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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]
He needs to play independently.  Let him choose what you will do, but at the first sign that he's trying to control how you play, you stop, tell him that he doesn't get to tell other people how to play, and you turn around and read a book or do something else.  After 5 minutes of quiet behavior, you can turn around and ask if he wants to play with you again, but that's 5 minutes when he's quiet, not yelling, not crying, nothing.  By allowing him to get away with bossing you around, you are teaching him that he has authority with everything.  I'm all for allowing a child choices, but I only offer 2 at that age, and both are acceptable to me.[/quote]
Thank you very much for this suggestion, I will try this. I had told him something similar before, that if he was disrespectful then I could not play with him but did not think to do the same for that issue because while he is being bossy, he asks it "nicely". As if it's just the way he likes to play, so it did not even occur to me to "punish" him for doing that. Instead I tried to reason with him. I will most definitely try your suggestion, I hope it works and he doesn't throw a huge tantrum. But will surely stand my ground if he does because I have no problem doing that. Once I say something I do not go back on my word.

[quote=Anonymous]Thank you, OP, for answering my questions. I can now clearly see that your change is over-burdened with so many options and all the decisions he is being forced to make. If his parents are doing the same thing, the poor child doesn't have a chance of a happy childhood.

He needs to have zero options/decisions to make, except during his playtime, either alone or with a peer. Responsible adults should never be taking orders from a child. He's so confused.

Plan a consistent daily routine and stick to it, unless he's home sick. Once or maybe twice a week, he should have another child over for a play date. The same day of the week would be most ideal.[/quote]

Thank you very much for the advice! I figure that since it was related to play time it was okay to let him choose what to play with and that I didn't need to offer options for that. I never had this problem with other children with that strategy, but I can see what you mean. He might need even more consistency than most kids and I can see how limiting what he choose could help. I have read so much that children get to decide so little and that they should have choices on things that don't really matter that I usually just let them choose the non important stuff and it had worked until now. But I will definitely change this. I obviously never let him decide important things and the snack thing his parents told me he is allowed to choose, so I followed their directions assuming that it was something that worked for them.

I only initially did what he asked during play because at first it didn't seem like he was being bossy, because he often claims he wants to reenact a scene from the movie, so I thought why not. Then all of a sudden that's all he wants to do all the time. He did try to boss me around at other times demanding that I hold his bag or clean up his toys and any time that happened I made sure he knew that was not ok and did not do what he told me to. But perhaps he needs more rules.

Thanks again for your help!
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