BUDA — Tania van Bree and her family have lived in Buda for 10 years and she has wanted to participate in city-held events, but felt like it would have been difficult for her son, who has Level 3 autism. This led her and the city to join forces in offering feedback on how to implement sensory-friendly initiatives for her family and others and better serve all members of the community.
“He needs the most support for that kind of diagnosis — he is also non-speaking — and large crowds, lots of sound and lots of visually-exciting things sometimes cause him to get really distressed and give him a lot of anxiety, especially if it's new,” van Bree explained. “When there's lots of events happening, we want to still participate and do things as a family, but a lot of times, those awesome family events that we could maybe take my daughter to, we've always had to pick and choose between do we just take my daughter and split up our family or is this something that we're gonna just bail out of entirely because it would be too difficult and too distressing for him.”
On the city’s 2023 post about the annual Trail of Lights event, van Bree commented, asking if they have ever thought about hosting a sensory-friendly night or something similar. As her son, Willem, loves hiking, van Bree said that they go to Stagecoach Park — where Trail of Lights is held — very frequently, so “it's a really good opportunity for him to be in a familiar place with just a little extra pizzazz and the holiday spirit and everything.”
