To Leave Holiday After 2 Days Owing to ASD DS Behaviour

[Overdon]

DS has just slammed the bedroom door against a dressing table in temper said door now has a hole in it. The house we are renting is immaculate and I’m terrified what else he will trash. (I did take out insurance when we booked but don’t know if it will be covered)

The door incident occurred I had told him off for barging in the bathroom demanding to know where his football was, he refused to wait til I was finished. He didn’t even want to play with it, but was ‘curious’ to know where it was. FFS.

I told him his behaviour was unreasonable and his response was to scream abuse and bang the door and damaging it.

I can’t face walking on egg shells til next weekend.It’s just me and him in the house, his behaviour was bad yesterday too, took him to a fair and had to bring him out as he was swearing and shouting at me because I didn’t want to go on a particular ride.

Although holidays have been challenging in the past ( hotels are a no no) I thought we would be ok as a) we are staying in an area familiar to him and b) the property we are staying in has a private garden ( we live in flat so he said he was looking forward to this, but he’s only been out in it once.) I didn’t expect it to be plain sailing but think I would be less stressed at home.

I booked an activity’s this afternoon, won’t be going now as I have no idea what he will do next, my anxiety is through the roof. I mean really what’s the point in this ‘holiday’? We are in the UK and only 3 hrs drive from home, should I bail ?

*expect

Quite. But the usual suspects will pile in essentially telling you you have no rights to anything and how dare you expect any.
SIGH 😓

we are in a private and very pleasant holiday home which I do not consider to be a "highly stressful situation "

It's an entirely new and totally unfamiliar situation which is very likely to be highly stressful for any autistic person.

All I'm saying is that your ds may have been at the very limit of his tolerance levels when he wanted to know where his ball was. He did the wrong thing and you reprimanded him which may have tipped him over his tolerance level. Hence the explosive response. It's not about the ball or barging into the toilet - It's the sum total of everything.
I honestly do understand how hard it is.

Knock it off. What about NT siblings? Oh wait, they don't matter either. Got it.

It really isn’t about you thinking it’s not a highly stressful situation. It’s about how he’s finding it.

Ok. I'm also the parent of an NT child. I want him to have some normal childhood experiences, and not be too limited by his sister's autism. How do I square that circle? I am genuinely worried that if we take him away and leave her behind, she will grow up and ask why she wasn't included on family holidays. Will she accept "because you hated them" as an answer? Or will it seem like rank favouritism?

If so does DS not get to go anywhere new because his sister doesn't like it? It's one thing for me as a parent to make sacrifices - how many sacrifices does DS have to make?

I don’t understand either. In fact the more the OP posts the less I understand about the whole thing - including the OP’s understanding of autism.

and either this was the first time the lad did what he did at the bathroom door and it’s a clear indication of how he’s not coping. Or he does it at home as well and it’s only today the OP has decided it’s not acceptable.

Someone calling his mother a "fing whre" and barging in on her while she's on the toilet is not just someone with ASD, it's someone who is acting abusively while also having ASD.

This isn't an ASD thing, it's a violent abuser thing. People in thread who blame this kind of behavior on special needs aren't being kind. In three or four years if he treated a girlfriend the same way, he'd rightly be seen as an abuser.

The sexual overtones of the situation are highly concerning, both the privacy invasion and his choice of how to verbally abuse a woman. I would be extremely concerned he's watching pornography, which can especially impact kids with ASD because it's difficult for them to understand context switching.

I genuinely cannot believe some people are trying to say you don’t deserve 5 minutes in the fucking toilet

I’m actually shocked
you do realise OP is a person too? She isn’t just a fucking robot?

I hope it improves for you OP whether you decided to stay or go home
I also hope his dad fixes up and gives you some actual help x

@djdkdkddkek

Ah but she's a "bloody neurotypical" so it's all her fault. Didn't you get the memo?

Well if he’s watching pornography it’s pretty obvious where he’s watching it b

@NanaNelly

Meaning what exactly? You're very very keen to put this all on OP and your lack of empathy is frankly shocking.

