Making friends as a mother of a special needs kid

[Anonymous]

There's another thread in general topics about it being hard to make friends. I feel the same, but that it's even harder when you have a child with special needs. I have 3 kids, and my youngest has ASD. I am so stressed all the time, dealing with him. He generally has challenging behavior all the time. This makes it hard to enjoy going anywhere socially. Add to this that my husband is an antisocial ass, I feel doomed to not have friends, at least for the next 10 years or so.

Can anyone relate?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's another thread in general topics about it being hard to make friends. I feel the same, but that it's even harder when you have a child with special needs. I have 3 kids, and my youngest has ASD. I am so stressed all the time, dealing with him. He generally has challenging behavior all the time. This makes it hard to enjoy going anywhere socially. Add to this that my husband is an antisocial ass, I feel doomed to not have friends, at least for the next 10 years or so.

Can anyone relate?

Yep.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's another thread in general topics about it being hard to make friends. I feel the same, but that it's even harder when you have a child with special needs. I have 3 kids, and my youngest has ASD. I am so stressed all the time, dealing with him. He generally has challenging behavior all the time. This makes it hard to enjoy going anywhere socially. Add to this that my husband is an antisocial ass, I feel doomed to not have friends, at least for the next 10 years or so.

Can anyone relate?

Yep.

Yes. But... You will find the right person/people when you least expect it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's another thread in general topics about it being hard to make friends. I feel the same, but that it's even harder when you have a child with special needs. I have 3 kids, and my youngest has ASD. I am so stressed all the time, dealing with him. He generally has challenging behavior all the time. This makes it hard to enjoy going anywhere socially. Add to this that my husband is an antisocial ass, I feel doomed to not have friends, at least for the next 10 years or so.

Can anyone relate?

Yes, many people find friends through the parents of their children's classmates- especially in the 0-grade 6 area. They frequently develop through play dates. This doesn't happen if your child is not having play dates. Having a child with special needs impacts that. IME, parent are more reluctant to have friendships- whether because they want to have playmates for their child or they just don't want to deal withs child that takes extra time. You don't get invited into bookclubs, you don't get invited into Bunko groups, or BBQ's. It was night and day with my second child- who was much more socially adept and well liked.

One way to combat this is to be the ones that host the bbqs, potlucks. I find people will come to your house, but are reluctant to host. Another is to volunteer heavily at your child's school and meet other parents that way.

When my ASD/HFA child was in 1st grade, he invited all the boys in his class to his birthday party at our swimming club (indoors). Everyone came and had a great time. He was not invited to one birthday party that year, not one. It was really sad, he was at the bottom of the social ladder. There were about 18 boys in his class.

[Anonymous]

Completely. It sucks.

[Anonymous]

I feel the same way. We always do the inviting. So sick of it. Only have a few folks who invite us back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's another thread in general topics about it being hard to make friends. I feel the same, but that it's even harder when you have a child with special needs. I have 3 kids, and my youngest has ASD. I am so stressed all the time, dealing with him. He generally has challenging behavior all the time. This makes it hard to enjoy going anywhere socially. Add to this that my husband is an antisocial ass, I feel doomed to not have friends, at least for the next 10 years or so.

Can anyone relate?

Yes, many people find friends through the parents of their children's classmates- especially in the 0-grade 6 area. They frequently develop through play dates. This doesn't happen if your child is not having play dates. Having a child with special needs impacts that. IME, parent are more reluctant to have friendships- whether because they want to have playmates for their child or they just don't want to deal withs child that takes extra time. You don't get invited into bookclubs, you don't get invited into Bunko groups, or BBQ's. It was night and day with my second child- who was much more socially adept and well liked.

One way to combat this is to be the ones that host the bbqs, potlucks. I find people will come to your house, but are reluctant to host. Another is to volunteer heavily at your child's school and meet other parents that way.

When my ASD/HFA child was in 1st grade, he invited all the boys in his class to his birthday party at our swimming club (indoors). Everyone came and had a great time. He was not invited to one birthday party that year, not one. It was really sad, he was at the bottom of the social ladder. There were about 18 boys in his class.

Hugs to this pp.

[Anonymous]

Can you pick up a hobby or activity that isn't directly connected to your kids and socialize through that? My younger child has a disability and although I have hosted many, many play dates, we never get a return invitation. In addition, my older chid has been teased and taunted so much because of her sibling, she doesn't want playdates either, so we fill our evenings with outings and inclusive activities and socialize only with friend we've known for a while. I've come to recognize most parents at out school as fickle, superficial and uninformed and have shifted my focus for friendships elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Big hug! I feel like I am constantly putting myself out there for ds' sake with minimal return. I feel like the minute I mention a diagnosis people are afraid of how to talk and socialize with us. It sucks. I am just thankful for my friends from pre-diagnosis.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Big hug! I feel like I am constantly putting myself out there for ds' sake with minimal return. I feel like the minute I mention a diagnosis people are afraid of how to talk and socialize with us. It sucks. I am just thankful for my friends from pre-diagnosis.

