Church and Sunday School

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We're not regular churchgoers but my husband's aunt invited us to go to church with her sometime this month and I'm wondering if our 4 year old with PDD-NOS and who is rather hyperactive would do okay in the nursery. He goes to preschool for full days at a school especially for kids on the spectrum but has never been in church before.

He met all his teachers and other treatment providers at the program he's in before he started so they weren't strangers to him when he started school, but he's never been left with strangers before. He's pretty friendly, just tends to get aggressive when he gets frustrated. It won't be for a very long time, just a couple of hours at the most. I was just wondering if any of you have experiences you could share.

I think the nursery would be fine, but at his age you are going to get a lot of frowns and stuff for leaving him there during Mass. Some churches don't even have nurseries, they just have cry rooms because of that.

I'm a big believer in putting the kids in the nursery during Mass. Most others aren't though. I never will forget when we went out to see Fr DeFazio say Mass and I was shocked that he only had a cry room. My kids were always fidgity at Mass until they started school. That worked really well for them!

BTW, are you going to send him to Kindergarden next year? If so, call SFX NOW to get on the waiting list. Also change membership to that parish. Believe it or not, it's cheaper than OLS and there is more individual attention there. Mine went there, so PM me if you want and I'll give you some in's and out's about how to get in there when they say they don't have openings. It works, trust me. SFX is closer to you than OLS, and even though most people say OLS is better, it's not. Every kid who went to SFX that wanted to go to John Carroll, did get in. Same ratio as OLS. You need to start going to Mass there now, meet and suck up to Sr. I'm sorry, but that's how it goes.

If I were you I'd tell your husband's aunt to go to hell and not go to church with her.

Last edited by dajand8 on 13 Dec 2012, 9:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.

don't trust religious institutions with the safety of your child, especially if it is a catholic church. This is an objective, logically valid viewpoint.

Jesus f*****g christ. Read the reports and grow up. That was alter servers, not kids in the nursery!

Agreed - and you can usually stay in many "childrens rooms" in there with the kids and watch them yourself, or they'll possibly have some women there to watch the kids (not the horny Catholic priests someone's paranoid about...)

Churches are particularly intolerant of autistic children.

Some are and some aren't. That gross over-generalization does not help answer the OP's question.

I found myself in a similar situation with my autistic daughter at just about the same age. Here is what I found helped: I explained to the caregivers what her "triggers" were, how to avoid them, and how to respond quickly if something started to brew. They also had some kind of pager system so that if something came up that they couldn't deal with, they could page me. It was kind of like the pagers The Cheesecake Factory uses to tell you your table is ready. I'm sure a text on a phone on vibrate could do the same. We basically decided that free time for her would not be spent with shared toys, but rather doing a solitary activity. She had an excellent time.

I don't know what kind of churches other people go to, but my experience has generally been that the women who monitor the nurseries love kids, and the churches that I have been to generally are happy to see new faces and try very hard to make new people feel at home in hopes of convincing them to return. I say this because while I understand that many people have had bad experiences at churches, to generalize those bad experiences to every church is very unfair. Some churches practice tolerance and acceptance as a central tenant of their beliefs. Unless you know for certain that this church is not one of them, it is not fair to hold it responsible for the misdeeds of others.

My parish has 2 churches, an old one and a new one.

The old one has nothing, the new one has a cry room.

There is no one attending it, parents sit with the children, but it's in a separate room (but you can see the alter) so kids can move around if they need to.

The best bet I think would be to ask if they have anything for children.

We were in the same boat when we moved. We attended my parents church and just did a quick explanation of the fact our daughter (almost 3 yrs old) has Autism and what she may do or not do. Then we told them that if they had any problems or a question to come and find us in the sanctuary. They were a little nervous because they had never had a child in the nursery with Autism. We have been back a couple times since then and it has been a positive experience and a teaching/awareness opportunity as well.

If the church does not have a nursery or has a nursery I would not go if you are uncomfortable with it. You can always call the church and ask about it as well.

I go to a good church that is pretty supportive of my child. There is only one lady who isn't tolerant and nice but the rest of the folks allow my child to play with Legos or to tell a story if he wants to.

I DO AGREE that it is indeed up to you if you want your child to attend a choice. My family brought me up to understand that every person has a choice to religion, orientation/lifestyle and ideology.

I also agree that you do have to take extreme care when choosing a church. IF the staff or volunteers aren't educated in your child's condition(s) and they aren't flexible then it isn't worth it.

I once went to a liturgical church (not Catholic) where they didn't want my child there because he was too disruptive. I never went back.

This church that I go to now is an interdeominational one that is very compassionate and creative. They do crafts and have cooking classes where they help the kids make cookies, and they have children's church.

I lucked out, that's all. Believe me.

My child has very mild PDD NOS and moderate ADHD and ODD.

I am overjoyed to see this posting because I used to have problems with churches myself, until I found the one I am at now.

We go to church about 2 times a month. My 3 yo ASD son goes to Sunday school with his 6 yo NT brother. I tell his brother to keep an eye on him when he can and tell the ladies there to let him do what he wants to. I tell them that he may or may not participate but not to stress him if he doesn't. They keep him safe and really, that's all that matters to me. My son has a communication delay and is self driven. He seems happy enough when I pick him up. I also make sure he uses the bathroom before we get there (even though a few times he still asks them to use the bathroom) and we make sure he is not hungry. They give them snacks in Sunday school but we also bring snacks with us. They are there for about 1.5 hours. They also have DH and my cell phone number so they can reach us if there is any issues.

Churches have rooms specifically for children to be in to cry and be miserable? Churches sound like wonderful places!

I can't tell if your being ficiscious or legit are misinterpreting it.

Instead of having to take a crying infant out into the hall and miss the service, they have a place the infants can cry and not disturb anyone.

Maybe I'm misinterpreting it. Two posters spoke of a "cry room" as an alternative to a nursery. It gave the impression of a named room within a church, implying children were callously dumped there on their own to cry while the parents participated in the service.

If a "cry room" is the same as a "nursery" fair enough. It is just the two words imply different things to me - one implies misery and the other implies care.