Who is behind Autism Family Travel Guide?
Hello! First, let me explain who I am and what qualifies me to run an autism family travel guide. I am Natasha and I consider myself to be an expert in autism family travel. Why? Because I have been doing it for over six years now, originally travelling with my autistic son, Travis. I now have two sons who are diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum, and I also have a little girl too.
In the past 6+ years, I have travelled to 33 countries and special economic zones around the world, taking all kinds of style of trip: backpacking in Asia, day trips abroad, weekends away, caravan parks in Scotland and England, cruises and so much more. I really do have a massively varied experience in travel and the majority of it has been travel with an autistic child (or autistic children)!
The autism family travel gang
As I mentioned above, I have two autistic kids – both boys. I also have one daughter. My oldest child is Travis and he is 9 years old. My middle child is Luke and he is 3 years old. My youngest child is Sylvie and she is 1 year old. The children travel with me and their Dad, who is named David.
Natasha
I’m Natasha, but I’m known as Tasha to most people. I’m a travel-mad mum of three wildlings. I’ve always enjoyed seeing new places, and I think the passion for that was ignited by family holidays as a child. I’m late diagnosed ADHD like a lot of women from my generation who never got the diagnosis they deserved as a child.
David
My partner and father to my children is David. He also loves to travel but would probably be content doing it a bit less than I want to 😫. David is a business owner at Apex Forestry and spends time planting and maintaining trees to help rewild Scotland. His business employs a number of people, but David still likes to get his hands dirty and pitch in wit the physical aspects of the job.
Travis
Travis is my oldest autistic child. He is a July baby, and loves that his birthday is in the sunny summer period. For his 4th birthday he asked for a trip to Thailand! Travis has both autism and adhd, which autism families often affectionately refer to as audhd. Because Travis is a brilliant masker and master conversationalist, it took a long time and lot’s of fighting and shouting to get his neurodiversity assessments and eventual diagnosis. Travis also suffers from anxious avoidance and has a very real and intense fear of bees. This often controls whether he will go outside and even affects how he will move around inside of our house (to avoid bees that he thinks could have made it in through windows or doors).
Travis’ special interests are: gaming, consoles, YouTube gamers and editing videos of gaming. He will also play around with editing pictures of videos of our dog, Bear.
Luke
Luke is my covid baby, though technically I found out I was pregnant just before the UK lockdown hit in March 2020. I actually found out I was pregnant with him on Mothers Day, and he was then born on his Dad’s birthday! Both of those things are so unique and go to show just how special Luke really is. Luke has a private autism diagnosis but is on the NHS pathway and has been since he was very young. Unfortunately, NHS diagnosis is hard before the age of 5 unless they are absolutely obviously and stereotypically autistic. He is more stereotypically autistic than Travis – he has a speech delay, his sensory issues are more obvious, and he will avoid touch unless it is on his terms, but he is not stereotypically autistic compared to the autistic spectrum popular in general. He can have extreme emotional outbursts with no clear trigger and can be inconsolable for a really long time.
He is 3 now, but I feel like I’ve known him for so much longer – perhaps it is down to so much 1:1 with Luke during covid, or perhaps it is because of so many days spend at home working so hard with him to help him with speech, emotional regulation, gross motor skills and other areas where he was struggling.
Sylvie
Sylvie is our miracle girl. After 70 years of only boys on David’s side of the family, everyone was amazed when we found out she was a girl. Despite her brothers being the ones with ND diagnosis’ Sylvie is absolutely my challenge. Just like her hair, this girl is wild. I wholeheartedly believe that this girl will have some sort of neurodivergent diagnosis in the future, because her behaviour and mannerisms have baffled us since she was born.
Sylvie just turned 1 in April and still sleeps like a newborn. We are exhausted every single day. She is inquisitive and bright, and her mischievous grin makes me smile every single day. I am fascinated by this tiny human and how quickly she turns from baby to child with all of these amazing personality traits and acts of silliness.
Learn more about us on the Autism Family Travel Guide Instagram page.