6 year old Mini Dictator

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I am new here, have been doing tons of reading and was wondering if anyone else has the same type of thing with their kid(s).

My 6 (will be 6 on the 6th) year old son is like a mini dictator when we play. He loves to play imaginary games. Like, he will be Darth Vader and tells me that I am the other Darth Vader, or so and so. He likes to tell me "how" to play, to the point where if I do something he doesn't like he will tell me that I am playing wrong and insist that I do it such and such way.

He will change it up to his current obsession, he is mario and I am luigi or power rangers, etc. He even tells me how to talk! what my voice should sound like. He loves to play and comes up with the most awesome stories, but he is so demanding!

He has recently become obsessed with numbers, probably because he started kindergarten this year. He says that 8 is his favorite number and that he wants to be called 8, I am called 5, his step dad is 2 and he even gave everyone in our close family that he interacts with a number. He then gets mad if I call him by his real name and yells at me to call him his number.

He just seems to be so "controlling" of how we play. He is the same with video games, you have to play his way or he will have a fit. If we play Mario WII he chooses my character. He even tells me that my favorite color is blue, I don't really have a choice. I'm not sure how he is with the kids at school, he doesn't really interact with many kids when we are home, he is an only child and there are not many kids in our development.

Just wondering if this is a "spectrum" trait or if he is just a bossy guy?

He also got in trouble the other day for spitting (! !) on another kid in school. He is NEVER bad and I was shocked when I heard this. I asked him why he did that and he said the kid was acting "crazy" and was not standing in the right place in the lunch line..

Thanks for any insight!!

--Megan

Yes, this is my personal bugaboo with my own son, who is 11 - rigidity. He also can't play board games (though he's getting better) or games of chance, because not knowing the outcome is too difficult for him (if you say you're going to play a game and he will always lose, he can tolerate that: it's the not knowing)

I wish I had an answer - this exact type of behavior (which is not unheard of in NT kids of that age group and younger, BTW, it's a developmental thing) lost my son all his friends last year. The other kids were very tolerant until mid 3rd grade, and then it was too much for them.

The good news - after the diagnosis, which DS decided to share with his classmates, kids were more tolerant, and he has taken a lot of social skills classes and pragmatic speech classes which have helped. He still struggles with wanting to play "my way," and with finding a way to tolerate other kids' needs and wants, but he's really putting effort into improving and it shows.

Thank you for your reply, I am hoping that it is something he will grow out of or he will learn to control as he gets older. He is still so young, so I don't want to hurt his little heart and I and his step dad are his main playmates, so we just go along with it for his sake. He is such a happy little dude I hate to make him upset. I know most people (friends and family) think that he is spoiled and "gets his way" all the time, but really I'd rather follow a silly rule he thinks he has to have than have a full out meltdown.

I would use positive reinforcement- what would he work for? What would make it worth it to him to try new ways to play?

I would set up some structured play that you get to take turns being in control. Every time he follows a tiny step that you dictate, he gets a sticker. If he ears 10 stickers, he can get... whatever little thing he wants. A Hot Wheels car or some little thing.

I laughed as I read your post, OP. I laughed, because I used to be this mini-dictator. In fact, one of my parentally-bestowed nicknames was "Little Tyrant" or "Little Dictator". Homo sapiens horribilis. I am still laughing as I type.

Anyway, this dictatorial behavior is indeed related to autism. It happens because the child comes up with one way to do things, and this One True Way feels just so right and awesome and beautiful and wonderful and all possible positive superlatives that any other way is POOP.

This behavior does ameliorate over time and with age. I would say that you may give your son little nudges in the more flexible direction as he gets older. You can explain to him your perspective, very explicitly. For example, you can explain that the One True Way feels great to him, but not everyone feels that way. Different people have different One True Ways, so you might do the Darth Vader breathing noise five times, as per your number, and he may do it eight times, as per his number, but your One True Way that feels great to you is different from his One True Way that feels great to him. So when playing, it is nice and kind and good to take this information into account. So if one of his playmates does something different than he expects, that is because the something different is part of his playmate's One True Way, and it feels great to his playmate, so the best thing to do is to be nice and kind and good to everyone by letting them have their One True Way some of the time while doing things your One True Way some other of the time.

At that age, I don't know how much your son understands about other people's perspectives. I knew nothing, but then again, no one explained it to me explicitly, but instead, expected me to pick up on it myself. If you explain these matters in simple words that emphasize how him doing things the way he does makes him happy and that is what happens when others do what they do, then he should be able to understand about different perspectives. Since no one explained it to me, it was nonsensical to me why anyone would not do everything my way, because to me, my way was obviously the One True Way that made everyone as intense happy as it made me.

