A child's development has nothing to do with parenting

[Reallytired]

My son's development was really slow as a baby/ toddler. He had physio to help him walk and he also had glue ear which delayed his speech. We are fairly confident there is nothing wrong neurologically with my son. He had orthopedic problems.

However at the age of seven he has now caught up and is enjoying school and has loads of friends. He can ride a bike and swim.

My five month old daughter development is quite advanced. She is sitting well without support and making attempts at crawling. She certainly wont be needing the child physio.

However my children both have the same father and have been parented in exactly the same way. It goes to show that development is luck and nothing to do with how good someone is at mothering.

It has been a surprise how different two babies are.

MV I'm sure that the teachers at your sons school don't think badly of you.

I'm an SEN teacher and a lot of the parents of the children I am involved with are lovely. Some stuggle with their own problems. A few I could quite happily beat to death with a spoon. I always wait to find out some background before I pass judgement (and I have always resisted the urge act on the feckless ones, although those are the ones I often don't ever get to meet.)

When dd was born she had a few physical abnomalites, we saw a genentist who explained to us that no one has a perfect set of genes, sometimes inperfections are significant, sometimes they go unnoticed. I have noticed that some children do brilliantly dispite there parents, some struggle dispite wonderful parents, some children are able to cope with the difficulties life throws at them, others are floored by things that others take in their stride. BUT good parenting always makes a difference, it just makes a diffence in different ways to different kids.

Of course it's going to be a combo of both. Otherwise all the work you've put in with your son would have been a bit of a waste, wouldn't it?

I know what you mean, though. When you have a child with a developmental delay or with an undiagnosed disability, you do get people doubting your parenting. And it does knock your confidence.

You may try to tell yourself that people aren't really thinking this, but when at every paediatrician's meeting they seem more keen to discuss parenting (and assuming that you indulge in all sorts of overprotective practices that you know you have never been guilty of in your life) than actually talking about your child, then that fiction is hard to maintain. Or when you come back to school after weeks with a child sobbing from constant pain and the teacher tries to be helpful by telling you that actually she always sent her children into school unless they were really ill (but she's not questioning my parenting, oh no ). Or when they tell you that all children have learnt to tie their shoelaces by age x if you've just practiced enough (what, even the paraplegics?).

I used to take comfort from my second, stronger, normally developing child: "well at least that will show them I'm not such a hopeless parent". Ironically, he has now been diagnosed with the same disorder; it just showed later in him.

But in the meantime, I have grown stronger and more confident, and I also think the medical team and the schools have got to know me and my children and are moving away from the stereotypes of what kind of family would have these children. But I've been there and done it all: made tea for the nice ladies from Social Services, helped the lady from Education Welfare to fill in her forms (after she had first lectured me on the importance of education! pah!), been lectured on parenting by all and sundry. Rhino hide it is.

It is weird that people congratulate you on a baby being able to sit at 5 months. I mean, who cares really? Even if you had brought it about, why would it matter?

In years to come are people going to be looking at her and thinking "wow, that woman is really, really good at sitting. She must have had a bit of a head start on the rest of us"?

I think this is too general - I mean, it NEVER occurred to me that I could influence when my dcs crawled or walked. (Obviously I'm not including children with disabilities). All 3 of them were totally different - dd1 crawled at 6 months, ds at 10 months and dd2 missed it out altogether.

But if you're talking about, say, development of independence, then I have consciously encouraged this and done specific things to try to get them to be more independent. I have at least 2 friends who, for whatever reason, don't seem to want their dcs to be independent. There are HUGE differences between what their dcs can do for themselves and what mine can (have to!), which I'm sure can't all be down to genetics?

My dd has extensive issues rising from her Noonan Syndrome.
I was told when she was 5 that my parenting had been the main factor in her success at overcoming so many obstacles.
Don't sell yourself short OP!

I still blush at the two times when I have really judged friends for what seemed to me like babying their children and assuming they couldn't do things. It seemed SO obvious to me that these parents were holding their children back and that was the reason they seemed such babies. Both children have since been diagnosed with autism. The parents were simply responding to the abilities of the child they had. It must have been a great comfort to them to finally get an explanation.

I think it's a delicate balance, on the one hand not holding your child back, on the other hand working with the child you've actually got, not some general assumption about what children ought to be like.

Thing about autism is that because of the different way autistic people learn things, and the way the world is set up for the REST of the world, autistic children (pre dx) often aren't learning, so they ARE behind.

When my son was dx wiht GDDs a part of me thought, well it's not autism then. I was shocked when it did still turn out to be autism.

Fair enough comment Cory, but the children I was referring to definitely don't have any delay or special needs. One of them acts in a totally different way with his father from his mother (they are separated) which is interesting. His mum (a lovely friend of mine, but we don't agree on much!) carries him around all the time at age 5 nearly 6, takes a pushchair when we go out, gives him a dummy whenever he asks etc, however with his dad he walks next to him carrying his own backpack like all the other kids in his class.

My point KTNoo is that I would have sworn those children did not have any special needs either. One of them was not diagnosed until she got to Junior's. She was a charming outgoing child, who just seemed very very babyish.

Though of course I accept that babying could have a similar effect on an NT child and that may well be the case with your friend.

The thing that gets me, though, is that if you do have a child with developmental delays/invisible disabilities, people will automatically jump to the conclusion that your parenting is causing their behaviour and not vice versa.

KTNoo, I would say that the important thing is that that child (your friends) is more than capable of fitting in with his friends when he wants to. HE does know what's expected of him and he can conform.

Educational psychologist would be reassured by that. Have chatted to a fair few of those over the years with my two dc.

Your friends child might well NEED a bit of extra reassurance from his mum in the aftermath of a big change (parents separating) and tbh, if that takes the form of a bit of extra babying on their own terms, then it's not a big deal imo. I'd say it's meeting some need of his right now.

This is far more important than forcing him to conform to 'average' milestones just for the sake of it.

I don't want to rain on your parade but my dd3 sat up well young (4 months). It was the ONLY thing she ever did young. She's not particularly slow but the early sitting hasn't translated into anything else very noteworthy.

I do agree though my 3 dds are utterly different in so many ways.