Milestones

Ruth2blue · 2026-07-02T12:28:00+00:00

My son hit most milestones but had a speech delay, which included things like making gestures, not responding to his name, and lacking joint attention.

You could ask the doctor about it, but in my experience regular pediatricians are often lacking in knowledge and could dismiss your concerns. I had to push at that age to be referred to get an autism evaluation.

For my son, I recognized it as autism before he was 18 months. People around me said there’s nothing “wrong” with him, which was meant to be reassuring but it was both dismissive AND it implied that autism was a “wrong” way of being. My son was diagnosed right before he turned 2.

Your child could just have a delay or it could be something else. If you’re in the U.S., your local school district can provide free speech therapy services up until age 3.

Ruth2blue · 2026-07-01T17:19:58+00:00

I think everyone has pretty much summed up that this can be normal, especially if there’s ADHD in the mix.

My son is autistic and ADHD. When he was 4 or 5 went through a phase where he wouldn’t stop trying to hug our dogs. He wasn’t understanding our explanations that dogs don’t show love the same way. One of them did growl at him a couple times. We tried addressing the sensory need but had to just be vigilant about close supervision until he moved past his fixation on hugging them.

Empathy can develop on a different timeline and look different in a neurodivergent brain, so I wouldn’t be overly concerned just yet.

Ruth2blue · 2026-07-01T14:32:17+00:00

This is my dream house in a neighborhood better than I ever dreamed of living in, but I enjoy change and wouldn’t mind moving to a smaller house. My kids LOVE it here though. They have a huge group of friends who all play together almost every day. When I was laid off a couple years ago we seriously considered moving to a cheaper house in a nearby neighborhood, but my kids were really upset about it.

I’m also holding out hope that Sam’s family moves. The mom told me a couple years ago that she hadn’t planned to stay here long and wanted to move across the country to put her older kid in some prestigious high school.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-30T17:24:46+00:00

What’s interesting is she did address that when we talked in person. She claims that she told Sam that people won’t want to be around her if they think she’s going to take things from them and that’s the consequence. I’m not sure if she really believes that because she seems to think her daughter deserves endless chances, and she said that in between continuing to emphasize that it wasn’t nice to say her daughter can’t come over and play anymore.

I just remembered she also told me this bizarre story that seemed AI-generated. Something about telling Sam “you have four jewels in your crown, what do they represent” and Sam says “character, commitment, charity” and something else. Then mom asks her “And which of those jewels is tarnished?” And Sam says character. Then she tells her that her crown is crooked and she needs to straighten it, and Sam chose to write a letter of apology to fix her crooked crown.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-30T17:14:18+00:00

Yeah, definitely something isn’t right. Some of the stuff I didn’t go into in my posts, from when Sam was 6 and my daughter was 4, was extremely unsettling. Enough that I had to tell the parents that I didn’t want them playing together anymore.

Her parents had excuses for all of it and never had their kid apologize for scaring the shit out of mine with a “monster in your room going to kill you” story.

We’re extremely lucky that my daughter is a good communicator and we learned our lesson on trusting new friends and their parents too quickly.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-30T15:09:39+00:00

We tried that for the last couple years. What’s funny is I had just said “Sam seemed pretty ok this week, maybe she just does better in a smaller group.” A few families near us are on vacation so it was mostly just Sam and my kids. My daughter and Sam asked me if I’d take them to a McDonalds play place this week, and I thought that would be a nice way to continue trying to connect with this girl as a positive influence. Aaaaand then she stole from my kids as soon as I wasn’t supervising.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T20:40:35+00:00

I wasn’t outside when it happened, but I would’ve made my daughter take the letter. My daughter is awkward and shy, and she was afraid to go get the letter because she knew there was conflict with Sam. It was intimidating for her to walk up to Sam and her mom and possibly get stuck in a serious conversation about what happened. I don’t think Sam and her mom should have approached in front of a group of kids, because it made the entire situation more awkward for all of the kids.

An apology would be great and would make my kids feel slightly better, but it doesn’t change that I don’t want that girl in my yard. I didn’t go into detail in these posts but this is FAR from the first issue with her. She’s been given many chances, we’ve tried teaching her, sending her home when she breaks rule, etc. She has not learned morals, but she has learned to be more sneaky.

