To cancel Christmas for all future years?

OP I was you last year, everything we did was because that's what we "should" be doing, and what my
Christmas-mad NT loves. A very wise woman advised me to get rid of "should" from my vocabulary when it comes to my autistic son, and it's genuinely made life so much more enjoyable for all of us. We did very little by way of days out, or he stayed home with dad while I did things with our daughter. Our Christmas Day this year was exactly like others have described - easygoing and relaxed, he chose his own clothes and what to eat and when, we kept dinner very easygoing and didn't go anywhere with too many people. He stayed regulated for the whole day, which is unusual even on the best of days.

Be kind to yourself, it's so hard unlearning a lifetime of habits - and frankly letting go of traditions you might really treasure. But you know your son the best so tailor his day for him rather than the other way around. An autistic Christmas is so pleasant when you've experienced a very dysregulated Christmas!

This is such a sad thread. Life just sounds so unutterably relentless.

Some autistic people will be able to take on board and learn from advice on how to react, handle things etc. Some won't, that doesn't make them rude and families/those around them should bear that in mind.

A neurotypical person/child should be able to learn from advice, so if they choose not to listen and do so then that becomes rude.

Our youngest is being assessed for ASD at the mo, and is away with us all for Christmas at the mo. At home he's been quite calm recently, being away has been harder for him. Despite being with family he is quite overwhelmed, so has been steering clear or most of us for a while, had his own meals etc that I brought from home. The wider family hadn't really been aware of his assessment but we have talked about it loosely.

I don’t think cancelling Xmas would help him in the long run. Let him spend the day how he likes. A bit of exposure to the real world might teach him to adapt as he gets older.

You cant cancel Christmas, it's not fair on your other DC

My DD10 is autistic. This is what I do to make Christmas easier for her / still fair on DS

Presents.... i give them some gifts early. This year they got 4 gifts early staggered through December, less for her to open on xmas day and less likely for her to get overwhelmed ( and who doesnt love an early present 😅 )

Present wise, most of her things she picked exactly what she wanted and I bought them for her. She didnt have many surprises as she knew exactly what she was getting. But that's what she likes and its easier for her

Food wise: I do a buffet style Christmas dinner with Christmas food / some normal foods and everyone just helps themselves to what they like

Around 1pm she started getting snappy so I got her cozy on the couch and told her to have a nap. She woke up 2 hours later refreshed. If she hadnt of had a nap I would of let her to go to her room for a few hours to have some quiet time Edited to add I'd she hadnt of had a nap she would of had a horrific meltdown* and also, there is no pressure to open all her presents at once. She is currently painting in the kitchen and has 4 presents she hasnt opened from yesterday

If you want Christmas to be a little calmer then you need to make some adaptations for him and you. We dont see family over Christmas as DD gets overwhelmed ( so do I tbh )

It's just finding a way that works for all of you isnt it

I'm autistic to
I struggled yesterday,and I had the same issue with gifts ,but I controlled myself yesterday,but today I woke up in a foul mood and took myself of out to calm down and give myself a good talking to .
I had a fixed idea in my head of how Christmas would be. And it wasn't yesterday,and by this morning I needed time alone to gather myself.
As a child I wouldn't of had the insight to do that .
I love Christmas because it's the same songs and movies and tree and decorations every year ..the same meal on the day .
Your son is one person out of the whole family ,don't cancel Christmas, because it will resentment towards him from other family members.
My children also have autism
We managed by letting them take wrapped presents to their rooms ,to open when they feel able to .
I cook the pie that one of them only eats ,mash potatoes for the other one ,and no one has to sit at the table to eat if they can't face it ..they do sit there ,but they know they don't have to ,and they know at any point they can leave the table if they get overwhelmed.
We keep music calm , usually classic FM ,and no background noise from TV .
We have a slow ,calm ,no stress day .
People go to their rooms with food and presents, whenever they need to ,no questions asked .
I hope next year is easier for you xx

My youngest (now 18) is autistic, dh and one of the older siblings probably also are. Over the years we have developed a formula which works for us, and balances the needs of both ND and NT family members. The formula barely changes from year to year. When the dc were younger, part of the run up to the festive season of CE to NYD was verbally reviewing what we would be doing. We repeated the reviews over several days, building up a picture of the week. We didn't need to do visuals or social stories, but those may also be helpful.

