obsessed with Death and dying

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My 13yr old son never stops talking about death, when he was younger all he would say was that he wanted to die.

Today he was off school because he was ill and again the his topic of conversation was about death. He is now on the internet checking how to destroy humanity. When he was been assessed I said that he didn't have one obsession like cars, aeroplanes etc but now I think he does and its Death.

He constantly talks about it daily, at times he gets very low and threatens to kill himself, I had to take him to the psychiatrist recently because he was threatening to hang himself and tried to use the dogs leash to do this and also produce knife and threaten to cut his wrist and throat.

The psychiatrist said he is been attention seeking, we have had a number of these scary incidents which are worrying. When this happens I arrange an appointment with the psychiatrist they always reassure that all is ok I don't understand how this behaviour is ok and wondering if anyone experience this and how to deal with it. He always says he is going to kill himself and wants to die this I can manage but when he tries to harm himself I don't know what to do and I am not getting any advice from the psychiatrist other than its behavioural.

For a while now he is also obsessed about vampires and he wants to be one he also wants to go to the moon. I have had all the talks about death with him, when he hears someone has passed away, he always says its unfair why its not him because he wants to die and the person probably didn't. My sister has terminal cancer and he said again he feels sorry for her but wishes it was him as again he wants to die.

I was hoping as he got older this would cease but its getting worse not better. I have said that he does get stressed out at school but I have managed to get the school to make changes but nothing seems to be working.

I would also question the psychiatrist. Even if it IS attention seeking, that's not a healthy way to live. And, sometimes attention seeking behaviors turn out to be fatal by accident. I'd definitely seek out another opinion.

I'm sorry. It must be so difficult to deal with!

My non-professional random thought might be to take him to visit a graveyard. Could this be explored and gain some perspective if he is really hung up on this subject?

In particular it might be interesting to observe stone markers showing long lives. I still remember seeing my great grandpa being buried and his stone showing his remarkable 102 years and all the things he saw in the 20th century.

We have a societal aversion to talking about death. One of the things that can be helpful is to overcome your own aversion so you can hear the person better. Ask questions like, "what do you imagine will happen if you died" "how would it be different from now" see if this is a thought of escape from emotional pain, or an interest in the afterlife, a curiosity, a way of coping with fear of death or some other reason I have not even thought of.

We have a societal aversion to talking about death. One of the things that can be helpful is to overcome your own aversion so you can hear the person better. Ask questions like, "what do you imagine will happen if you died" "how would it be different from now" see if this is a thought of escape from emotional pain, or an interest in the afterlife, a curiosity, a way of coping with fear of death or some other reason I have not even thought of.

I have asked these questions and he says that it has to be better than his life now. He says he feels sad, hates his life and wants to die or he is going to kill himself daily.

I try talking to him but these are the only responses I get, and that I would be happy if he was dead. I keep telling him it would break my heart, later he comes looking for hugs and kisses. If I ask for a hug or kiss no only when he wants.

Get a new psychiatrist. The one you have now is an idiot. His obsession plus feelings of sadness are very concerning. The fact that he has made attempts, whether "serious" or not is a huge red flag. Seriously, don't wait.

I would find a new psychiatrist. Definately. If it were just an obsession with death, or interest in it, I would have suggested he look up some embalming sites, etc. He could do that for a living when he grows up. But saying he wants to die, even if your dr is right and its suicidal ideation not actually being suicidal, he still needs treatment for that.

I know he's old enough to know this and all, but I would have a talk with him and make sure he knows that when people die, they stay dead. There is no coming back.

Vampire obsession is common at his age. My daughter is in that herself right now and has been for a couple of years. Vampires are popular with teens now. I wouldn't worry about the vampire thing.

Have you asked him why he wanted to die? What he thinks will happen if he does die? You should talk about this with him, not just the psychiatrist. Ask him what would make him not want to die. Ask him if he really wants to be dead or if he just likes the idea of dying. Sometimes people don't seem to get the difference.

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I'm giving it another shot. We will see.
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At his age and the fact that he has Asperger's it is common for him to have obsessions that may be very odd or maybe even scary. I was also obsessed with death at his age and I wanted to know what happened and I read about murders and serial murders and old people being found dead in their house, this fascinated me but I learned quickly to keep it to myself as it upset other people and they thought I was weird (nothing new there). I, like someone mentioned, loved to wander through cemeteries and I still do. Now that I recently lost my son (age 24) my "what happens when you die?" obsession has re emerged just in a far different way.
I think he could be attention seeking by gauging your reaction to his threats of suicide. He may need more reassurance that he is important to you but if you fall into this game of "freaking out" when he makes these threats you may be prolonging this type of behavior. As morbid as it may sound or seem to you he may be just very intensely interested in how people grieve and how his own parents would grieve over his death. Im not saying NOT to take any threat of suicide as nothing but I would call his bluff. If he told me that he was going to hang himself with the dog leashes. I would ask him calmly, "Ok how are you going to do this?" even have him show you. More that likely he will break down and become upset if he is bluffing or as I say just gauging your response. Its like the old "Im running away from home" thing. If you help them pack and act sad and say you will miss them they break down and cry and say they are sorry and they dont want to run away. My Mom did this to me as she was tired of my "Im running away" tantrums.
If he has never hurt or harmed himself in any way this may very well be just an obsession. I am also still obsessed with vampires and/or being some sort of eternal being and I write stories about it now. Maybe you can encourage him to write stories about it. Like write a story about him being a vampire or maybe even how he would think you would react to him dying. This may be more therapeutic for him than anything a psych can do for him. I mean if you rush and put him on meds that he doesnt need this could be a problem as well.
My obsession was mainly fueled from fear of death, not wanting to die but still wanting to know what happens and how other people would feel if I died or how I would feel if someone died.
I know its hard to look at it without viewing it in an emotional way when your son is telling you he wants to die but have you ever tried NOT getting upset? and if so what is his reaction to that? does he become angry? say you dont love him? anything of this nature.
I would talk to your doctor about this and ask him if he thinks this is what is going on or maybe even talk to a different doctor and ask him if its possible that this is just an aspie obsession and not really serious threats of suicide. No matter what I would watch him very closely, because I dont know him so I can not be sure of any of this, but you might try not to over react and see how he reacts.

