I went to the IEP meeting at S8's school today, burning up yet more of my dwindling vacation hours (gee, thanks, exW.) The meeting went extremely well, and I really like S8's teachers and staff, especially this year. I had been warned by others with Autism Spectrum kids that third grade is often a very difficult transition for these kids -- I am very thrilled and relieved that S8 seems to be handling things well. Compared to last year, S8 is doing fantastic.
During this meeting I sat with S8's primary teacher, his CCR teacher, the school's assistant principal, and my exW. The problem arose because everyone seemed to defer to exW by default. Most glaring to me was that the CCR teacher seemed to address everything to exW and not me. I was sitting front and center, with exW next to me on my right, and yet the CCR teacher, who was doing most of the talking, was always facing exW and making eye contact with her. Only once in a long while would she cast a brief glance towards me.
It was very disconcerting. I tried to engage and make eye contact with everyone present, and still they focused on xW. I was thinking to myself, "Hey, I'm right here! I am S8's parent too! I'm not here as window-dressing or to be a fifth-wheel. I need to be just as involved as his mother."
And then when it came time to sign the paperwork, the CCR teacher gave the forms to exW first and allowed her to sign in the blanks labeled "parent" -- I had to squeeze my own signature in around the other lines. It's like I was just an afterthought.
I've searched my thoughts and feelings on this, trying to be realistic and asking if I am being just a bit too sensitive. I think partly so -- but I know I feel slighted just the same. This was nothing personal, I know, but it reflected an insensitivity where male parents are concerned. The automatic assumption is that the father is just along for the ride, and less concerned about the details or the decisions regarding their children. A definite gender bias.
I can't say that I blame them personally for this unfortunate tendency to focus on the mother of a child to the exclusion of the father -- as when ex and I were together I did indeed delegate a lot of decision-making to my children's mother. And how would they know our situation is any different from so many other "normal" households.
I am thinking that this attitude only discourages father participation in their childen's education (that's how I felt, certainly.) And the resulting lack of participation by these fathers only feeds into this biased attitude about them. Thus it only helps perpetuate a vicious circle.
In all honesty, it also grates on me that exW just ate this special attention up, particularly because it came at my own expense.
But in all humility I have to get over this and move on. I'll nurse my wounded pride and my injured sense of fairness. I just wish people would realize that their biases, innocent as they might seem, can still cause harm.
