Re-decorating ASD sons bedroom?

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Hi i am in the middle of decorating DS 7 (almost 8) room and although he was a little upset at the start we have got as far as plastering and it is due to be painted this weekend.

The problem is he wants everything exactly as it was same paint ,same pattern same mr. men stickers .....i was hoping to make it a bigger boys room but my son has been very tearful at the thought of it looking different.....he is currently attending CAMHS twice a week and today they talked about bedrooms and changing them ...he came home upset about discussing his bedroom but the staff there say i should go ahead and do what i want as he needs to understand he is getting older and change is ok...

but i feel is it worth upsetting him as it is his room after all i have tried involving him asking him to choose so he has control offering different colours but same stickers and it ends up with him being very upset....

so opinions please ...what would you do ..thankyou

If it was me then I would leave it as it is, exactly the same. The way I see it is my child has to accept change in school and everywhere else in RL and so he is entitled to a safe haven somewhere where things are as he wishes and calming to him.

At least if he has had a hard day coping with change he can relax in his room at night :)

It is his safe space, his retreat. You could paint it the same and blu tac the stickers on the wall so that they are easier to remove if he does manage to move onto more age-appropriate interests. It sounds like major disruption, where's he sleeping whilst this is going on?
He may be willing to face change slowly, a new item at a time. Not everything all at once. What are his main interests?
Mine is 17, his room doesn't look the same as when he was 8. Although the base colours are the same and he has some of the same furniture.
Pick your battles, is this one you need to have?

I am thinking just do it the same as he was very upset....and finds it hard even to discuss it.......he is sleeping on the sofa at the moment with me as he wont sleep in our room....not he does much sleep lately anyway ..

the mr men are the peelable ones but could do with some new ones ......he has asked for a new green (instead of blue) carpet.

I also feel he has just restarted at camhs which is a ig change for him as he has been home educated so attends there 2 mornings a week.

I agree about is it a battle worth having ...i said to my OH i guess if he was mad on ben 10 we would have done it....

His interests mmm its difficult as he is not into "boys" things he likes peppa pig,ben and holly ...mr men lol he has always like these.....its hard because as soon as you try and talk to him about it he says "can we give him a break" all he wants is "the same" and why to we have to talk about it .

Hi
We have just been through the same thing with our DS he is 11 and has only just allowed us to change his bed and curtains etc in his room that he has had since he was 3.
We took it gradually in the end starting with the paint (everything has been chosen by him including his new mattress!), we had to move his wardrobe out to make room for a bigger bed, that was the hardest bit but he is actually sleeping better as the from the location of the new bed he can see the landing and stairs.
We introduced a new duvet and curtains a couple of weeks apart. There are lots of "smaller child" items he wont let me get rid of like his soft toys but as far as we are concerned thats his decision.
Agree with what someone else said its thats his haven so why change it, afterall I have spent hours trying to get my DS to be able to spend time in his room and relax!
HTH

We have exactly the same with ds1 (age 9, AS). He absolutely refuses to let us change the decor in his room, but he shares with his younger brother (7) who no longer wants the Bang on the Door Alphabet stickers above the picture rail. and would like to change at least the wall on his side of the room from the bright yellow ds1 chose as a toddler.

It's become a bit of an issue recently, as ds2 has started having friends round to play and it's obviously been 'mentioned'.

Despite this, we have had to decide to leave things as they are for the moment. AS others have said, its ds1's safe space and we already know he takes comfort from staring at the stickers when he's trying to fall asleep and also when he wakes in the night and is desperately trying not to call out for us. He has enough things to deal with at the moment and I feel it would be too much for him to cope with his safe space changing as well.

He still has the diggers duvet cover and pillowcase from when he was a toddler as well and there's no way he will relinquish those.

hi thanks for replies..i have decided to paint it the same and DS has been checking his room as it is being painted making sure the decorator knows what to paint it like lol.....was hoping to move the bed but dont think that will be happening either...but at least DS will be happy.

I'm glad it will remain the same, as others have said, it's his safe place. Ds2 was eleven when he finally decided his Paddington Bear curtains should be changed. However, at almost 17, he still has all his pokemon soft toys on the bed, although I don't have to say goodnight to them all now!

Perhaps you can make almost all the room the same, but use one corner of the room for "new things" with maybe a cork board or something that he can put new interests on, so that he still has his Mr Men stuff, but has an area to put things as well. So it's a little change, that maybe is less threatening to him? It will give him a chance to explore new and different things without feeling overwhelmed by them. We are currently preparing to change DS2's room, and that's what we're looking at - making some subtle changes and opening up one area of the room for "new things" for him.

Thanks for advice im glad now that i kept it the same..dont know why i tried to change to be honest......think i will introduce new things slowly and we are going to not put lots of his old toys back in but put them in the loft as he couldnt move for stuff....he says he is looking forward to playing in his room now there is more space but hasnt wanted to clear toys out .....so wont tell him but at least if its in the loft and he notices i can get it back .

John Lewis do very nice Mr Men prints. You could do a nice neutral scheme and then accessorise with Mr Men stuff. Then you can quietly put away the duvet cover and the pictures and replace them with something else when the time is right.

Hi folks, just to let you know this is a zombie thread.

It was originally posted in November 2011.

Ha ha Moose! You are so right. I don't know why I didn't notice that earlier!

Hi just seen some replies i will have a look at the website thankyou and John Lewis too :)