a chance for the SN community to tell you how it really is and to tell you the horrid stuff they have to deal with

[2shoes]

all the time..
after the horror of the other thread, I think it would be good for the sn community on mn to tell their stories, when they have been harassed/assaulted/ and abused by the nt world.
night help to put a couple of minor incidents that someone in the nt world has had to put up with for a very short space of time.

so I will start ....
we were subjected ot haye crime for 5 years....why because my ds fell out with them when they called my dd a spaz.
we can't go out without the staring...small children blocking out way in the shop, whilst mummy/daddy does nothing, just so their child can stare at dd, who is shock horror in a wheelchair.
my son was bullied at school by nt kids who took delight in calling dd a spaz.

mie are minor compared with most.

Yeah, I pretty much ignore the parents too posie

Couple of fantastic Sn kids in the Y5 group I help with...ooohhh...I just love them! soooo sweet!

We've also had all sorts thrown at our windows and door a box of dog excretement left on our doorstep and a back window broken also had my drivers window smashed but don't know if there's a connection.

DS also has no friends if you ask him what a friend is he thinks it's someone you know.

Ds 17 is continually laughed at, stared at, pointed at. Why? because he has autism and when he is anxious he stims which for him means he wrings his hands, grimaces and makes guttural noises.It's not even just children who do this it is grown adults who should know better.
My other children have been called names and ridiculed because they have a "weirdo" "freak" for a brother
I've been insulted and threatened by parents who believe I'm a poor parent because ds doesn't fit their social norms so might not realise there is a queue, be able to say "excuse me" or misjudge the space needed for him to get past.
Parents gathered up a petition to have him removed from his school because they saw him as naughty and disruptive even though he had full time 1 to1 support.
We had police called because a father had found a bruise on his child who had said it was ds (no one saw ds do anything and his 1 to 1 was present) and ds couldn't deny anything anyway. When school prevented him getting into school to "give insanity's son a good hiding" (he was 5) he threatened to firebomb our house instead. He was a convicted violent criminal and so threat was considered real.
He's seventeen, I still help him dress, I still run his bath and he's as dependent on me now as he was as a toddler, I'm tired (exhausted in fact) not only caring for a child who doesn't sleep but fighting bureaucracy to get the education he needs and trying hard not to dwell on the future and what will happen to a son who needs constant care when I'm not able to.

This thread would be better off somewhere other than Chat so it doesn't disappear. That way, on threads such as the other one being referred to, people can just link to this one. Some of the posts on here make horrific reading.

FWIW, children do stare. It's how you handle it as a parent that makes the difference. I firmly believe that my however bright, happy and successful my DCs grow up to be, if they also grow up to be unkind and intolerant then I will have failed as a parent.

On a more personal level, the looks and mutterings I get walking down the street with 6yo Dniece. I'm white, she's mixed race and has ASD. To help her not go Haring off into the road, I babble away a load of nursery rhymes, jump and skip with her. The and faces I get just for amusing a child are outrageous!

I have more too, my parenting skills are constantly judged not only by members of the public, but also the school.

I have been accused of being 'over anxious' pre diagnosis for thinking my ds had difficulties.

If ever i ask for ds to receive more help, the over anxious mother card is played again, despite professionals recommending that he NEEDS it.

I have been referred to social services secretly by the school 'to help mum deal with anxieties', despite CAMHS telling school in writing that i did not suffer with anxiety and that ds's anxieties were school related.

Not one to maunder on about my lot, as we have it good compared to many others and we adore our DS, warts and all. I tend to keep my horror stories for other parents of children with ASD that I know in RL, as there is always instant recognition and reassurance (and hilarious laughter sometimes, too)

But it is hard. DS has Aasperger's Syndrome, an invisible disability. It is socially isolating for us at times (it is getting easier, as we have slowly but surely built up a networ of friends who also have children with autism). Adults are far more cruel than children. I have been pitchforked out of softplay, toddler groups extra curricular classes, you name it. Very, very few places are genuinely inclusive.

Education is a nightmare. I cant even begin to describe the difficultiies DS faces.

We have lost friends and have major rifts in our family because of DS.

