Unbelievable

[MiladyDeWinter]

Sorry, I'm having a rant.

We got DS aged 2.7 diagnosis of autism the other day. I went straight to my parents house where my sister proceeded to be really horrid.

"You just have to tell them, you know" and "Oh he plays with his toys for too long. I make sure that my children don't do that, I take them away if they do".

As if I could have prevented DS's autism by interrupting him collecting or lining things up. And it's an absolute LIE anyway, I've never seen my sister pay the slightest bit of attention to her DC beyond dressing them up for Christmas or Halloween.

All that day she went on with her "you just have to tell them". However, her DS's school rang to say that she had to come and pick him up because he had shat himself twice and had no dry clothes.

I'm not a nasty person. If I was I may have said to her that she just has to tell him not to do it.

But honestly - she still has not a clue what autism is. MOST people upon hearing that a child has a condition which explains why they don't respond to the usual parenting tools accept that they have been wrong and in our case going a bit quiet and feeling guilty, but there's my ignorant sister sounding off about our parenting!

That must be very upsetting for you. We had quite a bit of that as well. I remember shortly before ds1's dx (when he was 2) being told - by family - something along the lines of 'you just have to say no'. Oh right. Why didn't I think of that then.

When I think back I took a lot of it and inwardly seethed. We're now 8 years further down the track and if someone dared to say that to me today I would honestly let rip. I wish I had way back when really as we didn't need it.

I would be tempted to tell your sister where to go.

"cheerfully strangle"

Yup!

Oh I still get this from my sister "you shouldn't let him do that you know", as if I can stop him! When I mentioned problems getting ds's shoes on she said "Just tell him. You are the mummy he is the child"

He is nearly ten and she still makes remarks like that.

She doesn't have children but I bet if she did they would be perfect angels .

SIL is the same - If she knew how to use computers, I'd set up a Facebook group for her - 'Dim Comments Farm' or something like that.

a rhino skin moment...

My sister is similar to yours, she can come out with the most horrible things. She had the nerve to say that should her DS had been like B, she wouldn't have dragged him to see all these doctors to try to get a dx, she said we were treating ds like a lab rat!! I was so fuming to say the least. She lives miles away from us and see B once or twice a year for a few days, she 's never had to hear the nursery teachers say he does this or he won't do that... she hasn't got to deal with the speech delay, the rituals, the tantrums that flare up for liitle reason, the stiming,...

Don't listen to her, tell her until she can say something nice or helpful to you then she might as well keep it shut.
I've let my sister dishing out her nasty remarks to me for too long, and a couple of weeks ago, i let her know what i thought of her comments. Felt a lot better afterwards.

Some people will never get it, they will never undertsand or even try to understand our dc.
Come here and let it all out with us on MN instead.