Just as a side note...if you feel that your son is REALLY going to attempt suicide DO NOT make an appointment, take him directly to the emergency room of a hospital. I had to do this with my daughter. She was 18 and I was on vacation. Her boyfriend had left her in my house and she was in a closet with a knife. I sent the police and she did have a cut on her wrist and did tell the police that she did not want to live so she spent a week in the psych unit. We later have found that she actually has a physical problem that causes issues with her brain, loss of blood and it can cause her to over react to things (the cut was superficial btw but I was still very worried), can cause hallucinations and "brain fog"....she will be talking and loose her train of thought. We were afraid she was developing mental illness (she also has Aspergers) but we found after having her on anti psychotics that she was having other issues before this, fainting upon standing and her legs turning purple. She has what is called POTS syndrome, you can google it if interested. I do not think your son has this but I just wanted you to know that I do not take threats of suicide lightly but the way you describe your son just sounds so much like I was at his age. He may also be suffering abuse (bullying) at school and that could also make him very depressed. I never wanted to die but I wanted my parents to pay attention and I also did not know how to explain to them the problems I had at school.

He is not on medication because of his death wish/obsession, he is to help with ADHD and more recently OCD traits.

He always made statements that he wants to die from a very young age, this I can manage and was not overly concerned. I didn't understand why he would say this but now I do it was a communication difficulty. He can now express better what's upsetting him, he still will make statements like I am sad, I am been bullied, everyone hates me but when I try and get him to go into more detail he shuts down or is not able. He attended a play therapist and this really helped with communication issues but we still have the one off statements.

He would also slap himself in the face and punch himself but this has ceased again the play therapy helped with this. Its only been over a year that he has received the ASD dx so I am educating myself with lots of help from this forum.

The incident with the dog leash happened last week he came home from a football game that he was attending with friends. I was making the dinner and everything seem to be fine only that it was Sunday and school next day, we get a lot of upset on Sundays. He said he was going to hang himself with the leash, I ignored and continue with the dinner and got the usual I don't care, hate him and family would be better off without him and would be happy if he was dead etc. He had the leash around his neck and was squeezing it really tightly and going red and not able to talk properly I held out and ignored it. He left the kitchen and put the lead over the curtain rail and went to step on the window ledge. I calmly asked him to get off and give me the leash which he refused. He then went up the stairs with the lead around his neck and pulling it as in strangling himself, I ask again for the leash and his sister was coming down the stairs so I forcefully removed it and put it away. He went to his room he told me he tried again but the curtain rail broke and would not hold his weight.

We have had a few incidents like this, we had problems with him taking sharp knifes and threatening to cut himself. I would just calmly take it from him and put it away, he did this again on Sunday but he had stopped doing this for a long time. Again I manage to get him to stop one behaviour only for him to replace it with another one. The hanging one is frightening because he could unintentionally seriously hurt himself or worse. I get more concerned as it depends on his mood he can get very low and when he talks in this manner its very worrying. He can say he is going to kill himself but his mood would be good or he could be laughing or joking. Because he is taking medication and when does harm himself even if he doesn't seriously hurt himself I feel its important to take him to the doctor.

These more serious incidents don't happen on a regular basis but when they do I act as calmly and possible try to find out why, but when he is in that mood there is no talking to him. The hanging behaviour first started with his school tie, belts now the dog leash, he told me that he needs a rope to do it properly. We have no ropes in the house.

I know school is most likely the trigger, I am working with the school, he doesn't want to be home schooled. If he refuses to go to school I let him again not sure if this is going to be more problematic in the future. If I make him go to school thinking that he will be ok when he gets home that never works he would be upset for days.

We are not back and forth to the doctor only go when incidents are worrying we try and manage things at home. He did tell the Dr last week that he wanted to die and was trying to kill himself. He has also says that he gets afraid but when he is brave he will do it.

I am looking for peoples view or experience to work out if this is an obsession, behavioural or attention seeking. I do know that he makes these statements to get a reaction but also at times he means it or really feels that way.

It may be a combination of the three-obsession, attention seeking, behavioral. But one thing is certain despite the reason-he is asking for help. What worries me is that he is on medication and those medications can be known to cause a person to actively seek to commit suicide, when before they were just constantly thinking about it. You need to discuss this with the Dr and possibly look at changing meds. As others have stated, I would not hesitate to find another psych and treat this very seriously. You may be a little desensitized to the serious nature of this due to the fact that he has been talking about death for so long. But the story you tell above is very frightening and I would be headed to an in patient hospitalization immediately if it were me. It is not that hard for him to find some rope. Please get help for him!