Family holidays as an autistic adult - argh.

[TheWayTheLightFalls]

I’m mainly writing to get things off my chest, but any advice would be welcome too.

I’m autistic, level 2 so moderate needs. There are many aspects of my life in which I function very well and I expect most people would be surprised at my diagnosis, but I have broadly arranged my life in a way that makes things better for me and minimises stress. I have three children (shouldn’t have, but they are here and the back story is long and irrelevant). On a daily basis I am just holding it together and trying to do my best by them.

DH fancied a holiday this school break. I really didn’t want the kind of holiday he proposed but he whined and beat me down with how lovely it would be and how much he would be doing and how he would plan everything. We are one day in, in Europe. So far:

I don’t cope well with changes in routine, which is basically holidays in a nutshell. I knew this, and here it is happening. It’s a bit better for me in places we have been before, because it’s more familiar, but that didn’t happen this time.

Airports/public transport etc - loud, crowded. Arrived late and needed to sprint through the terminal.

The accommodation is smaller than our home so I’m constantly surrounded by other people’s chewing, tv, chairs scraping etc.

I am uncomfortable in unfamiliar environments, and can’t shake that I am using someone else’s bed / towels / cutlery. Should have brought my own, forgot. I’m like this at home too - I don’t eat in other people’s home etc. “Uncomfortable” sounds mild but in practice it’s closer to disgust, so I am not eating much or able to be comfortable anywhere.

I’m just unsettled and sad, and then beating myself up for not enjoying things.

If we were at home one child would be at a holiday club that she loves, younger two would be in nursery. I’d be in my own home. Then in the afternoon I would pick them up and we’d get an ice cream, maybe go to the park - they’d be equally happy and I wouldn’t be on the edge of a meltdown.

DH is also pushing all the usual domestic crap onto me, which doesn’t help. And in a day or so will get pissy and angry at me because I am spoiling his holiday. And then will get a migraine which will push yet more childcare and domestic crap onto me.

The evening before flying I ended up taking visiting family to a West End show, ie staying up late and being tired, spending 2+ hours in a loud and crowded theatre, and coming home with a cracking headache. So that didn’t help. Again, very much “everyone else seems to enjoy this so why can’t I?”

Then we will come home and everyone will assume that I am rested and refreshed after my lovely holiday. I feel like DH knows that I am autistic, except when he fancies a picture perfect holiday and then I need to magically just snap out of it and facilitate things.

Neurotypical not ND, sorry.

You have to have boundaries and look out for yourself. It’s great to have a big family holiday if you want to. If you don’t, your Dh can do it.

For logistical reasons, we often go away separately. I take one dc and Dh goes away another time with the other (different ages, and we have a farm we can’t just leave for 2 weeks). It works great. Dh loves the idea of taking the dc away with his family. I would literally rather spend a week at the dentist. So he takes the kids to spend time with his family and I stay home. It works great. I do other things with them that I do actually enjoy, like sitting through a thousand gymnastics competitions or organising sleepovers with friends.

I’m not autistic. I just don’t do stuff I really don’t enjoy or know will be a disaster. I think you have to get better at saying no.

Ok @TheWayTheLightFalls you can book it when you book flights. There will also be a desk at the airport. You don’t have to wear a lanyard.

My dc have known about my limitations since they were little. My son was 3 when I was an inpatient in a psychiatric ward with his baby sister. They know I take medication every day. So when they were little we talked about mental health in age appropriate terms. Now they are teens they know I have a Bipolar diagnosis. My dd has known about her autism diagnosis since she got it, age 6.

children are far better at understanding than we sometimes give them credit for. You aren’t telling her what ‘is wrong’ with you. Just that your brain works differently than others, and the world isn’t built for this, so sometimes you need adjustments. Like a wheelchair user needs a ramp.

the “end game” is reasonable adjustments on both sides. Not the NT demanding his way or the ND hers. Sounds like how this holiday was decided and is unfolding for both and the DCs, is a result of no clear mutual understanding and agreement of what works for both, equally well.

This is what happened with my previous relationship. It was all great and I was so happy and then all the issues came out. It leaves you devastated but 'not allowed' to be as it is all about them.

I agree with others OP. There needs tobe compromise here. You can't 'unhave' your children. They deserve a holiday as does your husband.

