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Welcome to Shut Up About Your Perfect Kid

Therapy and sanity for ordinary parents of special kids.

Where Did our Friends Go?

If you’ve ever felt alone or abandoned by your friends because of your special child, you’ll want to check out this great blog post. Sound off and tell us if you agree.

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3 Responses to Where Did our Friends Go?

  1. Jennifer January 6, 2011 at 1:55 am #

    I believe I shut out a lot of people after my daughter was diagnosed with ASD, but my family shut me out cause they don’t know how to act around her and they mainly just ignored her…with the exception of my step-mother who seems to hate my guts but loves my little girl like crazy. And now I feel alone all the time. I, HER MOTHER, dont even know how to interact with her anymore…. Idk what im really supposed to be saying on here but i just vented a little HAHA

  2. Alicia McLoughlin January 8, 2011 at 4:09 pm #

    Really good blog there and so close to home it’s scary! Yes i think we can all relate to this and I would have mentioned family too because that hurts even more than “so-called” friends – all my cousins have turned their back on us since our daughter was diagnosed with ASD at age 2. Ironic because we moved to France so that our kids would be able to grow up with their cousins who are of the same age… that’s not gonna happen but hey, that’s life, we will make other friends and build our own families…

  3. Janet Foster January 8, 2011 at 11:14 pm #

    I know how you feel. I spent many years all alone with only a husband (not my child’s father) and my best friend, trying to stay sane and trying not to blame myself for my son’s disability. When I went to college I ran into many other mothers who seemed to like me and at first I didn’t tell them about my special son. When they wanted to come over to let their kids play with my son, many ran from my house and never returned and avoided me on campus after that. My family tried to understand, but since I didn’t quite get it I couldn’t explain it to them. My brothers dislike me for other reasons and I can only assume my son’s disability pushed them further away because of the control I had to have over every situation. Some of that control is an imperfect personality flaw, but most of it was cuz I had to have the control so that whatever we were doing didn’t create a meltdown with my son. Over the years I have realized that my parents were right, “If they really are your friends they won’t care about your imperfections.” and I added, “or the imperfections of your kids.” I still don’t get why a child with imperfections can be the only reason for not wanting to be friends with someone. It’s so high school!! It’s like saying, “I don’t like you because you have Adidas shoes and not Nike.” So like Alicia McLoughlin, we built our own family and that includes our family of friends!!

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