Cruising with Special Need Kid

[wendygrace]

Hi. We are considering a first time cruise. It would be myself, dh, dd, 6, and ds, 7, who has special needs (asperger's/high functioning autism/adhd). Safety is our number one priority as ds is quite spontaneous although he is getting better. I was considering the Disney cruise but it seems to be double that of other cruises! Could we successfully cruise on other ships/lines? Which would you recommend/not recommend and why? TIA

[tlbuckingham]

Did a little quick research and found a good article on USA Today blog about someones experience with Carnival for just such a thing.

 

http://blogs.usatoday.com/cruiselog/2007/01/cruising_with_s.html

[wendygrace]

Thanks for that article. It had a lot of good info. I'll have to look at Carnival more closely.

[chrystine]

My son is 8 and has PDD. We have sailed on many cruiselines with him- he will be going on his 11th cruise this summer. Carnival has always been great with him (cruised with Carnival ages 2 through 6) and they have always been very accomodating and patient with him. Before you cruise, it might be help to let your son see pictures of the ship and daily Camp Carnival schedules so he can know what to expect and look forward too.

 

As for safety, Camp Carnival's facilities are very safe and you don't need to worry about your son "escaping." As for the rest of the ship, I have never had any problems with my son. You may opt not to book a cabin with a balcony if that would make you feel more secure.

 

Happy Cruising!

[Essiesmom]

There are a number of threads concerning autism...perhaps if you try the search function for autism you will find some.

I just plugged 'autism' into the forum search and got two pages just in the family cruising forum. EM

[JLK22]

I am not sure if you checked out Carnival's boards for this topic but as I was browsing yesterday I noticed this link to carnivalconnections.com, that I think may help you get answers specific to Carnival. The board for cruiseing with special needs had a number of posts about cruising with autism, but here is one that was pretty informative:

 

http://www.carnivalconnections.com/cruisetalk/forums/t/59159.aspx

 

Good Luck!

[wendygrace]

Thank you all so much! I will be sure to look at all of this and do a search. I'm usually am good at doing that but oh so very overwhelmed with all the cruiselines and options. Makes me run and just do Disney. :) I appreciate the direction!

[Julienatul]

Call the cruiselines directly. All have a special needs department. Notify them if there is anything they can provide that will make your sailing easier. As far as safety, it is very difficult to "fall" overboard. Most public areas are surrounded by plexiglass or 5ft railings with mesh or rope covering the openings. You hear about people falling overboard all the time but to do that, they have to bring furniture over to the railing and climb up on it and then jump. You cannot fall "accidently". To get to the outer open decks, you usually have to go through a few heavy doors and even then there are highrailings. When you decide what ship, bring up pictures of it on webshots and you will see. Also you will be right there supervising your child so he wuldnt be able to climb or move furniature without you knowing.

[isk8]

Hi! I have an almost 4 year old son who is on the spectrum, and we are taking our first cruise with him on the Freedom of the Seas in September. He is VERY active, so we chose FOS because it has so many different activities for kids. There's no way he can get bored on that ship. Anyway, I know you asked about specific lines/ships, but I wanted to tell you what we're doing with the off-ship stuff. My goal is to minimize lines and waiting because that's a problem area for my son. So, we are not using the line's transportation. We are getting our own towncar service to and from the port (and Disney because we are going there for two days prior to our cruise). And for excursions, we are doing our own thing. Not only to minimize waiting in line, but to give us the freedom to do whatever we want on our son's schedule.

[Onessa]

My DD's best friend's older brother (now 15YO) is a very high functioning Aspbergers. Their family cruises at least once a year (since before the son was born). The mom is a special ed teacher with advanced degrees specializing in autism

 

Based upon her own experiences and that of the parent's of her students -- she indicated she prefers Princess or RCCI (don't know what, if any, experience she has had with Carnival). She indicated that most of the kid's programs have special training for their staff for special needs kids. For HER son, she avoids NCL because their counselors skew more to female, and her son deals better with "strangers" who are male than those who are female.

 

But she concurs that it is most important to research -- match the cruise and itinerary to her family's needs with special emphasis on her son's special needs. Good luck -- have fun!

[Paumavista]

If I could offer one other piece of advice.......do NOT travel during a holiday or extremely BUSY period. Staff and rooms become overloaded on some holiday occasions. My boys (not identified as special needs...but aren't they all?)...don't enjoy most kids clubs when there are ALOT of kids. We like traveling during off seasons....there are always some kids but they prefer the smaller groups.

 

r/Judy

[crusinmama06]

I have read some recent articles about "Autism on the Seas" joining with Royal Caribbean. Maybe you can search for those cruises?

