How to Maintain a Friendship with an Autism Mom

“You’ll lose, friends” another autism mom told me soon after my daughter’s diagnosis.   She was right.  One of the biggest casualties when autism becomes part of family life is friendships.  Every autism mom I know has lost at least one friendship related to her son/daughter’s condition.  A lot of these friendship are not lost with animosity.   It’s just that friendships are based on commonalities and when the central focus of your life changes, so do the people around you.  Still, I like to believe that there are things everyone can do to maintain these friendships and we’d all be better off for it.

It’s hard to maintain a friendship with an autism mom for the same reason it’s hard to write this piece.  Every autism mom is different so it’s hard to know what to say.  While one mom may be pleased and flattered to hear you say that God chose her to take care of such a special child, another mom may find such a statement annoying.  I belong to the latter group.  So I’ve tried to outline a few things that I believe the majority of autism mom’s may find helpful in maintaining a friendship.
 

#1.  Listen – This is not as easy as it sounds but it is by far the most important thing you can do for a friend.  For reasons that I don’t completely understand, many friends and family members are uncomfortable with the topic of autism and would rather pretend it’s not there.  They quickly change the topic and the message is clear “I’m not interested.”  Maybe it’s awkward because people don’t know what to say, but the truth is you don’t have to say very much.   You don’t have to know much about autism.  You don’t have to offer advice.  And quite honestly, we probably aren’t interested in the brother-in-law’s sister’s nephew who has autism.  Just listen.  We love that!  Hopefully your friend will understand that you don’t want to listen to autism anecdotes all the time.  It’s up to both parties to make sure there is a good balance in their conversations. But please remember: We want to talk about it.  Please give us that chance.
 

#2 Keep the advice practical.  You don’t need to give advice, but if you do “You should get out more.”  Is not advice that any autism mom is going to find useful.  Difficulty finding specially trained babysitters and the money they require are huge issues.   If you don’t have solutions for those problems telling autism parents “You should get out more,” is just going to make them feel worse.  If you know of a church that does a ‘special needs date night’ that is helpful.  If you know of a recreation program for special needs kids, that’s helpful.  If you know of someone who can help, give us that number.  You could also volunteer yourself, but don’t volunteer if you don’t intend to follow through.   Blowing off the offer when you are later asked about it leaves us feeling abandoned.
 

#3.  Know that raising a child with autism is different from raising a typical kid.  Sometimes you will look at us and think “Why doesn’t she just  do X?”  The truth is we’ve probably tried, and X doesn’t work.  We have to approach things differently sometimes.  From your perspective it may not makes sense.  Just know that it’s very different when you live it and try not to judge.
 

#4 Know when to keep your opinion to yourself.   If you don’t believe in state health insurance mandates and your friend is fighting to get autism coverage in the state, keep that to yourself.  If you’re against voucher programs and your friend is pushing to get special needs scholarships in place, keep that to yourself.  You think that integrating special needs kids takes precious classroom time and teacher attention away from your kids, don’t complain to a special needs mom about it.   If you want to keep your friendship, stay quiet.  What may be ideological to you will sound like “I don’t give a rat’s ass about your kid’s education/well-being” to the mother of a child with autism.   Maybe if you stay quiet and follow #1 your perspective will change.
 

#5 Don’t interrupt everything we have to say about our kids by telling us about the autistic person that you know of.  So often I find I learn way too much about a brother-in-law’s sister’s nephew. Where he goes to school, what Bibile study he attends, how many siblings he has, what his favorite recreational activities are, how many times he’s moved and what food allergies he has.  The person telling me this usually shows no interest in knowing more about my kid but she expects me to have an intense interest in this autistic person that I am unlikely to ever meet.   You wouldn’t like it if we always interrupted what you had to say about your kids with stories of neuro-typical kids that we know of.   Show us the same respect.   This includes the stories about the successful person with autism that you saw on TV.  Yes, these stories are inspiring.  But we’ve probably already heard of them and they are probably nothing like our kids in spite of the autism label.
 

#5 Talk about something other than kids and family life.  We are often so entrenched in our family lives that we’d love a conversation that provides a mental holiday.  This is a time that you can have philosophical disagreements and still feel like we had an interesting conversation with a good friend.
 

#6  Give your friend options. Understand that it may be more difficult for an autism mom to find a way to get out with you, but don’t stop asking her.  Offer a rain check or alternative dates.   When it comes to family events most of us know when the circumstances will be inappropriate for our children, but we still appreciate the invitation.  Give us the opportunity and allow us to bow out gracefully.
 

In spite of all this, the friendship may fall apart.  It takes two to tango and autism moms have to hold up their end of the friendship if it’s going to work.  Sometimes they don’t.  Sometimes a friendship has run its course and people move in different directions.  That’s okay. But sometimes a little understanding and a few simple rules will help keep the friendship going and a good friend is something that most autism moms really treasure.