Lazy 10 yr old, Need help with chores and task.

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My 10 yr old is the laziest I have ever met!

Not only can I not get him off his arse to do chores, but now he isnt even completing school work.

He is on ADD medication, so its not a an attention thing, and its been adjusted and is followed monthly with a specialist.

If I try to use his select interest as motivation, he will just choose something else to do, or play mind games where he doesnt need "toys" at all.

I have tried taking away things, punishments, yelling, ignoring, natural consequences... nothing is working.

Suggestions? Things that have worked for you?

I don't know how qualified I am since I don't have kids but I can remember a lot of my childhood, so umm here goes. Perhaps instead of punishments alone perhaps add rewards when he does his chores.

Yoiks! Sounds like it's "the power game" - not a fun one at all.

It has to be in his best interest to do chores. If he hasn't been indoctrinated (and that's what it is) from the time he was a fetus that chores are a part of what he has to do as a member of the family who is partly responsible for the daily functioning of same, it'll take some strategic moves on your part.

Off the top of my head - have you given him any choice in the matter? That is, a choice of which chores to do? A choice of which way to to do them? A reason to do them that's important enough to him that he will do so? Clear explanations of what is involved? Are they things that he actually understands how to do?

More information would help give us ideas that might help you.

I agree that this sounds like a power game. I've never studied psychology, but if this were an NT kid, I would suspect it's passive/aggressive behavior. As I understand it, that's usually a manifestation of the kid's feeling that they have no control over their own lives, so they simply start refusing to go along with your requests -- it puts them back into control of some part of their life. You might want to talk to his teachers to see how things are going at school - is he being pushed around a lot by other kids? Bullied? If he's got the impression that no one is on his side, that no one's got his back, he won't feel much like cooperating with anyone.

But you've got to be really careful here. If other kids at school see his mommy swooping in to the rescue, the teasing will just get worse.

oh my. power struggles...........as far as chores go in our house, everyone- and i mean even my husband- is told that they will go nowhere, nor do anything until chores are done. it's just a matter-of-fact sort of thing. no yelling, cajoling etc.......if a member of the family chooses to do nothing all day-fine. the consequence carries over until the chores are done.
it seems to go pretty well, actually. i'm not nagging anyone to do their chores. from time to time, i do have to remind them that they need to do their chores before they go anywhere. i think it works out ok because it's a consequence for everyone, and because everyone gets to choose what chores they do- they're not stuck with the same chores every week. we have a chore list, and everyone gets to choose 4 items from the list- 3 easy, and 2 medium. an easy chore might be dusting the tvs & computer. a medium chore might be emptying and refilling the dishwasher

I'm going to take a different tact. The first thing that raises a flag for me is the word, "lazy." Spectrum kids can be mistakenly seen as lazy when, in fact, what they are is overwhelemed or unable to cope. Think very carefully about the term. Lazy means you have the energy and ability to do something, but choose not to. If the child is really struggling with himself in terms of motivation, you aren't helping by letting him see himself as lazy.

I can really struggle with motivation, and I'm mostly NT. Negative consequences never worked with me as a child, and they don't really now. It's mostly that I truly don't have the physical and mental energy for life every hour of every day. I can pull it together in spurts where I'm brilliant, but then I collapse for 3 times as long as the spurt took.

Realize that for an AS child just getting through a school day is exhausting. By the time he comes home, he's mentally drained. He's been overstimultaed, he's been forced to apply dificult social skills, and he's been trying to sit still and pay attention - both of which are harder for him than running a marathon would be.

There may be other issues as well. My son has real mental blocks on homework, and we've had to devise some creative strategies over the years to help him get through it. One thing I often do is allow him to dictate. I read (now that he is a fluent reader; when he needed to practice this skill I didn't do it for him), he responds, I write it down. That way he can move and chew and do all the other physical things that allow him to think comfortably. When he was 10, we used to take a black marder and cut off half the homeworker to make it less visually intimidating (this was allowed in his IEP, but I think he's teachers would have been flexible regardless).

As for my son's room and chores ... he isn't assigned any chores, but now that he is 11 he OFFERS to do chores. He keeps his room clean now because he likes it that way, he's gone to great lengths to have it arranged and organized in a way that he likes (even if it doesn't go all that well with my personal aethesitic tastes). He needed us to help him with some of it, to make it feel manageable, but the work was mostly his. If you allow a child time, they can grow into these things. My son did. He now loves to help me cook (it isn't required, I just ask most nights if he would like to), he'll clear dishes when I ask with a simple "please," and so on. I think that, for him, the sense of control - that it was his choice - was important.

Basically, I never had the energy for power struggles, so I just didn't do it. And the house got pretty horrible, and the kids started to realize that THEY didn't like it that way, and started to understand the concept of teamwork, that the home is everyone's responsibility, ec. And, well, they grew up, and found themselves about to handle more, so they took things on. My AS son is also the one now who does 90% of the gear packing for family camping trips - being a boy scout has helped with that.

Which gives me another thought - my son has taken a lot of pride in being a Boy Scout, and has really upped his game when it comes to responsibility in order to meet Scouting goals and requirements. It's just different when it's in a book, and when he can SEE his friends doing it, than when it comes from mom.

Basically, in the end, you've got to change the dynamic. Regardless of the source of the problem, things won't change as long as the dynamic stays the same. You have to find a way to remove the stress that is echoing between the two of you, so that he can find his way.

Lol, sorry, that ALL sounds so touchy/feely, but, really, he's at the right age to CHOOSE responsibility, to the extent it is within his means, so give him the freedom to do that.

my kid is basically just lazy when it comes to chores, as she hates them. nothing deep and psychological, they're just work and she prefers fun. so i have it relatively easy.