My 9 year old son pretty much only plays by himself by going outside and imitating destructive animals, dinosaurs, and monsters (Godzilla, King Kong…), by punching, kicking, throwing or smashing smaller toys. He is not doing this out of anger or frustration. It’s just how he likes to play. For example, we just bought him a bigfoot stuffed animal, and he took it outside to a dirt pile, and tossed it around, dropped large rocks on it, hit it with sticks, etc. We will also often find several broken action figures out in the yard of his or his brothers, that he has broken by this play. He does have a diagnosis of ADHD and anxiety. He does like to play video games and play at parks and swimming pools and normal kid stuff. But when he plays by himself, it is typically in this manner. Does anyone have suggestions on how to approach this situation, helping him to shift his self play to be more constructive? He is not violent with people or animals, other than normal occasional wrestling with me or his brother. He gets very defensive when we bring the topic up and we are stuck on what to do next.
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