do you all have days when it just hits you, the gap between ds2 & his peers is so wide :(

[slacklucy]

DS2 will move in to yr 5 next yr at MS primary, he has 1to1 support.
Just watching him at school today, watching his friends that he has grown up with his disabilities just lept out at me.
Everyone is lovely, he is well supported, his friends are lovely but now they are at the age where they no longer see him as an equal.
When I went in to his classroom today a girl in his class was gathering his stuff together for him & put it in his bag to give to me.
They were all wishing him a nice holiday but got nothing in return.
They gave out certificates, of course they gave ds2 certificates too, but he actually hadn't earned it in the same way as the others Iykwim.

I of course am so very proud of him, he has achieved so much but he is and always will be dependent on others.

No reason for my post other than I'm just wallowing.

Yes I have that feeling every time I see my DS with his peers. It doesn't help that the school look at his friendships as the other children somehow being charitable, rather than proper friends.

Disheartening isn't it? No matter how much I accept him how he is, I guess I'll always feel a bit of sadness that he's not like the others.

Yes I have it frequently. I am so unbelievably proud of ds but it still hits me like a train sometimes.

Think it's particularly poignant at this time of year with school year finishing, it's a kind of marking-the-milestones event for everyone. For me ds finishing Reception is a bit of a moment of dread as I think about how much harder his life will get socially as he gets older.

and hug.

Yep and strangely usually over the silliest of things that other children are doing that just totally pass DD by, shes just not on their level in so many ways. Always hurts when it happens and tears often follow, then I feel bad that I feel bad - as if I shouldnt feel like this. Emotional wreck sometimes - no one truly appreciates what a rollercoaster we go with it all. But hey your post hasn't made me feel like I'm the only one - so my sanity saved for a while longer xx

Yes, there are good days and there are days when it's screaming at me and it's so frightening.

Yes I have a very close MN birth month group, all of whom I adore after years of regular chat and the odd meet up. Can't help wilting though occasionally at some of their LO's development stages and their normal parental worries sometimes make me spit.

Thanks all, at least i feel better that its not only me.. almost 10 yrs on I really am so proud of ds2 and so grateful that he has achieved so very much more than the doctors first thought possible.
99% of the time I am completly happy that ds2 is the person he is & then all of a sudden I get a whack of sadness.

You're doing well to be fine 99% of the time.

Yes, at DD's sports day. She's only 3 and had an absolute whale of a time, but every activity that was going on she had to do it her own way because she couldn't access it the same way as her able bodied friends. She loved it - I felt very because I could see how huge the gap already is...

Yes. I'm watching the gap widening between both the boys and their peers. For DS1, that gap is social and emotional, but for DS2 it's absolutely everything. I'm watching next door's barely 1 year old grandson catch up and overtake him in certain respects. He has nothing in common at all with the other 6 year olds in his class.

It's a little easier when it's just us at home, because then we're simply our own brand of crazy with no outside comparisons.

Our own brand of crazy , sounds good ouryve!