Hi, my husband and I have a 13 year old son, named AJ, and he was diagnosed with PDD/NOS at the age of 6. I took him to New York to visit my mother when he was little, and we took a train. When he came home, he started drawing intricate maps and buses on his mattress, so I thought he would be a cartographer when he grew up. As he got older, he lost some interest in the buses, but he saw Thomas the Tank Engine, and since then he's been obsessed with trains. It's all he talks about, all day, all night. If there is a show on TV about trains, no matter the time, he'll wake up early in the morning to see it. My husband and I have tried to get him interested in other things, but trains are forever in the forefront. He is determined to drive for the MTA in New York when he grows up, and I'm terrified that he will forget to stop at the stations to let people on and off. When he gets home from school now, he is determined to see trains on youtube, so he can hear the sounds and see the trains move. Just seeing a picture of a train is not enough. He wants to visit other countries to see the train stations and trains. He loves going to Penn Station in New York. He's even said that he loves trains more than he loves me, and he'll get very upset if I don't let him see trains. Should I try to get him interested in anything else, or should I just leave him be, and let him see trains every day?Trains are a very common special interest among people with autism. If it's seen and treated as a "perseveration" (and not as an interest), it's easy to be worried about it.
But what if your son were an athlete, spending every extra moment building football skills? How much would you worry? What if he spent hours playing videogames with friends? Most parents are less concerned about these types of "perseverations" among typically developing kids - in part because these particular interests are considered "normal," and in part because they are socially oriented.
In fact, trains offer a huge set of opportunities for your son - personally, socially, academically and vocationally. The trick is to turn the interest in trains around, so that instead of simply satisfying an urge to see and hear the trains, your son can also experience the fun and intellectual excitement of learning about, understanding, designing and building trains.
Take, for example, his interest in Thomas engines. In fact, Thomas engines are patterned on real engines, and there is a website that actually allows you to compare the real and pretend trains, and learn about their history, use and geography.
Thomas layouts are an important first step toward the very real and very popular pastime of model railway design and layout. If your son is really gung ho about Thomas and watching trains on TV, he may be an ideal candidate for a model train club. He can join an adult club (with support from you) - or you and he can work toward starting up a club at school.
Trains are becoming an increasingly important mode of transportation in the US, and always have been in other parts of the world. The number of possible train-related vocations is huge, including but not limited to design, engineering, maintenance, and, of course, driving. Consider the fact that someone (perhaps your son) will soon be developing new "green" railways across the US, along with the engines and cars needed to run on those railways.
Train afficionados can learn all about different types of trains and their histories; visit trains at historic museums; ride monorails and "bullet" trains (the Acela is a great ride); trace the historic and modern routes of trains; listen to and learn to play train-related folk music; build indoor and outdoor model railways; and much more.
In short, special interests like trains... animals... video games... movies... action figures and more are all direct routes to your child's heart. And every one of those interests (and most others) can become a gateway to learning, friendships, careers and adventures. The key is to find and provide the opportunities to take the interest from perseveration to hobby - and, perhaps, from hobby to career.
I wouldn’t worry about the trains. It could be a lot worse (my son had a fetish for dangerous sharps for a few years), and these things pass; the reader’s child will probably move through a series of different interests. I have Asperger’s, and as an adult I myself have had eight different careers, most of them very successful, and also learned four foreign languages to a basic utility level through my persevering abilities.
I average one unsolicited job inquiry a day.
Both my kids were passionate about trains with no end in sight, but they surprisingly outgrew. First my oldest son outgrew it when he turned 7, and then my youngest son outgrew it when he turned 7. Now they’re into Lego.
In the meantime, I used their interest to teach them all kinds of things, and compiled a long list of links to online train games (many of them learning games). Here’s my list (scroll down when you get to the link):
http://www.autism-pdd.net/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=11839&KW=trains&TPN=2
I just noticed that the reader’s son is 13, while the links I compiled are for younger kids.
As far as a career in trains goes, I recently talked to an autism expert and she said a career in the field of one’s special interest isn’t always such a good idea. The person with autism is often more motivated to pursue his interest on his own terms than do the job as defined and as required by his boss. I wouldn’t encourage a career in trains, but focus on a job that’s a good match with his skills and sensory issues, and emphasize that it’s good to have a hobby to relax with when you come from work.
Lisa: Have you heard of Darius McCollum whose obsession with trains was quite similar to this boy’s and he learned everything about the New York transit system. His obsession with trains has gotten him arrested multiple times for joyriding and he has spent a fair amount of time in prison and no time at all working in a train related occupation. You are quite wrong that these obsessions are not harmful and your neurodiversity perspective totally trivializes these problems. Darius has taken various medications to try to treat his obsessions with no effect. It is likely that he will continue to do this activity and be arrested and in and out of prisons for the rest of his life.
Something for you to think about while presenting such terribly simplistic solutions to hard problems.
Jonathan –
is it really your contention that by helping their son discover the broader possibilities surrounding an interest in trains that these parents will set their child up for a life of crime?
Do you really think that by telling their son “no trains” they will somehow prevent such an outcome?
My point is that there is a great deal more to trains that simply riding them. By helping their son to see that, and to take part in the larger world that happens to relate to a special interest, they may be able to provide him with the tools to turn an obsession into something more.
You can’t cure an obsession by forbidding it. You may be able to modify it, though, by finding other outlets that support but modify the interest.
Of course, these parents will know best whether their son is able to break away from obsession into interest. I’ve certainly met many autistic kids who can – and some who can’t.
Lisa
To obsess or not to obsess, that is the question?
I had what is known as hyperlexia, an advanced love of words, basically. I would obsess over my words all the time (okay, still do) from reading distionaries of various kinds, thesaurases, etc to creating new words. I list synonyms and antonyms as a calming thing when I’m upset.
This preoccupation/obsession with words could have led me to breaking into a word bank and set me on a path of crime! However, it didn’t. I became a writer instead and get paid for it!
It’s unfortunate that this man’s obsession has led him to make unfortunate choices that have gotten him into trouble. But the thing is, maybe if his parents had subverted his obsession into the opportunities that Lisa talked about, maybe he wouldn’t be having the problem he is now. Just maybe…
We found the only way to really reach and teach our son and the other teens/young adults we work with is to embrace their obsessions – or passions and help them develop their talents and skills. We are developing a vocational, educational and social support program based on workshops that help the kids build projects based on their own interests:
Autistry Studios. We would love to hear from others working in this area!