Screen time and special interests(ASD)

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

Help me think through this.

my oldest(DS12) is on the spectrum and puberty is killing us. He takes Prozac for anxiety and the NP just put him on Lamictal to try to even out moods.  She feels the mood swings are hormone related and something we just need to weather, not bipolar or anything. 

But omg. He’s so perfectly mature and wonderful one moment and the next he’s swearing and yelling at me that I’m just the stupidest person in existence. 9 times out of 10 it’s related to screen time limits.  I am at the point where I want to completely detox all my kids from screens because I’m so freaking annoyed.  Last night it was epic yelling because DS12 found out we got a seasonal campsite and plan to spend most of the summer there—where there are many activities, including for teens, on a daily basis, but very limited internet. I took away electronics for three days for the swearing and disrespect, but I just want to toss all of them.

My dilemma is that his Minecraft world is absolutely his special interest, and it encourages socialization because his sister and long distance cousins share the Minecraft world and they all play together.  His therapist is adamantly against a screen detox because she doesn’t believe we should remove his special interest, but he wants to play on his laptop to the exclusion of all other activities. He doesn’t sneak it, will grouchily obey when we remove screens, and eats and sleeps just fine.  He isn’t gaming all night and self regulates when he knows it’s 9pm, even when I’ve fallen asleep. He does his chores without asking as well. His grades are all 95% or above and he’s been high honors on the last six report cards, and while he’s at a special needs school, his academics are all seventh grade level, he has no academic concerns or accommodations. It’s all behavioral and environmental/sensory supports that he receives.  So he probably isn’t truly screen addicted, at least according to his psychiatric NP. But it’s an absolute meltdown when I require him to do some other activity that isn’t screens, whether it’s be outside, go to the trampoline park, take a walk, watch a movie with the family, play a board game.  Screaming, cussing, disrespect.  I literally just want his brain to reset from screens for a while, but his therapist(who has very little counseling experience and no ASD experience) disagrees.  Maybe I hesitate because I am not impressed with her anyway?(she feeds into his distorted belief that his seven year old brother is the root of every bad thing in his life, instead of gently challenging his perceived views, and it annoys me)

Thoughts? Totally not a JAWM.

(Also, I am on the spectrum, diagnosed in my 30s.  My special interest was the only thing that made me feel normal when I was 12 and hitting puberty, and I am 41 and have still not forgiven my parents for taking it away as punishment. So there’s that.)

 

Edited January 5, 2023 by Mrs Tiggywinkle Again

[Katy]

Can you get him another therapist?  She seems off.

I'd probably lengthen the off screen penalty every time, but not fully take it away.

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

1 minute ago, Katy said:

Can you get him another therapist?  She seems off.

I'd probably lengthen the off screen penalty every time, but not fully take it away.

I wish.  We don’t have therapist choices. He was on a wait list for six months for someone in this group to have openings, and this is just who had an opening when he was next on the wait list. I can request another one, but he’d go back on the waitlist.  He only sees her twice a month and only because seeing a therapist is a requirement for medication management.  And he needs his meds.

He received individual therapy once a week at school and group therapy twice a week, and his counselor there is absolutely fantastic.  I wish we could ditch outside therapy but as I said it’s required for his meds to be prescribed.

[Katy]

8 minutes ago, Mrs Tiggywinkle Again said:

I wish.  We don’t have therapist choices. He was on a wait list for six months for someone in this group to have openings, and this is just who had an opening when he was next on the wait list. I can request another one, but he’d go back on the waitlist.  He only sees her twice a month and only because seeing a therapist is a requirement for medication management.  And he needs his meds.

He received individual therapy once a week at school and group therapy twice a week, and his counselor there is absolutely fantastic.  I wish we could ditch outside therapy but as I said it’s required for his meds to be prescribed.

Have you confronted her about blaming the brother?  Maybe it's a strategy to earn trust?

[Innisfree]

Is there any Minecraft-related activity, product, whatever, that could be a reward for good behavior? This was a few years ago, but I think there was an Apple Pi computer that was focused on Minecraft. (Found it: https://www.playpiper.com/) There have been coding classes based on Minecraft around here too. Would he be interested in drawing up a behavior contract with you that would allow him to work toward a reward?

