Taking autistic kids to Disneyland

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Not sure if this is the right place to ask this, but it's worth a shot, so here goes...
I'm trying to figure out if I should do this or not. I want to go on vacation. I am sick of mundane life and I finally have enough money to go somewhere, but I am scared to take my kids somewhere that is not specifically child-oriented and I am also scared to go alone. Notice how many "I"s there are in there? Yeah. That's my concern. I don't know if it's just ME who wants this or if it's actually in my kids' best interests...

By the time summer rolls around, my kids will be 12 and 15 years old. Both have low-functioning autism.

The reason Disneyland is on the table is because two of my friends are going (each has an autistic child but also an NT kid). I am a single mum so this comes back to me not wanting to go alone. I know summer is not an ideal time to go but that's the only time I can go due to work.

As for the kids. Well, my 12 year old loves Star Wars and I am pretty darn sure he would love the Star Tours part of Disneyland (we're talking California here). Both of my kids also like fast rides and trains and water. But both of my kids also have issues with waiting in lines, loud noises, crowds, bright lights, weird food, weird sleeping arrangements, etc.

We have an autism service dog who is very helpful, and also the standard "autism kit", containing a weighted vest, noise-cancelling headphones, first-then cards, PECS, social stories, blah blah. I know about the disability passes that allow you to save a place in a line- but they don't allow you to skip the line anymore. We live in Canada, so going to California is a bit of a trek. Kids love long drives so that's OK but we can't bring enough food with us. We'd stay IN Disneyland to have a "home base" to chill and stuff, but then we wouldn't have a kitchen so we'd have to eat out. There are a lot of pictures on the website of the different hotel rooms so that might help prepare the kids. But it still doesn't solve the food problem- being that my kids have issues with weird food. Maybe I could plan each day's meals specifically though...

I want a vacation but it has to be a FUN vacation. Is this just stupid? My gut tells me that taking 2 autistic kids to Disneyland is stupid. But then again Disneyland does seem to try to make their resort inclusive, which is certainly more than most vacation locations can boast. Is it possible, with fantastic planning skills, to pull of a FUN vacation at Disneyland with 2 autistic kids???? Thoughts? Have you had a good experience? A bad experience?

Thanks in advance!

I have high functioning autism but I did have a lot of issues with noisy, crowded places and lines. My mum couldn't take me to movie theaters or festivals at Mel Lastman square or anything without me screaming and having a fit until she took me home and I wandered away from the musical Seseme Street Live when it came to Toronto. I'm Canadian too. When I was 12 and my sister was 10 (she's NT) we went to Disney World and I hated it and threw a tantrum and the rides were not worth the lines and the crowds and the noise and my sister and I started singing "I want to go back to Toronto". She liked Disney World but was upset about something else at the hotel. My mum didn't have a good time because of our behaviour and she was upset that she spent so much money to give us a vacation which she normally couldn't afford and we didn't appreciate it.

My first thought would be that taking autistic kids to Disney Land is a bad idea but I'm not sure because we didn't have the autism kit (a weighted vest or any of that stuff)and we didn't have disability passes(actually, I wasn't diagnosed at the time, I was diagnosed at 13, a year later) . What's the use of being able to save a spot in line? Being able to skip the queue is what would really help. My mum kept saying that nowadays she would have been able to skip ahead with me but I guess not anymore. Those things might help but I'm not sure. Maybe you could still go to California and just play on a beach with the kids and have a regular vacation without going to Disney Land (or anywhere that's loud and crowded).

Is there a smaller theme park closer to home where you could do a trial run? You could also stay a night or two at a hotel to see how that goes over.

I have a friend with six kids on the spectrum, though most are younger than yours. He is very upset about the changes for people with disabilities at Disney. He lives near the Florida Disney, but no longer can take his kids.

One thing you didn't mention.... are your kids infatuated with Disney? That would make the difference for me. Might be worth it if the kids are dying to go. Not if they aren't.

(Edited to add detail.)

I have an 8 year old HFA son, and we can manage a day trip to a local amusement park and it is Ok if we do not stay terribly long and we do not spend too much time doing things he thinks are boring. My husband and I have a 2:1 adult:child ratio which enables us to take turns doing one ride each on our own that is not something my son would do.

My son does not like new places and I could not be sure he would be willing to do #2 in a potty far from home. He would probably try holding it in. So obviously, in our case, a multiple day vacation is out. I don't think I would try it anyway b/c he seems to recharge being at home and being anywhere else too long clearly drains him. This is even true of places he has familiarity with and likes.

