AIBU to think my son’s gift reactions are not just rudeness?

[RunningOnTeaAndHope]

My son is 7 and currently on the waiting list for an autism and ADHD assessment. One thing we’ve struggled with over the years is how he reacts to gifts.
He isn’t intentionally unkind, but he doesn’t always respond in the way people expect. Sometimes he won’t seem particularly excited, won’t say thank you straight away, or will be very honest if something isn’t what he wanted. On occasion he’s become focused on something else and barely acknowledged the gift at all.
My family have started referring to him as rude, spoiled or ungrateful, and it’s becoming a source of tension. They often bring up examples from the past as evidence that he doesn’t appreciate things people do for him.
The thing is, I don’t believe he’s trying to be rude. He can struggle with social expectations and often doesn’t seem to realise how his reactions come across to other people. When reminded, he will usually say thank you, and he does often enjoy and use the gifts he’s been given.
I’m finding it difficult to know how much of this is typical 7-year-old behaviour, how much may be linked to possible AuDHD, and how much I should be pushing him to respond differently.

Has anyone else experienced this with a child who is autistic, ADHD or AuDHD? How did you handle family members who interpreted it as bad manners or lack of gratitude? I’d be interested to hear whether this improved with age and understanding, and what helped.
My DP (his dad) is similar in some ways, he doesn’t come across as very grateful when he’s given gifts, he’s always been that way.

‘quirky rather than rude/brutal’
lol love this. Yes this was exactly my aim and I’d have similar conversations where I’d explain it was a social expectation and he’d sigh and say ‘is it ‘social’ again mum?’ and I’d sympathetically say ‘yes kiddo, social makes the NT world revolve and you want to be in that world sometimes so you gotta speak the lingo’
It was literally the only way I could get him
to engage with social skills stuff.

I think non autistics often completely miss how irrelevant this stuff feels.

You have to doggedly train your kid and if you’re lucky they might get it on an emotional
level one day too and reward all your hard patient work :-)

They're right, it's rudeness. Not being NT is not an excuse. This is our job as parents to teach them social skills and manners. If someone gives you something, you smile and say thank you immediately. Even if it isn't what you wanted.

You aren't thanking them just for the gift, you are appreciating that they got you something at all. They might have got it wrong but the thought was there. They tried to make you happy.

If you continue to make excuses and allowances for him, you do him no favours. No one will bother with him, he will be seen as rude and ungrateful. This will hinder his relationships with his family and eventually his friends too. You need to equip him with the skills to form and function in relationships.

I don't bother with one of my nieces (11) because she is always rude, much the same as your son. I don't get her anything and I don't bother seeing her. Most of the family do the same. She is considered a waste of money and effort as she doesn't ever seem to like anything and never thanks you.

I used to give her money in a card but her bad manners have pretty much put me off now. It's her parents fault for not raising her better but she is the one ultimately impacted by her poor upbringing.

I agree but you do need to think about whether the capability is there, if there are learning delays or language issues which tend to accompany autism. But I agree basic manners at the level they are able to learn at are non negotiable. Even my friends caring for severely autistic adults will prompt them to say thank you if they have any speech. Yes it’s an often robotic copied response but that’s still an effort so I appreciate the effort from
the carer and the person they care for.

Well, full marks for honesty Pigriver junior! 😉

Good solution unwrapping elsewhere later but a lot of gift givers, especially grandparents get the joy from seeing stuff opened. Plus calling/writing with a note could be a mission too far. Probably easier to teach an automatic thank you until
they are a bit older. Parenting autism is very different to parenting non autistic kids.

I had no idea how much until my sister had kids who wernt properly autistic ( well one is adhd and one is aspie but it’s like night and day in terms of sheer long term slog).

Brilliant !
wouldn’t have worked with my lad until very much older as he had no generalisation skills.

but if they do that’s perfect !

You know it is possible to be AuDHD and be rude, right? Not mutually exclusive. Teach him politeness before the great big angry world does.

Has anyone else experienced this with a child who is autistic, ADHD or AuDHD? How did you handle family members who interpreted it as bad manners or lack of gratitude?

Yes - DD who just looked totally nonplussed with every gift and although she tried hard, just couldn’t use the right tone of voice to sound pleased or even slightly excited at the gifts she’d received. Gps would ask me if they’d bought the wrong thing as she seemed so underwhelmed and I’d have to explain that it was all part of Autism and that she’d have great fun playing with it all later, which she always did! As she got older and I would ask her what she wanted for Xmas, birthdays, she would say ‘nothing’, when I asked her why, she said ‘ I just don’t want anything or get excited about presents’, so we settled on giving her Amazon/kindle vouchers where she could get what she wanted, when she wanted it.

Have you ever heard of social stories?

They are an extremely useful tool for teaching children social responses

Maybe something is missing op, you’ve not explained how you’ve taught him how you manage it in the moment, do you remind him to say thank you there and then, speak to him about it, practice with him, remind him before he gets gifts?

it kinda reads like you just let him do as he fancies and don’t help him, which I’m sure isn’t true,

Like anything, ND or not, you simply show him how to act. Let him know when someone gives you a gift, say thank you.