As soon as my kiddo got into pretend play we had the same issues. While we loved that he enjoyed playing we also knew it would be really important for him to play with peers. So we worked on Theory of Mind with this book.

http://www.amazon.com/Teaching-Children ... 0471976237

We also had social stories about rules of playing with others and WHY it is important to follow those social rules and how others feel when they don't have a chance to use their ideas. Review the social stories before play. We would also role play with character to play out scenarios and talk about the best choice for the characters and how each character feels during the situation.

When we played, I would act as a peer would act. If he was too bossy, I would say well you can do that but I'm doing my idea over here. Then I would go do my idea alone and make it seem super fun. Sometimes he wouldn't care and other times he wanted to join in. If we were playing and he was ruining/sabotaging all my ideas I would say, "That's not fair! I did your ideas, now we should try mine." or something like that. His peers will be vocal about unfair play, so he needs to pick up on that and learn how to adapt to other kids in play. Sometimes we would do the first game his way, and the second my way. Just making him be more flexible and handling those issues in the moment. As always, reward and praise for being flexible. Keep it fun and motivating!

He is a LOT better at it now and it able to deal with it when other's have ideas. We are still working on fair play during battles, like not me dying every time!! Taking turns winning swordfights, etc.

I can say it has helped him make and keep friends. I"m glad all the work he and I put into it has paid off!

THANK GOODNESS I found this thread!! !! My son just turned 11 and he has ALWAYS been this way! I have worked pretty hard trying to get him to become more flexible. He's better...but still not great. I figured it was a part of the spectrum but it's nice to know there are other kids out there doing the same thing.

Oh yes, this is very familiar.

My son is almost 10 now and I would say that it has got a little better - maybe with age, maybe with the input he gets from SLT, school and at home. I spend a lot of time encouraging him to see things from the perspective of another - concrete examples work best as the whole abstract thing isn't much use. He can now work these things out for himself - sometimes on the spot, sometimes afterwards, and sometimes not at all!

Around the time he was diagnosed he used to play at running a restaurant at his grandparents house. It was fun to start with, but he took it so seriously and was so dictatorial that we really had to stop it. He wanted to control our every action, word and expression so it stopped being fun and became a real source of conflict and dispute.

My son is an only one too, and it is important to me that he has fun and a sense of control over his own life and choice of activities. It's really a balancing act between giving him the freedom to be himself while encouraging him to understand that other people should be able to exercise their choices too. A bit of give and take is required all round, and a lot of patience and good humour.

Thank you, thank you, thank you everyone. Everyone tells me that I baby him too much and that I give in too easy and let him control me. Family think that I am overreacting, they are still in denial that he is even on the spectrum...

Thank you so much, I feel tons better.

Thanks guys!

First time user here on the Forum - hope this works - My son 6 is the same. He has a little sister and he NEVER plays what she wants to play. I feel like I am constantly saying "Please play what she wants to play" - He tries sometimes but he always turns the play around into what he originally wanted to play.

"I think he's too young to determine whether or not this is some type of clinical manifestation of something. If he were an adult I would say this sounds like OCPD, but he isn't. He's 6 and even normal, NT 6 year olds can act like this. There's a very simple solution. Set boundaries. He'll get upset at first but he'll get over it. "


I find it really interesting that you said that because the psychiatrist mentioned OCPD and said it is party of who he is. I am waiting for the final paperwork but I do believe he was going to have that on the final diagnosis..

still waiting to see it on "paper" tho.

sorry I cannot figure out the quote option!

Usually I agree with Chronos but not on this one. This type of inflexible behavior when it is the way that the child interacts more often than not is classic ASD. As others have posted, with work like social stories and role playing and as he matures, it is possible for him to become more flexible. The important thing is what btbnnyr and others said - you must explicitly explain to him about other peoples' point of view. Most kids that age are pretty self-centered but most NT kids will figure out the Theory of Mind stuff themselves without a lot of specific coaching. They figure out that they need to take other peoples' feelings into consideration. Most ASD kids won't figure this out on their own.

Welcome to Wrong Planet!

You have gotten some great answers. The only thing I would add is that even though you would like to avoid meltdowns at all costs, at some point, your son will need to learn flexibility. Pick a time to stand up to him when you don't have things to do or places to be. The only way he can be taught flexibility is to not always get his way. I know it is hard, but flexibility is a very important skill that he will need in life. Try giving him small rewards for being a little flexible.

Trust me, I don't have all of the answers to this myself, so I hope I am not coming across as judgemental. I am guilty of babying my son who is also 6 as well. But I just remember his teachers at school making the point about flexibility, and it is something that I have always tried to work on. For instance, if he is really set in his routine for certain things, breaking the routine just to give him practice on adjusting to unforeseen changes in his environment.

Hope this makes sense----Glad you found Wrong Planet!