Advocacy training and a lot of practice are what keep me from losing it when talking to therapists, the school nurse, and other personnel who just don't get it.
A couple of years ago I attended the Wrightslaw one-day (6 hours) conference on advocacy and it was one of the best things I have done to help my son at school. If you can't attend in person, they have a DVD with the same presentation for home study.
A couple specific things that help me:
Taking notes (the physical act of writing helps me stay calm), even if it's just a casual conversation and not a meeting. (Plus I can write snarky comments in the margin instead of being tempted to say them out loud). Plus, therapists and other personnel seem to be more careful about how they word things when they see I'm writing it down.
Being familiar with the law (including my rights & DS's rights), state dept of ed policies, district policies, and best practices. And more importantly, knowing where/how to look up the things I don't know or can't remember. You don't have to know everything, you just have to know where to find it. This gives me the confidence to have calm discussions, because when there is a dispute I can always suggest (in a friendly tone), "let's look that up together" or "can you show me that law/policy?".
Gena
DS, age 11 and always amazing
“Autistics are the ultimate square pegs, and the problem with pounding a square peg into a round hole is not that the hammering is hard work. It's that you're destroying the peg." - Paul Collins, Not Even Wrong