Found Something
I have been on a bit of a "cleaning things out" kick lately. Today it was a portion of the area underneath the table in our living room. It is a big round table with essentially a shelf underneath it. Over time, stuff has gotten shoved in there. It is obviously not stuff that we miss, or it wouldn't be under there. Or, as often happens, it is missed but the table is hiding its treasure well. But, I digress.
One of the big differences between girls and boys with autism is what happens to their bodies during puberty - the biggest of which is when girls get their periods. With so much of the focus of autism on boys, this is definitely an area that is greatly lacking in information. I struggled with the process with Cara. I have posted the resource that I found tonight that we used to help get us through.
Cara did not fully potty train until she was ten years old (not unusual for an autistic child). However, she potty trained just months before she started her first period.
It is impossible to tell when a girl is about to start their periods and prepare them for it. It is especially hard with an autistic girl. Cara is very much here and now. As she has gotten older, she has a better hand on what we are going to do in the future. When she was ten, though, that skill wasn't there. As I started to show her the materials for her period, I worried that I would be too early. I was told to practice by using a calendar and measuring out the days as if she were really having periods. I thought that would just confuse the situation because Cara is very concrete and doesn't always transfer general to specific.
Instead, I used the item that I posted in the resources section. It looks like this:
Each strip has an instruction and information on it. Anyway, I went over the cards before her first period came. I had her wear a small pad and she seemed okay with it.
Cara never got upset or freaked out by the blood. She just accepted it. Unfortunately, though, when her first period came, she refused to wear a pad and insisted on wearing a pull up. Pull ups are not designed for periods and are more expensive than pads.
An even larger problem was when Cara dried off after a shower. She paid no addition to the fact that she was getting blood on her towel. We were doing a lot of laundry loads of towels. At the time our cards didn't have anything about the towels.
We made it through two periods and then decided that the battle wasn't worth it. We started her on period suppression medication and let that one go.
This is a tough fight for parents of girls with autism. Many do not like the idea of starting a girl (Cara was about 10 or 11) on hormone treatment so young. And many parents are successful at potty training. With all the "battles" I had getting Cara where she had to be and what therapy she needed to do. There were behaviors to manage and social stories to write and so on...Cara having a period was more than I could handle and I suspect it was for her as well.
Still, the cards on the ring did help me prepare Cara for what was to come. I think they may have worked because she was never upset or afraid of the bleeding. She took the whole thing in stride.
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