Man uninvites daughter's autistic classmate from birthday party. Kid's mom is furious.
When this father is conflcited, he asks Reddit:
'AITA for 'uninviting' my daughter's autistic classmate to her birthday party?'
I needed to get some unbiased opinions, and a friend suggested I post here. Hopefully everyone can help. I, 37M, am a single father to my daughter, 8, who will be turning nine this Saturday. I'll call her G. G decided she wanted pool party birthday party at our house.
I plan on doing other activities as well, such as bounce houses,cookout, s'mores, movie by the pool, make your own cookies, etc., followed by a sleepover with some of her friends. It's gonna be a busy day, and there'll be roughly 30 kids at my house. Some parents are staying, and some are just dropping off their kids and picking them up later. I'm fine with this.
I let G invited whoever she wanted, and she chose to invite a classmate, A, that is autistic. I was fine with this, as I've always taught G not to judge others based on their differences. Here is where my dilemma comes into play.
A's mother called me last week to ask if it would okay just to drop off him and pick him up the next day so he could attend the sleepover. My problem is I have no experience with an autistic child, and my understanding is A is very low functioning. I guess he's prone to getting easily overwhelmed and will start to shutdown/outburst.
I told A's mom that I wouldn't be comfortable with him being there by himself as I would be too busy with everything else going on and am inexperienced with autistic children. A's mother got really upset with me, telling me I don't understand how hard it is for single moms to get alone time, and how A would be devastated that he wouldn't be able to attend and how happy he was to attend a party, since he rarely gets invited to things., among other things.
A's mom is now going around saying I 'uninvited ' her son because of his autism, causing parents to throw shade at me. The parents that are staying offered to help with A, but they also have little to no experience with autistic children either. One parent on my side A's mother did this to her at her son's party, and he definitely is a handful, so not to feel bad. So, AITA?
Let's find out.
evolvewren writes:
NTA! Autistic mom of someone on the spectrum, here. She wants a free babysitter. Shame on her for even attempting this. Folks on the spectrum are often traumatized by untrained supervision/a lack of supervision. If she needs a night off, she can seek out the many services provided for Autistic folk or talk to her own family/friends.
mcbnjex writes:
NTA. I am a mom of an autistic daughter. I would never leave my daughter alone at a party and she is older than 8 years old. Most of the time my daughter can manage without me but at parties there is a lot of noise and other triggers and she needs me for support. If the mom of the autistic boy really wants him to attend she should attend the party with him.
stargazer writes:
NTA. She's using this opportunity as a babysitter/free time for herself. At 8, I'd have never let my (autistic) son be left in that situation. She asked you answered honestly, and now she's pissed and petty that you're unwilling to care for her child for 12-18 hours.