ASD son doesn’t stop talking about his special subject

[Powerofpurple]

His special subject is countries of the world and he’s extremely knowledgeable on it (he’s 6 years old). His memory is incredible and he can draw a map of the world from memory and name every single flag.

But the one issue is that he doesn’t stop talking about it from the moment he wakes in the morning, until the moment he goes to sleep. Everything about it in all different forms - smallest to largest countries, eye colours of each country, populations, borders of each country, food from each country and so on and so on.

It’s never ending and as much as I enjoy hearing about it, it’s wearing me down.

My son is older but he has now grasped the concept of other people not necessarily being interested in the subjects HE is interested in. Which means the monologues are now often prefaced by "I know you might not be interested in this, but..." and then proceeds to tell me anyway 😂

I’d start steering him towards written projects - could he make a poster of flags for his room, or do a fact file about a different country every week? See if you can find an activity book maybe. My dd is older now and at the time her constant chat about what she was interested in drove me nuts, but now she’s a quiet teenager I’d love to know more about her world. Some of our best times when she was younger were times I found trips/organised stuff at home related to her interests - could he help you plan a meal from a different country once a week, you can eat it while listening to that country's music, he can make table decorations, flags etc?

He also measures time in how long it’s been since Mary Seacole died.

I laughed so hard at this!

I'd love a son like this. Embrace it.

He's regulating himself by talking about it. If you try and stop him you run the risk of meltdown/shutdown which will cause actual trauma. If you really can't stand it, put your earphones in?

Oh I used to use this to my advantage! The best way to be able to persuade ds out for a good walk was to allow him to talk at me about his favourite subject. Ahhh I miss the days of hearing all about Thomas the Tank Engine/Minecraft or whatever.

Special interests really are a pita. 😂

There have been moments I’ve missed him being non verbal, as evil as that makes me.

DS is currently telling me about different engines for locomotives that he’d like to see taken apart and cleaned.
He also loves farming equipment but when I took him to a John Deere show room he didn’t want to go in because he preferred the brand New Holland on that day and John Deere just wasn’t cutting it.
He has really profound learning disabilities but also will use Google maps or Google earth to look for train tracks or tractors being used on farmland’s.

With hindsight DD has hopped from one interest to another and is unhappy when she doesn't have something to absorb her curiosity.
We had a Titanic phase too! It was a school topic though, which sparked it. Lots of collections as a child - particular toys, pebbles, Lord of the Rings, dragons, a particular book series, one specific podcast, keeping rats (we don't have rats), currently it's early Kings and Queens and British politics in the Blair/Brown years 😁😁

Dr Who here. He can name every baddie, every Dr and their companion.
And name every episode in order from the very first one and tell you what the baddie was, the name of the person or race they helped, how they helped and the exact running time!
He's 16 and it's all he talks about and watches from sun up to sun down. He's even somehow managed to get Dr Who into his GCSE coursework for English, English Lit and Photography, so it makes sense for it to be there 🤦‍♀️

My ds is 25 and undiagnosed but on the waiting list for asd/ADHD assessment ( 2-3 years!). So many of these posts resonate. I wish I'd realised earlier, he's only being assessed now due to anxiety and depression which may well stem from one of these conditions

Exactly this - being cut off in the middle of a flow of talking about a special interest creates (for me, at least) a kind of mental pressure; if I can't let it out by talking (or typing, although that's slower) then my brain goes into a feedback loop that I struggle to get out of.

I've been through Brexit politics, Trump politics, the MCU, 3D printing, a whole year spent on legal intricacies...spare a thought for my other half ;)

So did I! It’s also helping me understand my brother better, for years he measured everywhere in our city from a random location I’m pretty sure neither of us have visited (he may have once) eg “How long does it take to get to X from South Street School?” Um I don’t know mate but it’s 10 mins walk from here where we both are right now which seems more useful 😂

Omg we had the John Deere obsession. Seems to have been entirely replaced now by trains and Scania trucks. Mostly trains though. Sometimes you just can't get it right 😆

I've just had a flashback to when I got a really very long lecture about how Japanese train carriages are connected to eachother. Along with diagrams. I'd forgotten about that. I think I was traumatised 🤣

"I love that you're enthusiastic about this topic, but it's not as interesting to me. So you can talk to me about it for 5 minutes but then I'm going to talk to the adults about other things. So the clock starts now!"

