Summary: I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday whose two children are borderline special needs children. One of them is on the autism spectrum and one has a sensory processing disorder. This friend was explaining to me some of the behavior problems that her middle child is dealing with and some of the defiance and impulsive activity that he has. As she was illuminating some of the things with which she was dealing, I caught myself attempting to make her feel better. I came back with a response that I knew better than to use. I told her that I have three children and I see mine doing the same things. Even as the words came out of my mouth, I realized that it was not the correct thing to say. One of the most annoying and irritating things for the parent of a child who is on the autism spectrum or who is dealing with a sensory processing disorder to hear is, “well my child does that too. I think that’s just normal.” I was frustrated with myself for what I had said, because I always advise others not to compare the behavior of normally developing children with special needs ones. We think that we understand, and yet we really don’t understand at all. No two children are the same. Despite what we see on the outside, kids with SPD and autism are not behaving the same way that normally developing ones are. The behavior that you are dealing with in your children who are typically and normally developing is not the same as that of a mother with a child on the spectrum. One of the biggest differences is when we’re talking about defiance and tantrums. I, as a parent, am tempted to say that my children behave like that all of the time. When I say “all of the time,” it means at the most once or twice a day. It may seem like “all of the time” to me and I may feel like I have to deal with it “all of the time,” but to the mother of a child on the spectrum or with SPD, it probably is about 400 times a day. The behavior is over and over and over again, to the point of being exhausting. It is very much a different thing with which to deal. So, whenever you are talking to a parent and they are venting or explaining some of their frustrations, it is best not to come back with the response that it’s normal and that all children have those problems. While it’s true that they all may behave this way some of the time, they don’t do it on the scale that a child with sensory processing disorder or autism does. If you have any questions you'd like addressed on this podcast, please reach out to me on my website, www.jasonmillerhealth.com
