Lol - Thank you all. Nice to know we're not alone
Thanks for the advice and we're implementing most of those strategies. I do insist my time and explain that as a family we're all entitled to have some time to do things we're interested in. Once I have extracted her from around my neck begging me to keep playing, she's very good at entertaining herself - though not so much the stopping talking (I like them mandatory quiet time idea - will definitely give that one a go).
I put time limits on those games that really bore me and I explain that while I can see it's a game that she loves, that as an adult such and such a game is only interesting for me for so long, but that she is welcome to keep playing it. I also often say "I'm done for pretend games today, I'm happy to play a board game, do some craft, read etc or I can help you set up what you'd like to play and then I'm going to do x".
I think sometimes she has a whole scenario playing out in her head and she has an idea of where she wants it to go, so it can be very hard for her to switch gears. I do give her some warning when I am going to stop playing so she can get her head right, but that brain keeps whirring away.
I'm not sure if it's a positive or negative, but she doesn't do this unless she's one on one with us or a couple of very trusted family members. (I was going to say negative - as she really doesn't give anyone a sense of who she is, but hearing your stories, perhaps there are some positives!). So at preschool, she's as quiet as a mouse and in most social settings, even with us there, she's very quiet too (I remember the parents of one of her friends asking me if I had any concerns about her speech when she was 3 because she then, as now, she barely says a peep at other people's houses - then we'd get in the car to go and and it would be yammer, yammer, yammer!). This seems to be a part of her desperate need to fit in by going under the radar - a story for another day!