I do not know if this will give you insight about what is feasible and what is not for your family. All I can tell you is that pushing our son to do things he was not equipped for, like in the early days when we did not know better, was not a good idea. We are very well have acquainted with the notion of "sunk costs" and have left in the middle of things when it just was not worth it b/c something we thought would work did not. I am assuming that if you go on an expensive vacation with friends and you have to bail, that you will end up resentful. So I would be as sure as sure can be before experimenting on such a grand scale. Little, less expensive tests, as others have suggested is usually the better course of action.

I don't want to sound as negative as I probably do. I have missed many things I would have liked to do b/c they were not good fits at that time. I am the kind of aspie who does not mind doing things by myself, and that makes it easier to do things sometimes on my own. If part of the draw for you is social,than that is harder.

I'm the fellow with six kids on the spectrum that my friend "aann" just spoke about. I am disappointed with the changes to Disney's disability access program, but here are a few things I've discovered in going to Disney World in Florida. You may need to call Disneyland directly to find out if they apply out there. When you call, ask specifically for Guest Relations. Anyway, here goes.

When I heard about the new program, and read other people's challenges with it, I went to the park alone one day and spoke with someone at the Guest Relations office in the Magic Kingdom. I told the fellow that I can understand why Disney changed the program--it was too easy for non-disabled people to game the system and get free passes to all the rides all the time. I get it. I really do. I understand that this was especially problematic in California. Anyway, I also explained that my kids would have a very hard time going to one attraction, getting a return time, and then having to wander around the park for an hour or so before enjoying that attraction. The problem is that the sensory overload is too much for them, and we can realistically spend only two or three hours (max) in a theme park on any given day. So considering this new system, our kids would be able to enjoy one, maybe two attractions each day--hardly worth the cost of a ticket. I explained this respectfully, but also letting the Cast Member know how hard this can be for us. This Cast Member (that's what they're called) was pretty understanding. He took my name and phone number, and entered my information into their computer system, along with a synopsis of what I explained to him. He then gave me a case number to keep with me. He told me that any time we go to one of the parks (we're annual pass holders), I should stop by Guest Relations first, give them my case number, and request a few re-entry passes for each of my kids. These are like the old Fast Passes, allowing you to use the much shorter Fast Pass line for most attractions. I was very grateful or his understanding, and told him as much.

So the next time we went, I visited Guest Relations in Epcot, gave the Cast Member my case number, and retold my story. The nice gentleman gave us three re-entry tickets each, which I thought was very generous. We did very well that day. But the next day, we went to the Magic Kingdom, and I did the exact same thing. The Cast Member there gave us only one ticket each. Now, the Magic Kingdom has waaaaay more attractions than Epcot, so it didn't make sense. I told the Cast Member that we received three at Epcot just the day before and asked if we could please have that many for the Magic Kingdom. She begrudgingly gave me just one more ticket each. We managed, but it definitely made it harder for us.

A friend of mine who is very familiar with Disneyland told me that this has been a problem there as well--it's not uniform. It all depends on the mood of the Cast Member at the time. But if you play nice, emphasize your kids' needs and your love for all things Disney, and if you show that you're not going to be a pain in the rump, you stand a better chance than if you are confrontational or too demanding. You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

Sorry this is such a long post, but I was trying to be clear. I won't presume to tell you what to do, but I do think a phone call to Disneyland's Guest Relations can help pave the way.

As for food, you are right to be staying in one of the resort's hotels. Disney goes out if its way to accommodate special dietary needs. I was in Anaheim last month on business and stayed at Disney's Paradise Pier hotel--their lowest-level (but still very nice) property, and was very impressed with their flexibility. I have celiac disease, which means I have to eat gluten-free--and I have to be very careful about cross-contamination. But every meal I had, both at the hotel and in the parks, was prepared for me separately using non-contaminated equipment and gluten-free ingredients. They're very good about it.

So that's all I've got. Good luck to you. I hope you can go, and I hope you and your kids enjoy it. If everything falls into place, it really can be a magical time!

We've some prior threads on this exact topic, so definitely search for them. The long and short of it is that with proper advance planning you can make this an enjoyable vacation for all of you.

Some of the tricks, just off the top of my head:
1. Give the kids the map - it helps them center the experience and feel in control
2. Take advantage of the special services for special needs kids
3. Plan on multiple days so you can spread things out, and retreat to your hotel room often to prevent sensory overload. And also so you can bail for the day if it becomes evident you need to.
4. Stay as close by as possible for all the same reasons as in #3.