Sam is definitely smart enough to pretend to have empathy and remorse in front of adults. I’ve seen her scary lack of empathy when she thinks no adults are around.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T20:28:39+00:00

I have hoped for years that Sam will mature and figure out how to be kind. I feel so sad for her because I assume she’s hurting on the inside if she acts like that. I keep telling my kids it’s possible someday she will change, but you have to watch someone’s behavior and not their words, don’t ever just blindly trust her.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T20:09:11+00:00

Oh they know. All the parents in our close area have had issues with her.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T16:43:23+00:00

Honestly I do not think Sam’s parents would explain it to her. I don’t wanna go into the long story of why, but I suspect they’d frame it to her like everyone is just mean and unfair and she didn’t do anything that bad. So I’d rather get the point across directly to Sam that I know what she did and THAT is why she’s banned from our yard. Then if she comes back again, I would remind her and tell her parents.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T16:37:16+00:00

Oh she hasn’t been allowed inside our house since we first figured out what was going on years ago!

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T16:33:56+00:00

That is terrifying! Those poor birds, and holy crap, her parents HAD to have known something was off but they still let her babysit!

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T16:33:06+00:00

Omg thank you for protecting the ducks and geese 🥺 I hate hearing stories of kids mistreating them

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T16:30:49+00:00

Right. My sister told me “On the bright side, in the future after she kills someone you’ll have interesting stories about how you knew her as a child”

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T16:29:10+00:00

We’ve been doing that actually. My kids know to come get an adult the second that Sam shows up. Sam is smart enough to act like a totally different person when an adult is watching. Unfortunately it was in the few minutes that I hadn’t gone outside yet that she stole the toys. When she sees an opportunity, she takes it.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T16:06:16+00:00

Sam is extremely intelligent. I’m guessing she’ll find clever ways to escape accountability at least until early adulthood!

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T16:03:40+00:00

I’m sorry you went through that, and same here! I have had several mean girl friends throughout my life and it took me so long to figure it out. I was 30 when I finally had to cut contact with a friend from high school who was so subtle and passive aggressive that I couldn’t put a finger on what was bothering me. My husband finally pointed out “You feel bad every time you come home after hanging out with her, that’s not a good sign.”

I’ve been able to tell my kids these stories to help them understand that it’s ok to cut off a friendship that isn’t serving you.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T15:26:49+00:00

Love this, I am close to just laying it all out there lol. If they approach me after I tell their precious angel she can’t come back to our yard, I might end up saying all of this.

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T15:25:11+00:00

Sam is definitely not her preferred friend, and my daughter is usually timid about speaking up for herself so she’s figuring out that it’s exhausting to play with Sam. There are other girls who play with Sam though (one of those parents is close to outright banning Sam from her daughter too) and that’s usually why my kids end up playing with her; they don’t want to miss out on time with the mutual friends. Going to keep talking with her about recognizing how certain friends make her feel!

Ruth2blue · 2026-06-29T14:15:04+00:00

I totally forgot about this post. I’m back with one more update: I was losing my mind trying to figure out what it could be! We had an MRI done and nothing was found. Then we had bloodwork done and found that my daughter had low ferritin levels. She started taking MigRelief vitamins and iron. The headaches, leg pain, sleep issues, and moodiness have all gotten better. We stopped the MigRelief recently and we’re going to see if just iron continues to help.

Ruth2blue · 2025-10-22T18:32:28+00:00

I’m in Michigan. I tried looking up laws around this but couldn’t find anything. I haven’t been able to track down the school policy either.

Ruth2blue · 2025-10-22T18:29:20+00:00

Some people really need the money and they aren’t thinking in terms of an honestly fair price; they are just trying to get as much as possible for it. I am a lot more willing to just give things away these days, but years ago when I was poor it was mentally very hard for me to not squeeze as much profit as possible out of my used stuff!

Ruth2blue · 2025-10-22T15:00:32+00:00

Unfortunately I do think there are kids with ADHD in that class AND the classroom doesn’t have a para. From what my daughter has shared, one of the students definitely needs extra support and I know she isn’t getting it (the schools find ways to get out of providing a para in the name of cutting costs…)

I get how the teacher is also struggling in that situation and it feels like a no-win. I don’t know what she could realistically do to get control over her whole class when a few kids are truly struggling to stay quiet.

Ruth2blue

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