Autistic 8 yr. old which resort?

[tinkerbell728]

My son is an 8 yr. old autistic but Disney acholic. Last year was our first trip to Disney. We stayed at the ASMovies. We had dinner one night at Jikos. My son fell inlove with the resort. He even took part in a small children's parade in the lobby. I booked it for this year 9/2-9/8. I was worried about the noise from the construction and power outages at night.(Son is also asthmatic). I switched to the Contemp resort. Now I find out they are under construction also. Their Food court will be closed and no play ground. HELP where is a mom with an autistic 8yr. old to stay.

 

[dzorn]

We love POR, but have never tried a delux.

Denise in MI

 

[Bugsmom73]

Go back to AKL if possible. DS stayed their last year and loved the resort for the most part, he is only 3 though. But our true Disneyaholic, which is our DD LOVED it and keeps asking when she can go back. DH is asthmatic and we had no problems, we were there in December and had no problems with either. Do request that you NOT look at the constuction though.

 

[dreamsofdisney]

It's hard to say since we can't be sure about contruction during that time. My DS14 also has ASD and is a DISaholic. We've gone every year except one since he was in Kindergarten! We've stayed at ASMo, AKL and WL. He enjoyed ASMo when he was younger, but now LOVES AKL and WL. Also (please...no one jump all over me for this!) if you are comfortable mentioning to the CM when you book your room (and again a couple of days before check-in) that your child has Autism, you can ask *nicely* for a special request, such as "a quieter wing of the resort - away from construction if possible," or "a room close to the bus stop." We've found that the CMs are VERY helpful in trying to accomodate our requests, especially if we don't demand, but ask politely, and explain the reasons for our request.

Our first year at ASMo, we were all the way back in Lovebug, and each day my DS would have a meltodwon and kick up the flowerbed and scream alllllll the way back to our room. The next year, when I mentioned his Autism, they offered a complimentary upgrade to a preferred building. It was years ago, but it was huge help and made a world of difference.

At AKL and WL they have been great about room requests that we have sent in writing requesting rooms close to the bus stop, when we detailed how we sometimes need to make a break for it...and that can be hard to do with an overstimulated, out-of-control 14 year old!

Have a magical vacation!



~ Sarah

 

[tinkerbell728]

Thanks so much. I think I will switch back to AKL. I did also ask when I made reservations for a quite room request. I also pay the extra for a preferred room. Just for peace of mind.

 

[Dis1978]

Sorry to rock the boat here but we have just come back from AKL and it was absolutely dire. My DS has Aspergers so I know how crucial it is to have somewhere peaceful and as stress free posible. Believe me AKL is not the place to be right now. There have been so many complaints about the construction nosie at AKL. If you do a search you will see that there were a couple of threads in the last 2 week and some of the british travel companies with not book AKL rooms at present.
Anyway, I can only tell you about our experience. The room was dirty, stained sheets, food on the floor and old towel animal on floor. We were not given the rooms we had requested. The CM at reception was incredibly rude and unpleasant and told us a load of nonsense just to get rid of us.
Also the rooms are quite small and dark. I find that my apsie son copes a lot better with stress when he has some room to himself and space to relax. We checked out and went to OKW instead. It was about a million times better than AKL. There is so much space and it was the most relaxing place we have ever stayed at. My son was really calm and there were no meltdowns.
The GAc was also so brilliant for keeping the vacation meltdown free.
I would suggest renting at OKW or Saratoga for a relaxed vacation. Believe me I didn't think it was possible to relax on vacation with the problems we usually have with a child on the specturm but it was brilliant.

 

[Starr W.]

I have an Aspie 10yr old, we're DVC owners. We really liked SSR(going back again for Turkey day) and we just got back last week from VWL(liked that also, very relaxing). My son had a great trip, tried calamari at Mama Melrose and liked it and still liked it after we told him what it was!

We tend to go for the quieter resorts with plenty of room for him to go out and "do his pacing" if he has to. He gets a little ansy waiting in lines, but not too bad, nothing worse than a "typical" 10yr old. We also go for the 2br, as no way the 2 boys are going to share a bed on vacation, plus we like our privacy too.

Construction at AKL is going to be going on into 2009(I believe April 2009 is when the Kidani (DVC) building will be completed ). As for the Contemp. no official announcement on what is going on (DVC or all-suite tower, or a combo of both). Looked like some sort of drilling going on there last week(looked like testing for technical stuff for the footers). So that could be going on into 2009+ also.

 

[Kaler131]

I have a 10 year old autistic son and also a 4 year old autistc son....and they both LOVE Pop Century!

 

[Dis1978]

Just wanted to add that the problem with room requests is that they are only requests and Disney don't have to give you the rooms you would like. In AKL this could be the difference between a vacation on a buliding site or not! Also if you met the CM who was so rude to us, you would understand why I am not convinced that they would care whether you got a quiet room or not.