School’s Out for Summer: 3 Key Steps to Help Neurodivergent Kids Through Summer Transitions Without Parent Burnout
Benefits and Challenges of School Transitions for Neurodivergent Kids and Parents
As the school year draws to a close, many families look forward to the relaxed pace and freedom of summer. However, for families with neurodivergent children, such as autistic, gifted, ADHD, twice-exceptional (2e), PDA, AuDHD, or other differently wired kids, summer break can bring up a range of emotions and expectations. On one hand, the end of the school year offers a welcome relief from homework, the social and academic demands of school, and many of the challenges that neurodivergent kids may face as part of the daily school grind. Summer break can be an opportunity for deep rest and recuperation for both kids and parents. However, wrapping up another school year also means that the consistent structure of school, any positive support and social connections at school, and programming and cognitive stimulation that many neurodivergent kids rely on may become less available.
The changes in routine, structure, and support that come with summer can be overwhelming and destabilizing; leading to increased anxiety, meltdowns, and a sense of chaos for both children and their parents. For moms, dads, and other primary caregivers, the responsibility of creating a supportive and engaging routine and environment without the regular resources and support systems of school can be daunting. By understanding the changes inherent in this transition from school to summer; identifying their child’s and family’s needs and resources; and planning with these changes, needs, and resources in mind, parents can support their children through this shift while also taking steps to prevent their own overwhelm and burnout.
What is Parent Burnout?
Parent burnout is the feeling of physical and mental exhaustion that comes from a chronic experience of being overwhelmed by parenting demands. Parent burnout is marked by four key indicators, but at its essence, parental burnout is related to a prolonged imbalance between the responsibilities and demands of parenting and the resources available to meet those demands, resulting in stress and struggle. As demands and resources shift in the summer months, the key to preventing parental burnout lies in parents understanding and balancing the unique needs and resources of their child and family during this transitional period.
How to Support Neurodivergent Kids During Summer Without Parental Burnout
It’s essential for parents to identify their child’s needs during the summer months and access the resources to meet those needs in order to prevent stress, conflict, meltdowns, and burnout for neurodivergent kids and their parents. Following these three guidelines can help keep the whole family in balance and out of burnout this summer.
1. Identify Strengths and Challenges: Notice What Works for Your Neurodivergent Child
It is helpful to bear in mind what you know about your child and their capacities when making plans for summer. No list of considerations will be complete for your specific child, but there are some things that can be helpful to reflect on for many neurodivergent children.
Neurodivegent Time Management
Autistic, ADHD, gifted, twice-exceptional (2E) and other neurodivergent kids and teens may struggle without the structure of school, or they may prefer the relaxing freedom of unscheduled time during the summer months.
One thing to think about is your child’s comfort with structure. Observe whether your child does better with a predictable routine or a more relaxed approach. Consider what type and level of structure is supportive for them rather than restrictive or overwhelming. A child who relies on the predictability of school might struggle with the open-ended nature of summer days. To address this, maintaining some routine elements, like a consistent bedtime, or creating a visual schedule for daily activities can help ease the transition and provide comforting predictability. Summer camps, classes, or programs that offer structure and stimulation while also supporting your child’s needs may be helpful to explore.
For children whose energy, interests, or needs are more effectively supported with a relaxed and flexible schedule, the summer may be a great opportunity to reduce scheduling demands and let them have more agency to go with their own flow and meet their needs at their own pace. If your child is groggy and slow to wake up in the mornings but has restless energy in the afternoon, consider this when thinking about activities to build into their summer routine so that you are working with, rather than against your child’s needs and capacities if possible. If your child struggles with being able to predict or regulate their energy and mood, having the autonomy and flexibility to structure their days, and the ability to modify plans or opt out of scheduled activities may help to reduce stress and tension for the whole family.
Summertime can be a great time for neurodivergent kids to deep dive into Special Interests (SPINs). Avoid parent burnout by leveraging passions and focused interests to entertain, teach, and inspire your child.
