My son going on his first sleepover camp!

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Im excited and nervous but I think he will do great and is excited about it. He will be go next week for two days and one night with his therapy center. He is 9 and has Asperger's, they wanted my daughter to go to but when we told her she had to sleep without Mommy and Daddy she flat out refused. She is only 6 and has classic autism (they have kids who are more severely affected than her go but they are older) so we decided maybe to try with her next year.
My son says as long as he can take his dolphin blanket and his therapist finally talked him into only taking three of his stuffed animals (he wanted about ten of them ) than he will go. So this is very exciting for us as he used to never want to leave the house.
He LOVES his new school he is comfortable and happy to go every morning. My husband talked to the principal of my sons school this morning and he commented to my husband how happy Luc is lately and my husband said, "Yes and you will probably get my daughter next year too"
Maddy is not as happy at her school but one of her therapists is going to start coming every Friday afternoon from now on so that will help a lot. She has therapy on Tuesday afternoon and on Wednesday morning so now she will have her therapist with her on Fridays as well.....hopefully the clueless teacher and her equally clueless aide will learn something....I hope.
I know, Im being mean but this is my baby and as I posted earlier her aide has made up tons of excuses for going for training in how to take care of autistic children. Also I didnt post this part in my last post about Maddy having issues at school but I noticed how cold and stark white her classroom is....there is hardly anything on the walls and the desks are all lined up like some sort of institution. Its no wonder she is so stressed out!
Anyway, has anyone else had their child go to an overnight camp and did it go well? I think Luc will do well as he feels very comfortable with his therapists and the other kids. I will probably worry but Im acting excited about it for him, I dont want anything to change his mind. He gets to ride horses and fun things like that, he loves animals. I remember when I was a kid and I saw the parent trap and I wanted to go to camp so bad but my parents would never send me. Ive actually never sent any of my kids to an overnight camp (I know its just one night but still!) because they always cost so much money and I never lived in a place where they did camp in girl scouts although I had my older daughter in brownies and girl scouts....I did that too but we never went camping . Oh well I think I might survive the trauma of never going to camp .

Good! It sounds like it should go well, since he's with his therapy center. I remember having very mixed experiences with overnight trips; if it was something like a friend's house, with people I was familiar with, there was no problem. I would have a blast. But I remember Boy Scout camp (the one blight on what was otherwise a very enjoyable experience with that organization) being hell for me. I didn't know where things were or how far away, so I couldn't time when to leave or tell when I was getting close. Landmarks would sometimes change or look different from another angle so I wouldn't know where I was. And the activities after the day was done were always social, so I never could get the down time I needed.

I'm guessing that the people your son will be with are much better-equipped to handle autism than my troop leaders were; I hope he has a great time!

Reminds me of bad times. I hope it goes well for him. I'm sure it will if you believe he'll be taken care of.

Congrats on the camp, to you and to your son! I hope it goes well.

I'm an aspie and never went to camp, but then I never did anything as a child. My kids never went either, but that's because it's so expensive and only one child ever had any interest in any Scouting and that was very short lived. (They are NT's) If it's his first time away from you all and familiar people, he may be a little upset that night, but this camp sounds like it knows how to handle that, and it's perfectly natural for him to get upset at night somewhat. They will know how to distract him and how to help accomodate him. If you have any kind of a special bedtime ritual, maybe you could tape it and send something like a walkman or something with him with your voice on it to play to comfort him if he needs it. -- yes I'm fully aware that walkmen are no longer used, but whatever they use nowdays, I imagine you could put it on an ipod or something but I'm so far behind technologically I'll never catch up, I'm still reeling at the loss of the 8 track --

Try and take a partial break while he's gone. Only one child there to take care of instead of two. See if you can't get in some time for yourself, even if it's only an hour. Use some of the time that you would spend with him, to spend with your daughter of course, but also don't feel bad about using some on yourself. And don't spend the entire time worrying! But don't beat yourself up if you do worry a lot. The first time any of mine spent the night away from family, I worried most of the time, and everything was OK. Remember, if there is a problem, they will call you. Try to plan something special for you, even if it's only an hour. It's important to remember that Mom's need time too!

As for your daughters classroom, it sounds absolutely perfect for me! I would love that! But, we all have our own tastes.

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I'm giving it another shot. We will see.
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The link to the forum is http://www.rightplanet.proboards.com

Thank you for all your responses. I am also an Aspie but I wanted to be away from my house, I was a little nomad. I slept at home most of the time and sometimes would sort of be adopted at other peoples houses. When I was at home I did not participate in home life too much, its the reason I loved summer so much because I was free. I HATED school, it was like prison to me. I loved my Mom and was close to her but I was not really cuddly. She always thought I wanted physical attention because I hung on her arm or purse when we were out shopping but when I was a kid the isles and the lights in shopping centers made me dizzy.
My daughter has classic autism and she is accustomed to therapy based school....she thrived in the autism school the had her in when we were in the US and home therapy. She is very lost in the public school and is unsure of the rules, ect. Her therapy center has been trying to help by giving her a schedule but the aide will say that she doesnt want to use it, which is nonsense. She just doesnt understand Maddy or how to care for an autistic child. Maddy loves color and music and quiet. Those kids scream and yell on the playground so loud I can hear them from my house....its why she has earphones. She is a stressed out little doody when she comes home....she spends hours stimming, either running up and down the halls flapping and verbal stimming or spinning. She is agitated and cries about things like, the tip of her banana broke.

Anyway, I will try to keep my stress in check....I keep telling myself it is only one night and he will be with his therapists and his friends from therapy so he will be ok and have fun! Maddy goes to therapy on Tuesday so I will even have a few hours alone, awesome! We also have been holding out on watching our favorite Christmas movies so we can do that. I suppose Maddy will want to watch My LIttle Pony Minty Christmas again, oh well Ill survive that too !