Autism Awareness Day 5

Autism Awareness Day 5- Consistency is key. When you have a child with Autism you soon learn that being consistent and maintaining schedules can be very helpful. My thoughts on this are that if your senses can be easily overwhelmed, the world around you can seem chaotic and overstimulating, and you have difficultly clearly communicating with others then schedules and routines probably help you to feel more comfortable and secure. I think for my boys it is nice for them to know what's expected and what's coming next so they feel safe and in balance.

It is for this reason that we have a pretty set bedtime routine and schedule. We try to keep therapy appointments on the same days and times. We use the "clean up" song to signal the boys that it's time to put toys away. (songs in general are good but I'll talk about that on another post) I usually do not take my boys to the doctor if their regular doctor is not scheduled in that day. We like to keep the same therapists and the one time that we did have to switch therapists for a bit we tried to get Gatlin used to the new one before his regular one went on maternity leave. Doing these things helps to keep it familiar and comfortable for our boys. They are less likely to be overwhelmed and frustrated if we stick to the routine.

Now I'm not saying that you should never change things up because let's face it, life is full of change. What I am saying is that you should keep things on schedule when you can and when you can't it's best to talk about it, show pictures, or do whatever you can to clue a child with Autism in on what changes are to come. For example one time we missed physical therapy for the week so then when we took Gatlin in for Speech he became very agitated because it wasn't the right therapist. He was expecting to see Miss Megan and not Miss Jessica. This actually just happened with Draiman also since he's no longer in OT.

I have noticed that the more Gatlin understands what I'm telling him the easier he handles changes. On the other hand with Draiman it is just too overwhelming because he just doesn't understand what's going on. So we do our best to keep it consistent and when we can't we do our best to explain what is going on. We do incorporate change also because that's important to learn to deal with but we keep that in smaller doses since the boys have enough challenges on a daily basis any way.