I definitely agree with this. One of the best things about diagnosis was the freeing shift from "I hate doing this thing that I should like, there's something wrong with me, must push myself harder, oh no it didn't work, now I'm even more of a failure" -> "I don't have to do this thing, and pushing myself won't make me like it. No." It makes such a big difference.

Fuck me but that is one nasty post. Most NT women over 40 say will have had no fucking concept that they could even BE NT, cos it’s a boy thing innit, but struggled and masked and hated parts of themselves and tried therapy self help yoga fucking threw themselves into being better doing better non stop. what you’re saying is just .. .

And this is exactly the point about NT. just their reality isn’t “typical” so the majority weigh in with their assumptions judgements and fucking moral high ground

This is one weird thread. Posters quite often say there is no point taking DCs abroad before they reach a certain age and/or you need to agree with DH who does what before you go, but because OP is autistic she is getting slammed for saying the holiday is not working for her. I don’t think she has said she would never go abroad has she?

OP the lesson here is you need to be more forthright about asserting what works for you and what doesn’t. I am not saying never go abroad, but it might have been better to engage in the process and come up with something more suitable for your needs.

Yes, that's fair. The reason things have gone this way is because DH was adamant that he wanted sun, and offered to plan everything. And constantly negotiating over everything is bloody exhausting, so I agreed. But I think you're right, and (especially given that we could afford to do so) I think my saying "Fine, we can come to southern Europe but we need larger accommodation / a high end AI type place / more amenable flight times / whatever else" would have been better. We negotiated over some things (like shorter flight times), and that has made a positive difference.

Thank you @insomniaclife @OlivePeer @mindutopia @FoxRedPuppy and others for the supportive or helpful comments, I appreciate them.

I hear you. I look forward to holidays but find them very stressful. You might be better posting this in neurodiverse mumsnetters because you’ll get those who haven’t a clue what it’s like to parent when you are autistic saying you need to get a grip and act normal or other such nonsense.
Your Dh needs to step up. It should be equal parenting with you getting a rest. I recommend telling him you’re going off to explore on your own and disappear for a few hours even if you just find somewhere quiet to read. You deserve a rest too.

I absolutely do think that parents who limit their children’s lives and do not appear to do anything to help manage their symptoms need to either do so or remove themselves. I’m sorry that the NT reality for many spouses and families are that they feel abused or that they live half lives but I’m sure with some research you can find that out for yourself.

Nobody is obligated to stay married to an autistic person but the children of them have no option and again if parents of ND children are encouraged to talk about how difficult they find it and seek support- why are the children of ND adults to be entirely ignored and left to struggle on? As for the spouses can you imagine how much stigma and judgment is associated with them finally throwing the towel in and saying they cannot do this anymore let alone how they feel knowing their children will spend unsupervised vast amounts of time with a parent who says they shouldn’t have had them and cannot cope.

Many ND persons are wonderful parents and spouses. A large amount are not as evidenced.

I think you are beating yourself up about 'everyone else enjoys these types of holidays so I should too or my family will miss out.'

Nobody likes ALL types of holidays. There are types of holidays I (not autistic) might go on very occasionally if someone else really wants to, and others I would just refuse, and I would imagine everyone else is the same.

I assume you wouldn't make your DH go on a specific holiday he would hate (whether that's a phones-away vegan holistic yoga retreat, football on tour, clubbing in ibiza, historic city break, adventure sport abseiling and white-water rafting, or whatever example), so it's fine for you to not be able to want to go on his type of perfect holiday if it's your hell. There are plenty of other options that you have managed with, it's not his holiday vs never leaving the country for the next decade.

If he wants to go again in the near future, he can go alone, with friends, or take the kids, maybe with grandparents/his siblings if he wants support. Lots of options.

Your kids won't suffer if they don't go on a big sunny holiday abroad again until they are older. As pps have said, millions of families don't go abroad regularly or at all, whether because of cost, too awkward, or they just don't want to. It doesn't mean their childhoods are ruined. Do most kids remember holidays they go on before they are 10 or so anyway? My sister works in a school and whenever the children tell her about their holidays, they always mention the most random and inconsequential parts that were free/cheap, like an icecream they had at the beach or a bird pooing on daddy's head, when the parents have spent thousands on expensive activities.

Take this as a learning experience, and if you don't feel up to going again as a family until the kids are a bit older and you have time to properly plan a holiday that will work for all of you, that's fine.

