I (26F) brought my daughter (2F) to the pool at our community center today during family swim time. There were a few other people and then another family in the pool – a dad and his son who looked about 3-4 and a mom who was outside of the pool. The mom was wearing a shirt with a logo for an autism advocacy group which combined with her son’s behavior made me assume he had autism, but idk for sure.
My daughter likes to place on the steps of the pool so we sat down and she started playing with her little turtle that she brought. The dad brought his son pretty close to us (he was holding him bc he couldn’t swim), and he splashed us until the mom told him to stop splashing. No big deal, it’s family swim time. They then went away for a minute until the other kid saw my daughter’s turtle. He started pointing to it and his dad brought him over to the steps. The other kid then started trying to grab the turtle from my daughter, and she did not want to share and was turning away and saying, “no”, so I said, “I’m sorry, daughter’s name is using that right now.”
The kid then grabbed onto my daughter’s arm and started squeezing it trying to get the turtle from her (at this point, his dad is just holding him not saying anything or doing anything). I took his hand, pried it off of my daughter’s arm and said, “please give us space” and moved my daughter off the steps a few feet away.
The mom glared at me and then told her husband that my daughter wasn’t feeling social and that it was probably best if they left. Another patron in the pool commented that they shouldn’t have felt like they had to leave, but they ended up leaving a few minutes later.
I felt kind of bad for making them feel like they had to leave and usually I would never touch another person’s kid like that, but I was super uncomfortable with him grabbing onto my daughter’s arm. I am wondering if my response was too harsh and I was the asshole
Edit to add: ok I think I have some clarity on what happened. I was telling a friend about the situation and she said it sounds like neither parent was paying attention and so they did not see their son grab my daughter’s arm and me removing his hand. So from their perspective maybe it was more that he went over to my daughter, she did not want to share and I asked for space
NTA – so the dad brought the son over to take your daughter’s toy? He’s the AH.
Dad was willing to let shit start to avoid setting boundaries for his kid. They are mad they were put in a position to have to parent.
Yup. There’s kind of a stereotype about autistic boys being coddled and poorly raised by their parents and just being allowed to do whatever at the expense of everyone around them. Meanwhile girls are expected to do everything and more, god forbid we miss a tiny social cue.
Source: I’m a late diagnosed autistic woman
NTA He shouldn’t have grabbed your daughter and his father should have immediately explained that to him. I don’t blame the boy but the father should have intervened.
Yea the father is TA
NTA. their kid hurt yours, you didn’t make their family do anything. and just because he has autism doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be told no! i feel like that’d be a toxic way to grow up. the fact they didn’t intervene is strange too, they shouldn’t let their kid act this way, condition or not. then he’d just grow up undisciplined and violent with no understanding of right vs wrong
NTA. autism or not, they shouldn’t be allowing their child to grab into someone else’s child. He shouldn’t be grabbing anybody. You didn’t ask them to leave, you requested space after an uncomfortable incident. You did nothing wrong, please don’t feel that way.
If the autism advocacy group was Autism Speaks then I would be aggro immediately. As someone with autism who was diagnosed at 3 I can easily say that group has never had the best interest of any disabled group. They see Neurodivergence as crippling and they try to enforce the idea that people with Autism will never be functioning members of society and they refuse to let people with Autism advocate for themself.
As for the child. As someone who was considered “behavioral” and was non-verbal for my early childhood I usually hold firm to strong parenting being key to proper development and that people with autism should still be held accountable to their actions because if what you do makes you an asshole then no diagnosis could ever excuse that. No matter what mental illness or neurodivergence you have; you are still responsible for your actions.
It might not be fair, but that was my *instant* thought – the mom is connected to Autism Speaks and won’t teach her son boundaries because she refuses to believe that he can learn.
NTA
Crazy that the family felt so comfortable letting their child grab and squeeze another strangers child. I forsee a hard future for their son when they baby him through school and he doesn’t learn how to be a good person.
Being on the spectrum is not a pass to be a bully.
Autistic or not, dad should have stepped in even before he grabbed your daughter’s arm. In fact, we were taught by both our occupational therapist and early intervention teacher that we as the parents are responsible for “facilitating” appropriate interactions between our child and other children, so that he learns how to best approach other kids. Dad failed big time, multiple times. Mom was just an AH. You acted appropriately. My son is also 3 years old and autistic. Not that it matters. Autism plays no factor in whether or not you’re an AH in this situation. You are NTA
“We don’t touch people we don’t know!” in a cheery voice, while prying the child loose.
Even better, without permission! Doesn’t matter if we know or not. Always preaching consent and normalizing it is important. Don’t care if they’re my kid or not, if they’re Around my kid!