Sibling Issues

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you should look up something called Theory of Mind, its something i had never heard of before i started looking into autism. it has to do with seeing things from anothers perspective and the realization that other people have their own thoughts, feelings, and ideas. autistics often seem to lack ToM capabilities. i know barely anything about ToM, but it seems as if it could be one factor in why an autistic child has issues with sharing and asking permissions.

if you have issues with the sharing of video games or tv time, something we've recently found useful is a regular non-digital kitchen timer. we set it for 15 or 30 minutes, depends on the activity, and each child gets their alloted time. our asd child is 4 and this helps him a lot with taking turns. its cut down the arguing between the kids, and he is less emotional because he can see on the timer that his turn is coming up. we just have to be sure to keep it out of his reach as he has been known to try to make his brothers time run down artificially, or tries to keep it from being set when its his turn.

something else to consider, i do not know how long you have been a family together, but it sounds as if T was an only child and C and H are siblings and have been together their whole lives. it can be hard on any child to suddenly have siblings and be required to share. to go from 1 to 2 siblings can be an adjustment, to go from none to 2 i imagine is quite shocking.

Last edited by azurecrayon on 26 Apr 2010, 3:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.

But our big problem isn't about "taking turns." Its that the boy with AS doesn't want anyone to touch his stuff EVER, even when he has no interest in playing with it. I have read on TOM, but I can't quite grasp it (thank goodness for this website!!). It may absolutely be part of the issue. I am really struggling!

Theory of mind, like Azurecrayon said. From my experience with my own boys and everything I've read and heard, AS has a great deal to do with this difficulty in sharing (also the going from no siblings to two must be a big change too). With my sons it is the rigidity and black and white thinking (this is mine, not yours, can't wrap their heads around the many variations and nuances on ownership and sharing), lack of TOM (it may be a great thing when you share your stuff with me, but can't see that that means I should also share my stuff with you), that extra deep attachment to inanimate objects that DW mentioned (a psych. suggested to us that because bonding is so difficult with people, our son ends up attaching deeply to things instead) and also anxiety (one son in particular worries that some sort of harm will come to his belongings and that causes some of the not wanting anyone to touch them).

I totally get what you are saying about one kid's needs not trumping the other. It must be very hard to balance. Our sons are twins and both are on the spectrum, with some other co-morbids. They share a lot in common, but often have wildly different needs at different times which ends up causing friction, and because of the twin thing they have always insisted that everything must be 100% equal down to the last gram of the ice cream sundae! So how can we meet the different needs, while keeping everything "fair"? Impossible. One of the greatest pieces of advice we got was "fair is not equal", meaning in order to be fair we are working hard to meet each of their individual needs, but may have to meet those needs with different methods, so things will not necessarily be equal. For example if one needed glasses does that mean that we should purchase them for both just to be fair. Of course not, the glasses go to the one who needs his vision corrected and not the other who doesn't need them (this is the analogy we used to explain it to our sons). Your situation is a lot more complex as you work to blend your families, but the point is that it is impossible for you to make things equal for T&C when their needs are so different. Maybe teaching the "fair is not equal" thing will help.

I was glad to read when DW said she lets her children vent about each other to her! I do that too, but have sometimes felt a little uncomfortable about it. They so drive each other crazy at times though, and neither has the ability to see the other's POV. Sometimes all I can do is let them both feel heard, while we continue to work s-l-o-w-l-y towards them having patience/empathy/understanding for the other...hopefully...someday...

I appreciate all the responses. I, too, let the kids vent about each other. It's better than them acting on the frustration!

If this really is a Theory of Mind issue, then I am unsure of how to get him to understand that his actions are also hurting others. I really want to avoid those situations without causing a huge rift between the 2 boys-- which is what I think is going to happen. If I tell the one to just play with his own stuff and keep sharing, he will build resentment. If I tell the other he needs to share and it causes meltdowns, he will be miserable.

Kids

Pulling this point out because I found it very interesting.

And it might be an idea the OP can use to help the other kids give T some leeway: "since T doesn't have a close <friend/sister/insert whatever> like you do, he attaches to his things, instead. Trying to share his X is like asking you only to see Y in groups of 10 kids."

I didn't think possessiveness was exclusively an aspie trait, but it may be more pronounced in us; I do know that I personally am more possessive about my things than most people. I think I can shed some light on why this is through a few examples.

