Is Disneyland a Good Place to Take a Child with Special Needs?

My husband and I are proud parents raising five children ranging in age from 18 months to 8 years old. Doing this is a pretty tricky, not to mention exhausting, task. When you add in the component of a child with special needs, the complexity level of our responsibilities as parents more than doubles. Our two girls and three boys include a seven-year-old son with high functioning Autism, though you shouldn't let the phrase "high functioning" fool you--perhaps "high energy," or "high level of attitude" or "highly spirited" would be a more fitting description of his abilities.

In any event, choosing places to take the family as a whole (all seven of us at once) is not exactly an easy task. There are places that we seem to immediately rule out based on complexity level, and Disneyland has fallen into that category for a few years now. As an often-pregnant mom I have been able to use the excuse of either expecting a baby soon or having just had a baby to dissuade my husband from booking a Disneyland vacation for our family. Since this year was the first in our marriage that I was neither pregnant nor did we have a child under 12 months, I was running out of excuses and so we found a way to purchase a six day, five night Disneyland vacation for our little family, including my autistic son.

We had heard from friends and family that Disneyland employees--or cast members, as they are called--were very good about making accomodations for the disabled. We were not sure if we would fall into that category since my son's disability is mental and social, not physical, so I had some reservations about asking for assistance. I made a call ahead of time and was assured that we could speak with a cast member at City Hall once inside Disneyland and we would receive help from there.

Therefore, upon arising in Disneyland, California, our first stop was at City Hall to ask about arrangements. Without argument or in depth explanation we were quickly provided with a "special needs" pass that allowed us to skip to the front of the line for all rides that our son wished to go on, and this pass was good for the entire family, not just my son and an accompanying adult. We were thrilled since patience is not often a virtue of autistic children, and they often do not do well in large crowds.

Additionally, when fatigued autistic children will often begin "stimming" or their "stimming" will get worse (stimming is a repetitive behavior such as spinning in circles, making small hand movements, and so forth). This being the case, we would not have stayed at Disneyland long without this special pass for our son. There are similar passes for those that are physically disabled, and every effort is made to accommodate anyone wishing and able to ride the various theme park rides.

After being given this special needs "Fast Pass" (not to be confused with other "fast passes" that can be purchased or otherwise obtained for certain theme park rides) we were still even more pleasantly surprised to see how well all Disneyland cast members worked with our family to assist us with my autistic son so that we could all have an enjoyable experience.

We were able to have time to go on more theme park rides in one afternoon than many people are able to do in the entire day. We were concerned that we would be unfairly judged since our son's disability is not physical nor visible, but all Disneyland employees treated us very well--the only critical looks came from other Disneyland Park guests who were unaware of our situation.

In conclusion, we were able to spend five wonderful days at the Disneyland theme park in California with our autistic son and his four siblings with minimal trouble...and even then, the only trouble came from the normal family squabbles that come with hunger and fatigue. I would highly recommend Disneyland as an enjoyable family vacation for anyone with a special needs child, if you feel that you and your child can cope with the large crowds that cannot be avoided. If your child tires easily or his or her disability becomes more pronounced with fatigue I would recommend only spending two to three hours at a time at the park and taking small, frequent breaks.