Autistic daughter and safety on holiday

[LoudRedSnail]

Hi, I have an early teen daughter who is diagnosed autistic. She's mostly high functioning and very independent. However, sometimes she gets completely overwhelmed to the point of crying and running away. We were on holiday recently and she got too hot and tired and had a total meltdown and ran off in a strange city. My husband followed her and tried to grab her hand but it obviously didn't look good to people around as she's swearing at him and screaming. He ended up just having to follow her around at a distance in order to know she was safe but at the same time she (genuinely) just wanted left alone. But we couldn't leave her alone as it wouldn't have been safe. It was horrible. Has anyone got any advice or experience that might help us?

I also have an autistic dd and it sounds like your dh did just the right thing in the situation. Generally I find that prevention is better than cure, obviously not always easy, but basically I try to pre-empt the overwhelm as much as possible, you know the kind of thing, so sweep her into an airconditioned cafe and offer her headphones so she can cool down and block out the outside world - it is bloody difficult though and not always easy to see coming.