BeaArthur wrote:
Never mind if the mom over-reacted or was wrong. The better question is, how could the mom have better handled this incident to make it a teachable moment to her autistic child?
- pick out the complimentary part and say isn't that nice, or, how does that feel to you?
- look at the part "almost like us" and ask her child what she thinks that means - and how does it feel to you.
- ask if this valentine made the child happy or sad
- ask what kind of message the autistic child would write back to the sender
and so on.
It really doesn't matter what mom thinks or feels in this situation (unless she's reliving 2nd grade again through her child - an unflattering thought). It matters what construction the child puts on it. If the mom is in fact contributing to the sense of outsiderness, then really mom is the aggressor here, not the other child who sent this valentine.
These are really good points. I think the autistic child might not really even think that this was a bad encounter until her mom pitched a fit about it. Kids take their cues from their parents. If the parent reacts in outrage and horror at an ambiguous event, then that's how the child will take it, as a bad thing.
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Diagnosed Bipolar II in 2012, Autism spectrum disorder (moderate) & ADHD in 2015.
24 Feb 2016, 1:36 am
