Reply to Making friends as a mother of a special needs kid

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]It sounds like I've been lucky so far.  My son attended a preschool for 2-3-4 yr olds last yr.  He was in the 2s class.  By the end of the year, it was obvious that something was not right.  Of the 10 kids in his class, 6 sets of parents have been beyond supportive.  3 are teachers in MCPS.  They helped me to negotiate the IEP process.  They told me who to ask for, when to follow up, and how to get the services I needed.  One of moms is K teacher.  She reviewed his IEP goals from a K teacher aspect-- if he met the goals as outlined, would he be ready for mainstream K?  In addition, all 6 moms and dads are always therefore me when I need them---either to chat or to have a playdate or to vent.  Even though we are no longer in the preschool, we are still invited to all the bday parties.  So I don't think all NT parents are clueless--there are some really nice people in the world.  You just have to be lucky enough to cross paths with them.[/quote]

I think niceness is not the point.  I'm one of the posters whose child was not invited to any parties.  Parents were always nice to us.  But invite my child to their kids parties?  Think of including a special needs kid if there was a party of a few kids?  Encourage a friendship or move an SN kid onto a party list?  No way.[/quote]

I'm so sorry to hear that was your experience.  It's not fair for you or for your child.    In my case, perhaps because so many of the classmates parents are elem school teachers, they've seen it all already and are more accepting.  And our kids were 2 when they met.  At 2, your "best friend" is the one that has the blue car or the brown haired doll at the moment.  Kids that young don't really have an agenda.  Our kids just became friends because they just did.

Now--the other side is that we are now in a different preschool and the closeness does not exist.  I don't know any of the parents in the class and there are no organized outside of school social events.  Often I find that my friends are more accepting of my SN child because they are my friend and my kids and I are a package deal.  It remains to be seen what will happen in elem school.  From our new school, we have not been invited to any playdates or bday parties.  The new school does not publish a class list with parental information.  If I wanted to organize a playdate, I would have to send an email to the director who would then forward it to the other parent.  Truthfully, that's too much work to set up and I'm just not interested.[/quote]

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