[prairiewindmomma]

It seems like the screen time IS his special interest and that the key problem is that he doesn't like spending time away from his special interest.

It's like a kid who feels comfortable eating chicken nuggets and only wants to eat chicken nuggets. The solution isn't to take away the nuggets, it's to branch out FROM the nuggets.

I'd be looking at some activities that link to Minecraft and work on stretching his interests some. 

I'm totally curious how you're handling his transitions away from screens and also how you prepare him for when he's not doing screens during a time when he thought he would be doing screens.  I would .02 that there's something there that needs to be tweaked and he can work on flexibility there.  I would make that the focus of the therapy---rather than working on a "detox" by taking him away from access to his special interest.

 

 

[wendyroo]

How much time is he playing on his laptop, and how much free time does he have total?

Right now my 13 year old (ASD, anxiety) has no screen time, but according to all metrics he was on the border of screen addiction and it was greatly impacting his sleep, grades, behavior, outlook, etc.

But, before we reached the point that we felt we had to take screens away totally (for at least 3 months), we were allowing limited screens with the caveat that he had to "earn" them by doing non-screen activities. An hour of comic book drawing = an hour of screens, etc.

I told him the purpose was constructive, not restrictive. I wanted to strengthen his brain pathways for doing "hard" non-screen recreation - activities that required creativity, problem solving, perseverance, cooperation, set up and clean up, etc. So putzing in the lego area biding his time or casually flipping through graphic novels did not count. We began by brainstorming a list of activities that would count: board games, drawing, D&D, biking/sports, outdoor skills, cooking, etc. He could add almost anything to that list as long as 1) it was not on a screen, and 2) he was not just a passive consumer.

[gardenmom5]

I started dudeling with a ped neuro at this time.  She saw this all. the. time.  (I really saw it in 1dd - but didn't know she was on the spectrum.).  

It very likely is hormones.  It will eventually settle down.

I would suggest doing some reading up of stuff by Danny Reade.  He founded Asperger's Experts (he's an aspie).  Screen time is (can be) a safe world for aspies. everything is consistent, and rules are followed in games.

Dudeling is actually spending less time on the computer, and more time in the 'real world' now.  I've been working with him on reducing anxiety and we're finally seeing some real progress.  He's even gone so far as to express interest in socializing with kids he knows that are his age.  And is willing to discuss what things we would like.  (as opposed to his shutting down before.)

 Helping/requiring him to do things that can help him manage his reactions to frustration would probably go farther in avoiding the disrespect.

I found dudeling's reactions were often tied to what game he was playing as opposed to the computer itself.

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

Most days he is home from school at 3:15. He doesn’t have homework, because he flies through it at school, so he does whatever his chores are for the day and then has free time until 9pm.  
We did have a checklist of things to do before getting screen time; the problem became that he’s so rigid that days it needed to change—like if we had someplace to go in the afternoon and he wouldn’t get his checklist done due to time constraints, he’d perseverate on not getting screen time but become upset if I changed the checklist.

He is not interested in learning coding. We’ve tried that a few times over the years.  He wants to play Minecraft, Overwatch, the Pokémon Nintendo games, and watch YouTube videos of cute dogs. That’s it. He has an hour plus bus ride each way and spends that reading or listening to an audiobook, so I understand not wanting to read  more when he gets home, but I really dislike the constant fighting over spending the entire afternoon and evening on screens. 

 He does like D&D and I found a teen group nearby that he could play with, but he won’t go. He did pick out some miniatures last time we were at the mall but he doesn’t want to paint them(and fine motor skills are a struggle). 

His dad also hates video games and spent his entire teen years mostly outside playing sports and riding four wheelers, so he’s not of any help trying to come up with alternative activities.

[Dmmetler]

Would he like Minecraft Lego sets? Or maybe doing pixel art/planning for Minecraft worlds on graph paper? Learning music from Minecraft on an instrument?  Minecraft tie in books? I think there's a card game, too.