We have the same routines as in First/Next/Then etc, but never fix actual times for each stage until very close to that stage. Apart from stockings.

Stockings were opened in their bedrooms at any time from 6am. From 7am they were allowed to leave their rooms. Presents were, and still are, opened all together in the living room. Each person takes a turn delivering an item to everyone else, and we open them one at a time.

This may sound massively restricting, but it prevents overload. It allows each person to interact with their gift without being rushed - in fact, that's another of our rules: put on anything that can be worn, read something aloud out of any book, play with any game, if possible. It also allows people to take time out if they need to re-regulate or are disappointed. We return to present opening several times in the day. Present opening takes as long as it takes, sometimes even into the new year.

Every aspect of the day has its place in a pattern that is repeated every year. The routine is as much part of our festive traditions as putting up the tree and laying out the stockings.

The tree is another issue. Decorations go up slowly, over the course of several days, with the dcs' help, and the tree goes up once school is out. Again, it's about a slow build-up that involves the dc so that nothing is overwhelming.

We don't do exciting anticipation. I think that's the only aspect that the dc miss, but OTOH there's plenty of that outside home.

Hope some of these ideas are helpful to you, and you don't end up losing your Christmas.

Don’t cancel, try to find compromise. As everyone says let him choose his presents maybe online and then just order and wrap them. Don’t do then wait for presents.
Make the youngest’a room a special Christmas cave or grotto with lots of decorations and then a bit less in the living room. Your oldest is coming to the age when some children are very vocal about what they want regardless of any additional needs so it’s ok to give him leeway with certain things.
I think Christmas can be very overwhelming so following a bit of normal Sunday routine does help. I would look at food as well. We usually spread festive food over certain period rather than have a lot on one day I found this more manageable. Certain things we only do only we are out so you can make it part of special treat when out with the youngest.

OK here's how I would play it

Before Christmas tell DS You're getting a voucher for (insert shop name here) for christmas. On December 27th (or whenever suits you) we are going to go shopping and you can pick what you like. you could do amazon instead and he could spend the morning looking up what he wants, giving the rest of you some peace. It doesn't sound like the theatre of opening presents is his thing, it's all about the item so pick battles.

Christmas morning-- do presents first thing then let him do hobbies or something quietly and spend some time with your youngest.

Christmas lunch-- cook whatever you would normally cook for everyone. You aren't running a restaurant. If DS doesn't want that, then offer a sandwich and crisps or whatever you usually do for a lunchbox and let him make a choice.

Don't cancel Christmas. I know this year was a bust but it's important to your little one.

I have 3 autistic boys. You have to adapt to their needs. They don’t have to have food they don’t want and they certainly aren’t made to wait hours for presents. How is that a nice Christmas for anyone?

It’s really hard isn’t it?

My DD is autistic and started the day and ended the day completely overwhelmed, mainly because she was so tired from not sleeping the night before.

Things we do that help -

She writes a list but sends me screenshots of the things she’s put on it so I can get the right thing.

She is still quite young, so I do get her surprises too but stick to things I know she will like - certain treat foods she loves, vouchers for her favourite shop etc.

She doesn’t have to eat Christmas dinner. She can eat her normal foods.

We stay at home for Christmas - travelling to family and more gifts is too overwhelming so family come to see us in the morning if they want to, but we do gifts with them on Boxing Day.

Normal clothes, so yesterday was joggers and her favourite t-shirt.

We open presents in the morning, we don’t wait and if she chooses to not open them all straight away that’s fine too. Some years she does, other years she spreads them over a few days.

No pressure. She is free to take some time out whenever she wants, we keep the day relaxed and if it’s getting too much time in her room on her own usually helps.

Don’t cancel Christmas, a few tweaks can make a lot of difference x

That's good - it's not how it came across though!