Sympathy, op. It’s hard.

We need more words for holidays - like they used to say eskimos had for snow - because holidays with kids, and teens, never mind ND kids have nothing to do with relaxation and getting a break!

We got a motor home to create a home away from home and I don’t think I could manage without it. We have to build in a lot of down time and keep our plans very flexible.

Truthfully it would be kinder to leave him at home, but no one could manage him and neither could he cope with being left behind yet. With preparation and a wind down he does enjoy his holidays but I come back completely shattered.

3 days and 2 nights is the limit I've found with autistic kids. There's just no point in doing a week.

I wouldn’t necessarily leap to assuming he’s accessing porn because he’s called his mum a whore. Unfortunately that kind of language is all too common in schools at the moment (my dd
is 19 and at university and I’m constantly shocked at the language that is bandied about - and this is at a Russell group university). However, if he has the mental capacity to understand that behaviour and language is unacceptable then he absolutely needs to be told and have consequences- ASD or not.

As a complete amateur here, yes that’s what I would say - you couldn’t cope with holidays, but as DS went along with what you needed most of the time, he also needed time to do things he enjoyed, so we took him on holiday. Please don’t guilt trip yourself over this - you matter, your DS matters, your DD having a diagnosis doesn’t mean she gets the lions share of everything. 💐

@GreeboIsMySpiritAnimal I have NT dc and two with ASD, they are all adults now but we did an awful lot of divide and conquer so one parent would have the NT dc and the other the two with ASD. We did separate holidays, days out, theatre visits etc.
My older dc used to have a week away every year that they called their "get away from ds week". It got easier as he got older, he understood more and reacted less violently so we holidayed all together again then.
Now they are all adults and the three older ones plus grandson join us for a week away each year through choice and ASD ds goes away with his Dad and his brothers for a long weekend on their "lads holiday" each year.
It's difficult to see beyond the here and now when you are in it though. Twenty years ago I never thought we would ever have a decent holiday again.

I would go home. We just did a 3 night trip to Portugal which was stressful I wouldn't do any longer. My child didn't enjoy it he is happiest in his room with all his things.

This, as a not-amateur. But be prepared to be in the wrong according to both kids. Mother's place and all that😔

I am on holiday for a week with my autistic teenage daughter. Cue much meltdown, upsets, anger, frustration and fatigue because she's out of her usual environment.

It's cost £5k to do this and I'm not repeating it.

I have learn though for next time.

We will plan to be only 48 hours at a place.

We will Google, walk the routes, plan the possible photo opportunities.

We will book a gelato slot,
Book a boat trip, book a snack. I'm using the word book lightly, what I mean is to plan with a timescale.

We will research each thing we plan so there are no surprises.

We will stay central in whichever city we choose so we always have the chance to pop back. Maybe after a meltdown, maybe at a quieter time.

Sadly my daughter loves architecture and has missed out on so much because she couldn't cope. She's upset and frustrated. I'm upset that I didn't appreciate quite how much she'd need the trip adapting to be able to access it.

Tonight was a positive achievement and I got her in the swimming pool.

It's so hard with autistic teenagers.

Lack of empathy?

I think you mean my experience over 32 years as the mum of a young man who has a diagnosis of classic Kanners autism, Tourette’s syndrome and Epilepsy amongst other things.

Am I blaming? If thinking more probably could have been done for the lad before and during the holiday to help him cope better is blaming her. Then yes. I am.

You know I’m not really a tell tale on here and have made many shitty remarks but you really ought to be ashamed of yourself
you won’t be tho
what a hardened person you are. Just so hardened. Yuk

There is no excuse for any person ever to kick their way into a bathroom that’s in use and call their mum a whore. Ever.

Thank you to those leaving supportive comments.

To those concerned that my DS is accessing porn I can assure you I have parental controls on all devices. I have found he has picked up some unfortunate language at school though.

As a PP says no 2 people with ASD are the same, I believe I would be doing a disservice to my 13 yr old DS (and myself) if I did not pull him up re inappropriate behaviour.

In your opinion.