I Dropped A Ball And Nearly Missed Christmas: Life In A Neurodivergent Family

In this bonus episode of The Untypical Parent Podcast, I admit something slightly embarrassing: I dropped a ball… a Christmas-shaped ball. Somewhere between broken legs, work deadlines, end-of-term chaos, questionable diary scheduling, and trying to remember if we own wrapping paper (I can't find any and the shops have sold out), I genuinely thought Christmas was still 1.5 weeks away. (It isn’t.)

So, let’s talk about the mental load, especially in neurodivergent families. If your brain feels like an open browser with 86 tabs running, you’re in the right place.

In this episode, I share:

• how juggling life as a neurodivergent family can make dates slide right past you,
• why parents feel extra pressure at Christmas,
• how “dropping a ball” doesn’t make you a bad parent (it makes you a human one),
• simple strategies to survive the festive season without combusting,
• and why self-compassion should be top of the shopping list.

We chat about lists (and forgetting to look at them), boundaries with family gatherings, tiny adjustments that make big differences, and the power of just stepping outside for a breather when things get a bit much.

Key Takeaways

• Neurodivergent parenting = Olympic-level multitasking.
• Christmas adds bonus pressure, lights, noise, lists… and more lists.
• Feeling unprepared is completely normal (especially this week).
• List-making genuinely helps, if you remember where you put the list.
• Communicating boundaries with family can save your sanity.
• Tiny changes > giant expectations.
• Breaks aren’t weaknesses; they’re survival tools.
• You don’t have to “do it all” to be a good parent.
• Looking back brings perspective; looking forward brings hope.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Bonus Intro And Holiday Context
• 1:45 The Big Ball Dropped: Christmas
• 3:49 Real-Life Juggle: Injury, Exams, Work
• 6:14 The Date Mix-Up And Panic
• 8:49 Regrouping With Lists And Perspective
• 11:44 Self-Compassion For Overloaded Parents
• 13:49 Micro-Changes For Neurodivergent Needs

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:30

Hello and welcome back to the Untypical Parent Podcast. This is a bonus episode. We're heading towards Christmas, and life has been lifing, as you might call it. And I thought I'm going to come on and do a little bonus episode about parenting in neurodivergent families. Which is what the podcast is all about. But this feels particularly important, probably, to share around this time of year, but actually probably relates to lots of times through our years. So what happened? I've got a story for you. So the story is of a parent juggling a lot of balls.

SPEAKER_00: 1:24

And you may well relate well to that one.

SPEAKER_01: 1:27

The things that we are juggling just during the weeks, the months, the years, feels like it is huge. And it is huge. It often is huge. When we're in neurodivergent families, we juggle more than the average family, I think. Anyway, I'm known to drop a few balls here and there. I think most of us are when we're juggling as much as we are. But I dropped a rather large ball this week. And that large ball had the name Christmas on it.

SPEAKER_00: 2:07

Now what do I mean? So work has been busy. My youngest broke his leg. We've been stuck in the house really for about six weeks. And there's been a lot on.

SPEAKER_01: 2:25

There's been a lot on. My eldest is in his GCSE years, we're applying to colleges, we're doing college visits. You know what it's like? It all gets a bit like that. With the broken leg has brought difficult times. There's been changes and stresses for all of us as a family, and it's been a tricky time. Anyway, we all go through tricky times, that's what happens, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00: 2:49

We go through these tricky times.

