Obsessed with horror films?
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Obsessed with horror films?
| Thu, 10-26-2006 - 12:23am |
Hi,
My soon to be 11yr old son who's been dx'ed with Aspergers has really become obsessed with watching all the Halloween movies, Freddy vs Jason, Friday the 13th, Texas Chainsaw massacre, etc. type movies. For the longest time, I told him NO R rated movies but since Halloween was coming up and he kept bugging me and telling me ALL the kids watch him, I let him watch a few and I watched them with him too. Of course, he wants to keep watching more and more and the gorier the better. He's been doing so well in school and then today I got a note from his teacher stating he's really wound up at school the past coupla days and some girl accused him of calling her a lesbian. When I asked him about it, he said he didn't and he doesn't even know what that is. Someone at school mentioned it was a good girls name. And then he asked me if it's the same as "happy" like "gay". LOL
Today when I told him he needed to take a break from them because they are starting to affect him at school he was bawling and got really upset. It made me upset to think that a movie could affect him like this. He said he just wants to be "normal". That made my heart break. I told him he's normal no matter what, he doesn't have to watch what the kids are watching at school...I know he's just trying to be cool but the movies out nowadays are pretty bad and I know some parents don't care what their kids watch. With the Aspergers, does it make it worse for his brain to process this stuff? How do I get him off this obsession now? I feel so guilty for even giving in:( He just won't let up...he just tests me all the time, and he caught me in a weak moment.
Any suggestions>
Thanks,
amy
My soon to be 11yr old son who's been dx'ed with Aspergers has really become obsessed with watching all the Halloween movies, Freddy vs Jason, Friday the 13th, Texas Chainsaw massacre, etc. type movies. For the longest time, I told him NO R rated movies but since Halloween was coming up and he kept bugging me and telling me ALL the kids watch him, I let him watch a few and I watched them with him too. Of course, he wants to keep watching more and more and the gorier the better. He's been doing so well in school and then today I got a note from his teacher stating he's really wound up at school the past coupla days and some girl accused him of calling her a lesbian. When I asked him about it, he said he didn't and he doesn't even know what that is. Someone at school mentioned it was a good girls name. And then he asked me if it's the same as "happy" like "gay". LOL
Today when I told him he needed to take a break from them because they are starting to affect him at school he was bawling and got really upset. It made me upset to think that a movie could affect him like this. He said he just wants to be "normal". That made my heart break. I told him he's normal no matter what, he doesn't have to watch what the kids are watching at school...I know he's just trying to be cool but the movies out nowadays are pretty bad and I know some parents don't care what their kids watch. With the Aspergers, does it make it worse for his brain to process this stuff? How do I get him off this obsession now? I feel so guilty for even giving in:( He just won't let up...he just tests me all the time, and he caught me in a weak moment.
Any suggestions>
Thanks,
amy


I'm dealing with a similar, but slightly different problem. My son is obsessed with video games. I like video games too. I thought the games were good for him because he will persist with them, like he won't for other things. He will keep working at a game to achieve a goal and there is a lot of problem solving, etc... in the games that I let him buy.
*****BUT*****I started to suspect that his video game habit was causing him to be more aggressive. I took the games away about 2 weeks ago. His behavior has improved at home, but not so much at school.
I really don't think it's the content of the activity...it's the prolonged engagement in the obsession that's the problem. I'm guessing if your son was obsessed with watching romantic comedies and he got to watch a lot of them, you would still have similar behavior problems even though romantic comedies do not have disturbing themes.
I haven't reintroduced video games yet. I'm trying to figure out a way to let him play them for controlled periods of time. Ha, I haven't figured that one out yet.
With us it is video games too. These obsessions can be such a challenge. I have to agree that it isn't the object of the obsession that's the problem... its the amount of time devoted to the obsession that causes the problems.
With Haley (also AS), the video games are the biggest issue. She gets so into these games (Mario Kart mostly) that the characters become real to her. She says she knows they aren't real but then I start hearing that these characters are her imaginary friends. Last year, she had an incident at school where one of the bad Mario characters was trying to shoot one of the good ones and she was yelling at him in the lunch room. Was a rough situation. Thankfully that has improved.
Another obsession my kiddo has is these two different anime shows. Inuyasha and Naruto. This is an older sister influence. I honestly do not feel they are appropriate for her. There is too much adult content that sneaks in to those shows from time to time and there is a lot of violence. I try hard to keep those shows to a bare minimum or not let her watch them at all but it isn't always easy. I have pretty much cut out Inuyasha now thankfully. Still working on Naruto. Why can't she just like Strawberry Shortcake?? LOL
As far as getting off the obsession, I think it really just comes down to setting strict limits. I have tried limiting exposure to the obsession a little bit at a time and gradually replacing the obsession with something more appropriate. For example, Haley always insisted on playing these games before bed... even at bedtime to help her fall asleep. That of course doesn't work and she just loses sleep so I started setting specific time limits... making the limits tighter and tighter. During the time when she normally would have been playing the game, I started introducing a special story time and making that time longer and longer. Now we have squeezed out the night time games completely and have a really nice story time before bed. Has worked out pretty well thankfully.
Mom to Erin (19) and Haley (10yo Asp