[waxhawfamily]

Hi, I haven't posted in years! We adopted our DS just over 3 years ago from Tula, Russia. He was 26 months old at the time and all seemed to go well.
This year he should be in kindergarden, but we didn't feel he was ready for a lot of reasons. He is still in a preschool type program and we have a few little things that are starting to bother us. One of the big ones is that he shows no signs of imagination - which should have kicked in around age 3.

He is not interested in playing with toys at all.
He doesn't have nightmares at night (which are a sign of vivid imagination)
He doesn't play act or pretend play unless he is pretending to eat - he is obsessed with food.
He is social enough, but he doesn't enjoy actually playing with other children unless it's video or computer games (no imagination required there)
He absolutely does not play by himself
He doesn't even get startled if you surprise him

Does anyone have experience with this being a sign of any disorder of any type?

[greenrobin]

You might try finding momraine. She has kids from Russia and experience with their issues.

Have you contacted a therapist yet?

[kretzklan]

I posted a question almost exactly like this about my DD from Russia on the Russian board a while back. She is now 9 - but really never displayed any imaginative play. I got tons of great advice and some of it helped. I have only just now seen her use "voices" to create stories with her dolls. She is better at imagination when playing with DS2. Hopefully you can search for the thread - or even repost this on the Russia board. You and I aren't alone...there were a lot of folks that totally understood.

[marykath]

Sounds familiar! We adopted our daugther in the US, though foster care, at 17 months. She is now 4, and we have had some of the same play issues. It took soooo long to "teach" her how to play with toys, and they are certainly not her first choice even now...I can sometimes get her started by playing on the floor w/ her, but it can be hard going, especially when she starts trying to use the toys inappropiately. My advice, for what it's worth: keep trying to play w/ the child, trying different toys and themes (my daugther isn't into actual toys, but like to role-play, playing things like mommy/baby or Dora/Diego, for example). Keep trying until you hit on something that captures his interest. But don't force it, either. It's a fine line, I think.
Can someone point me to the Russia thread on this topic? I searched but couldn't find it.

[waxhawfamily]

Thanks for the input.

We do have a doctor / counselling appointment set up for 3 weeks from now.

Our DS is 5 years old and when given the choice to go into a room filled with toys and play with any of them, or go into the same room and clean up, he reluctantly chooses to clean up. For him, it is the lesser of two evils.

Making him play in his toy room is a punishment for him - that's just not right.