Published on 12, July, 2020
My son (who is now 5) was diagnosed with autism 2 years ago is very scared from cars and buses. This anxiety started nearly 3 years ago and I decided that is better stay away from this transport to make him less panicky in the street and help him with sensory overload...thinking it will go away...But it didn't.
As you can imagine I missed a lot of things : weddings, birthdays, family holidays and any trips all together.
His fear of cars and buses is scary to watch and be around. If the bus is too close he will run as far as he can, screaming, hitting and pulling anyone around him.
We can't go anywhere further than 10min away from the house and this is for the last 3 years...
To summarise., my husband and I getting separated. My family thinks I'm lying about his fear because I don't want them to see my son. My ex's family thinks the same. My friends turned their back as well.
I tried slow approach , talking about cars, getting close to them for months. Safe distance from a car is about 1 meter, bus is around 5 meters. Anything closer triggers panic attacks
How to even start moving away from this fear? Anyone had the same issues?Any advice how to approach this problem?
P.s. - I'm not here to listen how horrible people are around me and my son .( Three years is hard to explain in two sentences.) I'm here to find the way to help my son...
What is the trigger for the problem? The noise? Smell? Movement? Being strapped in and helpless? Not being able to see out properly? Does he have toy cars?
The bigger and stronger he gets, the more he will be able to control the situation so he might learn to use this tactic with anything he chooses not to do - so understanding the trigger will be helpful to you.
I think what happened years ago, he was in a car and bus where he got sick . Dizziness and fast moving surrounding makes him freeze. Even when we go with a train he kinda freezes, he doesn't talk or move he just sits there looking so confused.
Now when he sees a bus approaching he would cover his eyes and sometimes ears.
Cars are slightly easier to walk next to, but not too close. Although he tried to open doors at random cars parked in the street couple times, but this stopped and he never got inside.
If it's something to do with car sickness how do I go around it? I tried to explain to him that if we would just sit in the car without moving he won't get sick but it didn't work.
Fear of sickness is quite common. It sounds like he's overloaded - too much new stuff going on for him to process fast enough. Is he interested in toy cars and trains? Are there any transport museums near you? Getting him to understand the mechanisms might make it so he's more interested in the technicalities of what's going on so he has something to concentrate on other than sickness. Another trick is to occupy him with games while out & about - spotting car colours, looking out for landmarks, spotting road signs etc - anything to enable a few successful journeys so the fear of sickness becomes secondary and he looks forward to the 1:1 interaction of going out somewhere.
Spotting things in the distance is better because they are more stationary in the visual field.
Trainspotting and bus-number spotting is a low-risk interaction with transport.
Rewards after journeys can help motivate his mind into something other than fear.