OP here - thanks for the ideas. To the PP who said make them stretch, I totally agree and would love to do it but in this case I'm not sure how. It's a good skill to be able to entertain yourself (and necessary for my sanity). Do you have any ideas for how to encourage that. Thanks for the specifics 11:15! I will try those. One time I did set a timer and tell him when it went off I would stop doing X and play a game again with him. It sort of worked - I say sort of because almost the entire time he followed me around asking if the time was up yet!

I relate. Mine was a late talker and people used to always say :be careful what you wish for because once your DC talks he will never shut up." Here is what I find helpful when I need to get things done or do something with his sister..

1. Give him a set amount of mom time where he can share everything before I need the break. Make it quality time rather than just saying "oh" and "yes" because you are trying to get other things done as he yaps on and on. (I do this, you may be better.)

2. Prepare DC for the time when you need quiet..e.g. in 20 minutes..Decide with DC what he/she will do during that time. Let him/her know how long quiet time will last.

3. Throw lots of praise his/her way for being appropriate during quiet time. I have also offered a reward if DC can be quiet for X minutes. He chooses. Yes, I will give a cookie even though experts say to leave food out.

4. IPAD always works and that is a reward in and of it's self. He could spend an hour using that thing if allowed.

It's changed as he's gotten older, but when my DS was a preschooler he played by himself much, much better than my NT preschooler does. My ASD kid was happy to just do his own (often repetitive) thing. It wouldn't have been healthy for me to let him do that all the time, but it was nice when I needed to get things done. My NT preschooler, on the other hand, always wants my attention or to show me something or to talk to me.

ASD kids get stuck in their comfort zones so easily. I make my kiddo stretch his. Not drastically where he feels unsafe. But I believe that it is important to open up their experiences of the world. I think all parents have to do this but it is particularly intense with an ASD kid. But I've seen some ASD kids who have never been challenged in this way and they and the parents are trapped in very small worlds. I'm generalizing and I'm sure your situation has a lot of unique detail... But stretching the kid is my general advice.

More intense parenting for more years.

I know all children are different so it's probably hard to draw a generalization, but just wondering what other people's experiences are. DD has never really been able to entertain herself when she is with DH or I. Even as a little baby I remember other friends could put their kids on a playmat for a few minutes but if we did that DD would scream like crazy. At school she keeps to herself and doesn't interact much at all with other children, but when she is with us she is *constantly* interacting (talking, touching, repeating, vocalizing etc.) I SAH 3.5 days a week and we spend all our time together on the weekends so I feel like she's getting a good amount of attention overall but it seems like it's never enough. She also gets a lot of focused attention throughout the day (20 minutes playing a game, time on the floor building with blocks, etc.) If I ask her to play by herself it lasts a minute or less. Even if I set her up with an activity like art or something, she's back in 2 minutes because she needs something, is bored, etc. Is this an ASD thing or just a personality trait? Has anyone found anything helpful to cope? We have another DC and some days I feel totally fried by the constant stimulation. I don't want to be upset with her if this is who she is, but it seems like there's no volume control and no break from 6am - 8pm. The only time she's relatively still is if I let her watch a video which I do during the day for both of us to decompress but I don't want to park her in front of the screen for too much time since I think that has downsides too.