Christmas - Survival Tips Needed.

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The festive season is the worst time of year for my 3yo HFA/AS daughter and I'm looking for suggestions to help her.

I'm prepared to avoid the shops at all costs, most of our Christmas gift shopping is already done, we already get all our groceries delivered online.

I've got a social story about putting up the tree and taking it down again.

From about mid October last year and the year before she would simple meltdown if we left the house.

Would I be out of line asking her PreSchool not to play Christmas Carols, they send her around the bend (and to be honest I can't blame her).

Being in Australia it starts to get rather warm here around November and I wonder if the heat plays a part in it.

Perhaps sensory water play to keep her cool.

well if she melts down in school, they'll have quite a bit of problems. It wouldn't be out of line to explain the sitaution, but it would be out of line to expect them to avoid all christmassy signs/decoratiions/songs as you have to consider that everyone else will expect them to have it

Depending on the teachers educational background, this knowledge may even result in such things being introduced in more of a safeway that limits meltdowns while at the same time increasing her ability to deal with such things


If this preschool is just for socialization and not something you use as a babysitting service than perhaps work out a deal where you keep her out of school on certain days or pick her up early and they use those days for playing christmas songs

Last edited by Triangular_Trees on 13 Sep 2008, 8:30 am, edited 1 time in total.

Will she meltdown if you start talking about it now I have already started bringing up Christmas to our daughter almost 3 I have to prep her for months before a new event like that takes place. We too avoid malls stores etc.. its just to much for her.

I have to say I am jealous you can get your groceries delivered!!

I don't think it is realistic to have preschool take down decorations or anything but avoiding songs or having her removed from the class during songs I can totally understand my daughter freaks at certain songs to where there is no recovery for hours.

If it is at all possible find out from the teacher when the trigger events will be happening and just don't take her that day.If you work, is there someone else that can care for her? Can you take a day or two off work? She's 3 and she'll recover from missing a few days of preschool. Why cause a meltdown when you know it can be prevented?

When my son was in public school (we now homeschool) we figured out that a very upsetting day was our Halloween holiday. Kids would dress up in costumes but some were gruesome and scary - they haunted my poor son's mind for weeks after. So I just didn't make him go the day they had the costume party and he didn't miss it at all and we also avoid looking at the scary, costumes in the store.

Good Luck

The best thing I've done about Christmas was to just not have it anymore. I was excluded from putting up the decorations when I was living with my mum. One day no decorations, return from school, decorations all up... The place looks so different, when I get used to them it's time to remove them... and the process starts all over again. If you aren't Christian you don't need to do Christmas, and I am not Christian. It's the best move I've made since moving out

G'day leechbabe,

Being a Melbournian as well I understand where you are coming from. When J was young - I didn't shop until there was someone to look after him - Safeway/Coles were his nemesis - especially with the constant Christmas carols playing - but then they drove me nuts too!

J also doesn't so the heat well - even last summer (when he turned 13) his behaviour was palpably different as the mercury approached 40C.

I would wonder if the pre-school/creche is playing Christmas carols really loud? J went to a creche that had an owner who learned that ALL the kids got hyped out when they turned the volume up. Or is it just the songs themselves?

Good luck - it sounds like you are doing a great job learning what works for your daughter.

Cheers

I wonder if the best way to approach it at three is to pick and choose what will be a part of Christmas for you at home and start to introduce those things now,a little at a time. rather than having everything appear at once.

e.g make some decorations together.. put them on a tiny tree, take the tree down .. put it up again another day .. decorate .. take it down again etc.. so that it becomes familiar. read stories about Christmas trees etc..

Limit the number of differences in the house and do not surprise. Sitting on Santa's knee is too much for many children ASD or not. Put pictures on the outside of her gifts of what is inside. ( no surprises ) Involve her in wrapping some pretend presents and unwrapping them etc..

Introduce some of the Christmas foods one at a time in the course of an ordinary meal.. etc..

After all .. Christmas is a time to show love and compassion .. consider her needs at this point so that she has plenty of preparation time for Christmas - and consider your back up plan for the day if things turn to custard.

My son has one friend over for his birthday and a birthday cake .. because that is what he likes .. it's HIS birthday after all .. not mine. Consider what she can cope with at Christmas and introduce it gently.

As for the carols.. maybe she would like to have some at home on a children's CD player that she can turn off and on .. sometimes for little ones it is about familiarity and control .. so if she can turn them off and on herself .. she may not object so much. It might also help her become familiar with the songs. failing that.. just ask the preschool to have some alternative activity for your daughter when they do Christmas carols.

Creating a tuned down and positive experience for Christmas the first time around - may make subsequent Christmas's easier to cope with , particularly if there are no negative connotations associated with it

I think my parents got into the drink early in the day, I don't think that would be very helpful for you.

