Sating My Wanderlust

I’d start with Switzerland, the US of A, Canada, and Australia because we have family there, and we’d love to see them. And then, of course, there are my favorite places I’m dying to see again like Santander and Paris. Check out a couple of anecdotes I have regarding my Spain visit.

View at Medium.com

View at Medium.com

I’d like to visit so many places. It was always my intention to make travel a big part of my life, and it was until autism entered the scene. We got to travel by plane with my first son, but he was still a toddler at that time and easier to manage. My youngest has yet to experience a plane ride. We’re just too leery of how that would pan out, so we have yet to attempt it.

Nonetheless, I’m praying that they would be able to visit other countries as well, that we would find tools to use for their sensory issues or, even better, that the SPD would go away completely.

I get so stressed just imagining the flight with all those tales of airplane Karens in the back of my mind. What would we do when the boys start their verbal stimming, if they have a meltdown? They’re used to land travel in a private vehicle, but they hate being stuck in traffic. That’s usually a meltdown trigger. Would they be able to manage sitting in one place for such a long time?

How would they react to takeoff and landing? I can imagine the noise and the ear sensation leading to screaming. Maybe we could try with a local flight before we even consider more than 10 hours of travel. Then again, it’s not just the flight, really. All those waiting times involved? I shudder to see my boys suffering through them. It’s also all about keeping them in safe spaces. We have to consider my youngest’s eloping inclination. Then there are the sensory sensitivities as well. There are just too many unknowns. I’m already exhausted thinking about it.

If autism didn’t figure into my travel plans, some of the new places I’d love to see are Prague, Salzburg, Bavaria, Greenland, and Patagonia.

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