[nybumpkin]

LHP, who is a poster on the Carnival board, has done numerous cruises with a special needs son and has had very positive experiences with the various age groups in Camp Carnival. They've gone above and beyond for her son. If you look her up, I think she includes an e-mail address where you can reach her.

[wendygrace]

Wow! Lots of helpful advice here. We are definetly sailing off season. We're now looking at January or late Februray (how does Mardi Gras effect things?) and avoiding spring break times.

 

I'll look at Princess and RCI and we're definitely looking at Carnival.

 

Thanks for the tips on excursions. After looking at the trips, I think you're right. There is no way we could keep our son contained in lots of those situations. We'll research the ports and do our own thing and probably spend most of our time on ship where it will be relatively quiet.

 

isk8, let me know how it went please! And if you need any Disney trips, pm me. We've been there twice for over 10 days total and we loved it but there's things you can do to enhance your experience when you have a kid with special needs.

 

Thanks again for everyone's help. What a great group of people!

[flsunnymommy]

I thought I would chime in here. I have done two cruises with my son with high functioning autism. We also have two more planned. We have found RCL very accommodating as a group called Autism on the Seas has partnered up with them. We had private muster drills, dinning, group activities, disembarking, the staff was informed about autism, the same staff worked with our kids daily. We loved it! They help you as much or as little as you want and even have special cruises with 25+ families on the spectrum. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask.

[cruisingram1]

I thought I would chime in here. I have done two cruises with my son with high functioning autism. We also have two more planned. We have found RCL very accommodating as a group called Autism on the Seas has partnered up with them. We had private muster drills, dinning, group activities, disembarking, the staff was informed about autism, the same staff worked with our kids daily. We loved it! They help you as much or as little as you want and even have special cruises with 25+ families on the spectrum. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask.

 

I thought I would add this information about this group.

 

http://www.alumnicruises.org/Autism/Autism_Home.htm

 

We were recently on a RCCL cruise and there was a AOTS group on board. Everyone looked like they were having fun. You might be able to get some more feed back at their website.

[flsunnymommy]

AOTS is also having an information both and information session on the cruises they are on. So be sure to check out your RCL cruise compass and stop by one of the sessions.

[Mrsg324]

I have a high functioning DD with Autism/ADHD. We went on a Carnival cruise and i would highly rec it to anyone. They were wonderful. I contacted their special needs department before the cruise. They contacted me. We weren't in our cabin 10 minutes & they were calling us. They were looking for us at muster, let my daughter decide which group she wanted to join. I could not complain about anything they did. They were amazing.

[kitty9]

On my last cruise on RCI Navigator of the Seas, there were a number of special needs kids on board, and they seemed to be having the time of their lives. There were a few of Down's kids, two in electric wheelchairs, and from what I could tell, a couple of kids on the spectrum. All seemed to be thriving. They had the kids dress in pirates costumes and they joined the parade in the Promenade. It was really cool to see.

[flsunnymommy]

My son was in the Pirate Parade. Watching him perform on stage with the other kids, was the highlight of my cruise

[Pfmk]

We had a great time 4 years ago on Holland America in Alaska in late August. It is quieter then, so the kids program was relaxed and easy going. My high functioning autism son was 8. We are travelling again with HAL to Northern Europe in late August. Only 15 kids will be on ship total (as of now) but that allows a lot of attention from the counselors.

We find the sanity of returning to the same room night after night very comforting to our son (and his typical younger brother). This time we're even taking grandma.

[lds26]

Im so glad that i read this thread b/c my sons are coming with us on our cruise and they both have unique needs. I sent an email to our PVP @ Carnival to ensure that he is aware of their needs and can provide us with security that their needs will be priority to him as well as us. We have to ensure that we have a functioning mini-fridge for medications for our one son as his unique meds will disintegrate if not refrigerated properly. I hope that all these issues will be addressed prior to us going.

 

Linda

[flsunnymommy]

Please make sure once you are able to go to your room on the ship that you do so and check for the fridge. When we checked we did not have a fridge. It then took almost a day to get one. So now we know to check before we leave he dock.

[Kerry's Girls]

We have to ensure that we have a functioning mini-fridge for medications for our one son as his unique meds will disintegrate if not refrigerated properly. I hope that all these issues will be addressed prior to us going.

 

Linda

 

You might want to bring a back-up cooler just in case. Often the little fridges on ships don't stay very cold, so even if you are supplied with one, it may not do the trick. When I cruised with meds that needed to be kept cold, we put them in a zip lock in a cooler and the room steward kept it filled with ice.

 

Best,

Mia