Eco, I'm going to write from the perspective of parenting my DS-- may or may not fit yours.
My son doesn't really have a bad temper but he is SO passively-resistant that it came down to what felt like threats (and that is not my preferred MO--ha!) I guess they weren't exactly threats, but statements of reality: if you want to stay in this program, you have to do the work. This would usually get his attention, but it felt like such a heavy toll to pay.
His passivity is not IMO a personality quirk but part of the neurologically atypical stuff.
We have trouble with:
--initiation (hard to start)
--not seeing the steps that lead to success clearly (being able to think ahead/organize/anticipate)
--not being able to organize the steps (much much easier to do what's comfortable than learn unfamiliar steps; worse in situations that have high stakes)
These are all EF issues very common to people who have ASD or ADHD.
I do know that I do not especially want him to live in my (metaphorical) basement in adulthood, reading *everything* about his current interest, drawing, and asking bizarre philosophical questions at each crack of dawn...
I would try not to dwell on the long term future (and its possible specters). Rather, I like a 3-5 year planning horizon.
Look at the next few years, and decide what skills are missing that are needed within that horizon. Pick one, work on that. Let the rest be easy until that's mastered. Then pick another.
Our process is to decide what behavior we want to see, support that behavior so he knows what it's supposed to look like, and then gradually fade the support.
This is a hard, hard job.
YES.
I have privately nicknamed him Bartleby the Scrivener because he "prefers not to" on just about everything, unless it's been outlined, mind-mapped, explained to his satisfaction, and then enforced *perfectly* in a way that convinces him without causing him to decompensate.
Yep. We cannot (still, age 12) say "clean your room." We have to break it into sub-tasks. (Pick up laundry and put it in the basket; all books back on shelves.) By teaching and reinforcing the sub-tasks you can work toward independence in a manageable way, with fewer freakouts.
We certainly cannot say "study for your final." We have to build a plan that divides this into reasonable subtasks, and then help him stick with it.
BUT I can say that we are seeing huge improvement with this kind of support. I am very pleased with this process so far.
I guess what it boils down to is a middle road (like Bluemagic said)-- not letting him get away with "rather not" but also supporting him in trying to do stuff so that it doesn't result in personal crisis.
I will also say that demonstrations about stress in new situations are not inherently to be avoided-- rather, they're a sign that you're somewhere at the top of the ZPD. Don't dial all the way back so that there are no freakouts-- support through the freakout toward the desired result instead.