This advice works for some NT. For some ND is the opposite.

fixed it for you

And also a recipe for growing resilience. Peddling this idea that any stretching of your limits is bad and doomed to cause disaster is really damaging and limiting for the autistic community. There’s a vast difference between over stretching and stretching but you will never know the difference if you don’t try.

So where exactly are OP's needs supposed to factor into the equation?

Oh yes, that's right. Bottom of the list because she's female, a parent and has a disability. Quelle surprise. 😒

Has it not occurred to you that if OP's DH was being more accommodating and helping more with certain things, she'd he happier/less stressed and thus find it easier to parent optimally? His being expected to be more reasonable and step up more is hardly condemning the poor diddums to 'a half life'. 😒

You're coming across as though you think you know more about autism than you actually do know.

You don’t know enough about me and my ordinary life to comment about my levels of resilience. I have young kids. I run a successful charity. I do lots for the people around me. I push and try and experiment and accomplish a huge amount in my everyday life but am currently at my limit. Unfortunately trying to+ finding out the hard way that it’s too much + husband being an arse when I say I need support doesn’t leave me with much.

It's interesting that you put all the responsibility on the ND people.

Perhaps NT people should be more careful who they have children with? I mean after all why would you have children with someone's who's autistic when you know full well they might not cope?

why is it the ND person's responsibility to leave? Why can't the NT person take responsibility for providing their children with a better life?

If a NT person will let their child spend lots of time with someone who can't cope with them that surely that also makes them a shit parent

But we can't have the NT people being judged for leaving or removing themselves or not protecting the children. But if the asd person stays or goes or doesn't protect them they're fair game to be judged.

What “symptoms” are you talking about? And how would you propose “fixing” autistic people so they aren’t a “burden” for their family??

Im interested to hear your answer to this because I bet you don’t know enough about autism and the support autistic people are able to get (I’ll give you a clue….there isn’t any).

I’d also like to address the posters that repeatedly say autistic people seem to abuse those around them. Whilst I can understand certain behaviours are challenging I’m sure the majority (I’m aware some will be abusive by choice) are just trying to get through each day. I don’t think most people are aware of the mental energy that daily life drains for ND people. It’s not like regular tiredness, after a busy day my brain will literally shut down. I will cry, I will have meltdowns, I will struggle to cook. Most autistic people have spent their whole lives being bullied and carry a lot of trauma. There is no therapy for autism. Conventional therapies such as cbt don’t work well for autistic people and there is no cure. I can’t just not be autistic. Most of the posters who have autistic spouses may or may not realise yet there is a high chance their children are ND even if it’s gone unnoticed at a young age. When speaking to us please remember that one day your children may be an autistic adult. Would you want them to be told they shouldn’t be parents? That they are bullies? That their lives are destroying those around them?? I’m leaving this thread because I’ve seen enough bullying for one day.

You basically just said again that NT partners don't matter at all and only the autistic partner does, proving the very point you're arguing against

Please explain. I don’t see how I’ve said that at all. I think you are clutching at straws because you see your argument falling apart. In fact I don’t think you’ve read what I’ve said because at no point did I say that, imply that or intend that to be the meaning. I think you’re reading into things that don’t exist unfortunately 🤷‍♀️

I’m not prepared for my post to be interpreted in a way that suggests I don’t care about my NT spouse. I do. We communicate very well. We support each other and are kind and loving. It’s been rocky at times but we talk about things a lot to make sure we compromise and are both happy. Sorry if that doesn’t fit your narrative that portrays all autistic people as evil monsters. We aren’t.

Holidays with small children are hard. I just want to let you know that they get easier - for all of us. It's a combination of practice and the children growing older

Having read five pages of (presumably) ND posters offering thoughtful and sensitive support to the OP, and (presumably) NT posters telling autistic people that they're not fit to be parents or relationship partners, I'm wondering just how it is that it's us ND people who are accused of lacking empathy 🤔

Pray do tell where I proposed ‘fixing’ autistic people?

I apologise if ‘symptoms’ is the wrong terminology. Perhaps issues such as screaming meltdowns, crying and the like infront of children cools be addressed or absolutely ‘unavoidable’ the parent can remove themselves from the children so they are witness to traumatic and disturbing behaviour.