After graduating from college, my studio apartment had papers strewn all over the floor. I absolutely hated when my mom would visit, because she would try to neaten them up. I knew where every paper was, even though it looked like a disorganized mess to everyone else; if one moved, it could take me hours to find it again.

Similarly, I hate it when people insist on helping with the dishes. They organize things differently than I do, they towel dry stuff instead of letting it air dry which leaves smudges on it that they don't care about but I do, they stack things in the wrong place, which breaks my routine. It's so much more efficient when I don't let anyone else into my kitchen. My kitchen, I say! Mine! Do not enter!

I hated it when my mom would go through my files when she visited - not so much for the privacy reasons that most people would care about, but because she didn't put everything back in the exactly same place. Papers in files would get out of order and such. Eventually she got to the point that she would do it surreptitiously, being really careful with things so I didn't notice. I was fine with that, even though I actually knew when she was doing it, because when she thought she was fooling me, she made sure to put everything back where it was.

Similarly, I had a neurotypical live in girlfriend for many years, and I hated letting her borrow my computer. She'd open and close windows with abandon, totally messing up my system for using window positioning to keep track of what I was doing. It was horrible! There wasn't the same problem when I borrowed her computer, because she didn't care if her windows got moved around, close, opened, whatever. And now that I have an aspie wife, I can let her use my computer, because she knows to put things back exactly as they were. Exactly. That means, to the pixel, because if a window is mispositioned by even a single pixel, I'm likely to notice and be annoyed - as she would also be if that happened on her computer.

I'm also a pack rat, but I think that's a different thing. Stuff that's clearly no longer useful I can toss, though even a small chance of its being useful some day will cause me to keep it.

While I recognize this is how it's described by neurotypicals, I don't think it's accurate for Aspies.

Rather, the issue is that us aspies recognize that we can't understand someone else's situation so accurately as to be able reliably, with 100% certainly, know what they want or don't want. And the truth is, anyone who thinks they can is fooling themselves.

For us, the obvious conclusion is that it's easier to ask the other person about what they want. If they say it's okay for us to use their things, we'll take them at their word. If they mean it's only okay for us to borrow their things if they can borrow our things too, they should say that.

Maybe you need to get T more toys until the distribution is more balanced. I would certainly expect a kid who owned fewer toys to be more possessive about them. If there are things that you don't want to buy more than one of, make it clear that they are community property to be shared rather than belonging to any one kid.

My bet is that if you had a rule that T had to ask permission first before borrowing toys, he wouldn't have a problem with that. He might also be more willing to share if people asked his permission first, as he could then explicitly get the toy himself and give it to them, rather than letting them mess with the toy directly.

Wish we could get him more toys...but he has no interest in anything else, to be honest. Also, the money just isn't there right now. We have had to remodel the house to make room for everyone.

I suppose we could try to have him ask permission first, but it just seems so odd. H and C aren't going to ask permission to use each other's stuff-- or this could cause everyone to demand permission be given. I am positive that he wouldn't remember to ask permisson-- his memory doesn't work well.

I do appreciate all the ideas. Maybe using the idea that he is close to his toys because he doesn't have anyone else might work. IDK.

Have you tried just sitting your 3 children down and having them agree to a fair toy sharing set of rules?

For example, what toys are family property, and which ones are property of an individual child? A large object like a ping pong table might be considered family property, which needs to be shared fairly by everybody. The children's own toy balls are their own property and as such they have the rights to those toys.

You can then set rules as for when individual property can be shared. For example, if a toy is stored in the child's own room (or a marked toy storage chest) then that is for them only. If another person in the family wants to get a toy from another person's room or chest then they must ask permission first. So if your son wants to keep his toys his, then he needs to put them in their proper location when he is done using them. If a toy is left out in a family area (such as the living room) then it is free game for anybody to borrow without first asking for permission. But, if the owner decides that they want their possession back then the other sibling must give back the toy. Individual property rights must be respected. It isn't a matter of being selfish, it is a matter of the law. That's how things work in the adult world.

Now you can certainly encourage your children to share, and talk about the benefits of sharing. But sharing done via force isn't sharing, it is stealing with intent to return. If you really want your children to share, it must be something that they do themselves because they want to share what they have. All you can do is point out the benefits while at the same time reminding your children about respecting the property and possession rights of other people.