For us, Legoland was the bigger hit than Disneyland. A little quieter, and the activities are more interactive. But, the kids will want to be able to say they've gone to both someday, most likely.

Could you find a hotel or condo that has a kitchen, and make a run to a local grocery store? That would make a world of difference as far as food is concerned.

We recently went to Disney World just prior to these changes being enacted, and I think that it's sad that "normal" people could abuse such a system - but that's a commentary on how sick our society has become. Anyway, we have one child who is autistic and nonverbal and only partly potty trained. This was actually our second trip; the first time we had him on a gluten/casein/soy free diet. I don't know about your children, but the issue with ours was elopement, aggression, extreme hyperactivity, OCD and like I said the special diet. Here are some of the strategies that we used:

1: get a doctor's note to take to special services. It will help you get any sort of pass that would help with waiting for rides.

2: introduce your children to the experience by obtaining audiovisual promotional materials or by watching semi-professionally produced videos on youtube. We discovered the latter after our trip. Some are pretty good and I dare say more representative of the true experience than the actual Disney stuff. A few are nearly professional quality and shot in such a way that there is no "shaky cam" and all pans are done in a calm manner. A few have professional introductions and any time spent waiting is mercifully cut short.

3 consider flying directly. Our local advocacy agency sponsors an event where families with autistic children are walked through the process of checking in, going through security, walking through the terminal and even boarding the aircraft. They gave us a LOT of good ideas. We made sure to pack a lot of activities and snacks and were introduced to a secondary, less-frequented security checkpoint.

4 if you stay onsite, get a suite or stay in a self-contained unit. We stayed in a normal hotel room the first time and it was mayhem, but the second time we rented a "cabin" which was essentially a small mobile home. It had separate rooms for sleeping, a living area, a separate dining area and even a full kitchen. Because our son tries to elope, we blocked the back door from the outside and put a chair against the front door so that he would have to move the door in order to try and open it.

5 if you stay in such accommodations, the temptation to cheat on special diets or be exposed to allergens is greatly reduced. Even, still as indicated above the food accommodations in Disney are top-notch. Simply inform your server of your childrens' dietary restrictions and ask to talk to the chef for alternative ingredients.

6 set a schedule of expectations and take frequent bathroom, rest and potty breaks and don't attempt to do things on the fly unless your children initiate a request to do so. Our son's school uses a PECS schedule but we don't - and were fortunate to not have to because there was so much to see and so much walking around to do that our son's urge to elope was pretty much extinguished. As for sensory overload, we didn't have too much of a problem with that during the daytime while walking around the park. As long as he was able to keep walking he was happy - and fortunately Disney sets up many of its attractions so that even when waiting you're not standing idle in many places and there's a lot of interactive things to see and do. That only became an issue when we would try to go on certain older rides or stayed late for a parade or fireworks. It can get quite crowded at the end of the day and all the excitement can be traumatic if your children have sensory processing difficulties. Even still, we were blessed that our son was able to adjust and by the end of the trip he knew where all his favorite spots were. In fact, we had a GREAT deal of progress with regards to potty training and didn't even have to resort to pullups. Public bathrooms became part of his adventure.

7 when dining in restaurants outside of the hotel and park areas, plan in advance. You are able to book reservations before you take your trip. This helps with setting a schedule. For example, in WDW there are several theme parks so we split up the trip to dedicate one day in each park and would book either breakfast or dinner in the park we attended that day. We'd grab lunch during the day at random times and would basically choose a spot that didn't look too crowded at the time.

BTW, one thing I discovered afterwards was that the whole experienced really proved to be a BIG motivation for both our kids. The "honeymoon" lasted well into the winter and we'd reinforce it with trips to the local Disney store. I also discovered that there is an XBOX 360 game that works with the Kinect sensor which is essentially a tour of Disneyland in California. It's been out for awhile so it's really cheap too. I wouldn't be surprised if it were available for as little as $10 USD from amazon.

I know that your children may have different difficulties than my son but bear in mind his behavior is pretty severe so the trip was a welcome change of pace and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. I often joke that I'd take a job cleaning toilets there - only I'm not completely joking. Disney can be overload for some, for others like myself it can be a great escape. I hope that you go through with this trip and I hope that you are able to tailor your own experience based on my advice and observations.

PS: watch out for OCD though. Our son became addicted to the "It's a Small World Ride." Our son was terrified the first time but by the end of the trip he'd lead us across the park to ride it and afterwards we'd use a youtube video of it as an ABA reinforcer.

