Helping Your Child Find Their People: A Parent’s Guide

Helping Your Child Find Their People: A Parent’s Guide to Friendship & Connection for Autistic Children

Your child deserves friendships that fit who they are. This 68-page guide gives you practical, neurodiversity-affirming tools to help your autistic child build connection in their own way, without pressure to mask or act like other children.

It is written for parents of children ages 2 to 18 and covers every kind of communicator, including children who use few or no spoken words.

What’s inside:

• How autistic children connect, and the double empathy problem explained

• Friendship by age, with ideas for children with different support needs

• Where to find friends, neurodivergent groups and how to start your own

• Planning playdates, parties and sensory-friendly outings

• Social stories, visual support cards and “All about me” worksheets

• Levels of closeness, sarcasm and idioms, and clear friendship and crush rules for teens

• Working with school and choosing affirming supports

• Challenging behavior, meltdowns, rejection and bullying

• Safety with friends, online, with their body and in the community

• Care for you, the parent

• Scripts, a summary of the main steps and a glossary of key words

  
  

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