how do you define an obsession?

[Saker]

This is a sort of out of interest question really rather than leading to anything. As many of you know, Ds2 has no autism diagnosis but some tendencies plus motor and sensory integration, speech and language problems. He is in a special needs unit but they are struggling to cope with his motor difficulties and so we are applying for a statement. His teacher wrote in her report that he had some autistic tendencies such as his obsession with animals. It's true that Ds2 loves animals, trips to the zoo, playing with the animal hospital, zoo, farm, safari park etc at school but I had never thought of it as an obsession. But then I wondered how you would define an obsession. He certainly talks about animals if given the chance but I feel that is more because he is happy to be on a subject that he can understand (his receptive language not being great). He can be reluctant to leave games with animals in them but not so that he would have a meltdown or not be able to play something else. I am just interested in what other people see as an obsession in their child as opposed to a strong interest.

Good question! My ds has such a strong interest in cars, it can totally dominate his thoughts to the point of not wanting to involve himself in anything else, I guess this would be considered an obsession. He can't go anywhere without a toy car, he doesn't need to be actually holding one but just needs the reassurance that one is in his coat or my handbag should he need it. When he finds particular situations difficult, he uses his toy cars to block out his surroundings, he gets totally immersed in them. He demands that toy cars are always left in the car/in my handbag/lined up by the bath and windowsill, in fact in every room of the house. He constantly lines them up and gets very upset if they're moved, I have to clean up around them. In fact as I type now he's asking me which car out of his line-up is the fastest, a question that I have to answer time and time again every day. When me and dp are out in the car with him, it's incredibly hard to hold a conversation, he continually butts in and asks the same questions over and over again about cars, and will become furious if we don't answer these repetitive questions, it's so tedious I can't tell you. It's like sometimes he's just incapable of thinking of anything else.

Thanks Macwoozy - that's really interesting. Certainly Ds2 is not that obsessive - we can talk about other things and although he does repeat questions they are not usually about animals.

We are doing an RDI program with him. One of the RDI approaches when a child repeatedly asks the same question is to give a totally ridiculous answer and turn it into a sort of game - so for example Ds2 likes to ask repeatedly "What's for tea?" - I tell him the first couple of times - after that I start saying "zebra on toast" or "library book sandwiches" or something like that and it seems to divert him from asking. Another approach is to turn the question into a chant or song without actually answering. You may feel this is totally inappropriate but I mention it in case it can help at all as you are being driven mad .

I think about this too (ds 7.5 with "working hypothesis" (no diagnosis) of semantic-pragmatic disorder - anyway definite language problems). He has what I think of as "immersing interests" (an imaginary planet, complete with complex civilisation, architecture, fauna etc.; "what this street/house/road would have looked like in 1970/1940/1900" etc.; robins) which are, I think, plumb on the red line dividing interest from obsession.

The obsessional bit is something to do with how his interests are emotional - not just intellectual - basically he uses them to feel safe. He got cross with me the other day for not answering the "what would this street look like in 2016?" question the way he wanted - I'd used exactly that tactic of the deliberately silly answer & said "oh, under water". And when he's "being a robin" it's pretty much always a defensive retreat from reality thing.

What keeps these from going right into obsession territory is that, though he uses them to feel safe, his need for them isn't absolute - he can use other things (including some other people) to feel safe too.

When Sam (DX HFA) gets up, he dresses then gets paper and draws. When he gets back froms chool, he draws. He hoards paper, art things- anything to do with drawing in boxes in his room. He's the same though with modelling (anything from junk to lego) so we say (and Paed agrees) he ahs a craft obsession. he'd probably develop loads, but we very specifically do not give him the opportnity.

I have been known to have the odd obsession too- As traits at least though no DX. Worst one was mini cars when I was about 20- wouldn't discuss anything else, was an expert on them, whol;e social life based on tehm. So now- my obsessions tend to switch off suddenly, afyter a few years.

Current one? MN. Of course.

I'll try that Saker, you never know, and yes it does drive me insane, but fortunately I haven't got it as hard as dp, he works in the motor trade, and if dp is about I always tell ds to ask his dad, since mummy doesn't know anything about cars, then I can just think about something else whilst my dp gets a good grilling.

Whilst we're on the subject of obsessions, I've been known to have a few myself. Whenever I'm interested in a particular topic, I have to know absolutely everything about it. I became interested in the holocaust and now have over 70 books on the subject

I think the difference between ds1's obsessions and his interests is that with an interest he can generally take it or leave it. With an obsession he needs someone to take control and tell him to take a break.

His most recent obsession was a particular Gameboy game. Not only would he have played it morning noon and night if I'd let him but he was also getting too involved. He would burst into tears or a rage if he was 'killed', for example. The new rule became that if he was showing signs of being upset by it, it was time to put it away. This worked well. As well as playing it he also talked about it almost non-stop, either as a running commentary while playing or as a continuous topic of conversation when he was doing other things.

His strong interests were very different. He's very interested in tornados, foor example. If there's a weather programme on about storm-chasers or freak weather he likes to watch it. He has also borrowed some books from the library on the subject. He likes to talk about them but it's a two-way conversation and he only talks about them when something else reminds him of them, eg water swirling down a plughole.

Ds2 has strong interests but I don't think he's quite reached the level of obsession yet.

It's interesting the thing about the obsession making your Ds feel safe Bink - I think that is a bit the case with Ds2 because I think he feels that he knows where he is with animals - and while he is on that subject then no-one can ask him something he can't answer (which as he has been assessed frequently from the age of 2 happens to him a lot ). But he doesn't actually know loads and loads about each animal either, because he can't read and he couldn't understand a lot of the concepts that would go with knowing a lot of facts and figures. Certainly it doesn't seem to dominate his life to the extent that some of you are describing here.

ds1's obsessions are long lasting- washing machines, washing lines. They can be useful- something to draw him in. The problems are caused by the compulsions- so things he has to do. They switch all the time. Sometimes foor example doors have to be touched, today he needed to switch the fridge off open the door and then get someone to switch the fridge back on (watching the light). I refused so we had a lot of screaming (and a huge nosebleed). Complete compulsion though, me refusing was very difficult for him.

I've hear obsessions referred to as kind of autis culture, a choice, compulsions are involuntary.

Dd has obsessions that imo are subtle but there.
They certainly do not dominate her life last term it was Tudors and the summer it was football.
It was more of an interest but certainly ticked the asd box for obsessions.