Being Judged

    Many ASD parents can tell you that we are judged by many in Society. Today I dealt with that at the beach by a Mother and her tween/teen kids.

    Friends that have been places with me know that when the boys are breaking a rule I count. If they are fairly close, I count 1-3, if they are further away I count 5-1 so they know to come back to me.  On the 4th of July a friend introduced me to her friend and her friend had met me before in the park. She told me that she was impressed that all I have to do is count and the boys come to me without me yelling for them by name. It was nice to hear someone that I do not really know understand what I do.

  Having three boys with Autism can be hard as they can tune out the world when they want so calling them by name out in public doesn't always work. Most of the time they would say they didn't realize I was talking to them and in a playground this could be true when other kids have the same name. So when they are close to me, I will say their name, give a warning and count to three. If I reach three they get a time out or other punishment. Then I created the rule that if I say the number 5, all of them are to come back to me without question. If they are not to me by the time I say 1, they get a time out or other punishment. 5-1 system has been working really well as it has been giving them a little more freedom. If we are in a store, they are able to look in another aisle (close) and when I want them to check in, I count. I also have a color system in place, we start at green and each time they break a rule the color change. Green, yellow, orange to red, once we hit red, we go home.

  Now that the boys are older we have been going to the beach a lot this Summer and it can be hard at times as there is only one of me and 3 of them. We have developed a small routine of exploring, swimming, snack, playing in the sand and swimming again before we leave. Some days we go twice a day, a couple of hours in the morning then a couple at night. This works well since I open the shop 12-6 most days.

  Today the boys were testing me to the extreme, they had their warnings but kept pushing me. We were on code orange when Karl and Kyle walked on the rocks barefoot. I started to count, a Mother and kids near by turned to me and started laughing the situation because at first the boys didn't respond. The boys did end up coming back just after I said one so it was time to leave. Those kids seemed to think it was funny, as did their Mother. When I said it was time to leave because we hit code red, Kyle started to cry and Donald started to wine. I told the boys that if they continued we would not return tonight. Well they continued and were told we would not go back. At this point the Mother had caught my look and turned around. Donald at this point was having have very loud temper tantrum which lead him to losing the beach on Monday as well. Through all of this Karl was remaining very calm and giving his brother a look of "just stop" but they were determined to continue. Eventually I got them to the car while ignoring the tantrum from Donald and we left.

  It baffles me, why were the kids laughing??  Are parents really so relaxed that kids find it funny when they see a child getting in trouble?? What was up with the Mother laughing too?? While I know many parents judge other parents, hell I have myself on some topics. But here is the difference, I usually only think about it and the other parent would never know my thoughts. There are times, I may quietly talk with a friends but still the other parent would not know. It is called using discretion and I would never let my boys disrespect another parent like that.

  All in all, I stood my ground as I knew what I was doing was what is best for my boys. I also knew that they would remember what happened today and want to follow the rules and behave from now on. All kids will test parents now and then but it is our job to show the that we are the parents :)]