Special Interests: Autism, ADHD, Gifted & 2E SPINs and Passions
Many neurodivergent kids have areas of interest that are true passions; diving their curiosity. Monotropism, or the ability to focus deep attention on a few areas of interest, is a common characteristic of autistic kids. ADHDers, gifted kids, and twice-exceptional children may have a strong capacity to focus their attention on an activity of high interest or novelty for a long period of time.
If possible, talk to your child about what might interest them for the summer, or what they might want to learn about or spend more time doing. Leveraging your child's interests can transform summer into a season of joy and discovery. If your child loves music, for instance, you could plan a summer filled with musical activities such as attending concerts, enrolling in music classes, or having access to instruments to allow for self-guided exploration at home. If your child has a passion for nature, you can plan activities like nature hikes, visits to botanical gardens, or starting a small garden in the yard or windowsill. These activities can keep your child excited and engaged while providing a sense of continuity and purpose. Science kits, art supplies, building sets, and open-ended materials can allow for creative exploration and self-paced learning. Local and online classes that dive deep into interest areas such as the stock market, coding, cooking, gaming, math, music, creative writing, science, art, and more can help your child dig in with subjects that they love.
2. Anticipate Needs: What Are Your Neurodivergent Child’s Support Needs During Summer?
In assessing your child’s challenges and strengths you can begin to identify and anticipate what their support needs may be and start to think about how those needs can be effectively met or accommodated with the resources available to your family.
Neurodivegence and Sensory Needs
Understanding and meeting your child’s sensory needs this summer can help support regulation and reduce stress, meltdowns, and parent burnout.
Other need areas to consider include your child’s sensory needs. Supporting your child's sensory needs can help them access their interests without overwhelming their nervous system and contributing to meltdowns. If your child loves nature but is sensitive to sensory input, plan visits to quiet, serene locations rather than crowded parks. Equip them with sensory tools like earplugs or fidget tools to help them manage their sensory environment throughout the summer. If your child’s sensory system craves stimulus, movement, or lots of input, visits to parks, pools, and other summer-friendly spots, or freedom to play with water balloons or the sprinkler outside may feed their sensory system and support sensory regulation.
Neurodivergent Social Battery and Social Needs
Balancing social interactions based on your child's social energy and preferences is another opportunity to support a positive summer experience for the whole family. For instance, if your child enjoys music but finds social gatherings exhausting, consider arranging one-on-one music lessons or virtual jam sessions. This way, they can engage with their interest in a controlled, less overwhelming social setting that respects their need for balance between interaction and solitude. Taking an online class with a small group of peers may be more enjoyable and less socially demanding than a local day camp or overnight camp experience. If a shorter, quiet, family vacation to a rental home with a pool is what helps your family connect and recharge without overwhelming your child’s sensory system or social battery, consider whether trying to make a crowded amusement park vacation happen is a compassionate or wise plan for your family.
Neurodivergent Interoception and Body Wellness Needs
Meeting your child’s body wellness needs is also important for their physical and mental well-being. Movement, outdoor time, hydration, nutrition, sleep, toileting, and hygiene are all important needs to consider when thinking about the two to three months of summer break. Many neurodivergent kids may not have a well-developed sense of interoception, or an awareness and understanding of the cues from inside their body about how their body is feeling or what their body may need to stay regulated and comfortable.
With a less structured schedule or routine, many neurodivergent kids may struggle with noticing, managing and effectively addressing the needs of their bodies. However, not meeting these needs may result in dysregulation and distress that drains emotional and physical resources from you and from your child. It can be tough enough for stretched parents to remember to feed or water themselves, let alone remind a child to drink, move, shower, or sleep. Struggling to balance this is normal, however, these needs are essential to meet for your child’s overall wellness, and for yours. Think about your child’s support needs in these areas and how you might help them to better meet these needs without it becoming overwhelming for you.
Meeting neurodivergent kids’ body wellness needs in summer can look different than during the school year. Flexibility with time outside, movement, sleep schedules, and more may be easier to accommodate.
