I would love not to have an "ulterior motive" for everything I do with DS2

[lingle]

health warning! This is a real whinge about something positve so only read if you're feeling tolerant.

I'm focussing above all else now in trying to increase DS2's flexibility and social confidence. Yesterday, a 5 year old NT girl with superb social skills came for tea with DS2 (4.7). DS2 used all his new-found showing skills to show her how to play a simple board game. Inspired by her example, he swapped the colour of his playing pieces several times....

I saw the opportunity and grabbed it - I told them that it was time to come to the table and he could be a daddy and sit in daddy's chair, and she could be a mummy and sit in mummy's chair. Hey presto, he was in such a good mood that it worked. It's the first time he's ever willingly sat in the "wrong" chair. He didn't even blink an eyelid when the girl's brother showed up and sat in DS2's chair.

It was all lovely, but yesterday evening I cried. Because even though we are a happy family, and this work with him is immensely fulfilling and immensely important, and often I feel I have a richer relationship with him than other mothers have with their ordinary children, I wish he didn't need so much help with these things, I wish he wasn't so terribly vulnerable.

Oh lingle, I know what you mean and I think you are perfectly entitled to 'let it all out'. Yes, it is fab that your son is making so much progress, but it does break your heart a little when you realise how much stuff you have to 'teach' your child which other children just pick up.

'Teaching what you never had to learn' is how Carol Gray described in on the social stories course I went on. That sums it all up.

Then, suddenly, sometimes you think everything you do is always about'teaching' - with DS there is handwriting practise because of DCD, making lots of opportunities to climb and bounce because of sensory/low muscle tone problems, setting up and helping facillitate play at tea parties etc to encourage social skills and flexible play, working on social skills (like pleases and thanks) with stickers and rewards, encouraging reading and numeracy where school has turned him off.

And this is not to 'push him' ahead, it's just so he can keep up in an NT world.

So it is a bit sad, but as you say we are rewarded with a rich knowledge of our children that will stay with us forever and a sense of reward that we can build the confidence in our child to make them achieve their potential.

You are allowed to go 'aaaarrrghhhh' whenever you want though......especially on here!

I know what you mean, have had similar moments recently. Particularly when we've had a breakthrough - it seems to crash me back to the big world out of our own bubble. Is your DS2 due to start primary school in September? My DS1 is, and I'm anxious about how it will work out for him,

Great achievement on the chairs for both of you .

yes, it's all part of the ahem joy isn't it? at times it does feel overwhelming, feeling like your teaching language from the bottom up - every word from scratch at times, when it feels like all the other kids absorb language almost by osmosis!

well done mini-lingle.

I know exactly what you mean though.

i would love to have a day where I am not calculating to the minutest detail dd1's actions and reactions. Not weighing up precisely what she has eaten, in case she has a reaction (gf/cf/all colours/sweetners etc are out. she also reacts to "normal" foods like apples)

A day where I can just sit and play with the dds, and not work on turn taking/labelling/appropriate language. Or, not trying to introduce a game (ie snap) because of it's useful potential when in restaurants/aeroplanes/therapists waiting rooms.

And I wish I could properly feel the joy when dd1 has mastered something (I do, but it is always a little bit tinged with frustration or sadness too) without immediately plotting the next step in the sequence, eg dressing/toiletting/etc.

maybe one day.

justa - I've never had a real DX for DS beyond language delay (well OK language delay with subtle social communication difficulties....), don't feel you need any particular diagnosis to post on here, at pre-school age it can feel like a very thin line between delay and disability at times....

thanks for the lovely tolerant replies.

debs, it's like we have to be hothousing parents just for them to cope isn't it? I never wanted to be a hothousing parent. I wanted to just provide a nice environment and let them get on with it!
Funnily enough in our case it's not so much teaching him what I never had to learn as teaching him what his father never had to learn - the more this goes on, the deeper I realise these traits go in me - which should cheer me up as I've compensated for them all sufficiently to have a pretty great life (and I'm even accepted by the playground alphamummies albeit with a reputation for slight eccentricity).

notfromaroundhere. yes, he starts school in Sept. This can certainly be an anxious time. I guess you're spending a lot of time figuring out how you can prepare him.

silverfrog, you certainly deserve to have that day, and I hope it comes. It is a bit worrying about not quite feelign unalloyed joy isn't it? You long for a milestone but quite often you can't whoop when it comes (though I did scream when he said "porridge gone").

Justabout - stick around - no diagnoses needed here. Sometimes you can't articulate this stuff until someone else says it - often someone whose child's problems run deeper. I think I taught DS2 all of his first 800 words (yes I counted for a long time!). Word number 801 came from nursery (finally!). He did eventually have a language explosion at about 3ish.

I can identify exactly with what you say, as can all the parents and carers on this site. JAKA So right, we're having to TEACH children to sit, hold cups etc..But when they finally get it the joy is because ours, and their, hard work is paying off and we know we are giving our LOs a fighting chance in the world.

lol about coal-mining!

Anyway, DH is away, which is probably why my emotional resources are a bit lower than usual.

Must go and indulge a guilty pleasure (have discovered lots of new-to-me Jeff Buckley on youtube if anyone else wants to go there).