Terrified of Halloween

Post Reply New Topic

I posted this in the parent's section, I am also posting it here.

I am an aspie who teaches children on the autistic spectrum.
I have a student who is terrified of Halloween.
She stems at the sight of many directions, and goes into sobbing fits when her teacher reads halloween stories to the rest of the class.

Has anyone here every dealt with such issues successfully in their own lives?
Does anyone have any ideas how to help this child?

All earnest help is appreciated.

personally, i love anything to do with ghosts, witches, vampires etc so i cannot relate to your student's fear. the only thing i can think of that may have triggered the girl's fear is that she must have misinterpretted something that she once heard someone say about halloween. perhaps you could try to get her to talk about it and reassure her that the things that she associates with halloween are not going to hurt her? perhaps you could try to gradually expose her to things that are connected- but not exclusive- to halloween (for example, pictures of black cats) and when she seems less anxious encourage her to familiarise herself with things that are more strongly related to halloween (for example, pumpkin lanterns).

if i were working with this child, i'd get her into a one to one situation with me (or school counsellor, or someone she trusts) and see if i could find out what the problem is first. might be as simple as a response to the whole "witch/evil/spooky" thing.

irishmic, if you could find out more details, i'd be able to help more. any chance of that?

edit: on reflection... make sure you acknowledge her fears as real, even if the cause "isn't" - there may not be monsters under the bed (as it were), but the child's fear of them is real.

My two sons are both diagnosed with autism. The much higher functioning 16 year old loves Halloween.

My much lower functioning (no verbal expression, fairly good verbal comprehension) 11 year old gets all stimmed up this time of year, knocking over decorations and the occasional piece of furniture, hitting and biting mostly himself.

There are two things he does like about Halloween. The first is jack-o-lanterns. He likes playing with toy jack-o-lanterns and, last year, for the first time, helped carve the real one. He also likes going out and getting candy (he discovered the joy of that two years ago), but I'm not sure how closely he associates it with Halloween itself, since he sometimes looks to do it at other times of the year.

waaaaaaah! sorry, litguy - having one of those alzheimer's moments again... i'll edit the post.

Personally, I don't like Halloween. My family stopped doing the traditional door-to-door, handing out candy when I was about 5. Instead, we would all go out for dinner and come back home and watch a movie. (For the first few years, it ended up being either Charlie Brown and Snoopy or Sesame Street...)

Is there going to be a Halloween party at your school? Maybe you could talk to the girl's parents about having her stay home for the day or something. Or maybe she could be in the school office or the library (or some other place) when everyone else is having the party. You could also try and figure out if there is any specific part of Halloween that bothers her.

I love Halloween. ^_^

-SpaceCase

Ever since Middle School I developed similar feelings in regards to April Fool's Day.

First, this student is pretty far down on the scale of autism.
She is non verbal, highly sensitive, etc.

Second, I walked back into the classroom today after spending some time away, and
boy even my poor aspie brain was on sensory overload.

The windows are covered with a dark forest scene, there are cobwebs hanging from the ceiling, and a big black spider hanging from the bullitien board.

My poor brain can't imagine why this student is having difficulties.

Sounds like she needs a safe place in the classroom.
Can the decorations be removed from some place in the room, and a screen set up so she can go there and not have to look at the decorations?
In that place you can have her bring what she likes about this time of year. When I was a fundamentalist christian I would have a harvest party this time of year.
Maybe she can wear headphones and listen to music while the others are listening to the story. I do this when I am walking outside and it cuts down the sensory input a great deal.

Lots of Love Yupa
I agree with you.
I had to watch a cultural awarness film the other day for work.
In it, one actor utters the following

It has taken my son a long time to be able to enjoy Halloween. First he never liked getting in to a costume. Then he was too afraid to go out in it. And he never likes it because he cannot see other peoples faces and he likes to know exactly who he is talking to. Nothing fake for him.

We had to sit down on Halloween day and go through what we thought the whole day was going to be like from what we do when we wake up to which house will be the last one to visit. After we are dressed and ready for the trick-or-treating we sit on the front porch and watch other people walk by for a while until he is ready to go. This year he said he thinks he wants to walk our cul-de-sac by himself because he said no other sixth grader walks around with thier mother. So I told him he can be a few houses ahead of his sister and I.

It has been trial and error all these years to figure out what makes it most comfortable.

Thank you for your wonderful reply Antigone.
Exactly the kind of story that I was looking for.

I hope that this is a great Halloween for you and your family.

I think the headphone suggestion is a great one Namiko.
I actually utilize music myself when I am feeling over stimulated and need to trudge on.

Enya works wonders in helping me relax.