Anyone have a dancer who’s Autistic?

[Skintdancemum]

DD age 11 is really talented and does lots of dance, including competitions.

Shes really highly strung, and puts so much pressure on herself to be perfect. The melt downs when she doesn’t do as well as she had hoped, plus the desire to be doing classes but needing to balance the ongoing risk of burnout, is so hard to manage.

I find my emotional state is dependant on hers a lot, as it’s so hard managing everything and not knowing if I’m helping or making her worse by allowing her to do the classes

Anyone?! 🙏

Hi, ex-dancer here but not autistic so feel free to disregard my advice.

Im not sure high level dance is the best place for anyone with perfectionist traits. You can never be “perfect”, there is always something to improve on. And for so many dancers, especially ballet dancers, this need for perfection ends up in an eating disorder. Also, as you get older, the rejection from auditions is never-ending, very tough mentally.

What type of dance does she do? What are her long-term plans?

But I can also see the other side where she is learning to deal with not being perfect every day. I think, if she wants to continue, she needs to learn that a “bad pirouette day” doesn’t mean the end of the world and not meltdown over class (I was a lot happier when I realised this!). She may benefit from a professional help is this is a difficult lesson to learn for anyone, without the added complexities of autism.

Thank you, it’s very difficult to know what the right balance is.

She does jazz, ballet, lyrical and contemporary.

She has tried talking therapy but due to her autism it just didn’t work, as she wasn’t able to articulate/recognise how her autism impacts her responses to stress etc

I was coming on to say the same as pp. My eldest is neurotypical and went to full time ballet school as a boarder. There were a couple of girls with autism in her class and both finished their time at the school hospitalised with serious eating disorders. The perfectionism is difficult for most children but when combined with obsessive behaviour often seen with autism it can be very dangerous. Additionally, comorbidities such as anxiety and OCD bring additional risk factors.
This is not to say that children with autism should steer away from dance. Just a note of caution that it is a very risky path to walk if the level of commitment to dance is high. There are plenty of areas of interest that don’t lead to serious potential health problems.

@user1471539385 can you advise of any other areas to encourage? She’s so tunnel visioned with the dance, but I would love her to have other interests!

Dancing for fun is fab, but serious dancing or competition need to be handled with care. Anything that doesn’t focus on body type is likely to present fewer risks. What about art or music if she is creative? With a healthy (and limited) dose of participating in and watching dance on the side?

I was a ballroom dancer and I have autism. I did exams and competitions too. Yes i was
gutted when I didn’t do as well as I should have. I eventually quit when I was 11 because I couldn’t stand the pressure between school and dance

My DD is a dancer and has an ED, she is NT. A lot of people she has met in hospital have been ND, I'd say about half.

My Autistic, anxious DD loves dance and is naturally good at it. but I purposefully chose a place where it's not competitive at all and more about having fun. She absolutely loves soccer, which our club for juniors is non competitive and fun. She's starting to think of doing it a bit more seriously now. Im very wary of her doing anything that would add any pressure to perform, she doesn't do well with that and is very hard on herself and very self conscious. Soccer has helped with those things and she's done a lot of CBT which helps too.

@EliflurtleAndTheInfiniteMadness my dd is also naturally talented, but the pressure she puts on herself is out of this world. It’s so difficult as she wants to do it, but equally I can see how negatively it affects her at times. But at other times it really helps her confidence, so I feel stuck at what is right for her

Does she like animals? If you're looking to re direct, horse riding could be amazing for her

@liveforsummer she is terrified of all animals 🫣

@Soubriquet did you manage to find something else that you were passionate about? Would you advise against the competitions?

No I didn’t, and I regretted quitting tbh.

@Soubriquet i don’t know whether to stop her doing them or not! She would be devastated if i stopped her, but it’s such a lot of pressure and she doesn’t cope well with it at the time

What makes you regret stopping, if you don’t mind me asking?

im so lost with all this, its a new diagnosis and im struggling to navigate it all

I'm autistic, and danced competitively right up until I was 18 (when I got injured). For me, the routine of the classes, the structure of everything (especially ballet), and the repetitive nature of things like rehearsals and exam prep were really comforting. I knew that, regardless of what had happened at school or home, I could walk into that studio, and it would all go away. I knew where to stand, what to do, and what was expected of me.

I also found real freedom in being able to express myself through performing - particularly as I found it difficult to do verbally. Several people over the years said that the only time I let anyone really see me was when I was on stage. I think I miss that more than anything!

I regretted it because I really enjoyed the dancing. I loved dancing every week and I stopped because I wanted more time with my friends.

You could maybe let her do the dancing but not the comps for a while. See if it helps

I should add, that it took me a long time to find what worked for me in terms of dealing with disappointment, or feeling that I hadn't done it perfectly. I worked on trying to set myself mini goals (like nailing that one step or turn this time, or making one person in the audience smile), and also tried to make myself say "that didn't go as well as I would have liked" rather than "Oh my god, it was so bad! I messed it all up!". By the time I was 13 or 14, I was much better at processing those emotions. Never got any better at accepting compliments on my performance though! I always wanted to say "but didn't you see..."

I'm an ex dancer, have ADHD and had an eating disorder for a long time. Personally I'd stop the competitions and find a school that focuses more on the fun/expressive side of dance. Contemporary might be good for her as there's a lot of "letting your emotions out in the movement" (sounds a bit wanky I know!), and some types of contemporary are ballet based if she enjoys that.

I started karate at her age when the ballet started getting a bit intense and continued through university. It was an overwhelmingly positive experience and a really surprising number of those at both my home and uni dojos were on the autism spectrum, or dyslexic / dyspraxic.
It was a very welcoming and sociable activity, but also reassuringly rules based with repetition and structure to a class which may suit your daughter if she’s at all interested. Also you could go with her if you find the right club - which might be great or a terrible idea but we had lots of families training including my parents joining the club a few years after me.

@CaptainCallisto that’s actually really reassuring to hear as I know if she was to stop she would loose something really important to her

@Pinkywoo , she does do a contemporary class! She loves it!

I think the issue is, she gets huge amounts of validation from when she does well at competitions, which she currently doesn’t get from anything else. To stop them would also take this away. I’m trying to balance this with the knowledge that the competitions aren’t healthy for her mental health when she doesn’t do as well, plus the pressure she puts on herself.