ADHD Parenting Tip: Do Something Entirely Unexpected With Your Child
February 18, 2009
Here in New England, for many students it is February break from school. For me, I fully understand the emotional “letdown” of having some time off. And by letdown, I mean the total relaxation that can happen. My wife is a teacher here in the greater metro-Boston area, and I witness first-hand what happens during these brief breaks from school:
- Schedules can be thrown out the window
- Lots of things to be done (waiting to be done)
- Competing attention for wants, needs, and desires
- Lingering time
- And so much more…
There is something to be said about sticking to a schedule. After all, they provide a framework for getting things done, expecting what will happen, and being able to turn to some “known quantity” when things turn to a struggle.
Yet, at the same time I tell parents to stick to a schedule, there are also incredibly important reasons to throw that schedule out the window.
Breaks from school are in some ways meant to be a break from the same old routine that can make any child or family feel suffocated or mundane.
Now, I’ll apply the standard – individual clause – in this case. And by that I mean, who sticks to a schedule, when they stick to it, and how closely they stick to it will differ from family to family and child to child. There is no standard advice for what you should be doing. Just know that children with ADHD benefit from structure and famililiarty.
So What?
I am sharing all of this because it is incredibly important to keep in mind that life should be fun, free, and spontaneous (at times). Children want to do fun things, and believe it or not, they want to do fun things with their parents.
They might not always admit it, and they might even play hard to get…but deep down inside they’ll be happy to do something fun. But here’s the catch… The fun has to be something they want to do.
So this week, if things get a little overwhelming or you are stuck on how to spend the time – do something unexpected with your child. Let them pick the activity, and then you should get involved in it.
Let go of exepctations and just have some fun.
ADHD Client Self-Awareness and Confidence
February 9, 2009
I was struck by the pain a very successful entrepreneur shared with me. He grew up hearing that he was lazy and stupid because he couldn’t manage his time and stay ahead of his school work. Even after he was diagnosed with ADHD late in high school, his family couldn’t understand what he was struggling with and accused him of being undependable and dumb.
This bright, creative, kind man still carried many of the weaknesses that you might expect from someone with ADHD, but he does well with the occasional support of medication. He has made an impressive life for himself with huge successes in his personal and business life. He is the CEO of the midsized company he founded and has two great kids.
What hurts me is that he doesn’t know how good he is. He still feels like that kid his parents mistakenly thought he was. He has carried that false image forward through college graduation, a successful start-up business and the current, profitable company he has grown into a recognizable brand.
He came to me because inside he feels like a fraud. He wonders how others can keep from seeing the truth about him. This is one of the tragedies of ADHD, a person is functioning well, but hasn’t taken time out to correct and update their personal-awareness file. They are in an enviable position in their lives, but can’t enjoy the success.
My entrepreneurial client was stunned to hear from me that many around him were almost assuredly also feeling anxious about their competence, that early information so impresses itself on our brains that it’s difficult to shake up our primal self-image.
Understanding what was happening and having a chance to talk it out gave my client a great boost of self-confidence. He is surprised and pleased that there was this next level of confidence that he didn’t even know was available to him.
I asked him what kind of difference he thought this increased confidence would make in his life. He grinned and said that with everything he had going for him, he figured he could change the world if he wanted. He just might!
Sharing Expertise Isn’t Knowing It All
February 2, 2009
Jack, a young man in his early twenties, and I were talking, and taking more than our share of the guacamole dip, at a friend’s party. We were getting along well because he was dipping with the Fritos and I was using the multi-grain chips. He responded to my question about what he did for income by explaining that he was the day-manager of a men’s store.
He politely reciprocated the question and I explained that I was an ADHD/Executive coach and briefly described how, among other things, I tried to help people with difficulties around focus of attention and organizational issues find lasting solutions to problems that were standing in their way.
He brightened up and said, “I’d like to do that kind of work.” I asked him what about it appealed to him. He replied, “I am always able to tell my friends what to do when they’re stuck, and I think I would be good at it.”
He began to share with me some stories of his successful advice to friends; it was impressive in its scope and boldness. His raw certainty reminded me of more confident times in my life. I had a momentary sinking feeling as I realized, “Boy, are those days gone.”
The problem with his notion of his strength is that coaching isn’t about telling anyone what to do. Although, as I think about that, I do suppose I tell my self to stop talking and listen more. And I recently had to remind myself to cool it with the pearls of wisdom that sounded so interesting to me, but didn’t really address where my client was at.
The longer I practice, the more inclined I am to just ask questions.
“Where did your attention go at that moment?”
“Have you ever tried anything that worked?”
“Did you forget, or get distracted?”
“That was successful! What did you do differently to make it work?”
“How often does that happen?”
It’s my job to provide some scaffolding around my clients’ judgment, strategy, planning, etc. until they can get on their feet. Of course, there is a need for suggestions to consider when their stuck, but most of my effort is in trying to make the hidden visible and bring awareness to particular patterns, so that they can discover the methods that might work for them
I’m not sure what I’d tell them to do even if I had unusual perceptiveness. After all, until something is tried it isn’t clear what will work, and once it is tried, they’re often in a better position then I am to know what really works.
I told my young friend at the party something similar. I said, “I encourage you to explore a coaching career. I’m sure as you look it will become clear whether it is what you hope it might be. Let me know if I can help.”
Read more from Jay at: http://www.livingstonservices.com/
What Causes ADHD?
February 1, 2009
What Causes ADHD? Clients frequently ask this very important question. In order to properly treat a medical condition, it helps to know what caused it. There are a number of factors to consider, but at this point it is well known to science that the leading cause of ADHD is genetics. ADHD is almost as heritable as height. If you have been diagnosed with ADHD, there is a 15-20% chance that your sibling has ADHD and a 10-30% chance that one of your parents has ADHD. And if you are an identical twin diagnosed with ADHD there is a 60-70% chance that your twin will also have the condition.
But genetics isn’t the only cause. There are other risk factors for ADHD such as prenatal exposures, maternal smoking during pregnancy, maternal alcohol use during pregnancy, psychosocial stressors, and traumatic brain injury. However all of these other factors only add up to approximately 30%, while genetics is the cause of ADHD 60-70% of the time.
What does this mean for treatment? It tells us that ADHD is a medical, biological, neurodevelopmental condition, not a choice and not a made up diagnosis by the pharmaceutical industry. It reminds us that what may appear to be willful bad behavior on behalf of an ADHD child is more likely to be as hard wired in their DNA as the color of their eyes. It tells us that medication should be at least considered for a medical condition. It also guides us in our decisions regarding non-medication interventions.
Research has shown one of the best non-medication treatments for ADHD is education. A simple yet effective intervention for ADHD is in educating those around us – what ADHD is and what it is not. We need to educate medical professionals, teachers, parents, partners, spouses, employers and anyone else who will listen so that expectations can be adjusted for an ADHD individual and accommodations can be implemented as needed. One of my colleagues, Walter Sherburne, has started a free Adult ADHD support group in the Andover area as part as our initiative for public support and education. Additionally Drs. Cerulli and Stern are implementing www.askdrcerulli.com, a free Q&A teleseminar hosted the second Wed evening of every month. Just log onto www.askdrcerulli.com and post your question for the next live Q&A. We will be in touch!
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