Great tips I wanted to share...

[Renosiris]

My son is ASD and his brother is neurotypical (he's younger so who knows what could come up). They had their first trip to Disney in 2008 and we were spending a LOT of money to make this trip happen. I was worried about how they were going to handle this trip, especially my ASD son, and didn't want to see our money go down the drain as our trip became a nightmare.

Some of you might not have the situation/money situation to do this, but I thought I would share it for those who might. The summer before we went to Disney we bought season passes for a local amusement park. At first the days were really hard, but by the end of the 4th day visiting the amusement parks we had great improvement. They understood lines, waiting their turn, dealing with the heat, not getting everything they see,and not eating everything they walked past etc. By the time our Disney trip came around they were pro's and the trip went far better than I could have ever hoped.

I also bought ear muffs ( the kind people that work around heavy equipment wear) and let them pick out stickers to put on them. We called them their ears, and they wore them around their necks to put on when they felt it was too loud. They also got lanyards with a mini keychain flashlight from the dollar store around the end. When he felt scared of the dark he understood that he could flash the light down at his feet, or in the cart and felt better about the ride. In addition we got a disney button about it being their first trip, and wrote on the back our name, resort name and room number incase we got separated. They knew who Disney workers were because of their name tags, and if they got lost to go to them and show them the back of their pin.

 

[SueM in MN]

Those are really good hints.

Thanks for sharing.

 

[kirstenb1]

These are great suggestions. Our 4 yr old has ASD, and she's always grabbing the flashlights out of closets around the house. I'll get her a mini one for WDW, thanks!!!!

 

[Renosiris]

My kids were really good about not asking for things, but here is another thing that worked really well was regarding their spending money.

They each had 50 bucks to spend at Disney. We got a dollar store wallet, and paper money. In the wallet we put 50 dollars in paper money to represent the real money they had (that way I didn't need to worry about them losing it). When they wanted to buy something I would show them how much paper money was going to be used. Somehow seeing it changed their mind about buying things. When they saw they would lose five papers for some candy they would say "No way!".

Near the end of the trip they had spent it all, and they said "Can I buy this?" I would get exicited and say "OKAY! Get your money out." They would at that point say "Oh! I don't have anymore." "Oh, that sucks. Well, let's go then." They didn't make a peep about it.

 

[starnightstarsky2000]

Our son has Aspergers and something We didn't try to do was to stay to the same schedule that we had at home and it lead to a tired worn out 8 year at the happiest place on earth. See although our son goes to public school he is by nature a night owl as both his father and I are. So we tried to change that and make it to each park for morning rope drop (never made it once on our 10 day trip) as well as to each of our scheduled ADRs which I am happy to say we wont be doing this year other then two special days (one where I will go alone and meet up with some dis friends for High Tea and the other the night of our 10th wedding annivery dinner at Boma. As racing through the parks to make them made it so rushed that everyone got more and more stressed out. So this year we are going by what we feel is the best so up whenever we wake up and to the parks/resorts to eat when we are hungry and back to the room if needed for a nap to be out until 2am. This year our son who we have been working with since last years problems will know that it is okay to tell mommy and daddy that he is ready to go back to the hotel cause we will come back to the parks as soon as he is ready too(last year every time we asked it was answered with No I'm fine even when clearly he wasn't which lead to tough time getting him understand that WE would come back we weren't leaving for good). How we have worked this out for him is we started to put this into practice since we came back so he knows that what we say is what we do. There are days when I wish other kids really wouldn't share their nightmare stories with our son about how their parents do one thing and say another. *Sign* Gotta love kids.

 

[npierce25]

i love the wallet idea. a lot of people have gotten my daughter gift cards, but i dont want her to get swipe crazy, i like the fake money idea!!! thanks!

 

[Angela3272]

Great tips, thanks for sharing!

 

[It'sWDW4me]

My kids were really good about not asking for things, but here is another thing that worked really well was regarding their spending money.

They each had 50 bucks to spend at Disney. We got a dollar store wallet, and paper money. In the wallet we put 50 dollars in paper money to represent the real money they had (that way I didn't need to worry about them losing it). When they wanted to buy something I would show them how much paper money was going to be used. Somehow seeing it changed their mind about buying things. When they saw they would lose five papers for some candy they would say "No way!".

Near the end of the trip they had spent it all, and they said "Can I buy this?" I would get exicited and say "OKAY! Get your money out." They would at that point say "Oh! I don't have anymore." "Oh, that sucks. Well, let's go then." They didn't make a peep about it.

Oh I like this idea! I think I'll take this another step and print the "money" on different colors of paper and assign one color per child. My brother and his 3 kids will be with us this August and the oldest (9) races through whatever he has and then convinces the younger two (8 - on the spectrum & 6) to "share" their remaining whatever with him. With different colors of "money" he can't be spending his sibs' souvenir funds!

 

[Stag]

I really love all these tips!

Here's one that's been brought up in the past I think on another forum, and I think it rings true for ANYONE with a disability, whether it's ASD or physical or what have you-- do 80% of what you can do when at Disney! I've found that at any amusement park, pushing it too far was a huge mistake and doing so landed me in a wheelchair for two of the days on our last WDW trip. Oops. Note to self: Walking around in the parks all day, then coming home and staying up till 1 in the morning only to get up at 7-8 the next day is a baaad, bad idea!