I'm 13 and have a question about Autism

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Yep....cows can be stubborn that way

Is he happy today, or did he get frustrated?

He was happy, then. He was also very secure. An autistic person has to really feel secure in order to just fall asleep without a big ritual around it.

A free-range person is the opposite of a helicopter person.

A free-range person allows the kid to wander around at will. They don't have to call the free-range parent to tell them where they are.

Most kids who grew up before the 1970s were "free-range kids." I used to go out to play from about 9 AM, straight until dark. I didn't have to call my parents or anything. Of course, I couldn't LOL--no cell phones, and I usually didn't have a dime to use a pay phone. I was a kid in the 1960s and 1970s.

I agree with krafite. If he seems like he's getting too overloaded take him somewhere else to cool his jets. He likely was taking everything in at once. It can be difficult maintaining a balance between being accommodating and being over protective. It might have been too much and wore him out, but that's no necessarily a bad thing. That old horse sounds like the perfect therapy animal. Really it sounds like everything went well.

I think the old horse, (what is the horse's name?) is perfect. It reminds me of the book The Horse Boy. You should read that book and your parents should too. I think he had a great day and it's very good that he went right to sleep. I think it's very healthy to get kids doing productive things that tucker them out so that they sleep well.

It will be obvious if he gets overwhelmed. If he does he might have a meltdown or a shutdown where he just kind of goes zombie on you. If he does, just take him to a quiet darker place and let him rest. He is learning his limitations and what he can do. I think the ranch is the best place for him. If he asks to do things, let him do them. And horse riding is incredible therapy for Autistic people. The rocking of the hips really activates parts of the brain and it really helps us with all of our issues. You should also let him be on the horse bareback as well and let him lay on the horse for full contact with the horse's body. This is fantastic therapy also. Horses have an incredible energy that really resonates with Autistic people. I think he had a great day. He might become an excellent horseman as he gets older.

My dad has always walked a tightrope between being protective and being rough and tumble. usually the rough and tumble goes well, other times it doesn't. There are times I can go out of wack through no fault of his.

I should add since it is more of a sibling thing that my cousin does all sorts of things you're not supposed to do with me. But we are the same age and have been raised together, so there's stuff he intuitively understands about me that no one else does. That's something you got cheated on so to speak. You have the knack and the right stuff, but you haven't had JD's lifetime to get the kind of intuition you would have if this had started when he was a baby and you were 6 or 7 years old.