To wonder what to do about child who hates holidays

[Tinseltrees]

We have 2 children. One pre teen, other mid teen.

The mid teen has never really enjoyed holidays or even days out. We have been leaving them behind for majority of days out since they turned 13 but they are nowhere near sensible enough to be left alone overnight or longer yet. We don’t really have an option of leaving them with anyone else either.

Our other child is very adventurous-loves being out and seeing new places.
We are lucky enough to be able to afford good holidays but if we ask the older one where they’d like to go they will always say nowhere.

when we have been away before they tend to enjoy elements of any holiday once they are they but still say they would have preferred not to come.

DH and I feel sad that younger one is missing out on opportunities because their sibling is so reluctant. We have considered holidaying separately and just taking younger one but that seems a shame too.

to avoid drip feeding-older one is under Camhs for anxiety in general including school avoidance. Their attendance is actually good but it is an effort every day to get into school so I feel they are using up all their ‘leaving the house’ energy on school and can see why they don’t have much left for holidays.

What would/do others do in a similar situation?

We have a similar situation. We go for self-catering properties so the older one can have own room and lots of time to themselves while we're away, and we try and consider their preferences when booking, e.g. they don't like busy cities. It's very hard to balance everyone's needs isn't it!

I'd be saying its a family holiday and they have to come. Especially if in your experience they have enjoyed aspects of the holidays in the past

Id give them the opportunity to chose a couple of activities whilst there (or if they refuse, you choose tailored to their interests) and also compromise on them bringing an activity they enjoy at home with them (eg gaming, arts and crafts) and letting them have a couple days staying in the accommodation whilst you go out. But at that age, I would be insisting they come on the family holidays

My DS is autistic and struggles with all the change of holidays. We manage by always going to eurocamp, so we have our own accommodation, can keep normal routine and food, and the cabins are more or less the same at every place, so it feels familiar to him. We then go out for a couple of hours one or twice a day and spend a lot of time hanging out at the accommodation. It's a compromise, but wouldn't want to do a holiday the whole family didn't enjoy.

We had a very similar situation to this when I was growing up (my brother is 4 years older than me and has ASD teamed with anxiety), he didn’t want to go places and I did.

Parents managed it by involving him throughout and that “I don’t want to go” wasn’t a feasible answer, but he was allowed to help pick things like flight times and hotel which made him feel in control. They’d also talk him through the itinerary even down to the nitty gritty as his anxiety could be set off by changes to routine, like getting up at 2am for the airport. They’d let him pack his own hand luggage but made sure it had comfort items in like noise cancelling headphones, emotional support teddy (since he has this even now we are in our 30s), sweets for take off/landing etc. We also did a lot of return visits to locations which worked well. Then when it came to day trips on holidays, it was often a case of one parent staying in the resort with him and the other taking me out, which is a shame but often how it just goes in practice in these situations.

They also never told me about holidays when I was young, as I’d be over excited and humming around the house for weeks before we left, which would set off my brothers anxiety. They would make sure he knew we were going and involve him, but otherwise everyone stayed cool as a cucumber and then it was “oh hey, we’re at the airport, let’s go on holiday”

I appreciate some of this is more relevant to a child with ASD but maybe you can take and adapt some elements for your situation. Is your older child fairly reasonable, do they get on with sibling? As maybe would be worth having a chat to say “We know you get really anxious about holidays, but we want both of you to have really great experiences and don’t want either of you to miss out, so let’s work on this together, what would help you?”

as for timing regarding school etc, when do you usually go on holiday? Would mid summer break work? Gives your child some time to decompress from school (and really give them time, a week or two with no pressures) and then could go on holiday towards the end of July so they’ve maybe rebuilt their ‘social reserves’ (not a medical term but one I use for myself!)

Do you have anyone they could stay home with - grandparents or similar?

Ah this is tricky for you. Some good ideas on here but just to add another one - I think I’d be looking at one parent staying home with the older child and the other parent doing cool stuff with the younger one. The parents swap so it’s not the same parent going away/staying home.

Not ideal, I know, but your situation isn’t ideal. It’s just about making the most of the hand you’ve all been dealt isn’t it? Older teen isn’t the way they are to be a pain in the arse, they are currently life-limited by their condition/neurology and it’s just about finding a solution that works best for you all isn’t it.

Time might help. DD has improved on this issue. We went on holiday in 2022 and it was a disaster and we ended up staying in the holiday cottage most of the time.
Last year I took DD away twice for the night and we went to London and she did fairly well. They were places she wanted to go and researched. Had to spend a lot of time talking about what the places would be like and what we would be doing.

id look at booking a normal family holiday every year that isn’t too far out of the eldests comfort zone

then alternate and each take the youngest somewhere she actually enjoys on top.

as the child who was held back throughout life by my brothers ASD I cannot stress enough how much of an impact it made on me. Negatively.

The problem is if all the energy is going into your child being able to function as expected during term time it’s understandable that by the holidays they will need time to switch off and recover. Ds did one day away last week with me to somewhere he had been desperate to go but he is now on day 4 of “recovering” from that.

i think for the next few years - especially as the school pressure is likely to increase - a divide and conquer approach to trips away is best with maybe aiming for 3 or 4 days together somewhere during the middle of the summer holidays.