You've received lots of good suggestions. The only one I would add would be to consider using this program: https://www.ridemax.com

While you may get ride accommodations from a nice Cast Member, the software ensures that you won't be "surprised" when a ride is down for repairs, have ample time to get to attractions that you would like, and allows for built-in breaks. We utilized it years ago and it made our trip go very smoothly. It seems that they have made quite a few upgrades too.

I say that you give it a try, with maybe a back-up plan if things go south. We, too, found Legoland to be more to our liking...both kids (DD is HFA) love Lego more than Disney.The park was more spacious and less crowded than Disney. I heard that the Lego hotel is pretty sweet too!

Thank you guys!! !! Very helpful. It's greatly appreciated.

We stayed at the Carousel motel years ago. It was offsite [a nice walk] from the entrance and was included in the special get in one hour early program [no idea if that is still around or if the Carousel is still included] There was not a kitchen, but there was a fridge and a microwave. We would get up in the morning, eat cereal for breakfast, then go to Disneyland. We would come back at lunchtime and eat deli sandwiches, swim on the rooftop pool, nap, and then go back to the park, We would eat dinner out [not real fancy, because after our 3 days at the park we were going on a cruise of the Mexican Riviera, where there would be huge amounts of food] The fridge, microwave and being able to cool off in the pool and take a nap made it all so much easier [luckily, we did not get kicked out when my then5 year old son punched Chip [Chip and Dale] in the stomach]

Just wanted to say BOOO!

I didn't know Disney changed their policies and I am very sad. I am also disgusted by people who take advantage. I have never "taken advantage" of my daughter's diagnosis at amusement parks because she fares as well as any other kid her age with waiting, so I didn't think it would be right. Kind of leaves a sour taste in my mouth that parents of kids who don't need the accommodation found no problem with abusing it so that kids who need it can't get it.

Sometimes people stink.

Hi, I have asperger's but I'm probably moderate to high functioning. Last summer my parents took my to universal studios because as a child I always wanted to see Dr. Suess land. We spent a week there with an on grounds hotel. Food was an issue sometimes so I'd suggest bringing some of your own. Also my only saving grace was that my family had passes to skip the lines for all the shows and rides. I don't know if Disneyland provides them(Disney world is closer to me) but at Orlando studios you could buy them or get them with your on grounds hotel.) Skipping lines made a lot of the crowds much more bearable.

There will always be that group of people who are just out for themselves and all they can get. They think the rest of us are suckers and sheep. I think they don't live very meaningful lives. Thankfully, I think there are more of "us" than there are of "them," and we should keep on living the way we believe life should be lived. I much prefer our world to theirs. I can't imagine how cold the world must be for them.

But it is a huge shame that they have taken advantage of the generous spirit of the Disney policy to the point where Disney felt it necessary to severely adjust it.

Still, Disney does not have to be impossible. Research and choose a quiet time of year. That is what we did in the way back. No accommodations needed.

I don't know if I would recommend that for your own personal vacation. It's probably worth really considering who this is for. If it's a vacation for you, then you should get someone to care for your kids and just take some time alone. If it's for the kids, then you will probably have to work like crazy to keep them in good spirits because of all their special needs and concerns. Of course that's all fine, but I don't know if you'd come back from something like that feeling rested.

It may be worth trying small dose versions of this, like local fairs or chuck-e-cheeses. Disney is a marathon version of those. If you can come away from a local fair with the kids in good spirits, and yourself feeling cheerful, then maybe Disney would work. If on the other hand 5 hours at the local fair is exhausting, be aware that Disney would be way worse.

Something worth considering is that there are probably fun alternatives that would involve fewer lines, and just as much of the stuff the kids love. Going to zoos, planetariums, natural science museums, beaches, natural wonders (like caves or geysers, etc.) all could be just as rewarding with fewer those potentially distressing elements. There are also many theme parks that are slightly less crowded than Disney. If your kids aren't personally obsessed with Disney, it may be worth considering one of those instead.

It may even be worth doing a lot of smaller day trips, so your kids get to have fun experiences, but then get time to recharge with their comfortable routine, rather than a single week-long trip. Similarly, for yourself, your money may be better spent getting a babysitter for the night and going to a spa once a week for several weeks (if your goal is personal relaxation). Anyhow, those are just some options to consider...hope you guys have fun with whatever you do!

Edit - one more thing, I've heard of special "autism days" at theme parks in which they offer special accommodations for people with autism or DDs. It may be worth looking into that.