OP, I would match the kid's tone and push back. "What's wrong with YOU? That's a very rude way to start a conversation and I think you know better." It is hard because they are using the trappings of propriety to be mean...so you do the same.

I am not SN or mother of an SN kid, but I agree with the pps who are closer to this that "nothing is wrong with her" is the wrong way to go. It doesn't acknowledge her clear difference and you lose credibility with the kid--and with your daughter, who is surely painfully aware that she is visibly different. The lesson you're imparting to the rude kids isn't "she's not different" but "differences are not an excuse for rudeness."

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Both my kids are NT. OP, I don't think that kids are as mean spirited as you think, and many don't even notice other kids may have special needs until 8 or 9. It sounds like the kids approaching you have poor manners but probably aren't malicious. I'd try to formulate a response that isn't rude frankly but that still shuts down the questions. Personally, I wouldn't want to teach my child that obnoxious behavior should be met with more obnoxious behavior, especially when the exchange is between a child and an adult.

I think your experience strictly as NT parent is different than those of us with SN kids.

Right, that's why I'm offering a different perspective. But clearly it isn't wanted.

What you should be focused on rather than the SN family's reactions is educating your kids about differences of all kinds and how NOT to be obnoxious. No one's child -- your NT dears included -- should be walking over and asking these sorts of questions. No more than they would ask a fat person why they are fat, right? You should be there as their parent to intervene at the very least and not leaving the SN family to worry about responding or how they respond.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Both my kids are NT. OP, I don't think that kids are as mean spirited as you think, and many don't even notice other kids may have special needs until 8 or 9. It sounds like the kids approaching you have poor manners but probably aren't malicious. I'd try to formulate a response that isn't rude frankly but that still shuts down the questions. Personally, I wouldn't want to teach my child that obnoxious behavior should be met with more obnoxious behavior, especially when the exchange is between a child and an adult.

I think your experience strictly as NT parent is different than those of us with SN kids.

Right, that's why I'm offering a different perspective. But clearly it isn't wanted.

Anonymous wrote:Both my kids are NT. OP, I don't think that kids are as mean spirited as you think, and many don't even notice other kids may have special needs until 8 or 9. It sounds like the kids approaching you have poor manners but probably aren't malicious. I'd try to formulate a response that isn't rude frankly but that still shuts down the questions. Personally, I wouldn't want to teach my child that obnoxious behavior should be met with more obnoxious behavior, especially when the exchange is between a child and an adult.

I think your experience strictly as NT parent is different than those of us with SN kids.

Anonymous wrote:Both my kids are NT. OP, I don't think that kids are as mean spirited as you think, and many don't even notice other kids may have special needs until 8 or 9. It sounds like the kids approaching you have poor manners but probably aren't malicious. I'd try to formulate a response that isn't rude frankly but that still shuts down the questions. Personally, I wouldn't want to teach my child that obnoxious behavior should be met with more obnoxious behavior, especially when the exchange is between a child and an adult.

I think you are very naive.

I'm sorry, but where are these curiosity seekers parents??

Any kid that is innocently asking these questions will be very young and, at a pool, would be (or should be) within ear shot if not arm's reach of their parent. The kid's parents should be intervening and teaching them when to ask questions and when to keep it to themselves.

Not knowing the child or their intentions, I'd just ask them where their Mom or Dad is tell them to go ask these questions of them and not you. That should get Mom or Dad off their respective arses and more proactively monitoring their nosy kids and teh inappropriate line of questioning.

Both my kids are NT. OP, I don't think that kids are as mean spirited as you think, and many don't even notice other kids may have special needs until 8 or 9. It sounds like the kids approaching you have poor manners but probably aren't malicious. I'd try to formulate a response that isn't rude frankly but that still shuts down the questions. Personally, I wouldn't want to teach my child that obnoxious behavior should be met with more obnoxious behavior, especially when the exchange is between a child and an adult.

Anonymous wrote:I'm kind of stumped... My daughter is young so I haven't dealt with this a lot yet

Maybe something like "Do you enjoy being mean? Did you come over here to make her cry?"

Kid answers no (or yes if they are a real little shit)

"Well, you're not the one in the wheelchair so what do you care? Why don't you just go enjoy your life? Get lost."

I am really nice to kids I think are just confused but if I think they are mean I won't play nice.

I appreciate this but my kid in a wheelchair enjoys life too, a lot, all the time. I would like to get away from this notion that life with a special needs child and for the SN child is constant doom and gloom and burden and despair and catastrophe. There's an outpouring of discontent on this forum because that's what it's for. Just as there's an outpouring of sleep and behavior and food problems on General Parenting. But that doesn't mean that life with babies and toddlers is all problems and that doesn't mean life with my kid is all despair.

I'm kind of stumped... My daughter is young so I haven't dealt with this a lot yet

Maybe something like "Do you enjoy being mean? Did you come over here to make her cry?"

Kid answers no (or yes if they are a real little shit)

"Well, you're not the one in the wheelchair so what do you care? Why don't you just go enjoy your life? Get lost."

I am really nice to kids I think are just confused but if I think they are mean I won't play nice.

Anonymous wrote:Look, I know the difference between an awkward good faith request for information and a mean sneer. I'm a mom. I'm not going to pre-empt some kid whose trying to formulate a query but doesn't have the aplomb to pull it off. No way. I go out of my way with such kids. I'm talking about sneering remarks and jeers and looks of outright disgust.

I just want to say I know where you are coming from. It drives me crazy when I come to a board for support and people patronize me saying I just misunderstood. Ugh.

Anonymous wrote:I'm with your dh. Tell those little brats to bug off. You could give your daughter some good comebacks to use as she gets older.

Rude kid: What's wrong with her?
You: Nothing, what's wrong with you?
You: That's a rude thing to say. Go away.
You: That's none of your business. Stop being nosy.

I don't buy the "developmentally appropriate" argument. They aren't 3. Teach your daughter that she doesn't have to be a doormat because she is different. No one gets friends by begging for them.

NP here. Thanks for this advice.
OP thank you for posting this.

Anonymous wrote:My dd has ADHD, not exactly an NT child, but not someone with a visible disability. She goes to camp JCC, and every year comes home telling us about the SN child in her group. She actually gives us a lot of details about the child's abilities, strengths, weaknesses. She is asking someone a lot of detailed questions - or is observing very well. I can't imagine that she's subtle while she is asking,

But, she finds their abilities interestingm like these kids just as they are, and would never be mean on purpose.

Empathetic kids are out there! Hang in there!

I love kids like your DD!

My dd has ADHD, not exactly an NT child, but not someone with a visible disability. She goes to camp JCC, and every year comes home telling us about the SN child in her group. She actually gives us a lot of details about the child's abilities, strengths, weaknesses. She is asking someone a lot of detailed questions - or is observing very well. I can't imagine that she's subtle while she is asking,

But, she finds their abilities interestingm like these kids just as they are, and would never be mean on purpose.

Empathetic kids are out there! Hang in there!

Anonymous wrote:Are you serious? You think there's no meanness or bullying in small towns? Omg.

I think you were responding to me. No, I don't think that at ALL. But at least in a smaller town, you eventually know everyone and you aren't surrounded by mostly strangers day after day after day. There is good and bad in it.

7 is too old to be going up to other kids and innocently asking questions like that. At 5, I would say they were genuinely curious. I would respond with "why do you ask?"