You're obviously getting lots of ASD comments but when was last full blood test your son had. My son gets very anxious, fearful of leaving the house, not interested in going anywhere. His iron/ferritin levels were on the ground. Bringing his levels back up made a huge difference.
Center Parc type holidays could be a good compromise, safe sites so can leave him in lodge, 2/3 bedroom, amazing pools, lots of adventure type activities. European ones much cheaper than UK.

I have 2 kids with ASD and one (mid teens) is much less keen on holidays/going out than the other one.

We go for Airbnbs ("whole home" ones with a lot of great reviews, and also good Wifi) where he can have his own bedroom in peace and quiet. He can stay at the Airbnb on some days while the rest of us have a day out. We can cook and eat in the Airbnb sometimes instead of going out, and even when the rest of us go out to lunch or dinner then he doesn't necessarily have to come - he can have scrambled eggs or a takeaway in the Airbnb instead. We pick a location with a lot of different options for sightseeing and day trips and activities. He has his mobile phone and we make sure it's working for whatever country we're in, and he knows who to call and what to do in an emergency.

We have one adventurous extrovert child (ADHD) and one extremely shy autistic introvert.

So far our most successful trips involve going somewhere near an exciting destination. So for example - stay in a nice villa half an hour from Rome for a week. On two or three days of the week once of us takes the ADHD kid into Rome to see the sights, eat gelato etc, while the other stays home with the autistic kid building Lego and reading the same stories over and over.

It gives our adventurous child the exposure to other places etc that we know is good for him, without being too overwhelming for the other kid, plus means we get one on one time with each of them.

I’d be getting the holiday anxious one assessed.

My Dd is like this and is ASD. We compromise by taking plates and cutlery with us, and she takes her own bedding. This usually helps a bit.

Our entire family has traits of neurodiversity, and some have diagnoses. We found over the years - including pre-diagnosis - that all holidays needed downtime built in. So if, say, we went to Disneyland, we could not visit the park all day every day for 5 days. There had to be some decompression time every day, whether in the park or in the hotel, and the middle day was generally not spent at the park at all.

We also found that we could not just come back from holiday and go to school the next day. No ending holidays with one last treat, here. The dc needed a couple of quiet days at home to decompress before going back to school.

I wish there were kennels for teenagers. Just park them there with unlimited wifi and junk food and they'd be content. Family holidays are just lost on them as they don't enjoy anything anymore because its with their PARENTS.

part of being a family is sometimes having to suck up doing what everyone else wants to do.

In your case that means sometimes the mid-teen has to suck up (and not ruin by moaning) holidays, and sometimes you all have to find a holiday that will bring you as a family unit, maximum fun.

We've learned with my autistic child that it's best to avoid lurching from school time into holidays. He needs a buffer of quiet days to unwind and adapt before a change.

Last year he didn't want to camp so we came up with a mutual compromise of booking a static caravan, but as it was dearer and we had boot space, we would be taking bikes. He can ride but tends to moan about it, but getting to the larger bikes he is appreciating the boost in speed. He wouldn't admit to enjoying it, but the cycling past us at full pelt and calling us losers was a bit of a give-away 😂

On holiday, we alternate a busy day and quiet day. Familiarity of chains helps. He struggles with the unknowns of things like independent cafes. Chinese and Indian restaurants follow an almost chain-like formula so they work well. Having plan A and plan B also helps if things are a bit uncertain, and being involved in planning.

Divide and conquer also helps when one's old enough to leave for limited periods. Both children need their needs meeting.

Would you consider a cruise? More anxious teen can stay on the ship with lots of amenities and the younger one can go on lots of day trips

Under 16s can’t stay on cruise ships without an adult staying on board.

Thank you for these answers and comments-makes me feel less alone if nothing else!
The suggestion of one ‘easy’ family holiday and one extra for younger child is a good one actually.
The ASD comments are useful. Older child has been assessed and apparently doesn’t have it but I’m not so sure and tend to use ASD strategies anyway. It’s tricky to know what is typical teenage apathy and what is more ND.

I have suggested a cruise before but DC1 is too worried about illnesses spreading on a cruise ship to go for that.

Slightly different as my older child has a physical disability. But as they have got older I am learning to respect when they say they really don’t enjoy a lot of the holiday stuff the rest of the family enjoy. Being away for them is hard physically and a sensory overload. They are always invited on day trips and weekends away but I rarely
insist. We are doing a 1 week AI full family beach holiday which they will enjoy staying in the hotel the entire time. Hoping the younger ones will be entertained enough by the pool. Then doing another trip without them.
as they have got older they have explained to me why my type of holidays and trips don’t suit them and they really don’t enjoy it. Sometimes being inclusive isn’t about being made to do things that you don’t want to do.

I would go with self catering apartment /villa/cottage at your chosen destination so that your older DC can stay behind at the accommodation if they prefer .

Could you consider a self catering break where there are all the luxuries of home. Then leave the reluctant holidayer at your chosen accomodation, while the rest of you go out during the day for a few hours. Just thought it seemed an opportunity to compromise.

We’ve only ever really done self catering anyway to be honest-we still have the issue of dreading the build up and the travelling and the actual leaving the house. Once those things are done we tend to be ok but it takes a lot of the joy out of it.
I like the suggestion of not really mentioning it to the younger one and maybe making it more explicit to the older one that they can take their own things.