I have an 8 year old son with autism and two younger neurotypical girls. I can honestly say that my main driver for heading towards FI is to ensure my son will be ok. He is moderately functioning and even if he crosses over into high functioning territory, he will likely remain immature for his age. My biggest fears involve him being taken advantage of in this dog eat dog world we live in. Currently we reside in the Seattle area and plan to re-locate within the next few years to enable us a cheaper COL and a home that can be his forever home. Ideal is mustachian lifestyle where he can walk/bike to everything he needs. A cute neighborhood where our neighbors know us and will be eyes and ears as he ages. In a perfect world, my daughter’s will grow up and oversee his care as needed but in case that doesn’t happen, we want a paid off home and a trust in place for him. The future for him is unknown right now and we are older parents so the plan is to save, buy a home, pay it off, save and save some more. I can relate to many of the posts on here and I’m here for advise or a listen and a nod. I get it. Oh, do I get it. I’m with ya.
I have an autistic 11 year old who also has ADHD and is gifted in math. He has significant executive functioning deficits, delayed processing speed, and a lot of sensory challenges.
The sensory stuff has been a big issue at school, on the bus, and in group childcare. As many of you have e mentioned, it is those small things that can really make it difficult- we are hiring a nanny for summer childcare this year because DS just cannot cope with the chaos of the community center childcare. Trying to anticipate and work around 20 different things like that is exhausting.
I am pretty engaged with the autistic adult community in my city and they feel very strongly that a lot of autism therapy is very damaging- especially the traditional ABA model where you train your kid like a dog to be neurotypical. So that information our choices.
I think our son will be able to work and live independently with support. Luckily his academic strengths and special interests (computers, math, coding) line up with careers that are typically accepting of the quirks of autism. So we are hopeful that with someone (us until we die, perhaps then his sister or a spouse) to help with management of things like paying bills, etc, he will do ok. I do think he will need support though his mid 20's- we won't be able to just drop him off at the dorms freshman year and be done!
We are tentatively planning to fire when our youngest (currently 9) goes to college, so about 9 years. We probably could a little before then but we don't see much point when we are still beholden to the school calendar. But our son's situation will significantly affect that. We would definitely work longer to fill a trust (or whatever) that would provide him with a basic apartment, etc, for a worst case scenario. And probably similar if not equal for his sister. She will have responsibility for her brother (should she choose to accept it) and I want to compensate her for that.
My situation is somewhat similar to
@Bittle and
@MayDay.
My son is 10, he has Asperger's, he is very gifted in math, computers and coding, he is in EY tier 3 in math, keeps being in 99 percentile in all MAPS tests for our district (a very good school district), out of the charts for other math tests. Other parents would have probably wanted their son to skip a few grades, but I know that he needs social skills more than anything else. I have noticed very early, when he was 3, that he's different (his older sister is only 16 months older, so I had someone "recent" to compare him to). We started even before the preschool to "teach him how to appear normal." And he's doing quite well, now it takes a long time for people to figure it out, if ever. He has less problems at school this year, less classmates are making fun of him now, and he seems happier. But every time there is always a situation when he reminds me that we still don't have a script for every situation. He called me today to ask if I liked it that in the previous phone conversation he had hanged up immediately after he said , "goodbye" (he just wanted a confirmation that I approve this behavior). At least he doesn't ask me to confirm that his favorite color is red. Parents of "normal" kids just don't get it, they probably think that I'm a very controlling mom, if my child needs to ask me, "was it ok to hang up after I said 'goodbye'?" No, it's just my son wants a structure and a clear answer to every possible situation, a clear "yes or no" answer to every possible situation. In his world, I should know an answer to what his favorite color or movie is, and that there is a correct answer and someone other than him might know it for sure.
My fear is also that he could be taken advantage of. He trusts me now, but I don't know if that's going to be the case when he is 18 or 20. I'm "Love and Logic" parent, not a helicopter one, but with him I'm more of a drill sergeant/friend. It seems like it takes him more time to "learn" a lesson. Even though he knows that if he's not in the car by 830am, he is going to walk to school, after every summer we get a few "walk to school" days. I try not to bend the rules just for him, but it simply doesn't work for him to follow the rules like his sister does.