Challenges with the grandparents!

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I'm a single mom with an ASD daughter, just turned 4. I am extremely blessed and fortunate, because my folks have let me and my daughter move back to their house, so I can afford to only work part-time to facilitate a fairly extensive early-intervention program for my daughter but...

My mom (the grandma) is driving me nuts

She gets on my case every day that I don't take my daughter out enough. This is a little girl who goes to a 3 hour head-start type preschool every morning, has a 1-on-1 aide for 3 hours daily in the afternoon, we take her to the park or for hikes, on the weekends she goes to the busy pool or waterslide park and McDonalds when she's at her dad's, it goes on and on! My daughter is doing wonderful she's a very happy little girl who's learning all the time, but I insist that she needs some freetime to do her own thing. But my mom actually believes, that if I would just haul her around to walmart/grocery shopping/the bank etc and enroll her in dance, music lessons, sporte etc that this would somehow 'cure' the autism?

I've tried everything I can to help educate my Mom, I've bought books, provided pamphlets, we watched the "Temple Grandin" movie together. I'm getting really, really frustrated. At the same time, my folks really love my daughter plus they let us live here for cheap so I can't really assert my self to much about it, I kindof just need to take it, then brush it off. Anyone been through this before, suggestions?

It wouldn't "cure" the autism, but some of that might be a good idea anyway, if you can afford the extra time. You could always ask your mom to come along and help on the grocery trips and such if taking care of the girl by yourself slows down the shopping too much.

It's a generational thing; back in your parent's day today's AS kids would have been labelled as "stubborn and overly sensitive","weird" or quirky". As a child growing up in the 1980s, everyone called me "stubborn" and I was placed in emotionally disturbed classes because I demanded way too much attention from my teachers when I was in the primary grades. My parents did EVERYTHING under the sun to try to pretend I was "normal" by repeatedly trying to mainstream me (which were unsuccessful) and placing me in extra curricular activities and telling me to "stop being so stubborn" and actually making fun of me all the time (yes, my very own parents teased and berated me) for acting much younger than my age and again, being "stubborn".
I've suspected that I have AS for 10 years (since I first heard of it back in 2000) and got the official diagnosis last year. As much as I try to "educate" my mom about why I'm the way I am, she has no interest and I suspect she thinks it's just another replacement "label" comparable to the "emotionally disturbed" label I had as a child as opposed to a genuine neurological difference.

Just my two cents,

Allie Kat
http://www.myaspergerslifestory.com/