Halloween Was A Bit Different This Year

photo courtesy FreeDigitalPhotos.net and Simon Howden

Halloween is a bit of a tradition in our house. I get the oldest one out doing some trick or treating and my wife keeps our son and the youngest daughter home and hands out candy.  Last year when our oldest daughter came home, the youngest girl said that next year she wanted to go to. No fussing (amazingly enough as she was in the worst stretch of her ODD at the time) but just plain simple statement that next year she wanted to go. She was going to be 4 so we thought quickly and decided, yeah, it would be cool.

Our son has generally not been overly concerned with Halloween,  his autism and quirks just meant that he really could not care less. We took him to a church “trunk or treat” a couple of times and he was ok with it, but just no real hype. Trunk or Treat always runs the Sunday before Halloween so when we ran through it this year, we noticed a bit more interest and fun in him when he was doing it. On a whim we asked him in an offhanded way if he wanted to go out for trick or treating this year and he seemed to think the idea was a great one (he is essentially non verbal so we use what cues we get to determine his interest).

So we decided this year we would change it up, we took all three kids and both of us and went out with all the kids. The youngest is spirited at her quietest and tonight was not her quietest, you could definitely tell she was enjoying herself to the limit. However, what was really interesting was watching our son. Being autistic, he has his quirks and you are only going to get him totally involved in any activity for so long, but the truth is that for the majority of his attention span he was enjoying himself, happily trailing along after his sisters with only the minimal controls.

He definitely tapped out before his sisters did but for the time he was into it, he truly seemed to enjoy going house to house, seeing the decorations and generally participating to the best of his ability.  Will he be interested next year? Time will tell, but for this year our son spent an hour doing the same stuff most other kids his age does and he enjoyed it.

That in itself makes this one of the best Halloweens we have had.