There are moments now and then when I wonder if parents of NT children have any idea what we cope with day in, day out, with a smile on our faces and a relatively 'normal' lifestyle when viewed from the outside.

I don't really want sympathy. I think having a SN child has genuinely made me 100 times stronger, kinder, more open-hearted and non-judgemental than I was before, and I thank my DS for that.

I remember DD2 being a toddler, about 3 and a bit I think, and she was STARING at a young girl in a wheelchair.

Really staring.

I was mortified.

Until she turned to me and said "That's so cool I'd love one of those" It was pink or purple I can't remember and had bright stickers on it and stuff on the wheels.

I took her over and we talked to the girl about her chair - her mum was packing her groceries. She said usually they just got stared at and no one ever spoke.

That made me so

Good idea for a thread. Anything that raises awareness is a good thing. I don't have any of these issues to deal with but DH works with children who do and the ignorance of strangers contributes hugely to the problems they face.

What was this other thread?

And yes, again, to the invisible disabilities.

DS is has a hearing impairment. You can't see it when you look at him. Doesn't mean it's not there and it doesn't affect his life.

orm it was someone complaining about SN adults in a playpark.

ORm, in AIBU, hte one about adults with LDs playing in a park.

Ohhh that one. I must admit I left it alone as I thought it would get a bit nasty.

Oh if it's that thread I saw it but thought it would be bound to go a bit horrible so I didn't look inside.

When DS1 was in mainstream he used to have really terrible episodes of refusal (he's ASD) where he would just lay down on the playground and refuse to go inside. I've had parents literally stepping over him saying things like "he needs his arse smacked" and much worse. I used to come home and cry but I soon toughened up. The mainstream school also lost him and my friend found him out on the road (when he was 7 with zero idea of any kind of danger) and the school refused to concede that was a problem! Gave me the ammunition I needed to get him into an MLD school where he is safe from bullying and spite.

Then there is the lovely incident where my sister and her deaf club were banned from a screening of Ready Steady Cook because Ainsley Cuntbag couldn't cope "with all the hand flapping"

when dd1 was younger, we applied to the school we wanted ehr to go to. she went for settlign in sessions for the preschool year (would have fed into prep school).

she did everything brilliantly. sat nicely for the story; listened well; said 'no thankyou' when offered a biscuit (she has multiple allergies) and instead came to me to find an alternative (dd1 was just 3, btw, with severe ASD).

she played nicely with the Senco (who was there specially to assess dd1), and did lots of puzzles. she sat with a teacher and helped sharpen all the coloured pencils, naming each colour as she handed them over - down to shades of purple (lilac, mauve) or blue/green (turquoise, sea green) etc.

she named all the shapes in the shape sorter (differentiated between square, rhombus, trapezium), and was happy to share toys/take turns with the other children. (no other child was tested in the same way, btw, they were just left to run around shouting )

I was so proud of her.

and then dh and I had to sit through a humiliating meeting where the teachers and Senco tried to list all the reasons they thought dd1 woudl not fit in. except they couldn't come up with any - thy said themselves that she knew more (fact-wise) than they expected an NT (means 'neurotypical', whomoved) child of the same age to know; that she was fine with sharing and turn taking (soemthing most preschoolers are still learning); that she engaged well in the sessions, as long as she wasn't too crowded; and so on. but that they didnt want her anyway - they couldn't quite bring themselves to say 'because she is autistic', but that wa sthe reason. they weren't even prepared to give her a chance. that was when we realised how hard the rest of ehr life was going to be - even when she performs better than expected, people still discriminate against her.

mind you, we got our revenge - some friends had their dd down to join the same school, in the January intake. when they went along for settlign in sessions and were told how lovely and inclusive the school was, the dh piped up 'but that's not true, is it? as you wouldn't take a good frined of ours recently, despite her being more able than our dd - could you explain what you mean by inclusive, beause you don't seem to practise it?'. it did make me

DD is on the Autistic Spectrum (no dx as yet) - my parents won't look after her in case she 'kicks off and they don't know what to do'

MIL thinks DD's autistic because she likes drawing

She was recently excluded from joining in a magic trick at a party because she shouted out, was laughing at the 'wrong things' and 'wasn't sitting down like the nice girls' - yes i was there, the entertainer said these things to her.

