thing really upsets me. I don't understand the parent who makes the decision to exclude one out of a class of 13 reception age kids - for soft play ffs!!
Neither did I until I witnessed what happened at ds party. The child ripped ds' presents open and damaged some. Food was thrown from other children's plates, he screamed at children because they wouldn't follow his orders, a child got hurt when he kicked them. Mum tried her best but it was awful. He went into crisis when Happy birthday was sung to ds.
Ds was really upset and said it didnt matter and that (name's) brain works different but I could tell he was gutted his presents were ripped and the party was ruined.
As I said previously I put it down to him being over stimulated and had him over on a 1:1 on a quieter basis and although no one got hurt, it didnt end well and mum said the same as before,he's good kind kid deep down.

Sympathies! It's tough and it used to make me cry, but missing out on parties isn't necessarily as awful as we might think.

It felt tragic when my bright, creative and funny ASD son didn't get party invites from his school class mates.
But raucous, busy, 'sporty' or noisy activities were never his thing tbf.

As long as your boy makes 1 or 2 friends at school he'll do OK.

I know, it can be heart breaking for us, but it might help you to remember that at that age they don't always look at it in the same way, even if they're NT. One of my DSs didn't get many invitations, and he was matter of fact about it, and he did get some eventually. Perhaps if your DS has a party he might get some reciprocity, but while some parents are on the ball with that, others aren't, and there's a lot of asymmetry. A nice memory is when one child requested a party for the whole class, so children who hadn't had many got at least one. That was yr 3 or 4. Hope your son gets some soon, but try not to let it get to you.

On the day take him out for a lovely treat. Perhaps if he does have a friend that isn't going to the party ask his or her parent if the friend would like to join you. Make that day a bit special for him outside of the party.

Oh behave. Teachers will often help out parents hand out birthday invites. It's not for the school to police who gets an invite and who does not.

NICE guidelines consider rationing as well as medical evidence. The OP is correct, for severe cases there is a strong case for earlier assessment before a key period of development is “lost” waiting for budgets to catch up.

See also NICE guidelines for grommets.

That is very thoughtless of the parents. The parents should have messaged parents individually or formed a private Whatsapp group for their party if they didn't want to invite the whole class. That is what the parents in all my DC's classes have done.

As a mum to a daughter with additional needs, I really feel for you and your DS.

Is it usual to allow children to give out party invites when the whole class is not invited? Also, shame on that child's mum for not including the whole class of 12 people, regardless of your DS behaviour!

My kid went through this. I hired a hall for his birthday and invited the whole class and got bouncy castle and games and food and party bags etc etc. did everything I could to make people want to come. One RSVP said they were busy no one else bothered to rsvp. one child turned up. My son never got over it has refused to do anything for his birthday ever since.

I have similar with my DD. I basically but her friends I pay for zoo trips and expensive outings to get others to want to come. No one has ever returned an invite. No one ever wants to come for just a home play date.

my ds I could understand as he’s clearly very different and his behaviour may seem scary for the other children but dd is high masking and desperately seeking approval always going out her way to help and be kind etc. she just gets used and rejected or made fun of.

People are so cruel.