Often times you don't even need to mention a diagnosis. People get a sense and definitely keep their distance.

[Anonymous]

I can totally relate (even though I'm the Dad of a teenage autistic son), I understand the sentiment because I see the lack of friends my wife has. (I too have very few friends outside of work, but I realize that it impacts a stay-at-home mom differently than a dad.)

I have a theory: When you are dealing with these types of issues daily there is a difficulty/reluctance to engage in small-talk & meaningless chit chat that many people talk about with their superficial "friends." My wife is unwilling to discuss much of the fluff that other people want to talk about, preferring to go deep, and talk about things of real importance, and that involves putting yourself out there (not a facade) and that's scary for some people, and they back away from it. In our family we are DONE with facades! We just don't have the time, energy, or inclination to try and maintain them. Especially since inevitably our autistic son will do something entirely unpredictable, and we can't really apologize for it, all we can do is say "that's how it goes when you hang out with our family!"

I don't know if it's any consolation, but the people that back away when they find out about a diagnosis in your family … those aren't the kind of people you want as friends anyway! Shallow People place to much value on this elusive notion of "normal" (which in my experience doesn't really exist!). Be glad un-accepting people are not your friends!!

Have you had any luck trying to make friends with the parents of other children on the Autism Spectrum? (I'm not sure if your youngest is in school yet). At least they would be people you have something in common with, and can share stories, experiences, struggles, and coping strategies with each other, in meaningful conversations.

Good luck and hang in there. You may feel like you are all alone, but with the statistics showing that 1 in 88 children are on the spectrum, there are many other parents out there that are struggling too.

[Anonymous]

I can definitely relate. I think it's tough finding friends period in this area, let alone if you have a little one with SN. I did want to chime in with something upbeat though. I started participating in a small playdate group (just 3 kids total) and we've been doing things for a few months now. Last month when my DS was diagnosed, I was unsure whether or not I should say anything...as I loved hanging out with these 2 moms and was afraid of how they might react.

I ended up deciding to tell them, and they were so wonderfully supportive. In fact, we were just invited to a Memorial Day BBQ at one of the kid's homes I'm not sure how long this hospitality will continue, but I hope it continues for my son's sake.

[Anonymous]

I can totally relate. My closest friends in the DC area were other special ed families. Is your child in PEP? Try to seek our other moms for yourself and other kiddos for your dc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's another thread in general topics about it being hard to make friends. I feel the same, but that it's even harder when you have a child with special needs. I have 3 kids, and my youngest has ASD. I am so stressed all the time, dealing with him. He generally has challenging behavior all the time. This makes it hard to enjoy going anywhere socially. Add to this that my husband is an antisocial ass, I feel doomed to not have friends, at least for the next 10 years or so.

Can anyone relate?

Yes, many people find friends through the parents of their children's classmates- especially in the 0-grade 6 area. They frequently develop through play dates. This doesn't happen if your child is not having play dates. Having a child with special needs impacts that. IME, parent are more reluctant to have friendships- whether because they want to have playmates for their child or they just don't want to deal withs child that takes extra time. You don't get invited into bookclubs, you don't get invited into Bunko groups, or BBQ's. It was night and day with my second child- who was much more socially adept and well liked.

One way to combat this is to be the ones that host the bbqs, potlucks. I find people will come to your house, but are reluctant to host. Another is to volunteer heavily at your child's school and meet other parents that way.

When my ASD/HFA child was in 1st grade, he invited all the boys in his class to his birthday party at our swimming club (indoors). Everyone came and had a great time. He was not invited to one birthday party that year, not one. It was really sad, he was at the bottom of the social ladder. There were about 18 boys in his class.

This was a similar experience to ours, only my son was in Kindergarten and it was all 26 kids from his K class in early November. Did not receive a birthday or playdate invite from any other child in that class all year. So I know how much it sucks! He is our oldest of 3 and we don't really have family type friends that we've made since his preschool years.

[Anonymous]

OP, hang in there. Here are some things we have done in the past to help both me and my ASD son make friends:

1. Athletic activities. Sign him up for sports. If he can be mainstreamed, go with that. If he qualifies for a special needs team, go with that too. DS played in little league for three years now. I would say 90% of his friends are from little league vs. school. At his last birthday party, we had 12 boys from little league and 3 from school. Sports really help make friends.

2. For you - try meetup groups. There are several meetup groups in the area for parents of SN kids. I am part of one, SPD-and-ASD-kiddos-of-Fairfax. We are pretty nice, I would say, and not judgemental.

3. If you want a meetup that is not about the kids, but about your personal interests - go for it. Once a week I go to all kinds of IT-related meetups. I learned Ruby on Rails, for example.

Overall, do not despair.