December is upon us and the build up to Christmas is in full swing. Some find this an exciting time of year full of anticipation and promise. Others don't.
J struggles with crowds, loathes surprises and can't bear loud music 'blaring out and filling my head'. So, we decided to chat about a few things that he thinks make this time of year more easy for him to deal with.
When he was in school, he hated the change of daily/weekly routine that inevitably came with end of term/Christmas show/party preparations and outings. Surprises are NOT fun for him. He says 'I like to know what to expect'.
Regarding presents, again, surprises are not welcome. What works well is when J makes a list of 'things I would be happy to get... but I know I won't get all of them'. Then we try to choose from them - although the list is always Lego, Pokemon, Nintendo and Star Wars items so we're pretty used to his likes by now.
Wrapping paper is a big issue. J can't even be in the same room as brown corrugated cardboard and finds many paper textures unbearable. He actually gets goosebumps when he hears or touches paper/card. Today was quite notable as we managed to get some Christmas present wrapping done - he touched, cut, folded and stuck the paper. Then he wrote the tag and stuck that on. It took an hour and a half to wrap just four presents but he did them all. This sort of OT activity works well because he can see there's a reason for what he needs to do.
For presents that J receives, he hates touching the wrapping paper and that's without having to deal with sellotaped ends. His grandparents refuse to adjust their wrapping technique to accommodate this so I 'doctor' all presents prior to J getting them. The ends are opened, with just a small piece of tape left to hold the wrapping in place. With cards, I open the envelopes and he *may* remove the card depending on "how it looks like it feels".
Presents we give to J are wrapped with minimal taping that mean the innards are easy to retrieve or else they are placed in a gift bag with a simple, small piece of tape on the top edge. Where things are too big to use these, we just use a plastic carrier bag and the ones from the Lego store, being yellow and mentioning Lego, work very well indeed. We reuse these year after year.
Christmas food is handled by writing on our weekly timetable (a chart I made and then laminated so we can use white board pens on it) the meals for each day. J talks about what he's happy to eat and we let him stick to that. We want as calm a time as possible and find it's not the time to challenge his boundaries.
Visiting people does not, generally, happen. We have a particularly fantastic family who we've known for years that we sometimes pop to see but our visit follows a standard pattern and we take our own food that we share with everyone. J knows where to go if he's finding it too much and wants to take some time out. Our pals know not to make a fuss about things and understand that J never, ever says "Goodbye", he just heads off to the car and that's it. Visit done!
Basically, J likes things the way they are. Christmas is no different. So, if you know someone who has similar challenges, please bear in mind that what you like may not be the same for them. There are ways round things, it's just a matter of finding, and accepting, what works for you/them.
