AITA for scolding my son for using his disability as an excuse and telling him pick up his plate?

An 8-year-old boy with mild cerebral palsy has recently started refusing to do chores, saying things like “I’m disabled” or worse, calling himself a slur. His father, frustrated by this behavior, scolded him after he refused to pick up his plate, telling him to stop using his disability as an excuse.

The boy became upset, and his mother comforted him, believing the father was too harsh. Now the father wonders if he overreacted or if he was justified. Read the original story below…

‘ AITA for scolding my son for using his disability as an excuse and telling him pick up his plate?’

My son (he’s 8) has cerebral palsy. One thing we taught him is never to look down on himself. While we recognize he has limitations, and we make accommodations for him, we make sure he knows he’s not defined by his disability and that his disability doesn’t make him lesser than anyone else.

As he grows older, we try to teach him to be more independent, as much as someone his age should be. He is 8 years old now. He’s a smart kid and usually gets the highest grades in his class. He is liked by all his teachers and classmates and has more friends than I ever had. I’m so proud of him. He is well-behaved both at home and at school.

But lately, he has started acting strange. I think it all started around 1.5 weeks ago. He started avoiding all his responsibilities. He used to make his own bed with our help, but now he’s refusing to do so. He stopped picking up his plates after dinner and started leaving his stuff around.

I’m afraid he might also stop doing his homework because for the last two nights, he didn’t want to do it.Whenever I confront him, he straight up says, “I can’t, I’m disabled, I have Cerebral Palsy.” One time he even said, “I can’t, I’m an R-word,” and laughed. I was shocked. I told him not to use that word.

I asked him if anyone told him that, and he said no. I told my wife, and we contacted his teachers, but he hasn’t told them anything either and he’s behaving well in school.
Last night, he didn’t pick up his plate after dinner again. I sat him down and told him to pick up his plate, and he screamed at me. He then again said he can’t because he’s disabled and useless.

My wife immediately started to comfort him with “no, you are not.” I was frustrated with him acting out. This time, I decided to be more direct and strict. I scolded him, saying that he’s only useless if he acts like he is. Then I said, “Now stop using your disability as an excuse and pick up your plate.”

His eyes teared up, and my wife took him to his room. She thinks I’m an AH for scolding him and raising my voice at him. I didn’t even notice I raised my voice, but that’s what she says. AITA? I should add that he has a rather mild case of Cerebral Palsy. He’s not wheelchair-bound, though he needs crutches.

See what others had to share with OP:

CarCrashRhetoric −  YTA. He’s 8. He didn’t come up with all of that by himself. Who is telling him that he’s the R word? Who is telling him that he can’t do anything because he has a disability? Instead of getting frustrated and telling him something he will hear from other people his whole life (that he’s “using his disability as an excuse”), you should track down where it’s even coming from.

It’s a new behavior. Has he started spending time with a grandparent? Does he have a new teacher or aid? Talked about new friend at school? Started watching a new streamer?

babjbhba −  YTA for not investigating this further sincerely a sister of a kid with a muscle disability similar to your child’s. Someone is telling your kid this stuff. Also pretty sure somedays they have more spoons then others to handle things he has less spoons then you and you have to understand that

Unicorn-Teatime −  Yta, I have cerebral palsy and grew up with a parent who refused to take I can’t do that because of my disability seriously. His lack of care caused my disability to get worse and left me with life long pain. He’s 8 and coming to terms with the fact he’s never going to be like the other kids and it’s hard.

Also someone is feeding him this language and I wonder where he’s getting it from

econhistoryrules −  I’m going to go against the grain here and say NTA. Let me explain. My brother has cerebral palsy. But the bigger problem in his life ended up being failure to launch because no one ever felt they could hold him accountable.

Like your son, at one time, he was the smartest in his class, but very quickly he figured out the loophole that he could get away with a lot because of other people’s low expectations. You and your wife need to be a united front on this and continue to hold him to high standards.

That said, you should also find out why the sudden change in behavior (but, honestly, sometimes kids just get ideas).You don’t want your son to end up like my brother, 39 and living at home, when he really could have had a career and independence. All those people who let my brother off the hook again and again and again ultimately had neither responsibility for his wellbeing nor respect for his fundamental dignity.

Madrugada2010 −  Wow, you tried nothing and now you’re all out of ideas? YTA. It’s obvious that he picked this up from somewhere. Stop pretending to be so clueless.

praeteria −  Ok read your post and try to imagine it’s not you or your son but someone else.. Dude. The kid is 8 and is saying he’s a r*tard and useless. Do you think he came up with that by himself?

He’s either tumbled into an algorithm online that is showing him video’s about disabled people being useless or memed on or he’s being bullied at school. Instead of scolding him, try actual parenting and find out where this behaviour comes from. The.. Kid.. Is. Eight.

rayn_walker −  Yeah. Yta. I have chronic pain and some times I can do things and some times I can not. And some days I see everyone else in my family having to do things for me and I feel like a l**er and get down on myself for not pushing thru more. I will never not have pain. I will never recover.

I will be on meds and receive injections forever to manage my problems that I didn’t cause, and I have no control over. Your child is 8!!! That’s it. Just 8. He gets to have days where the disability wins and he struggles and it messes with his mental health. That’s normal. No one is going to not have bad times with a chronic condition.

Your yelling just proved to him that he does s**k, and the negativity in his head just won. You need to cut him some slack, because YOU don’t know what it’s like because YOU don’t have CP. Being a parent of a child with disease does not mean you know what he is going thru. The other kids are doing things he can’t.

And no matter how much you tell him to not look down on himself, he is still going to have times when he does. That is normal. In fact if he didn’t have bad times before, then he prob just didn’t trust you enough to talk to you about them and didn’t think you would understand.

So if he hasn’t had any depressed times, he is holding it in and hiding it from you and that’s NOT normal. Some thing is clearly going on. And you are escalating drama and shame rather than advocating for him, even to himself. Bad weeks are normal. You have bad weeks. Stop expecting him to be a mature adult.

He is a child and is still learning on how much he can’t do and is missing out on. You can’t roll with every punch. Be on his side. He needs you to help him find modifications to get thru life and be successful. He doesn’t need you to be the pressure b**ly. He will find enough of those on his own.

dell828 −  You’re not reading between the lines. Somebody has made him feel that he’s useless and he should just give up. Disciplining this out of him it’s not gonna work.

True-Cap-1592 −  YTA. You need to figure out why he is calling himself these things. Is there someone at school or in the extended family who is telling him that he’s useless? Is he watching videos on the internet that call people with cerebral palsy R-word? This is a legitimate problem.

Was the father too strict, or did he handle it appropriately? What do you think? Share your thoughts below!