 

Basically, anything to feed the special interest, but doesn't require a screen. I've been able to get a decent number of kids with ASD to engage in music lessons by working within their special interests, but of course, I don't see what happens at home, and a lot of kids mask more with outside teachers. 

Edited January 5, 2023 by Dmmetler

[Terabith]

I actually didn't limit screen time after about age 8 or so.  I have, at times, said things like no screens until responsibilities were met (schoolwork, showering, chores, etc), but after about age 8 or so, I honestly feel like 1) screens are going to be present in adulthood, and so learning to manage time and screen use is an important life skill that is better taught as a kid/ teen while at home and responsibilities are fairly small, versus trying to learn to manage screens as a college student or adult, and 2) I don't like hypocrisy, and I utilize screens recreationally a lot, and it feels unfair for me to say I can use them and kids can't.  

My kids have gone through periods of managing them well, and periods where they managed them poorly, but they did learn by age 14 or so that using screens too much makes them feel icky.  They still use them sometimes too much, just like most humans, but I don't think they really would have learned that without it being a natural consequence of being allowed basically unlimited screen time.  

I would have no issue saying, "This summer, we as a family are going to x place," and one of the natural consequences of being x place is that there is limited internet.  

It would feel wrong TO ME to artificially take away screens, especially with a special interest, just because I felt like they were using them too much.  

But that's just what works for me and for my kids.  I know we are weirdos and I am fully aware that my fairly hands off approach to parenting older children and teens is kind of an outlier stance.  

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

My first instinct is kind of to be hands off, but he is so miserable when he’s spent more than 90 minutes on screens a day.  It really does seem to mess with his brain chemicals, but he doesn’t recognize it enough to help him self regulate.  
I’ve been reading a lot on screen addiction and it’s scared me a little bit, thus my desire to just toss screens for everyone here and spend time doing other things.

even camping, we’d make sure that he was able to play Minecraft and even Fortnite on the scheduled days he plays remotely with his cousins, because those are relationships we want to be sure we are fostering and as they’re scattered all over the country, we feel the gaming is good(most of his cousins are neuro diverse as well, so it just feels really important to keep those relationships strong).  But DS12 freaked out before DH and I could explain that to him. 

He has some fine motor skill deficits, which makes things like legos and crafts undesirable. Maybe I could find a Minecraft cookbook; he’d like to cook and I’m terrible at it, but I could try.

Edited January 5, 2023 by Mrs Tiggywinkle Again

[Amy in NH]

My kids who are not diagnosed ASD but are definitely ND had hormone related rages at that age.  They felt the surge and it took some self awareness to redirect themselves toward something like exercise that would help them regulate until it passed.  We also had screen battles at that age, and discontinued all computer time for a couple of years until they could handle it with more maturity.  I imagine that's harder now, with screens so much a part of everyday life, so I'd be sure to find and facilitate other outlets for the special interests.

[Terabith]

9 minutes ago, Mrs Tiggywinkle Again said:

My first instinct is kind of to be hands off, but he is so miserable when he’s spent more than 90 minutes on screens a day.  It really does seem to mess with his brain chemicals, but he doesn’t recognize it enough to help him self regulate.  
I’ve been reading a lot on screen addiction and it’s scared me a little bit, thus my desire to just toss screens for everyone here and spend time doing other things.

even camping, we’d make sure that he was able to play Minecraft and even Fortnite on the scheduled days he plays remotely with his cousins, because those are relationships we want to be sure we are fostering and as they’re scattered all over the country, we feel the gaming is good(most of his cousins are neuro diverse as well, so it just feels really important to keep those relationships strong).  But DS12 freaked out before DH and I could explain that to him. 

He has some fine motor skill deficits, which makes things like legos and crafts undesirable. Maybe I could find a Minecraft cookbook; he’d like to cook and I’m terrible at it, but I could try.

Has he had enough time feeling miserable with too much screen time to make that connection for himself?  I would much rather that he internalized "when I spend more than 90 minutes on screens, I am grumpy and out of sorts" at 12 or even 15 rather than going to college at 18 without having figured that out because someone else always cut him off after 90 minutes.  But that takes a ton of time and practice with using screens too long to really figure that out for yourself.  