I think your family are being UR my son is diagnosed Auadhd and whenever he gets a gift I always say say thank you and my family respond to me in a seemily annoyed voice “he did he did say thank you straight away!” Sometimes in the chaos I’m not sure if he has or not and I see it as my family being loyal and understanding of my son.

One dd with ASD here. Suggest you role-play it op.

I took my dd visually through a set of drawings of a relative or friend:

1. thinking of them and and looking at the calendar and their birthday date coming up
2. thinking of presents they might like
3. going to the shops and browsing or looking on-line and choosing
4. getting out a purse and paying for it
5. getting it home and wrapping it
6. writing a card
7. travelling on the bus or in a car with the present to deliver it or putting it in the post

And once all of that had been explained, my dd with ASD understood the logic behind thanking someone for their effort and time even if she didn’t like the present itself! Plus we practiced a few stock phrases. And she got it when she saw she didn’t have to lie! And we discussed what thoughts are appropriate to share and which are not and in which specific situations.

Coaching, lots and lots of it. Used to get mine to pay for their things in the shop, make them get their books stamped at the library desk. Just anything so they can practice social skills. Teaching them to be tactful, well mannered and aware of social norms will be of great benefit.

Good luck.

Well you can say that but then you need to accept that it will isolate you from
the wider NT world. This probably suits many autistic people anyway but that’s a choice they can make as adults when they are able to understand the consequences.

as crap as it is we all need to learn to fit in to wider society if we are capable of learning that. I agree with the woman ASD 60 who posted before but i‘m also pragmatic and know that while my son and I are both natural loners we do sometimes want to have social contact (and yes is hard work, and tiring but usually rewarding if chosen rather than forced).
if my mum hadn’t taught me and I hadn’t taught my son this stuff in childhood, life would look very different now and would have been harder than it already was.
sometimes you need something and have to cross the bridge and communicate with the species on the other side

Well, exactly. There's a difference between deciding something as an adult and deciding that your child doesn't deserve the chance to learn social rules because they're autistic and it doesn't come naturally to them.

My parents were like yours and drilled into me how important it was to do certain things even though they felt unnatural or weird to me.

Well, unfortunately, for the Grandparents they might just have to go without the pleasure of seeing it opened and a genuine response. It's just not possible for some people. At best they'll get a badly acted, scripted thank you from a stressed-out ND child. If they're kind grandparents they'll take the time to understand how his ND brain works and look forward to hearing a little later how much he enjoys the presents they sent. It's important to be a good and polite gift giver as well as being a polite gift recipient.

teach him some manners - after all, the assessment might not conclude that he is autistic or whatever, and even if he is, it can’t hurt can it?

The thing is, as the autistic child gets older, they are going to encounter all sorts of people who aren't going to be as understanding or considerate as their grandparents and it's doing them a disservice not to teach them how to respond appropriately to the best of their abilities.

Finding something difficult and stressful doesn't mean you can just opt out, even if you are autistic. Life is all about going through certain cues and niceties - you don't have to understand them but you do need to be willing to go along with some of them if you want to be part of the world you live in.

Why are you straight up making excuses for your son? Get him to learn some manners - it’s nothing to do with his „needs“. Unless he’s non-verbal and struggling to cope in public I think it’s a good idea to teach him some social skills. It will give him a frame work for reference when he comes across new situations/people.

It’s normally when the gift is unexpected. But later on he likes it - so I guess he may need time to process it.

As I said in my OP, his dad is very similar and I always wish I hadn’t bought him anything as he’s always seemingly ungrateful. I’ve seen the same with his parents too, so it’s not just with me.

My son is ND and struggles with this, however it’s a good opportunity to teach them about empathy and appreciation of others.

Encourage him to think about the person giving the gift and how they have taken the time to choose, wrap and deliver a gift. Help him understand that it is the act of giving that he is thanking them for, rather than just focusing on the actual gift. Phrases like “isn’t it nice that this person cared about you enough to do xyz” really help them understand the social aspects better.

Involving them actively in giving gifts to other people can also help as it gives them insight into the effort involved and how the gift giver might feel.

It’s not about forcing them to mimic a socially acceptable response, it’s about teaching them to think beyond their personal feelings about the actual gift and be empathetic to people around them. Too many ND kids are raised in a bubble where the focus is so exclusively on them and their needs that they risk becoming very self centred and entitled.

I am going to start teaching him to say thank you, he does need prompting but I hope at don’t stage it will come more naturally.

You just need to teach it as a reflex. He receives a gift, he smiles and says thank you. The same as you teach him to wash his hands after using the toilet, or to shut the door when he gets in the car.

I’ll get mobbed for this but I really can’t help saying it. Is there anyone these days, adult or child, who is not “awaiting an autism and ADHD diagnosis”?