Mainly the scenario is that ds1 makes it very obvious he is severely autistic and learning disabled then does something 'wrong' (such as shouts, or tries to run into the wrong place - I always stop him) then someone gets the hump. Tuts, sighs, eye rolls, comments, winces, glares are all common reactions. Every time we go out we get stared at, usually because ds1 is making strange noises (he is non-verbal) but I try not to notice anymore tbh.

DS1 was recently told to 'fuck off' by someone driving a mercedes because he looked at the car. That was a bit extreme I felt. (The person he was with - not me, I was paying for something in a shop - told the mercedes driver where to go).

I had to rescue one of my helpers who was apoplectic with rage after ds1 was told off for jumping up and down on the pavement outside a shop. There were no passers by, it was on a quiet out of town shopping bit, he wasn't blocking the way, he was just jumping up and down excitedly pointing to some shutters.

Oh another time I visited a shop I went to regularly. Ds1 grabbed a large mars bar and I told him to get a small one, he misunderstood and thought I'd said he couldn't have one so kicked off, anyway all sorted within seconds. He then spotted some stairs and went to dash to them but I grabbed him before he'd taken a step. Meanwhile the shop owner had the right hump - when nothing had happened. The only other people in the shop were someone with LD's and his carer and I'm sure they clocked ds1 within seconds.

Oh and ds1 has a habit of standing in the wrong place in a queue. He never pushes in (he can't - he can't talk) but goodness the lemon sucking that goes on because he's stood in the wrong place. I ignore that as well.

These days it mainly glances off me, although I occasionally want to stab someone. I remember when I was 6 months pregnant with ds3 on a ferry. DH and DS2 were being seasick and I was careering around after ds1 who hadn't noticed the boat moving and was being feral. He kept trying to get into the shop the wrong way because he liked the barrier alarm sound so I had to keep wrestling him away. At one stage I managed to corner him to sit down for two seconds and an NT father with 2 perfectly behaved NT girls looked at me and shook his head slowly with a disgusted look. Had I been closer I would have let rip. I have occasionally mouthed 'DON'T STARE' at people who seem to be members of gawp city but usually I ignore.

We have mets lots of lovely people as well though. People I barely know who let ds1 sit in their cars and open their sun roofs for him etc People who work at our regular cafe and talk to him and joke with him when he pretends to run into their kitchen, and of course the simply fabulously wonderful surfers who take him out to catch waves. Ds1 is a very good filterer of the world's lovely people - I see that as a bonus :)

Cats
I think you misunderstood Purple's point.

It is tricky for those of us who do not have children with SN to find the right words, whether online or in RL.

I hate the "Children with DS are such special people, and their parents are saints" kind of things that some of my relatives post on FB. It always seems so patronising.

I don't think parents of children with SN are saints, but they do deserve our admiration for doing what all of us parents (should) do - anything and everything to ensure that their children grow up safe and well.

Their job is harder than ours because it is unrelenting, I think. Lack of respite and support, constant fights to get adequate care, lack of sleep. And then they have to deal with offensive fuckwits who think it is fine to bully or berate someone with SN.

I know you don't like to hear it, but the work you guys do on MN is absolute sterling. There are so many thousands of women who have been educated through your postings.

When I was at the cinema recently, a child close to us starting shouting and ran out of the film shortly before the end. I would have though he was simply badly behaved (in fact my DH said something along those lines) but because of MN, I realised that there could have been something in the film that triggered that reaction, and he could have been on the autistic spectrum.

Anyway, the point of this ramble is to say thank you to all the posters who share their stories and make more people aware of the issues that you face. Remember that far far more people lurk than post.

there really are too many to list :(

I always thought Ainsley cant be as nice as he pretends to be!

DS2 is on the spectrum and can be spectacularly stubborn and has splendid tantrums But by and large he confines these to home - never had to deal with other people commenting. His public minor oddnesses so far have been ignored. I can only imagine how hard it is when people decide to pass comment or worse.

hijack SORRY

I am sure the posters from SN, have far more experience of dealing with Education Authorities than I have, would anyone mind taking a look at this and seeing if you have any advice.

Thanks