Can you win by not engaging with a child?

By not?  If you have laid down rules in the house, every one of your children MUST obey them 100% of the time, surely?  Of COURSE we have to respond every time, don’t we?

Well, when you have a child with special needs, you are told to choose the battles you want to fight and concentrate on them.  An autistic child who has woken before the cockerel crows WILL be up at night.  THEY are awake so SOMEONE else has to be.  When Johnathan  was a baby growing into a toddler, and simply DID NOT SLEEP at night, in the end, I took him to the sofa where each side reclined.  I was dozing on one, with him on the other and my hand on his stomach, so that if he DID move, I would feel it and BabyTv had a night time schedule at that time which was gentle music and lights.  He was entranced by what he saw and mostly sat there all night.  He never actually GOT off the sofa, even though he made a slight attempt a few times.

I know other parents of a child on the spectrum have used many things.  Some of them have ended sleeping in bed with that child, or bringing them to bed with them.  And as long as the child is safe and loved and looked after well, there shouldn’t be a problem.  The fact is, you DON’T engage with the child.  You are using the method that best suits your family to ensure maximum sleep for all in the household.

I must admit that Kevin and I had agreed that we would not worry about our children and their eating.  We both really struggled with eating as children and were treated very differently by our respective parents, but we both agreed food and drink was not a fight we were taking on..  Obviously if there was some kind of medical reason or condition we would take steps to sort things, but was food and drink REALLY a problem?  Not to our minds.

These are two sides of autism that I wanted to deal with today.  Children on the spectrum need support and help.  In Johnathan’s room we have many sensory items to help him, including a pack of “calm down” toys.