Parenting a child with ADHD

Usually, my approach to blog writing (and to supporting parents in general) is to stick rigorously to what we know from evidence and research. My personal experiences with my own children help me empathise with parents, for sure, but these are not the grounds for my professional advice. After all, my child is not your child, and how my child might have responded to a particular parenting strategy is no predictor of how your child will respond. That’s why researchers use randomised controlled trials with large groups of children to investigate what works.

However, today I’m going to take a different tack and tell you what I have personally learnt through parenting a child with ADHD. I offer this to you simply as my own experience – for you to pick and choose whichever bits resonate for your unique family.

So, in no particular order, here’s what I learnt parenting a child with ADHD (for context, my son had predominantly inattentive type ADHD and a late diagnosis):

• Kids with ADHD who are not disruptive in the classroom often go under the radar. The ones who are “off with the fairies” (my favourite way to describe my highly imaginative child before we had a diagnosis) just get told they need to focus more. I lost count of the number of times I heard teachers say that my child needed to pay more attention in class – with no-one putting together the pieces of what was really going on or why he was struggling to do that.
• Cognitive ability test results should be taken more seriously. When there is a big gap between cognitive ability and school performance (as was flagged with my child from the age of 6), this should be investigated.
• Don’t be scared of pursuing an assessment/diagnosis. Knowledge will help light the way.
• ADHD (especially when untreated) decimates a child’s self-esteem. When a child is constantly getting things wrong and finding stuff hard that other kids find easy (but not being able to change), that has a huge impact on how they feel about themselves. Especially when they know what they are doing is wrong but can’t control it. One of the most important things parents of children with ADHD can do is to help them experience success and build their self-esteem.
• Combatting negative self-talk with praise is ineffective. Accepting their thoughts and feelings (even if you disagree with them) and empowering them to manage them is much harder but works in the long run.
• Sometimes, parenting a child with ADHD means ignoring the mainstream parenting manuals. Let relationship and connection be your guide.
• They will lose/forget everything and ask you every five minutes “What’s for dinner?” without ever absorbing the answer. Just roll with it.
• The positive side of lack of focus is creativity and imagination.
• The negative sides of lack of focus can be lying and risk-taking – and intense disappointment when the imagined (often unrealistic) outcome doesn’t happen.
• Hyperfocus is real. I watched my son teach himself how to do headstands, draw manga characters, create the perfect parachute for floating an action figure down our stairwell and become a mean spin bowler (that’s a cricket reference for US readers!)  – all through obsessive repetition, repetition, repetition.
• The love and affection I have received from my ADHD child is precious beyond belief. My particular child with ADHD is deeply compassionate and caring and sensitive to others’ feelings.
• When they are in their groove (in a place they feel safe and accepted) they blossom.
• ADHD comes hand-in-hand with anxiety, and often other mental health disorders too.
• The teenage years can be a complete car crash. Teenage brain developments tend to amplify anxiety, procrastination and emotional reactivity, and that can make the experience of being a teenager (and being their parent) much rockier for ADHD teens.
• Parenting a child with ADHD often brings shame, guilt and a constant sense of being judged or being at fault in some way. Some of this comes from others and some of it is internal. Thick skin and self-compassion are essential.
• It does get better once they come out of the adolescent dip. Hope is your friend. Catastrophising makes everything worse.

I hope you find that helpful. I offer if purely as my own experience of parenting a child with ADHD. Your experiences may be very different. If you are minded to share your own lessons learned, the comments are open.