And make sure you emphasize that this applies to all three children equally. This isn't for your aspie son only. All three kids will get labeled toy chests to use if they want to store their toys for themselves.

Edit: And if your son has a poor memory about asking permission then feel free to put a bit sign on the kid's toy chest which reads: YOU MUST ASK "C" FOR PERMISSION BEFORE REMOVING A TOY FROM THIS CHEST. And of course a similar sign for the other two kids as well.

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Is T really more "selfish"? Or does he have trouble understanding the many grey areas in a casual system of sharing belongings and not have the social skills to conduct the necessary negotiations successfully yet, due to his AS? It is great that the other kids have no problem sharing, but it is more difficult for T and that is not his fault.

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It sounds more like he's having a hard time figuring out how other people feel. He is selfish in a sense but maybe not because he doesn't think other people are important. It may be that he just isn't making that NT developmental jump to intuitively understand the feelings of others. He doesn't see the unfairness of playing with other people's things freely and then not allowing them to play with his things. My kids are able to do that pretty well now, but it took a lot of patience and explaining. It did not come naturally to them at all. (Their dx's are AS, AS and PDD-NOS, and all with ADHD, and the eldest has some serious psych issues). I probably had to explain it at least a hundred times before it even began to sink in. They still squabble about everything but at least they understand HOW to share. Now if they fight over stuff I just take it away from everybody. I don't have the energy to keep track of every single possession, and who's is who's and who's traded what with whom. If they fight, I just take the stuff away usually temporarily, but sometimes permanently if they are behaving particularly badly or if I feel it's presenting an unreasonable danger.

I like Tracker's response. As much as sharing is great, there need to be clear rules or chaos could prevail (not just in an ASD-affected family, but any family with kids, because they're all a bunch of little loophole-finding defense attorneys!). In our family, we have community property in the playroom. If kids don't want to share something, it stays in their room. If, for whatever reason, it comes out of the room and gets left out, it's fair game (that really cuts down on common-room messes! Hah!).

And I also have to agree with Kiley. If they're squabbling over community property, it goes in time out. Even though the kids are 5, 3 and 1, with ADHD and possible PDD-NOS for the older two respectively, they figured out REALLY quickly that they need to find a mutually agreeable way to share toys or they won't enjoy them for very long.

It may seem punitive to have property laws and toy repo for small kids, but that's how it works in the grown-up world and it's easier to learn as a kid rather than going to small-claims court! Also, the rules seem to be comforting to the kids. If James doesn't feel like sharing his super-special diggers, into his room they go, and he knows if his sister swipes them, there will be serious repercussions. There's no uncertainty. If a toy's in your room and you own it, it's yours alone. If it gets left out in the dining room, someone else can play with it and you'll have to wait -- no exceptions. If there's a fight and it lasts long enough for Mom to catch wind of it, your toy is gone until bedtime. (And if it's a hockey stick and you use it as a weapon, you may not see it until the beginning of next season.)

We have those rules too but they haven't worked so well. When an "offender" is caught with a toy that the owner was supposed to have left safely in his room accusations start flying. The owner says the offender snuck into his room and stole it. The offender says the toy was in the Den (or wherever). At that point I take the toy and put it away. I also let each party vent to me. I listen to their whole story and withold judgement. The other party will usually have a hard time letting that happen even though I remind them that they will get their turn. I send them away but they creep back, self control is really hard for them about that. There are certain things that they aren't allowed to share. The younger two have a laptop they share (they all three have desktops of their own). The older one, who loves progamming and just can't keep it to himself isn't allowed near anybody else's computer reguardless of permission. I will let him use mine with me present sometimes, but he isn't allowed too touch it. We've had to make rules that suit their own individual quirkiness.

I value psychohist's comments very much. I find that adult Aspies who are able to express their point of view well are very helpful to me as I try to understand my kids. One thing I would like to point out is that I don't think that most of us feel we need to understand the other person 100% for our opinions to be valuable. After all, people don't even understand themselves a lot of the time. A certain degree of inaccuracy is inevitable. This means we need to stay flexible as we learn more about other people and we constantly adjust our ideas. If inflexibility is an Aspie trait then that certain would explain why this kind of thing is so hard for some Aspies.