SPEAKER_01: 2:52

And in my wisdom, I was thinking I had loads of time. Like we all do, maybe. Christmas seems to have snuck up on me this year, and I don't know quite how it's happened. And as my partner said to me, Liz, you've had the Christmas tree up for over a month. How did you not realize? And I knew we were heading towards Christmas. I kind of knew that. But in my head, I had that I had another week. So I'm working up until I'm recording today. It's Friday the 19th of December today, and I'm recording today. And I thought, you know, for like appointments and scheduled appointments, I'm finishing today. I've still got work to do over the Christmas, but I'm finishing today. And everything, I kind of, you know, it's been really busy, loads of juggle and whatever. And I just thought, I'll finish on Friday, and then I've got another week and a bit. And I was driving home, my son's mentor on Wednesday, and we were talking about Christmas, and and I know as well along the way, people have been saying to me, Are you ready for Christmas? And I've been kind of going, No, but I've kind of got time, and people have been giving me weird looks. And I just thought, what's all that about? And even to the point my sister and my mum were talking about they were having the Christmas shop delivered today, on Friday. They could be talking to me this week. I mean, we're having it delivered on Friday. I was thinking, that's awfully early for Christmas. Why are they ordering it in? So anyway, still hadn't twigged. Still hadn't twigged. And my partner again said to me, Liz, what date did you think you were actually on? And I was like, I don't know, about the 7th or the 8th of December. And it was actually the 17th of December. I don't know where those ten days went. So we were travelling home in the car. I was I dropped her home after she's been to see my son. We were travelling home, we were talking about Christmas, and I was talking about what loads of time, and she kind of looked at me and I said, You've got like three days next week. And I went, No, no, no, we've got another week and a bit until Christmas. And she just went, No, you haven't. And you know that horrible, horrible feeling of, oh my god, I've dropped a ball. When am I gonna do? How am I gonna do Christmas? How about oh my god, Christmas is gonna be a failure. So I had to come home and do what I tend to do when I've dropped a ball, go to complete panic stations and then pull myself together and go, okay, I've got to make Christmas happen. So how am I gonna make Christmas happen? Anyway, I think I'm on it. I think I'm on it. It's gonna be tight, but I think I'm on it. And for somebody that doesn't like to be rushed or not feel prepared, I often seem to find my life feeling like that. I don't know whether any of you feel like that. But I often I say I don't like the feeling of being unprepared. I'll often make lots of plans and lists and I hadn't even made a list. And I like lists, and if you listen to me any of my other podcasters, when I talk about lifts are like my safety uh lifts, lists. Lists are like my safety net, I hadn't even made a list about Christmas.

SPEAKER_00: 6:28

Have now, don't worry, I've made my list.

SPEAKER_01: 6:31

So I just wanted to come on and reassure you out there that if you've dropped a ball like I have, and like we do, and as I say, this happens not just at Christmas for me, throughout the year. This isn't an annual thing. Um I think it just comes about when we're there's lots on, and this has been a particularly busy December.

SPEAKER_00: 6:55

So if you've dropped a ball this Christmas, or if you're listening to this at a different time and you've dropped a ball, I see ya. It happens. Try not to give yourself a hard time.

SPEAKER_01: 7:10

Try not to beat yourself with that stick of I'm a terrible parent, I should be doing bet we're carrying a lot. We are carrying a lot. I'm managing to laugh now. Um and I thought that's why I'd make a podcast episode about it. That actually it's so ridiculous. How could you drop Christmas? But I did. I dropped Christmas, but I've gathered Christmas back up again. I've probably dropped something else in the process. But Christmas will happen and they'll get presents. Will I be as organized as I want to be? No, but am I ever? Probably not. Not now. So I just wanted to say if you've dropped a ball now or ever before, we all do it. We all do it. And if you're heading towards Christmas and Christmas is bringing with it a sense of a bit of dread or a bit of worry or stress, because let's face it, it does for some of us. I wanted to think and take a minute just to talk about what you could do in those moments. And again, this isn't just for Christmas, it's different, you know, when routines change, when we've got to do things that maybe is outside of our normal routines or expectations, that these kind of things can help as you go along.

SPEAKER_00: 8:27

It takes a bit of bravery, and I know there's this kind of the way of you know, people saying you just got to be brave.

