How to survive festive gatherings as an Autistic adult

Because you deserve to feel magical too!

These days, it’s easy to find articles and content on how to support your neurodivergent child during the festive season. I love that there is so much neuroaffirming information out there for parents these days.

But as my co-host Julia Jones and I discuss on our soon-to-be-released podcast, Exploring Autism, autistic children grow up to be autistic adults.

And as an autistic adult, I find this time of year hard to cope with. Challenges include: disruption to routine, sensory overload, numerous social events and executive function demands (logistics, presents, food etc).

So I have written a guide to coping with one specific aspect of the festive season, which is gatherings (usually family). My context is Christmas but you can apply it to Hanukkah, Yule or any other gathering. Feel free to take what is relevant and leave the rest.

(Also! You don’t have to identify as autistic to benefit from this guide.)

This guide comes in three parts:

1.     Preparing for the gathering

2.     Coping while at the gathering

3.     Planning your recovery for after the gathering

Part one: Preparing for the event

Only go to events you have decided to go to

The world will not spontaneously combust because you decide not to attend a family gathering.

I personally did not realise this until my counsellor told me.

This is definitely a ‘do as I say, not as I do’ situation. I still can’t imagine just RSVP-ing ‘no’ to a Christmas family gathering, without an explanation like “I’m giving birth” or “I recently died.”

But sometimes even just knowing that I technically am not being forced to be there helps me reframe it as a choice. I could leave at any time.

Get people to advocate for you

The best thing about self-identification of autism is that you can start advocating for your accommodation needs as soon as you accept that you are autistic. (This is something else we discuss in the upcoming podcast).

It is likely you know what your needs are. Actually getting them met can be a completely different story. The good news is we are not alone in this.

As I mentioned in the section above, your support person might be a romantic partner. But it might be a friend you bring along as a friend-date. Or your favourite cousin you only see at Christmas.

Whoever they are, you can let them know your needs ahead of time so they can make suggestions and run interference on nosy relatives.

Reduce demands

There is so much extra pressure at Christmas: buying the perfect Christmas presents, contributing to food (and making it special!), making Christmas magical for the child/ren in your life; hosting gatherings – with a perfectly clean and tidy home... the list goes on.

Here are some ways you could reduce or eliminate demands:

-       Embracing ‘good enough’.  Francesca Liberatore of Radical Mothering calls this ‘Half-assing the holiday season.’ You can apply this approach to presents, the state of your house, and the magic quotient of the children’s experience of Christmas.

-       Leaning into ‘laziness’. Because laziness does not exist. If this time of year is hard for you, it’s okay to ‘contribute less’ than others. That’s not unfair; it’s equitable.

-       Leading a revolution to reduce demands for everyone attending the gathering. Can we do a Kris Kringle this year instead of everyone buying for everyone? Do we have to do a full fancy meal or can we do a Christmas brunch and have bacon and egg rolls instead? This year, for one of the gatherings I am attending, we collectively agreed to eliminate present expectations altogether. People will give presents if they want but there is zero requirement. It’s just for this year, but I am blissed out about this decision.

-       Delegating demands. For the last few Christmases, my partner has been in charge of presents. I have two presents to buy this year – one for a Kris Kringle and one for my partner. It’s a relief and I also get the thrill of knowing I’m doing my bit for gender equity in the home.

Part two: Tips for while you are at the gathering:

Take breaks when you need them

Organise a sensory room ahead of time. If you are gathering at a house, reach out to your host to ask them where would be the best place for your sensory room. Then word up¹ (1) your support person (this might be your partner if you have one or anyone at the gathering who is an ally) so they can field questions about where you have disappeared to. “She is just having a break. She will be back in a bit.”

Bring something to stim with

For me it’s usually crochet. But I have also been getting into doing abstract drawings with oil pastels. If you are worried about appearing weird, it might help to have your support people onside to fend off curious comments. Like, “Hey, she is enjoying herself, let her be.” And this leads me to the next tip:

You get to decide who you are at this gathering

Families have a tendency to typecast us, but we don’t have to conform to their vision of who we are.

A few months ago I rang a close friend early in the morning in tears over a flare-up in ongoing family conflict, and she gave me some advice I will treasure forever:

“You get to decide your place in your family. You can choose which family gatherings you go to and what you do while you are there. You can be the weird auntie in the corner if you want.”

Part three: Plan downtime after the event.

Do you ever have the experience of getting so exhausted from attending intense gatherings that you lose days of your life afterwards? What if instead of losing time, you reframed that time and planned for it?

If you brainstorm fun, nourishing activities now, you have the beginnings of a plan for recovery and something special to look forward to.

You know best what activities are going to bring you joy. (We autistics often have very specific desires).

Here are some ideas to start you off:

-       Watching your favourite TV shows and movies

-       Researching special interests

-       Taking baths

-       Being in nature

-       Listening to comedy podcasts

-       Listening to music

-       Napping

-       Eating samefoods

-       Cuddling the people and/or animals you live with (if your relationship with them involves cuddling and they consent to it).

For more ideas, check out D.L. Mayfield’s article about regulating your nervous system here:

The big ol' list of how I regulated my nervous system in 2023

As much as I hate the extra social demands leading up to and during Christmas Day, I also hate the eerie quiet when everything shuts down between Christmas Day and New Year’s² (2).

Having a list of nourishing activities to engage in will help me resist the urge to spend that time on home tasks I have been putting off, like organising the perennial pile of mess in the corner of my study.

Please join me in self-compassion in the quietest week of the year and choose TV over housework!

I hope this all helps. Here’s to being the weird auntie (or equivalent for your gender) in the corner!

1. One friend from my online writing group who helped me with edits for this piece didn’t know what “word up” meant. I didn’t realise it was regional dialect – I am in Australia and they are in America. I decided to keep it in but with a definition: It means “to brief”.

2. I am already dreading the library being closed for that time. I have been stashing books like a book dragon in anticipation. I currently have 12 books checked out from the library.