We've been gathering for church on Wednesday evenings, twice monthly. We celebrated Christmas together this second week of December and won't meet again in an organized sense until the new year. There are six children under the age of 11 in our group. I had decided to buy a gift for each child for the Christmas party.
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A few years back our church showed a video interviewing children about the worst gifts to receive at Christmas...socks was a frequent answer. Despite seeing this video, the message didn't sink in. I was probably distracted by some greater theme like, "Jesus is the reason for the season."
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My autistic child wanted to be a wolf for Halloween. In the obsessed fashion that only she can pull off, she howled at every door so the person behind it would know she was a wolf, not a cat, even though she was wearing cat ears.
Naturally, when I saw a pair of socks with a fuzzy texture she would love and a wolf on them, I thought she would go bananas for them. The price and size of the gift were in line with the individual treasures I had picked for each of the other children to open at the church Christmas party. I purchased this "perfect" gift without a second thought.
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Gift opening with autism is a tricky thing. Expectations are set and many autistics humans struggle with flexible thinking. What this means is if my child anticipates the gift to be something and it is not that something, the reaction will probably be less than flattering. We are working on that reaction. It is known as "the social fake" and it must be taught.
Guess what? My child was not expecting "grey fox socks" and did not appreciate a gift I actually put a lot of thought into. What was supposed to be a fun little gift turned into an evening of navigating emotions (my own included) toward this unexpected gift and her reaction toward it.
Eventually, some dancing lights I put on distracted and relaxed her. While the other kids danced around to Christmas tunes, she surprised me by saying she wanted to talk. We went into her bedroom and closed the door missing the goodbyes for the evening.
She worked through her feelings expressing that socks are "stocking stuffers" and should never be given as a Christmas gift. Why would I buy her "grey fox socks?" I shared the thought I put into the gift and my feelings.
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I came home from work the following day to fuzzy feet loving her new pair of wolf grey fox socks. She gushed how they kept her feet warm and she grinned as she ran her fingers along the tops taking in the texture.
Sometimes neurodiverse people need time to appreciate a gift or adjust their expectations. If you give someone you love a gift this season and don't get the reaction you hope, remember not everyone has mastered the social fake and the genuine appreciation is worth the wait.
Oh and in case you didn't get the message, socks are stocking stuffers.