We took the same approach to bedtimes, honestly, because kids need to figure out how much sleep they need and to understand for themselves the consequences of not sleeping enough.  

I am sure our approach wouldn't work for every kid, and I know it wouldn't work for a lot of families.  But it's worked pretty well for both of my very, very different kids.  

[Innisfree]

10 minutes ago, Mrs Tiggywinkle Again said:

he is so miserable when he’s spent more than 90 minutes on screens a day.  It really does seem to mess with his brain chemicals, but he doesn’t recognize it enough to help him self regulate.  

Could he learn to do quick mood checks periodically through the day? There are lots of easy visual charts online to facilitate a quick check-in: am I happy? Sad? Angry? Etc. Maybe if charting his mood becomes a habit, he’ll recognize the correlation with lots of screen time himself.

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

Please don’t quote this part—

Ds12 struggles very much to identify emotions and connect them with actions. We have worked on this in therapy since he was 4.  We are still working on it.  I know it’s autism, but it means that while he knows he feels miserable, he can’t connect it to screen use.  At the moment he blames just about everything on his brother, who doesn’t even have to be home to be blamed for DS12’s miserableness.  If there’s just no way to remotely blame his brother, it’s Dad and Mom’s fault. He just cannot connect even positive emotions, like happiness, to the cause.

so if he plays screens for five hours and then feels icky and miserable, it will be because DS7 exists, and not because he’s been on screens too much.  His social worker at school tried helping him chart his emotions, almost like doing a functional behavior chart of himself, and it hasn’t really helped.

[wendyroo]

My 13 year old cannot recognize his own emotions. His goal is always neutrality - he feels safe and content there. He avoids anything that could provoke any real emotion in him, positive or negative. If he does have an emotion, he often does not even realize it is "happening" to him, much less be able to figure out what emotion it is.

So, cause and effect doesn't work for him if the effect is an emotional response. Realistically, it doesn't even work if the effect is an extremal consequence...he just does not have the self-regulation to make himself change his behavior to aim toward or away from an effect. 

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

5 minutes ago, wendyroo said:

My 13 year old cannot recognize his own emotions. His goal is always neutrality - he feels safe and content there. He avoids anything that could provoke any real emotion in him, positive or negative. If he does have an emotion, he often does not even realize it is "happening" to him, much less be able to figure out what emotion it is.

So, cause and effect doesn't work for him if the effect is an emotional response. Realistically, it doesn't even work if the effect is an extremal consequence...he just does not have the self-regulation to make himself change his behavior to aim toward or away from an effect. 

Yes. You described it better than I could.  
He will self regulate to get screen time—he’ll do my checklist or his chores or whatever needs to be done. But once he’s on screens he can’t realize that it’s making him feel miserable; he doesn’t have that level of self awareness.

[Terabith]

Is he enough of a rule follower that he could understand playing for 90 minutes and then taking a 90 minute brain/ eye break?  Or does a break not reset him?  

[Harriet Vane]

Honestly, it seems like the only option is to live by a formula. The issue isn't so much the screen time but the transition away from the beloved interest. I wonder if he would similarly melt down from any other type of special interest.

Does he know that 90 minutes is the limit? (Appreciating what Terebith asks about playing 90 minutes and then taking a brain/eye break.)

Can you request that the therapist specifically work on transition strategies with him?

[prairiewindmomma]

Age 12 was REALLY hard on us. My 12 yos have all needed a lot of physical labor in order to work through the hormone surges.  We set up landscaping projects where we paid $10/hour for them to work hard. The money earned was then used to buy electronics they wanted.  We had them preparing landscaping beds, planting bushes and trees, hauling mulch and rock, etc.....small achievable jobs at a time....just because they needed the physical labor. 

I just mention that in case you need another tool in your tool chest. 

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

6 minutes ago, Terabith said:

Is he enough of a rule follower that he could understand playing for 90 minutes and then taking a 90 minute brain/ eye break?  Or does a break not reset him?  

He could.  He is very much a rule follower.

