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Should I tell other parents about my child's autism?

MonkeyElliot

Hi, 

My daughter is 9, and having been back at school for 6 days I have already been into school twice for incidents that have happened and we have had several severe meltdown at home. My daughter's biggest problems are her social skills, which often results in her being brutally honest and others perceiving her as being mean. Often, she is just retaliating to things that have been done to her, but she is always 'in trouble' at school.

We don't have a formal diagnosis as yet, but the school SENCo is sure it is ASD, and when I met with her consultant last week, she is also. We are hoping she'll make the MAAT meeting in November / December, so should have a diagnosis by early 2022 (it has been a hard fought 5 years to get to where we are). 

My question is: should I tell other class parents about my daughter's ASD now, or even at all. I have discussed it with my daughter and she sees it as being just another stick that the children can beat her with, something else they can tease her about. But I have tried to explain to her that if the other parents, and children, knew about her condition and why she says and does things the way that she does they might cut her some slack. 

I just wondered what other parents experiences were in terms of telling classmates? 

Many Thanks in advance. 

Parents

  • I wouldn’t betray her trust if she’s asked you not to. Its your daughter that is autistic not you. It’s her private business. Feel free to discuss with teacher and professionals involved but her peers and their parents I wouldn’t. Your daughter will end up not trusting you. 

  • in reply to Lau

    Sorry, to be clear, I certainly would never betray her trust. I am looking for people's experiences of having told classmates / parents. If I could have some evidence that it might be of benefit then that is what I would discuss with her so that she would want to tell them. Conversely, if people have had bad experiences, I need to take that into consideration when discussing it with her. 

  • in reply to MonkeyElliot

    Majority of the time my eldest child’s peers don’t mention his autism. We have had a few occasions recently with one boy calling him names an autistic brat etc etc and another few incidents of a child hitting my son with a ball kicking him on his stomach and braking his water bottle and then saying they won’t do it again and want to be friends but another incident always happened. I worry about how vulnerable it can make my son and how other children can abuse that vulnerability. 

    There are also times when children have been supportive of my son and helped him. 

    If you have close friends and your daughter is friends with their children maybe let those parents know.

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  • in reply to MonkeyElliot

    Majority of the time my eldest child’s peers don’t mention his autism. We have had a few occasions recently with one boy calling him names an autistic brat etc etc and another few incidents of a child hitting my son with a ball kicking him on his stomach and braking his water bottle and then saying they won’t do it again and want to be friends but another incident always happened. I worry about how vulnerable it can make my son and how other children can abuse that vulnerability. 

    There are also times when children have been supportive of my son and helped him. 

    If you have close friends and your daughter is friends with their children maybe let those parents know.

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