Mother of an Aspie needs some advice...

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My 13 year old son is an Aspie. He has been diagnosed for 7 years now. We have him in therapy, a after school program for social skills, He has a case manager that works with him on life skills and he has made great strides over the last few years.

Ok on to my problem.

I came home today and my younger son 12 had a friend over and they had been in the kitchen. The friend had made the statement that he is not afraid of anything. So my Aspie son went to the knife drawer and pulled out a knife and held it up to the boy and asked are you scared now. Now he was not angry and did this solely to test the boys statement. This scares me. It seams to be there is a disconnect of a rational thought process when it comes to his actions. I am totally at a loss on how to move forward with this from a teaching standpoint. I never thought he would do anything like this.

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Ask him why he did it. Also be honest with him. Beating around the bush won't do anyone any good. Explain to him as clearly as you can why that worries you, and how it will affect his brother's relationships.

But I could be wrong, maybe he was trying to joke around. :shrugs: Not that that's a good way to do it.

It may seem quite inappropriate, but what he did does follow a logical train of thought.

Just explain that it's against the law to do such, and similar things; since "we're" rule orientated, it'll probably work.

Taking things literally and all that....

I agree with Dillogic - it is an effective way of proving his point. But he should understand that following the logical course should be tempered with an eye to the bigger picture. That there are many consequences to his "demonstration" that he may miss in his exuberance to disprove the boy's claim.

Tell your son that pulling a knife on somebody can get him in trouble with the law. Tell him he might go to jail.

I would further expand that out to not just include knives. Anything that is intended to make someone else scared, is asking for jail time trouble. The only possible exception would be to defend his life or the life of another, but still there would be a police inquiry as a result.

I can see where this was the logical thing to do after all he knew he could prove the point that the kid could be scared. We have been working on the thinking before actions as we have been having theft issues. Now I know he is not intending to steal things he just things something is cool and walks off with it to put in his special place in his room. Seams like this might be another type of manifestation of that.

I don't want to over react but I don't want to under react either. As he becomes an adult actions like these will be less and less tolerated.

We have been trying the whole it's against the law to take things that are not yours with the taking of items and we have not gotten to a point yet where the thoughts of this is not mine come before Wow this is shiny and cool and I want it for my collection. Still a work in progress. I know he is a child and still learning I just want to guide him the best that I can.

I like that I will have to use that because it could be more than just that some time later and him being so litteral would not see the connection between to different items.

This wasn't irrational and it shouldn't scare you. It was a simple social blunder.

The problem is that your son didn't know that socially, wielding a knife at all, for any reason, is considered a threat. I doubt he realized that it wasn't socially acceptable to use a knife to prove that it was possible for the other kid to become scared. The kid (as well as you) assumed that he knew it was unacceptable and did it anyway, with the implication that the threat was real, or at least that there was hostile intent. He, on the other hand, was most likely trying to make the point that everyone is capable of feeling fear, and that someone who "isn't afraid of anything" in everyday life would probably still be frightened if someone came after him with a knife.

He knows now, though, I bet. Or at least knows there's some sort of a problem.

Explain to him that any sort of weapon is very unlikely to be taken as non-serious. Same goes for death threats of any sort. While he should be aware that it's possible to make a non-serious death threat (for example, "I'll kill you!" in response to someone's eating the last cookie; threatening someone with a plastic butter knife; threatening to carve out someone's heart with a spoon), it's too complex and chancy a thing for him to experiment with at this point, because mistakes could cause others to believe that he really means to harm them, or at least is trying to bully them. Once he has done more studying on the subject of sarcasm and hyperbole and their use in cynical humor, he may want to try it out, but I'm nearly thirty years old and haven't fully figured it out yet--I think his time is probably better spent in learning other, more widely applicable skills.

a thirteen year old who repeatedly steals is either very immature (think 4 y.o.) or has a conduct disorder. has he ever harmed animals or picked on his younger brother?

Cathy he has not ever picked on animals and the only time he picked on his brother is when he was like 4 and would get angry. He would bite his brother whenever he would get angry. At that time we did not know about his diagnosis. In my reading online i have seen quiet a few posts about Aspie kids with klepto tendencies.

I was a biter and kitten terrorist as well as a pyro -I never did it to extremes and I've carried a lot of remorse for the way I acted. Puberty wiped out all those compulsions overnight. I had a classmate that burned down a local restaurant and went to prison, that scared me so bad to never want to start again, but anyway the call of sex, drugs, rock n roll won out

The kid did have a point; the friend's statement that he isn't afraid of anything is incorrect. But tell him about the word I learned to fear: con se quen ces

[Moved from General Autism Discussion to Parents' Discussion]

i only know four aspies, but we are all honest to a fault. i once stole a $2 book while purchasing a $70 order just to prove i could because all my NT friends already had shoplifted and i felt weird not to have. that's it for me. even for two years when i lived on $300/month (and rent-free housing), i did not steal.

when your son steals do you make him return the item with an apology and ban him from video games (or whatever he craves) for an appropriate period?

I found that with these sorts of things, overreacting was the only way to get my son to understand how serious I was. It is way too easy for him to assume that since mom didn't lose her cool, no one else will,when the truth is that a lot of people WILL overact. Kid's like mine just don't see it as possible, it defies their logic, they know they meant no harm so shouldn't that count?. You do practically have to make a federal case of it so that they WILL understand.

I'd be no holds barred making the point about a knife. I can see taking it slower on theft, but not on the knife. This is too big a trigger in modern society. He needs to know that in his core.

Granted, I always temper it by letting him know that I understand he meant no harm, but then make it clear that I need him to understand it would be super serious with anyone else, and that is why I'm being hard nosed.

what are klepto tendencies? the interenet says it means thinking outside the box, that, or keptomania.
when i was in my twenties i asked a man i dated if he trusts me, and then held a knife to his throat to prove it. he didnt mind. but i'm ashamed of it now and will never do it again. just wanted to see if he really trusted me like he claimed, that's all. and yeah, he did want to see me again.
tell you son what he did was wrong and unacceptable and he can go to jail. tell him how accidents can happen even if he doesnt mean it. tell him the rest of the world would consider it a threat and bullying, even though i'm sure it wasnt meant this way.
tell him of better ways to test if his friend is not afraid of anything. (something that doesnt involve jumping in front of cars. he'll be better off with the knife then).