My special interest is reading about British history.  I also would freak out if someone took it away, but I’ve learned to set alarms over the years.

That may be a better option. I recently read GlowKids and it truly freaked me out.

[prairiewindmomma]

There has been some (justified) criticism of GlowKids and Cardaras: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/freedom-learn/201803/sense-and-nonsense-about-video-game-addiction  I would also say that it's difficult to separate "special interests" and "addiction" in some regards.  Each has complicated dynamics and it's easy to just recognize the parallels without making the distinctions. I don't think they are the same thing.

[fairfarmhand]

1 hour ago, Terabith said:

I actually didn't limit screen time after about age 8 or so.  I have, at times, said things like no screens until responsibilities were met (schoolwork, showering, chores, etc), but after about age 8 or so, I honestly feel like 1) screens are going to be present in adulthood, and so learning to manage time and screen use is an important life skill that is better taught as a kid/ teen while at home and responsibilities are fairly small, versus trying to learn to manage screens as a college student or adult, and 2) I don't like hypocrisy, and I utilize screens recreationally a lot, and it feels unfair for me to say I can use them and kids can't.  

My kids have gone through periods of managing them well, and periods where they managed them poorly, but they did learn by age 14 or so that using screens too much makes them feel icky.  They still use them sometimes too much, just like most humans, but I don't think they really would have learned that without it being a natural consequence of being allowed basically unlimited screen time.  

I would have no issue saying, "This summer, we as a family are going to x place," and one of the natural consequences of being x place is that there is limited internet.  

It would feel wrong TO ME to artificially take away screens, especially with a special interest, just because I felt like they were using them too much.  

But that's just what works for me and for my kids.  I know we are weirdos and I am fully aware that my fairly hands off approach to parenting older children and teens is kind of an outlier stance.  

The hard part with some kids is that they do not connect the '"I feel icky" with the screens. And some of my kids don't even realize they feel icky. They're just mad at the world.

1 hour ago, Mrs Tiggywinkle Again said:

My first instinct is kind of to be hands off, but he is so miserable when he’s spent more than 90 minutes on screens a day.  It really does seem to mess with his brain chemicals, but he doesn’t recognize it enough to help him self regulate.  
I’ve been reading a lot on screen addiction and it’s scared me a little bit, thus my desire to just toss screens for everyone here and spend time doing other things.

even camping, we’d make sure that he was able to play Minecraft and even Fortnite on the scheduled days he plays remotely with his cousins, because those are relationships we want to be sure we are fostering and as they’re scattered all over the country, we feel the gaming is good(most of his cousins are neuro diverse as well, so it just feels really important to keep those relationships strong).  But DS12 freaked out before DH and I could explain that to him. 

He has some fine motor skill deficits, which makes things like legos and crafts undesirable. Maybe I could find a Minecraft cookbook; he’d like to cook and I’m terrible at it, but I could try.

This is my ds. We bought him a guitar and he's started lessons. Does your ds have a pet to play with? 

[freesia]

My oldest was very much affected by screens if we let him on more than an hour a day. Our solution was to have a set amount of time until he was 18. I would help him see that went he went over, he felt badly. He is NT, but he didn’t really see or maybe acknowledge the truth of it until he was at least 18. He absolutely had trouble with anger and depression and anxiety when he was on longer than an hour. Frankly, it was like magic once we set the limit. Within three weeks there was a marked turn around. He has thanked me for doing it once he got to college. Now, like I said, he’s NT. I know from seeing friends go through it, that early adolescence is really hard with ASD kids. But, I think it’s worth a try to set limits. Even with a special interest, one needs to learn to regulate the time. I’m of the opinion, too, that because screens involve dopamine hits, that it’s not something many kids can learn to self regulate themselves. Their brains are building pathways and we need to protect them like we do with helmets.  After 18 or so, I think they can learn by experience more. 

[Dmmetler]

If he can handle 90 minutes, would it do better to have multiple sessions vs one long one? Like having a short gaming time after school, and then going on walk or something else for a bit, then a gaming session before dinner, then eating and doing something else, and then one last one before starting to get ready for bed? That way it would still reduce time,but he wouldn't have to put it away completely for the day until bedtime. And maybe more shorter sessions would also reduce the effect? 

