Thank you Walmart!

So Halloween is a big deal in our family. It happens to be the first day my husband and I had our official date 31 years ago. We love everything about Halloween. We dress up we make a big deal about it and have a ton of fun. After our daughter was diagnosed with autism however our Halloween celebrations ended abruptly. The costumes made her crazy either looking at them or us putting them on her. The constant input of people scaring her or wearing spooky costumes made her crazy. She could not stand trick-or-treaters and constantly shut the door on them. After about three years of this my husband and I simply gave up. We understood that Halloween was no longer our special place but rather a time where we would have to hunker down and help her process why the whole entire Community engaged in this annual and ritualistic and extremely FUN day.

Of course then she couldn’t tell us all the challenges that she had related Halloween. We gleaned them over the years and just adjusted.

This week our caregiver extraordinaire shared a link to Walmart’s new pumpkins- the BLUE basket. I have to say I was overwhelmed. It’s a small gesture but a very important one. When our daughter was little we spent more time explaining to people why she acted the way she did. We could say she was autistic and it made no difference. The truth is people were annoyed because they wanted to celebrate Halloween and they didn’t want to stop their celebration even under the circumstances we shared. This BLUE basket is a clear symbol and simple solution to let our fellow community members know when someone has different sensory challenges. I don’t know who thought of this but I am grateful that it is being sold for a reasonable rate at your local Walmart. To those of us who live this life it makes a difference. Thank you Walmart!