Supporting Your Child with ADHD

Written by Trent Heck, LISW, LCSW-R, ACSW, C-ACYFSW

Connecting with your child can feel hard. Connecting with your Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity (ADHD) child can feel overwhelming.

This is because ADHD, a chronic (but manageable!) neurological disorder, creates significant difficulty with focus and impulsivity. For parents, this feels like constant redirection and correction of behaviors, when you’d much rather enjoy your often limited quality time. It’s natural for both the parent and child to have feelings of guilt, regret, or even depression as a result.

I know this from personal experience. Raising my eight-year-old son with ADHD, I often feel like I am not giving him the childhood experiences I want him to have. But I’m not alone, and neither are you.

Understanding ADHD & Its Challenges

ADHD impacts millions of children all over the world at an educational, social-emotional, and social-developmental level and may often continue into adulthood. Challenges may include a persistent combination of issues related to establishing and sustaining long-term attention, hyperactivity, and impulsive behavioral choice-making.

Additionally, children with ADHD often struggle with self-esteem, social/school anxiety, social relationships, and educational performance. However, these concerns can be minimized through cognitive-behavioral therapy, school accommodations, and medication management under the supervision of a qualified medical provider.

ADHD has three primary subtypes, and understanding the differences can help you better support your child’s individual needs.

1. Predominantly Inattentive: This subtype is informally known as Attention-Deficit Disorder (ADD). Individuals with this type of ADHD display issues primarily related to establishing and/or sustaining attention, or struggle with severe inattention. They struggle far less with reckless or impulsive behavior and may be mislabeled as “lazy” or “failing to work to their full potential”.

2. Predominantly Hyperactive: Within this subtype, individuals struggle far more with reckless behavior and impulsive choice-making. These individuals will be identified by their constant movement, frequent social conflicts, intense emotional displays, and poor decision-making, often without consideration of the associated consequences.

3. Combined Type: For this subtype, the individual displays all features and issues related to severe inattention and sustaining attention, as well as concerns related to social conflict, significant emotional dysregulation, low-frustration tolerance, and frequent instances of reckless/impulsive behavior choices.

Gender Differences in ADHD

There are significant differences to note regarding ADHD presentation and gender.

For instance, males diagnosed with the condition tend to display more obvious, externalized behaviors. This includes disruptive behavior displays such as interrupting, low frustration tolerance, social conflict, and impulsive choice-making.

Females, however, typically present more subtly with internalized symptoms. They may find it difficult to sustain attention, be easily distracted, daydream frequently, and experience significant issues with organization.

Regardless of how your child’s symptoms show up, here are some tips for supporting your child as they navigate the challenges of ADHD.

Behavioral Strategies for Supporting Your Child

1. Provide praise and concrete reward for meeting expectations.

Children diagnosed with ADHD are far more likely to be criticized than praised throughout their day due to the symptoms of their condition. Frequent criticism will have a direct impact on their sense of self-worth and willingness to “try” to meet expectations.

To encourage your children, refocus their perspective on what they did right, or almost right. If a child makes a mistake, talk to them about what they can do differently to have a more positive outcome next time. When the child meets expectations, it is essential to have immediate and concrete rewards present (at first) to encourage the new behavior.

Once the new behavior pattern is established, you can move toward unpredictable intermittent reinforcement, which is the strongest form of reinforcement learning. This can be achieved by instituting a “Caught You Being Awesome” reward program for when you see the child make a positive choice without parental prompting. Parents should also explain to the child why they earned the reward to reinforce positive behaviors and positive choice-making.

2. Provide short, concrete, and practical step-by-step directions.

When providing directions to your child, taking specific steps can help promote successful outcomes.

Before Giving Directions:

1. Get the child’s attention. This can be done by gently touching the child’s shoulder, kneeling to their level, and maintaining direct eye contact with them. Speak with a calm, even tone and regular voice.

2. Limit outside distractions. Speak with them in a location that is free from potential distractions, such as television, radio, and other people.

3. Be prepared. Wait to give instructions until you can be in the general location of the child as they complete the task. Be patient and provide reminders as needed to help the child complete their tasks. Be sure to offer ongoing encouraging vocal statements.

During Instruction Delivery:

1. Keep things simple. Provide one or two clear, concise, and direct instructions at a time, rather than a lengthy and complicated list.

2. Use positive language. When communicating with your child, focus on explaining the behaviors you want to see and hear, rather than those you do not want to see or hear.

3. Provide visuals. When working with younger children or focusing on complex tasks, it’s helpful to use visual aids. This could be illustrations or even photos of the child completing said task. The pictures serve as a task checklist to maintain order and ensure tasks are completed appropriately, leading to greater success.

4. Give them time. After providing instruction to your child, wait a few seconds to allow them to process the information. Then have your child repeat the directions back to you to ensure their understanding.

5. Demonstrate if needed. If the task is new to your child, you may need to show them how to complete it. Use slow, deliberate movements with short, direct answers to questions.

3. Establish Health Habits

If your child takes medication for their ADHD, it is very important that it be taken as prescribed and on a consistent basis. It is essential to maintain regular contact with your child’s prescriber to ensure that side effects are minimized and do not negatively impact your child’s health, growth, or development.

You should also ensure that your child gets adequate sleep. Maintain a regular daily bedtime and wake time, a balanced diet, and outlets for regular exercise.

4. Develop Routines for Homework and Chores

Work together to identify and choose some age-appropriate chores for your child to help with. This allows them to learn personal responsibility and self-confidence. For homework, schedule a regular time for your child to do their work and establish a distraction-free environment so they can focus. Once they have completed both homework and their basic, age-appropriate chores, incorporate playtime to promote healthy development.

5. Help Your Child Build Positive Relationships, Healthy Social Skills, & Age-Appropriate Friendships

For any parent, it is essential to be a positive role model, and consistently displaying the same positive behaviors is huge for children with ADHD. Modeling good manners, apologizing when a mistake is made, or even taking a self-time out when you feel overwhelmed are great examples.

Plan to have special time together without screens, 3–5 times per week. Fill this time with positive one-on-one interactions, such as playing board games, going for walks, or reading together. This will help build and maintain a healthy parent-child relationship.

You can also help your child develop at least one close friendship by facilitating playdates with other children from school, peer groups, or your neighborhood.

Lastly, you can facilitate a sense of self-confidence and pride by asking your child what they did that was respectful, responsible, and/or safe today that helped make the world a better place. Their response can be as simple as putting on their seatbelt when in the car or holding a door for someone else when entering a building. This allows you to assist them in understanding why these were positive choices and presents an opportunity to offer praise.

The final thought here is to be patient with your child and with yourself. Neither one of you has been in this situation before, and there will be a learning curve for each of you. Remember, you don’t need your child to be perfect, and they don’t need you to be perfect—but you do need to be there for each other.

If you’re struggling to understand or support your child, whether they have an ADHD diagnosis or not, reach out to Meadowlark!

We offer psychological testing to help identify potential challenges and underlying factors that could be inhibiting learning, development, focus, or interpersonal skills. Our clinicians can work with your child while also offering guidance for you as the parent.

Sources

https://www.berkeleypsychiatrists.co.uk/blog/what-are-the-differences-between-female-and-male-adhd