 

I have a few kids who Ineed to do that with in lessons, where I have to give them the stuff they want most spread out, because if we do all my stuff first, it's too much of a wait, and if we do the fun stuff first, the rest of the lesson is interminably long for them. It means a lot more transitions, but it reduces the stress a lot. 

[BronzeTurtle]

Please don't quote

I know you say this is for socialization and a big outlet for him as a hobby but since he can't connect his attitude with the thing then perhaps it is not a good outlet for socialization ad hobby even if it would otherwise have value in a normal situation. Hobbies are good, relationships are good...until they cause strife in other areas of a person's life.

For us, taking away screen time entirely caused the perseveration to go away. After a week of not having the stimulus of screen time we saw a new kid emerging. Having it as a possibility after chores/responsibilities or having a certain number of minutes per day caused the focus to constantly be on when they could play their game and for how long. And always caused negotiation for more which led to fighting and terribleness when they didn't get it. We tried unlimited and it was a disaster. To say we lost our kid for a month while we waited for them to self-regulate would not be an understatement.

It would be great if every kid could learn reasonable limits on their own if given the reins. But for some kids it literally is like a drug where a little bit just makes them want more and makes them focus on how much they can have and when they can have it. And if they get all they want they will do that thing over any other thing...even if they like the other stuff better. It can really be a feedback loop that gets cut when you cut it all the way off. Which is painful (don't get me wrong) but might be necessary to bring someone out of that self-reinforcing cycle. I don't know if people can understand it until they see it, how some people are willing to ruin their lives to be online, especially if there are other brain factors in play. 😕 It is really kind of too much like drugs.

as far as going into adulthood and having to learn later in life...our brains all mature at different stages. Yes in todays world one has to learn how to do this and maybe some people never will. But for us it was much healthier to not have the screen time dominating everything else and cutting it off meant we could scaffold other development much better (meaning, at all!). We can cross other bridges when we get to them.

Edited January 5, 2023 by BronzeTurtle

[Hilltopmom]

Glow kids freaked me out too.

And I would say my oldest spectrum kid was (is?) also addicted to video games- that started with WOW and Minecraft around that age. Don’t wait until he’s an older teen to try to take it away- that was a disaster.

I’d work on limiting (while you still can- we could not with a violent large teen) and adding other activities (for mine it was Robotics team).

Sorry. I’ve been there and it’s tough.

We did a mood stabilizer at some point in the teen years.

If it helps, mine is 22 now and came home for Xmas with a girlfriend (who he met playing online games) and didn’t get his laptop out once during the visit. It was also the first time he was pleasant in a visit in years. 

Edited January 5, 2023 by Hilltopmom

[kbutton]

1 hour ago, freesia said:

My oldest was very much affected by screens if we let him on more than an hour a day. Our solution was to have a set amount of time until he was 18. I would help him see that went he went over, he felt badly. He is NT, but he didn’t really see or maybe acknowledge the truth of it until he was at least 18. He absolutely had trouble with anger and depression and anxiety when he was on longer than an hour. Frankly, it was like magic once we set the limit. Within three weeks there was a marked turn around. He has thanked me for doing it once he got to college. Now, like I said, he’s NT. I know from seeing friends go through it, that early adolescence is really hard with ASD kids. But, I think it’s worth a try to set limits. Even with a special interest, one needs to learn to regulate the time. I’m of the opinion, too, that because screens involve dopamine hits, that it’s not something many kids can learn to self regulate themselves. Their brains are building pathways and we need to protect them like we do with helmets.  After 18 or so, I think they can learn by experience more. 

Yes, this is the kind of thing that worked for us. I agree so much with the bolded.

36 minutes ago, BronzeTurtle said:

It would be great if every kid could learn reasonable limits on their own if given the reins. But for some kids it literally is like a drug where a little bit just makes them want more and makes them focus on how much they can have and when they can have it. And if they get all they want they will do that thing over any other thing...even if they like the other stuff better. It can really be a feedback loop that gets cut when you cut it all the way off. 