SPEAKER_01: 8:37

Well, actually, that can be really hard, really hard when you risk offending people, upsetting people, it's not an easy thing to do, and it's taken me some years doing little changes over time to be able to get the big changes that I now have. So I I want to acknowledge that actually it's not just as easy as going, well, just do you. People go, well, just do you. But actually, if you're one of those people that worry a lot about upsetting people or worrying that you know you'll be seen in a certain way, or actually worrying that what you do will bring extra stress to other people, or actually to you, that you don't have to do it all in one go. It might be this Christmas, you just choose to do one thing slightly differently. And for example, you what took us a little while in our family is that my son doesn't like the surprise of presents. He wants to know what he's getting and who from. And it's taken us a couple of years, and some of um my family members have found it a bit harder than others, but we are there now, and he writes his Christmas list, assigns people to those presents, and delivers to those people what he wants them to buy him. We have landed on the fact that they are still allowed to wrap them because there's something that they want to be able to give him and they would like to be able to wrap it, and he's okay with that as long as he knows what the present is. So as long as it's not a surprise. And we've got there. That's that's what happens now. But again, this year, Christmas has changed for us. We have usually have a very set routine in what we do for Christmas and where we go, and that has changed this year. He's finding that quite difficult, that it's changed. We are still going to go, but I've had to give my family the heads up that we may not stay long. And as I say, it's been those little changes that we've been able to make over the years. I haven't felt able to change lots very quickly, but we've made little adaptations as we've gone along. And he's discovered coping strategies as we've gone along, and we've found ways round things, and we know that we have to take his airpods, we know that we have to take a phone, we know that we've got to find a space in the house where he can go to to relax. I know that we now don't stay overnight. That's all those kind of things we've learned along the way, and now we've landed, even though things have changed this year, it has caused a bit of upset and a bit of bumpiness, that I know that we have got a plan round it, I know my family understand, and I'm lucky in the fact that they are really good at learning how to include my son as well as adapt round him. Whilst also making sure that everybody else still gets the Christmas they want, and actually it doesn't have a huge effect that it only becomes about one person, it still remains about all of us. So that might be a couple of things, is see where you can make some small changes this Christmas that might just take the pressure off. Make sure you get some breaks in there. You know what I'm like? I'll talk about um making sure that you get those those pause moments is so important during Christmas, and even if that means going shutting yourself out in the garage for 10 minutes, I'm going to get the whatever you're gonna get, pigs in blankets from the freezer or whatever it is. Find an excuse to get yourself out and just take a minute, take a breath, go for a walk, get yourself out in the garage. I go sit on my motorbike in the garage. How weird's that. Um think about how presents happen in your family. You know, we don't just do this for Christmas, we do this for birthdays as well. He needs to know who is getting him what for any kind of present that he receives. And partly that's because, as well, he's told me he worries so much about what his reaction will be or what his face will show. And actually, he's worried about upsetting other people. So we've explained that to family members. So think about that. And the other thing is warn people, tell people, I've had to tell my sister, we probably won't manage the whole of Christmas Day. We're gonna have to probably go at some point. But don't worry about us, don't feel bad about that. I'm I'm really I feel really strongly about that. I don't want people to feel bad for us or pity us or worry about us. We're just gonna do what we need to do and we'll stay for as long as it's comfortable for the majority of us, me included, and my other son. But there will be a point when we'll go, we're gonna go, and that's enough. And you don't need to worry about us. That's absolutely fine. All that leaves me to say is it's been a year. Thank you for being with me over the year. I've thoroughly enjoyed, I think you've probably, if you've seen me on social media, you'd have heard me talk so much about the fact how much I love doing the podcast. So thank you for being with me. Thank you for listening, thank you for downloading. If you don't follow us, or follow me rather, there's an Instagram account specifically for the podcast. And if you like to watch things, we've got a channel on YouTube as well. So go and sign up, subscribe to that. I'm really trying to push it out on YouTube. I know lots of people quite prefer to watch things now rather than just listen. But if you just want to keep listening, obviously that's good too. So I want to say thank you ever so much for being with me and listening and being part of the show. We're into season four next year. We've got amazing, amazing guests coming up. I'm really excited about. And I think you're gonna love them. I think you're gonna love them. There's also gonna be opportunities. So, what I would love is if you have got something you want read out on the podcast, what I'm gonna try and do as well is let you know who I'm recording with. So it might be that you want to send a question in particular to that person when I record. I just record a long way in advance. Sometimes that's not always so easy. But I will be doing episodes with just me. Are they gonna be regular? Probably not knowing me. If I've dropped a ball like I have with this one, you might have gaps in between. But the guest episodes will stay regular, they will stay at once every two weeks, and those will be irregular with me dipping in and out as I have the spoons, and depending on how many balls I have dropped that week. All that leaves me to say is if you're heading into Christmas, whatever you do over the Christmas period, whether you celebrate or not, I hope you have some peaceful times. I hope you have some joy, and I will look forward to seeing you all in the new year. Take care, and I'll see you soon. Bye.