I had to stop and comment before reading past this page, so apologies if we’ve hit some sort of agreement on this...but I thought this gossip forum was mostly here because how the so called adults in the household were mishandling and mistreating Abbie. NO child will learn appropriate versus inappropriate behavior without external forces helping them navigate that development. Take a non NT child and it can be even harder.
I can understand that Abbie’s actions may make you uncomfortable, and in person you may find yourself feeling angry, but why the hell are we mad AT Abbie? How is a seriously IDD child supposed to learn to keep her hands to herself when she is repeatedly scared, tickled, grabbed, booped, etc.? When she does something “bratty” it’s because that behavior has been reinforced for years. To change it they need to majorly rework their schedule, home, and their own actions. Sending her to her room while they all keep sending missed messages with their own actions is just heartless. “Hey Abbie, we are going to poke you, tickle you, and otherwise touch you, but when you do the same you’re going to be punished.”
I also don’t think it’s fair to say outright that Abbie lacks empathy. She may not have empathy the way NT folks view it, but she very well could have compassion for others if she were given the proper social input from those in her home. My ex-husband truly lacks empathy. (Not being a bitter ex, he has a personality disorder and genuinely does not feel guilt or remorse.) He didn’t get pleasure from causing me pain, he just didn’t care one way or the other. I don’t think Abby hurts everyone because she means to. Sometimes she wants something and other times it’s a game. Her mental age does determine how her empathy would be expressed.
I know this is long but man, this forum was so great to find for a while. I felt like it was a place where the focus was on how horribly ASSa is representing the autism community. Talking about the family giving into spending and using their disabled daughter to do it. I’m not saying Abbies behavior should be ignored not you have to get to the root cause of it.
They have several hard YEARS of intense work to fix the mess they’ve made. That includes schedules, finding toys and sensory items she does enjoy, and focusing hard on PT and OT. COVID19 has torn the mask off of this family. When there’s no school to leave her at, no trips to take, less respite opportunities, they are forced to face what a lifetime of Abbie is.
Maybe I’m jaded. I have a cousin who is 23 but with severe IDD and cerebral palsy. He’s about 6-12 months, non verbal, and immobile. The denial portion of his life was brutal. My aunt was dedicated to therapies but the trauma of his premature delivery and complications made it clear he wasn’t going to progress how she wanted. A lot of the family were encouraged to give age appropriate gifts at parties but he couldn’t play with them. So he screamed. He screamed a lot. He shoved things. He whipped his head around. We stopped trying to force him to be typical for his physical age. Now he’s happy. He loves his infant toys. He still does PT and OT, but the focus is on quality of life.
A and P need to stop and love Abbie enough to see how they’re making her a difficult child for OTHERS to be around. It isn’t Ab who is at fault. She’s doing what she’s been shown and told. My cousin couldn’t tell is what he wanted so when we inevitably forced things on him he didn’t understand he screamed and screamed. There’s no quick fix. It takes years of hard work. It takes learning non-verbal cues if the kiddo isn’t fully able to use a communication device or sign language.
I’ll be back in a few days and skip ahead to the current topic. I get everyone has a right to their own opinions and I’m not trying to muzzle anyone. It’s just really hard for me to see children who are already vulnerable, be mishandled by their parents, only to end up further judged. These kiddos already have an uphill climb because they’re not NT and in some cases also deal with IDD.
Hope I didn’t hurt feelings, I just do worry about where Ab will end up if there isn’t a major overhaul to her routine
I had to stop and comment before reading past this page, so apologies if we’ve hit some sort of agreement on this...but I thought this gossip forum was mostly here because how the so called adults in the household were mishandling and mistreating Abbie. NO child will learn appropriate versus inappropriate behavior without external forces helping them navigate that development. Take a non NT child and it can be even harder.
I can understand that Abbie’s actions may make you uncomfortable, and in person you may find yourself feeling angry, but why the hell are we mad AT Abbie? How is a seriously IDD child supposed to learn to keep her hands to herself when she is repeatedly scared, tickled, grabbed, booped, etc.? When she does something “bratty” it’s because that behavior has been reinforced for years. To change it they need to majorly rework their schedule, home, and their own actions. Sending her to her room while they all keep sending missed messages with their own actions is just heartless. “Hey Abbie, we are going to poke you, tickle you, and otherwise touch you, but when you do the same you’re going to be punished.”
I also don’t think it’s fair to say outright that Abbie lacks empathy. She may not have empathy the way NT folks view it, but she very well could have compassion for others if she were given the proper social input from those in her home. My ex-husband truly lacks empathy. (Not being a bitter ex, he has a personality disorder and genuinely does not feel guilt or remorse.) He didn’t get pleasure from causing me pain, he just didn’t care one way or the other. I don’t think Abby hurts everyone because she means to. Sometimes she wants something and other times it’s a game. Her mental age does determine how her empathy would be expressed.
I know this is long but man, this forum was so great to find for a while. I felt like it was a place where the focus was on how horribly ASSa is representing the autism community. Talking about the family giving into spending and using their disabled daughter to do it. I’m not saying Abbies behavior should be ignored not you have to get to the root cause of it.
They have several hard YEARS of intense work to fix the mess they’ve made. That includes schedules, finding toys and sensory items she does enjoy, and focusing hard on PT and OT. COVID19 has torn the mask off of this family. When there’s no school to leave her at, no trips to take, less respite opportunities, they are forced to face what a lifetime of Abbie is.
Maybe I’m jaded. I have a cousin who is 23 but with severe IDD and cerebral palsy. He’s about 6-12 months, non verbal, and immobile. The denial portion of his life was brutal. My aunt was dedicated to therapies but the trauma of his premature delivery and complications made it clear he wasn’t going to progress how she wanted. A lot of the family were encouraged to give age appropriate gifts at parties but he couldn’t play with them. So he screamed. He screamed a lot. He shoved things. He whipped his head around. We stopped trying to force him to be typical for his physical age. Now he’s happy. He loves his infant toys. He still does PT and OT, but the focus is on quality of life.
A and P need to stop and love Abbie enough to see how they’re making her a difficult child for OTHERS to be around. It isn’t Ab who is at fault. She’s doing what she’s been shown and told. My cousin couldn’t tell is what he wanted so when we inevitably forced things on him he didn’t understand he screamed and screamed. There’s no quick fix. It takes years of hard work. It takes learning non-verbal cues if the kiddo isn’t fully able to use a communication device or sign language.
I’ll be back in a few days and skip ahead to the current topic. I get everyone has a right to their own opinions and I’m not trying to muzzle anyone. It’s just really hard for me to see children who are already vulnerable, be mishandled by their parents, only to end up further judged. These kiddos already have an uphill climb because they’re not NT and in some cases also deal with IDD.
Hope I didn’t hurt feelings, I just do worry about where Ab will end up if there isn’t a major overhaul to her routine
Bursting out of that stupid costume was the highlight!
Let her stick to eating it.
Just a medley of wild, baseless speculation to enjoy with your coffee this morning 80% of what they share with us is twisted to reflect positively on them, whether it’s the truth or not. I totally missed the incident with Grandpa