I hope it's okay to quote this part since it's generically worded...if not, I will delete. 

We had this dynamic at times with my older son and had to do similar things.

[wendyroo]

I agree with BronzeTurtle.

Peter started this school year off with reasonable screen limits (about an hour on weekday, 2-3 on weekends). It did not go well; it caused lying, sleep disruptions, school avoidance, aggression, etc.

By the end of September he had lost screen time entirely. I told him that he needed to develop alternative hobbies, and that we would discuss reintroducing screens when he showed me that he could stay busy and productively engaged without screens for at least a month.

He spent most of October pouting, and then most of November throwing himself wholeheartedly into D&D. He started playing, drawing, writing, planning and inventing D&D related things. It was great!!

At the beginning of December, based on him holding up his end of the bargain, we started allowing very limited screens - none during the week, and 1-2 hours on weekends. The result was instantaneous...instantaneously bad!! For all of October and November he had been sleeping, doing school, staying regulated, etc. Those were good months. It only took two weekends of screens for things to entirely fall apart. He spent every hour of every day fixating on screens...or alternatively lying or sneaking screens. He started being physically and verbally aggressive. He started belligerently refusing to do school work...even subjects that up until the previous week he had enjoyed. He started stealing money and candy from family members. Overall, he became completely unregulated and unraveled.

By the third week of December we had once again removed ALL screen time (not counting closely supervised Google docs and online classes). He bounced back pretty quickly, and now we have our kiddo back.

Obviously I hope that Peter eventually develops the maturity to self-regulate around screens in a healthy way, but I am also discussing with him parallels to people recovering from alcohol or gambling addiction. There are recovering addicts who will always have to entirely avoid their addiction. Alcoholics who will never be able to hang out at a bar and still resist temptation. And Peter might end up in the category...he might never be able to regulate himself around video games and only ever have the self-control to avoid them entirely.

For the time being, I am focusing on helping Peter learn to enjoy non-screen activities. Video game are certainly a fast, easy, reliable source of serotonin, but other activities can provide it as well if he gives them a chance. So I am finding ways to support him through the awkward, uncomfortable beginning stage of hobbies, when he feels uncertain and out of his depth, so he can reach the stage of the learning curve when the hobby start to feel familiar and enjoyable.

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

Tonight I asked DS12 his opinion. I used the myopia research as it relates to screen usage since three of us have poor eyesight anyway.  I explained that I am concerned about how much screen time everyone in this house is having including myself, and asked his advice on what we could do to reduce screens.

He said he’d research it and get back to me, lol.  But he was open to the idea that we break it up; sixty minutes  on screens and then do something else for an hour.  He said he didn’t Want to go lower than 60 minutes because he needs the time to concentrate on whatever machine he’s building in Minecraft.

I think more than anything, I need his buy in and to make it his idea.

Edited January 6, 2023 by Mrs Tiggywinkle Again

[SanDiegoMom]

Just throwing this out there -- is he eating enough? I had an older daughter, and my aspie has a twin sister, and their growth spurts and need for food was nothing like my son's.  He needed a steady stream of protein snacks, and when he didn't, and when hunger struck in conjunction with too much screen time, it was a disaster.  So many of his meltdowns could be traced to his growth spurt.  

So breakfast, homemade granola bar (more dense than store bought), sandwich yogurt chips and apple sauce for lunch, small snack before dinner, full dinner and a small dessert.  He was always eating. 

[Carrie12345]

I really like the idea of getting his buy in for scheduled breaks.

My dx’ed ASD boy (man now), spectrummy boy, and basically NT boy are all serious screen timers. Minecraft is, indeed, a biggy for the two younger. Man-boy is more into City Skylines these days. 😉 

I absolutely believe in the benefits this stuff can have, and I’m also notorious for allowing “too much” in the name of peace.

My only suggestion beyond the break periods is to always provide as much notice as possible. If there’s an afternoon appointment, make sure he knows the time (and travel time) in advance, and maybe agree to break up chores for during breaks?   I’m not above reducing chores on a busy day, too.
I see potential for backfiring if he’s the type to perseverate (sp?) on that “deprivation” during school, but he sounds more like a planner.

