Sometimes it’s really hard for our family to go places outside of the home. Whether it’s going to church, a park, a holiday get-together, or some other event, it’s difficult for my husband Steve and I to juggle our three kids 3 years old and under.

We’ve probably only been to a restaurant as a family only a handful of times. And it’s only for about 20 minutes. We have to eat fast because we have a 3-year-old, Nicholas, who has Autism. He doesn’t like loud noises, and is uncomfortable around food. Daniel, who is two years old, doesn’t sit still, and our 1-year-old, Grace, who can’t do anything on her own.

We don’t even attempt going to places like the zoo or the museum without bringing someone else with us to help. If we do manage to go somewhere, it lasts no longer than one hour, because that’s all the kids can handle. Now, if we go to one of our parent’s houses, that’s a little different because we have their help, but even then it gets hard after a few hours of being there.

We realized that when we go somewhere, it can’t be for more than a few hours before the kids start getting tired or having meltdowns. We used to hang out at our parent’s houses for an entire day, but realized we can’t do that anymore. When we’re away from home for too long or we’re off our routine, Nicholas starts getting fussy and sometimes melts down. It’s also really hard packing up everything for the entire day. We like for the kids to be able to nap in their own beds before going anywhere, otherwise they have trouble napping or don’t sleep at all.

It has really helped our family to stay at places for a few hours and then leave once things start unraveling. Christmas Day is how we discovered the short-term visit. We showed up at our family’s house an hour late (not on purpose). We ate, we hung out for a little bit, then left. Our entire stay was 2 hours and it was perfect.

We’ve been declining invitations to events where we know we won’t get any help. It sounds selfish, but if we’re going to spend the time getting out of the house, we want to enjoy ourselves a little bit. Over the holidays, we got invited to a get-together hosted by a couple, who would have been the only people we would know at the event. We didn’t go because we wouldn’t have gotten any help with the kids. We wouldn’t have gotten to talk to anyone else. For us, it’s not worth it.

We went to a wedding recently of a good family friend of mine. I was with Nicholas walking around with him in the walker, while Steve was taking care of Grace. My dad was with Daniel somewhere and I didn’t see him for a few hours. We wouldn’t have been able to do it if my parents weren’t there helping. Once Nicholas started to lose it, without question, we packed up and left. We barely got to eat anything. We are so thankful my parents took care of Daniel, because otherwise we couldn’t have gone.

This year we’re really trying not to push ourselves going places that we know our family can’t manage. We know what we can handle now. We know our limits. We know when Nicholas starts getting even a little fussy, it’s time to go. It doesn’t matter what we’re doing, we pack up and leave. Because if we prolong it, his anxiety and meltdowns get worse. This is good for our family and better for our mental health.