If with 'kindest' you mean extremely subtle hints, it's not going to work. You need to be clear and concise.

Bizarre that his parents let him corner you like that, they're the real rude people!

@PickAChew I've met my kindred spirit. Someone else who knows what an Enviro 400 is (is it a MMC though??). I know more about buses than I ever, ever wanted to need or know. DS has a seemingly encyclopedic knowledge about the things and expects that you have a similar level of knowledge. To the point that if you give him a Stagecoach fleet number he can immediately tell you exactly what kind of bus it is. His prized possessions are his Stagecoach rucksack and polo shirt a few of the drivers at the local bus station gave him for his birthday. And yes to the bus rallies as well.

You probably already know about bustimes.org as well.

This thread has just reminded me of DS1 stupid battles phase. Could a tiger beat a lion in a fight? Could an armadillo beat a hedgehog? Could 12 rabbits beat a cat etc etc. What about 9 rhinos against a small T Rex. I found a letter in his room a few years ago marked 'To God' from when he was little probably a Holy Communion exercise. It just said 'did you fight the devil?' 😂

It probably will get better but not stop. My DD2 is obsessed by the Royal Family. She knows everything the public can about them. She can name the next 32 in line to the throne. Every time an article comes out she reads and will memorize it
It is exhausting and she's 16 but she has calmed down a lot. We still hear about it daily but probably only about 2 hours a day.
She used to be obsessed by the Titanic and there is nothing about that subject I don't know now. That lasted about 4 years
So your son may change interests but I agree the best idea is either set blocks of time to talk about his interest or see if there is any sort of children's geography club he can join. Another idea is to get books about different countries from the library and set aside a time in the day when you read the book together and after a talk about it you talk about/do something different.

I love this thread! Special interests are so brilliant for my DS. He’s never bored because he can always think about his interest (for years now it has been football and associated EAFC stats). I knew every Thomas the Tank Engine train when he was younger.
He also has maps/countries/flags as a side interest and is doing well in geography at school.
Best way to avert a meltdown or get him to keep going on a walk when younger was to throw out a question like “which is your favourite out of Edward and Percy?”

My DD (also autistic) doesn’t have special interests in the same way and I wish she did. She goes through obsessions with particular computer games, but that’s not a positive thing…

I leaned heavily into the special interests with my DC over the years. We got merch, took trips, talked for hours and it made them happy, which is all I have ever wanted. I wasn't interested in many of the subjects but I still listened, it's one of the single most important things we can do for our children. If they don't feel listened to when talking about their passions they are unlikely to feel you will listen when they really need to talk about other things, which could be far more important.

I am also autistic and have my own interests, I dint spend too much time talking about them, but nobody listened to me as a child so...

“His prized possessions are his Stagecoach rucksack and polo shirt a few of the drivers at the local bus station gave him for his birthday. “

❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

Agree, it’s better to absolutely clear than try to hint - this will go over the heads of a lot of autistic people.

Either that, or talk back at length about an equally inane subject.

I think when my son declared back at me, ‘I’m not interested in Coronation Street!’ The penny dropped for him 😆

@Santasbigredbobblehat
Im sure it’s exhausting, but you made my day with the Mary Secole comment!

My non diagnosed son has obsessed about planets, countries, flags, now we’re on FIFA. He has an encyclopaedic knowledge of footballers, clubs, teams. He has some Ultimate Team that he was in floods of tears about late last night as it wasn’t compatible with the new gaming system that’s appeared in the house.

He is very intense about it all but luckily I can listen and talk him round to a degree of regulation. I assume that’s why he didnt meet the threshold for diagnosis. I feel your pain though. It’s a lot!

As an adult, My DH does this when he wants to be intimate. He'll be all "tell me all about (insert niche special interest) tonight"

I mean, it does work, so...

Just to clear up some common misunderstanding, it is not correct that autistic kids or adults never get offended if you tell them they've talked about their interest too much. They might not, but often they will be sad and just won't show it. Me and some of my ASD friends instead have all kind of taught ourselves to stop talking about it openly in a way that can be sad and painful. When one of us do get to monologue or engage with someone about our special interest it is so nice because it makes me feel like someone cares about me, but I am always worried about boring people. A lot of the times therefore I just don't talk much anymore. Reddit is a godsend for being able to connect with others about a thing with the constant anxiety that they want me to stfu.

Ah, I have two autistic DC. I now know a lot A LOT about subjects I never expected to 😂