[kbutton]

At that age (and before that even), my ASD son made his own schedule to some extent, and it helped a great deal. He knew roughly what he had to do that week for school, such as x time on a topic or x number of lessons (not sure if yours has the ability to know that ahead), when we'd be out of the house for lessons, tutoring, speech therapy, etc., and he had an idea about stuff like running errands because they were often attached to trips outside of the house. He was also okay to stay home if I took his brother to the store with me.

We visually blocked out the big stuff for the week on some kind of free printable (colored pencils on the type of printable that lists things out by time), and then he would plan his stuff around those things. It made him feel a lot more in control, and he learned a lot by trial and error (which we often had to smooth over!). He had free reign to do things like multiple lessons a day of his easy stuff so that on days we were really busy, he had plenty of time to do the harder lessons. He knew what he had to take with him if we went out of the house. 

I don't know what level of information you can give your son, but since schoolwork is not a problem, maybe visualizing family time, chores, etc. would make him feel more like he's making deliberate choices. Deliberate choices make people feel like they have some control, including, over time, to their responses.

A lot of calendars don't show evening hours, but it's not hard to white-out daytime hours, write in the evening hours instead, and then make copies. 

I am not sure what all we used at the time, but these are some similar templates: https://scatteredsquirrel.com/2012/12/got-a-busy-week-theres-a-printable-for-that/

https://scatteredsquirrel.com/2012/12/busy-days-and-two-free-printables/

There are free printables for just about everything these days. I usually try to find black and white ones that aren't distracting.

[Mrs Tiggywinkle Again]

He’s in public school and has no problems being off screens while at school.  He’s miserable if he’s got unstructured free time because he just wants to be on screens to the exclusion of everything else(except dinner lol) and if we say no it’s a meltdown.  
We’re spending next week at Great Wolf Lodge, a water park that he loves, and his first question was if he’d be able to bring his laptop. I said yes but the time on it would be minimal because we’d be in the water park and playing MagiQuest and doing fun things, and he basically had a panic attack.  
 

It’s hard for me to figure out what’s screen addiction, what’s an ASD kid being completely inflexible about routine changes, what’s anxiety about any unstructured free time, and what is a normal level of ASD special interest.

 

Edited January 6, 2023 by Mrs Tiggywinkle Again

[pinball]

22 hours ago, Terabith said:

I actually didn't limit screen time after about age 8 or so.  I have, at times, said things like no screens until responsibilities were met (schoolwork, showering, chores, etc), but after about age 8 or so, I honestly feel like 1) screens are going to be present in adulthood, and so learning to manage time and screen use is an important life skill that is better taught as a kid/ teen while at home and responsibilities are fairly small, versus trying to learn to manage screens as a college student or adult, and 2) I don't like hypocrisy, and I utilize screens recreationally a lot, and it feels unfair for me to say I can use them and kids can't.  

My kids have gone through periods of managing them well, and periods where they managed them poorly, but they did learn by age 14 or so that using screens too much makes them feel icky.  They still use them sometimes too much, just like most humans, but I don't think they really would have learned that without it being a natural consequence of being allowed basically unlimited screen time.  

I would have no issue saying, "This summer, we as a family are going to x place," and one of the natural consequences of being x place is that there is limited internet.  

It would feel wrong TO ME to artificially take away screens, especially with a special interest, just because I felt like they were using them too much.  

But that's just what works for me and for my kids.  I know we are weirdos and I am fully aware that my fairly hands off approach to parenting older children and teens is kind of an outlier stance.  

It might have worked for you bc you have girls.

AFAIK, boys seem to be much more prone to gaming addiction.

 

[freesia]

46 minutes ago, pinball said:

It might have worked for you bc you have girls.

AFAIK, boys seem to be much more prone to gaming addiction.

 

This has definitely been true in my house. The girls have no trouble self-regulating at all and frequently don’t use all their time. The boys have a lot more trouble—although ds2 is less effected than ds1.