Parents Embarrassed of Autistic Child - What Should I Do?

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My mother was embarrassed to be seen with me, because of my special interests. I'd get excited whenever someone would say that they were going to London or England and ask them a whole bunch of questions. She was also embarrassed about the way I wore my hair. I wore my hair like The Beatles which I thought was pretty respectable compared to the wild hairdos the girls at my high school had. My mum dismissed the possibility that I might have Gender Dysphoria and bitched about that during the first argument that she picked with me. However, my mum kept asking me if I wanted to go shopping with her and I'd decline the offer, knowing that my boyish Beatle haircut would embarrass her. She finally asked me why I didn't want to go shopping with her. I told her that she would be embarrassed to be seen with me for being the way that I am. She apologized to me, but I still felt hurt and betrayed. I eventually forgave her and started going shopping with her again.

maybe in some cases its parents being embarrassed for their children, for example when you watch embarrassing things on tv you feel embarrassed on behalf of the person so it might not be that they are ashamed of anything just empathising about how embarrassing it might be for their child.

of course I am sure there are parents that are embarrassed on behalf of themselves.

Also maybe its because of how people tend to judge parents of children who maybe to an outsider looks like they are having a tantrum or something that's just bad behaviour and think they are bad parents, other people may look down on the parents of autistic children because they do not know the facts and that's upsetting for parents to deal with.

also its hard, if it were me you want to protect your child from the judgment of others and if in public you can see peoples reactions to behaviour that is not the norm it might make parents frustrated and angry but not angry at their child but at the judgment of other people. that's how I would feel if I was a parent anyway.

in all respect,its unfair to make that judgement unless have got experience of her,she is significantly autistic-she is just high functioning,in her seminars she goes indepth about how exactly autism still affects her,she is also on meds.

I wonder if my parents are, and I've suspected so for a long time, because they've always like organizations like Autism Speaks.

I admit I get embarrassed when my children act out. But I am someone who has always been embarrassed my people looking at me. I could never fit in and was very self conscious. My daughter is turning out a lot like me. She is on the spectrum and I am not. I try to redirect my son when he throws a tantrum but he really only responds to threats of taking away his video games. He is 9 and too heavy to physically control. The other day he was mad and ran towards the street. I yelled to stop and parents were looking at me. Thankfully he stopped and didn't run into the street.

I feel I should clarify - I have sympathy for embarrassment. I don't have sympathy, however, for the embarrassment leading to not wanting to be seen with your child (and acting on that desire). Autistic kids shouldn't be hidden away from the world. (I also should probably add, I'm a ridiculously empathetic person, so I have sympathy for everyone. I had a dream the other night where someone was trying to kill me, and I even had sympathy for him. So I should probably rephrase 'don't have sympathy' to 'have markedly less sympathy'.)

As for the card idea, I actually had that thought, too. So I created a thread a few weeks ago trying to figure out what it should say. http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt249321.html

This is what we came up with:
"This child has autism. People with autism may behave in ways different from neurotypicals (people like you and me) because they have difficulty understanding social situations, restrictive interests, and may struggle with verbal language. Having autism is like being left handed, but on the neurological level. Some things a person with autism can do readily or better than normal, some require a different tool to achieve the same result, and some will make them metaphorically smear ink on the paper. If I handed you this card, this is likely one of the latter moments. Please help by showing tolerance. To learn more, visit autismspectrumexplained.com."

I think it could help...so long as the parent isn't too embarrassed to hand it out (that is a potentially embarrassing thing, going up to a stranger you don't know and handing them a card - but I think it can turn a negative gawking situation into a learning experience, so it's worth it).

That's not just good teaching. There is a subtype of autism where they're nonverbal/minimally verbal as preschoolers,. then go through a developmental 'catch up' period around 4-6 years old. Short of institutionalizing them or something, you can't really do anything to stop this subgroup from catching up - even if they get no treatment at all, they'll end up high functioning. (Some of Kanner's cases were like this.) Meanwhile, some other kids will be LFA no matter how hard you work to teach them.

Besides, I've been to a talk by Temple Grandin, and if you know anything about high functioning autism/Asperger Syndrome, you can definitely tell she's on the spectrum. She has odd mannerisms, odd tone of voice, can't handle people clapping, gets distracted by movement in her peripheral vision, gives tangential talks organized by similarity of the pictures on the slides - she doesn't really pass for NT at all. I'm sure if she wasn't a world-famous expert on animal behavior, some parents would be embarrassed to have her as their child.

When I saw her I wouldn't even be able to tell if I didn't know who she was.

My point is the embarrassment is really no worse than NT parents get from NT kids. People always stare at kids doing things.

The type of parental response may vary. For instance my 8yr old daughter was trying on new school shoes today. The shop assistant was trying to converse with her and instead of conversing she became obsessed that her feet had grown and she no longer was size 6. The shop girl smiled at me but I focused on my daughter and told her to answer the shop assistant and not talk about silly things. I reacted out of a desire to make sure she is aware of other people and their questions rather than being embarrassed by her response.

Our family saw Temple at one of her speaking engagements.

On the surface, no she doesn't stand out. At the meet and greet was when it was really noticeable.

Love her. Loved the talk. She does stand out as much has my husband does. My husband likes to think he blends in. Like a polar bear in the desert, Sweetie! Lol....

I think I'd just live and let live. People are entitled to their personal feelings and biases and whatever. The embarrassment is usually mutual anyway. It's not such a horrible feeling that you just have to get rid of. I think many famous, successful people's families are embarrassed of them, too.