Right off the bat - I don’t understand why you didn’t just open the presents?

No, we both got exactly what we wanted I guess I didn't describe it well

I absolutely have sympathy because my DD although not autistic has a learning disability and finds lack of routine and the noise very difficult and we had a few meltdowns yesterday. But we have two boys too who need a nice christmas so me and her dad just had to suck it up and keep on going to make sure the boys had a good day. But you are definitely not being unreasonable to feel that way, it’s really, really hard.

I voted you are being unreasonable because you have a younger child who loves Christmas. But it must be really tricky at Christmas. As others have said I would take him to buy his own presents, let him open them when he wanted and let him eat whatever he wanted for Christmas. I guess I would try to minimise the stress rather than cancel Xmas.

I don't feel like I missed out at all, sorry if that's how it came across.

As a parent of an autistic child, I think you need to chill out with Christmas expectations. We open presents when our son wants to, spread out throughout the day, he eats his Christmas dinner but sometimes doesn’t sit with us but wanders between living room and kitchen/dining. No offence intended but you’re being too rigid. I read plenty of positives in your post and I think you need to see it as a part success and just live and learn - some things were great, some things can be changed next time.

Nope .id do Xmas but let him open presents in the morning
Id prep him that any moaning next time and he goes to his room .
Id still do Xmas dinner but let him eat what he likes .

Clearly your other dc enjoys the day even with the meltdowns so you have to continue .

I think there’s a happy medium. I have a 9 year old with ASD and a (NT as far as we know) 4 year old. Things that have helped us to have smooth Christmases in recent years include:

• staying at home just the 4 of us.
• managing expectations around presents, eg making sure we know exactly what DS1 would like, and being honest if he won’t be getting them (long, aspirational list of devices here this year).
• not having Christmas food - we have a buffet with nice canapés for us, and DC-friendly food for the DCs. I would rather have a Christmas dinner but this is a lot less work and the combination of the time I have to spend cooking and then the pressure of a roast dinner DC1 isn’t keen on has ruined Christmas previously.

We do presents for the DCs first thing but keep some presents back for the afternoon, as it means the day doesn’t feel “over” by 0900.

We let the DCs have a pyjama day if that’s what they want.

I also feel like this is a slightly awkward age for Christmas - my 9 year old has stopped playing with toys, mostly, but isn’t old enough or mature enough for the kind of things teens would enjoy.

Christmas can be so difficult as there are so many pressures. We had a couple of car crash Christmases around age 5/6 which forced us to really rethink what a successful Christmas (as in, everyone happy and enjoying the day) would look like for us. That can mean doing things differently from the norm - above is just what works for our family.

You don't need to cancel. You can change it.

What things does your autistic son struggle with?

My sons can't cope with surprises so I have always bought them exactly what they wanted and told them what they'd got and what was in each parcel. They can cope with waiting until Christmas morning but not with surprises when opening their gifts.

I have always chosen not to place any importance on surprises or 'the magic of christmas' because those things may well seem like great things to others but are torture for my sons. So what's the point?

Get up at whatever time on Christmas morning and open their gifts at whatever time suits them and whatever pace they choose.

Christmas at our own home and no pressure to eat specific things or eat with other people or interact with other people.

Christmas has always been extremely overwhelming for them so we avoid adding unnecessary extras.

Eg this year my family came round. My younger son (24) came down once then stayed in his room. My older son (25) came in and out and chatted then withdrew for a bit then came back later.

Nobody commented on it or expected anything. We let them engage on their own terms and enjoyed the level of interaction they were each able to offer.

I think that's the best way to handle situations that you know are stressful and overwhelming. How can you make it easier for them.

See - to me, this doesn't sound like a balance - this sounds like DH getting his own way on everything due to his autism. I'm autistic myself, as is my dad, but that doesn't mean we can just do what we prefer and sod everyone else's wants and preferences.

Having autism doesn't mean you get to dictate the entire day, every year.

I think you need to just change how you so
it. Why did he have to wait hours to open his presents? No kid wants to sit around waiting.

Who doesn't open their presents first thing?!

Your poor young child.