{"id":1616,"date":"2011-12-05T20:09:51","date_gmt":"2011-12-06T01:09:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.yuriar.com\/wp\/?p=1616"},"modified":"2011-12-05T20:09:51","modified_gmt":"2011-12-06T01:09:51","slug":"surviving-the-holidays-with-aspieautie-kids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/2011\/12\/05\/surviving-the-holidays-with-aspieautie-kids\/","title":{"rendered":"Surviving the Holidays with Aspie\/Autie kids"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today I’m a guest on the Children’s Express BlogTalk Radio<\/a> show.\u00a0 Below is my notes for the show:<\/p>\n

________________<\/p>\n

I found this — http:\/\/psychcentral.com\/lib\/2007\/special-occasions-and-special-needs-kids\/<\/a> — Good article, lots of good ideas.<\/p>\n

Mainly \u2013 in our house \u2013 we take the entire holiday season \u2013 Thanksgiving through til just after New Years \u2013 off from homeschool\u2026. Mostly because it\u2019s such a stress-filled time for me.\u00a0 We fill the time with games, crafts, and Christmas movies and just relax.<\/p>\n

As far as tips::<\/p>\n

#1 — Trust your instincts. \u00a0You know your kid.\u00a0 We all have someone related to us who thinks this whole autism thing is a bunch of hooey, and they know just how to fix ur kid.\u00a0 Ignore it.<\/p>\n

#2 \u2013 be ready for the meltdown.\u00a0 The noise, the people, the lights, the music, the smells, maybe even the unfamiliar surroundings\u2026.\u00a0 It\u2019s too much. At some point, your kid will go on overload.\u00a0 Watch for the signals.\u00a0 Have a plan in place.\u00a0 Find a quiet room, or even walk outside, or go for a drive\u2026\u00a0 have the familiar comfort items nearby.\u00a0 It maybe a good idea to get a hotel room, instead of staying with relatives in an already crowded house \u2013 just so you and your child will have a quiet, clean, clutter-free place to retreat to when things & people get too overwhelming.<\/p>\n

#3 \u2013 if you are traveling a long way, have a small gift \u2013 like a book or toy \u2013 ready, and give it to your kids around the halfway point.\u00a0 It will help keep them occupied, and keep you sane.<\/p>\n

#4 \u2013 if you are flying, don\u2019t forget to pack the Dramamine or Tylenol.\u00a0 I found that one out the hard way.<\/p>\n

#5 \u2013 always do your best to prepare your kiddo\u2019s for what\u2019s coming.\u00a0 Let them know ahead of time the when, where, and how of the up coming visit.<\/p>\n

#6 — If you have a Cheek-pincher in the family, prepare the kids for that.\u00a0 But be ready to intervene when your kid meets the Cheek-pinchers.\u00a0 Be up front with MeeMaw, and tell her not to touch your kid\u2019s face\/hug\/etc, that he doesn\u2019t like it.<\/p>\n

#7 \u2013 Celebrate the holidays at your own pace, in your own time.\u00a0 One year at a FLY Fest (a Flylady convention) Kelly, Flylady\u2019s right hand woman said, \u201cIts not about that one day. Celebrate with your family whenever you get the chance.\u201d That stuck with me.\u00a0 We\u2019ve had times in the past when we lived closer to extended family and were expected to be there for holidays.\u00a0 So we held our own holiday on a different day, IE: Christmas.\u00a0 With all the gift-opening & new things\u2026\u00a0 it was too overwhelming to have the kids rush through our tree, leave all their new goodies to go do it all over again at Gramma\u2019s house.\u00a0 So we began treating Christmas Eve as \u201cChristmas\u201d in our house, with the opening gifts, and the big dinner, and the fun.\u00a0 Then we went to Gramma\u2019s house Christmas day.\u00a0 Result = less meltdowns due to overstimulation.<\/p>\n

#8 \u2013 Don\u2019t rush your kid through \u201cPresent time!\u201d\u00a0 —\u00a0 this took us years to understand.\u00a0 Let them open a gift. If they want to take it out of whatever packaging and play for a while before opening the next one\u2026 let them.\u00a0 Give them time to process things and enjoy the gifts and the day.\u00a0 There is no hard and fast rule that all gifts must be open by a certain time.\u00a0 Don\u2019t push.<\/p>\n

#9 \u2013 Try to remove as much of the pesky packaging as possible before wrapping the gifts\u2026\u00a0 and have wire cutters & scissors on hand Christmas morning.\u00a0 This will save you a world of time trying to untwist all those wires holding the toys to the box, and the tape and whatnot holding items & tags to the gifts.\u00a0 Remember \u2013 the key is to make this as stress-LESS as possible for YOU and your child.\u00a0 The faster you can get those toys\/goodies out, the better.<\/p>\n

#10 \u2013 In our house, we leave the stockings at the foot of our sleeping children\u2019s beds.\u00a0 They are free to wake up and rip into their stockings (usually filled with some trinkets, candy, scotch tape, etc.) and play whenever they like.\u00a0 But they aren\u2019t allowed out or to wake up mom and dad before 7am.\u00a0 The stockings give the excited kids something to do with that pent up excitement, and the 7am rule allows mom and dad to get some sleep after a late night of last minute wrapping.<\/p>\n

#11 \u2013 I got this idea from Dana Loesch, back when she used to have a mom-blog called Mamalogues. We give each of our kids 3 gifts.\u00a0 Because that\u2019s what Jesus got, & if it\u2019s good enough for Jesus, it\u2019s good enough for my kid.\u00a0 J\u00a0 Combined with each kid giving the other\u2019s a gift, that\u2019s 5 gifts for each of them\u2026\u00a0 throw in whatever Gramma and the rest of the extended family give them\u2026 and it\u2019s a decent Christmas without being over the top.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That\u2019s pretty much it.\u00a0 Remember, h8rs gonna h8. Don\u2019t worry about the negativity of others.\u00a0 And above all —- Trust your instincts!!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today I’m a guest on the Children’s Express BlogTalk Radio show.\u00a0 Below is my notes for the show: ________________ I found this — http:\/\/psychcentral.com\/lib\/2007\/special-occasions-and-special-needs-kids\/ — Good article, lots of good …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ass-burgers-rainbows","category-family_life"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1616","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1616"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1616\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yuriar.com\/katp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}