Consider what “good enough” looks like in these areas for your child and your family. Perhaps the summer transition can allow for reduced demands or added flexibility related to tasks like changing clothes, eating, bathing, sleep schedules, or outdoor time in a way that can provide greater ease. Imagine how you might support and accommodate their needs and yours realistically and compassionately to avoid burnout.
Engaging your child in conversations to determine their needs and challenges in these areas can be helpful in establishing reasonable expectations and accessing effective resources to support meeting those demands. Additionally, communicating with your child about the reduced or adjusted expectations for summer body wellness, as well as the resources available to help them care for their body wellness needs can lessen stress down the line.
3. Maintain Balance: Prepare to Meet Your Child’s Needs Without Overwhelming Yourself
A key element of burnout is the chronic imbalance of demands and the resources needed to meet the demands. So, as demands and resources change during the summer months, it is crucial to identify these needs and consider how community, online, family, or other resources can be accessed and reallocated to maintain balance and prevent burnout.
Access Support Resources to Reduce Parenting Demands and Parental Burnout Risk
Enlist support from friends or family to explore interests and share time together during summer transitions. This can provide affirming support for neurodivergent children and respite for parents to prevent parental burnout.
If the summer camp offers affordable, safe, transportation this may support your child’s needs for structure, stimulation, and transportation while conserving your resources of time and energy. If your teenager enjoys cooking, they could take charge of planning and preparing lunch a few days a week. This not only lightens your mental load and time demands but also gives them a sense of responsibility and accomplishment and gets the family fed. If your child enjoys computer programming or gaming, fishing, cooking, bird watching, or other interests, you might arrange for them to spend a few afternoons a week with a comfortable relative or friend who can share and support related activities. This not only meets your child’s needs and expands their support circle, but it also gives you some much-needed time to attend to other responsibilities or simply take a break to restore your energy.
Set Realistic Expectations for Your Child and Yourself to Prevent Parent Burnout
Helping your neurodivergent child through summer transitions involves setting realistic expectations and being willing to change them as needed. It’s important to let go of the idea that your child’s summer needs to look like other children’s. Focus on what works best for your family and reduce commitments or expectations that feel burdensome. By simplifying demands and prioritizing well-being, you can ensure a more relaxed and enjoyable summer for everyone. Planning fewer but more meaningful and manageable activities can reduce stress for both children and parents.
The keys to success in preventing parent burnout during summer transitions are a realistic understanding of your neurodivergent child’s needs; a compassionate awareness of your resources and capacities; a reasonable plan to support your child’s needs without depleting yourself or your family’s resources in the process; and a willingness to adjust plans to better balance needs and resources as they evolve or become clearer.
Seeking Support for Neurodiversity-Affirming Parenting Without Burnout?
It can be a real challenge to support the dynamic needs of your neurodivergent child in an affirming way and through transitions like the end of the school year or going back to school in the fall. Having a sense of your child’s needs and a plan to support those needs while maintaining balance for you and your family can help prevent or heal parent burnout. Healthier, less stressed, and more balanced parents report higher levels of satisfaction with their parenting role and feel more emotionally connected to their children than parents struggling with parental burnout.
If you are looking for assistance to find balance while parenting your neurodivergent child to prevent or recover from parental burnout, check out Shore Therapy’s online classes for neurodivergent parenting without burnout or consider whether the support of neurodiversity-affirming parent therapy may help.
At Shore Therapy, there is a commitment to providing high-quality, transformative, therapy for neurodivergent parents and therapy for parents of kids with special needs or higher needs to prevent parent burnout. If you think that neurodiversity-affirming therapy might help you and your family, contact me for a free consultation call. I'll be happy to answer your questions about parent burnout therapy or other stress and trauma-related therapies such as EMDR therapy or virtual EMDR therapy online. I specialize in therapy for trauma and PTSD and affirmative therapy with marginalized populations including LGBTQ and neurodivergent humans. I proudly serve individuals in Chicago North Shore, and throughout Illinois, as well as online therapy in over 35 states across the US. Read more about me and my training and experience, and reach out today.