My autie son loves Christmas! I start preparing him for Christmas a long time ahead & tell him exactly what date we'll be putting up the tree & what date we'll be taking it down. I let him choose what decorations we put on the tree. D especially finds the tree lights fascinating.

D does get stressed when we do any kind of shopping. I always try to do as detailed a social story as possible, including lunch/drink breaks & treats. I have downloaded the logos of the shops we most frequently shop at & have turned them into PECS type pictures. He then knows exactly what shops we're going to & last Christmas I also showed him a gift list of what we were shopping for. He ended up enjoying the trip because he knew exactly what we were shopping for, for whom & where. It actually helped us get our shopping done quicker too because we were able to focus!

The Christmas carols are hard to avoid. And The Danes love an excuse to sing at any time of the year! I think most people are fed up with hearing carols long before Christmas actually arrives. I've told my son that they're just part of Christmas & we all need to just try to not hear them if they're bugging us.

Could you perhaps have her use the iPod when you go out so she cannot hear the carols?

Or earplugs could be a good idea.

Failing that...blindfold and earplugs so as to sensory deprive her when going out. It may sound cruel, but so is exposing a sensitive to sensory overload.

As for the christmas stuff...I say have your child stay home and just slowly get them used to the idea of Christmas.

One big thing is not to place too much import on it. When I was young, I stayed up all night waiting.

And this may sound cruel but you may want to exclude mention of Santa. How would you react to being told an old man uses magic to enter your house while you sleep?

And don't put too much emphasis on the gifts. They could become focused on them.

I often dealt with Christmas by just standing back.

As for the heat...why not instruct the kindergarten teachers to have some cool water and a face-cloth/ towel on hand to wet down and to cool Heidi down? Have her sit in the dark and wrap a cool towel around herself could cool her down rapidly.

And yeah, it does get hot here in November.

For christmas carols...you'd probably be vetoed so the others could enjoy. The iPod could really help there, assuming she knows how to work it. Which isn't that difficult. Turn it on before she goes and just instruct her on what buttons to press.

Regards
GM

I think it would be crueler to not mention him - she is going to find out from the other kids, and thinking her parents don't even know about this man who will be crawling into their house could be quite scary.

It could be good to work out with her that santa claus is just pretend, or something like. When my brother asked for the definate truth about santa claus in kindergarten he was told that santa only visited children who believed in him. Children who didn't believe in him had their presents bought, wrapped and delivered by their parents

Thank you everyone lots of great stuff there. My brain is still fuzzy from lack of sleep due to our recent hospital stay. I'm going to print this thread out and work my way through the suggestions.

Quick notes - we don't do Santa or snow, neither fit into our Christmas mythology, not sure if mythology is the right word? Anyways my girls get told 'Santa is just pretend'.

I don't want them growing up to accuse me of lying to them all their lives about Santa.

The Easter Bunny is also pretend and anyway Bunnies are evil and should all be dead so we really don't do the easter bunny (bunny hate its an Aussie thing).

We've had a few problems with my 5yo NT daughter telling other children Santa is not real.

I like the iPod idea, her snow hat with the ear flaps certainly helps to block noise but I think it will be too hot to wear in summer.

We've got a quiet corner set up at Kinder so I will make sure that is there at the beginning of each session and have a chat to the teachers.

Last year we put a tent up at home for Heidi to hide in and I will do that again.

Heidi seems to like helping put the decorations up but she does have very definite ideas of where things go. I will try working on that with her before hand to find out where she would like stuff and why.

We are hosting the family Christmas party this year so I will do a social story similar to the Birthday Party one I did. http://leechbabe.wordpress.com/2008/05/ ... ial-story/

It is actually easier to have the party at home so long as the kids understand they need to stay out of the bedrooms.

My FIL will likely pass away between now and Christmas. Not sure if I should prepare Heidi for him not being there, I think it will be a really emotional time for the family, maybe helpful to cue her up on that.

I have to know why bunnies are evil

They are killers.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbits_in_Australia

Probably not quite as feral for the environment as we humans but still pretty bad.

They also mess up the environment by eating plants that stopped erosion etc.

*Wince* Him not being there could crush Heidi. It'd be routine for him being there and with him not being there...could knock her for six.

It's actually good to get Heidi involved. Why not let her decorate her own area according to what she wants whilst you do the rest? Allow her creative expression and keep her busy.

An idle aspie can do...disturbing things >.>

Quick question.

I'm trying to put together a pre-christmas social story.

For the decorations up everywhere do you think I could suggest Heidi wear sunglasses to reduce the visual sensory input? She doesn't really like hats and tends to cover her eyes fairly often when overwhelmed. I thought maybe dark sunglasses might help.

*edited to add - went to the shops today (20th Sept) and they are starting up with the Christmas stuff already. :: sigh :: bring on the madness *