There's a J In there… Somewhere!

We’ve all seen the images, a sleepy child curled up on the lap of their adoring parent sharing a bedtime story. This is a common image that is shared in parenting circles to promote the benefits of bedtime stories and how wonderful it is.

Even the other day, I heard a discussion on the radio that was romanticizing bedtime stories, even though the presenter admitted she struggled many nights.

When you’re autistic and/or ADHD, and so are your children, bedtime stories may not look like this at all, especially if you’ve all had a long day.

First of all, you may be ‘touched out’. This happened a lot when my kids were small. I had spent the whole day with kids climbing on me, holding my hand or my leg, carrying them, helping them with everything from changing clothes to toilet training. By the time bedtime came around, I didn’t want to be touched any more, let alone have a child curled up on my lap. They were often feeling the same way and didn’t want to be touched either.

Second, by the end of the day, I was exhausted, and reading a story at bedtime was yet another thing to do. When my kids were small, I was lucky to live with my parents and they would often do bedtime stories for the kids while tidied up after bathtime, even then, it wasn’t always the lovely, calm picture that is shown in stock images.

Third, by the end of the day, I didn’t have the patience to read either the same story over and over, wait for the kids to take their time choosing stories, or read a dozen different stories!

This is not to say that I didn’t read bedtime stories.

A few things that helped me, as well as having someone else in the household read to the kids, include the following:

• Limit the number of books or chapters, and stick to it – with two kids, if there wasn’t a limit, then story time could go on for a while. It was usually one or two picture books each, and once we were reading them novels it was usually one chapter, unless they were particularly short. There were some nights when they pushed the boundaries and, if I wasn’t too tired, they would get more stories, but having a limit at the start certainly helped.
• Silent reading after storytime – Once they were a bit older, and they wanted more stories, after I had tucked them in to bed they were allowed some time to read books quietly to themselves. Before they had learned to read, they would often look at the pages of their favourite picture books. There were some nights I forgot to go in and turn off the light, finding them fast asleep with their lamp on and surrounded by books, but usually I stuck to their reading time.
• Audiobooks – for a while, my kids would listen to audiobooks on CD to go to sleep. Most nights, this was in addition to the story they had read to them. You can get audiobooks on various apps, or you can still borrow a CD from the library if you don’t want devices in the kids rooms.
• Grandparents & other friends/relatives – Grandparents were an invaluable resource for bedtime stories. If you don’t live with grandparents, you could Facetime with them and have them read a story. If you can arrange it, both of you having a copy of the book can be useful, if not, reading them and showing the pictures works. If you don’t have access to grandparents, then other friends or relatives may be happy to read stories to your kids.
• Daytime storytime – there was a time when bedtime stories were just too hard, so we would read together earlier in the day when I wasn’t so exhausted and we were all happier to curl up with a book. We had a house that was full of books, so there were often opportunities during the day for a story. This also taught the kids that books weren’t only for bedtime.
• Sit on the bed and not curled up together – more often than not, the kids were lying in their bed and I was sitting next to them as I read without us touching. This helped on nights when we were all ‘touched out’ and the idea of further cuddles was more than I could cope with. We were still enjoying a story together, just not touching.

I was undiagnosed autistic and ADHD when my kids were small, and these are a few of the strategies I used to make storytime easier, but there were still some nights when all felt like too much. Having constant messages that somehow my kids would grow up not being able to read if we didn’t have storytime every night made the mum guilt huge… looking back, those missed nights didn’t have much impact as my kids were advanced readers!

If you’re an autistic and/or ADHD parent of autistic and/or ADHD children, find some things that work for your family. The romantic view of the sleepy child curled up on the lap of a parent enjoying a story at bedtime may not be what it looks like in your house, take comfort knowing that you are doing your best and there are other ways to share a love of stories with your children, even if it isn’t at bedtime.