ADHD - Put the breaks on.

When we first had our son diagnosed ADHD we began with a good educational psychologist.

He taught us something that I was reminded off by Dr William Dobson in his pod cast.

Slow down…. STOP……be in the 'now'!!

We learnt to understand the ADHD brain as having a Ferrari brain with bicycle brakes. I think this is so helpful for explaining the brain to a child.

Ritalin and other meds help the brakes function more effectively.

Meds help with impulse control….

Hyperactivity

Inattentive

Impulsive

But then what….

Well, the exciting thing is that the child is then what I call available to learn….

It is at this point that real other learning can happen. ADHD children and adults are often not aware of the effect they have on other people. There ability to read social cues does not work effectively BUT they can learn to read them better.

Dobson calls this Mindfulness. This is a psychological term and really is used in counselling. It is the idea that we can stop and think about ourselves and our behaviour in the moment. We can train ourselves to become self AWARE… this is different to self –INVOLVED but rather is a way of noticing what effect my behaviour is having on myself… the why of behaviour but more importantly for the ADHD child… the how my behaviour is effecting others.

I love this bit because a group of friend with kids on the spectrum were actually talking about this very thing.  That is, the idea that children are not really self aware. They simply just act. 

Part of growing up is becoming self aware and thinking about why and how we behave. 

Concious living.

This idea is really rich for me because it means we can help our ADHD children and in fact all our children to stop and really think about the effect of their beaviour.

A good example is an impulsive ADHD child's interrupting of conversations. This is something one of our children struggles with . He never seems to learn not to interrupt.

I am so excited to try and get him to start thinking about the effect that his interrupting has on others… ?? well see.

I guess that what he is saying is that the ADHD child can learn how do behave socially. A little like teaching an Autistic child to greet by shaking hands and making eye contact…. ( Temple Grande is a great story and movie illustrating this)

I really think we have to do some hard wok as a family on this front….

I often feel ‘sorry’ for my ADHD kids because of their struggles and so cut them slack. I think this is OK but not in the area of appropriate behaviour socially. 

We all need to function well so that we can live well.

ADHD , Exercise and Michael Phelps.

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What about exercise and ADHD?

The Michael Phelps Phenomenon

·       Exercise is important for us all. 

It is part of being healthy and human. Exercise for the ADHD brain is essential. In fact research  shows that an hour of exercise has a lasting effect on the brain for up to 3 hours.  This effect is the same as taking RITALIN. How profound!!

Michael Phelps the swimmer is ADHD and quite outspoken . He exercises at least 6 hours a day… everyday. He stopped taking Ritalin when he was 6. The extreme exercise has the same effect on the brain. 

So what does that leave us with…

I guess we ought to encourage our ADHD children to get moving!!

Our one son is naturally active and almost craves this movement. He has to do something physical every day and this need is insatiable. We have a gym membership and Squash is the order of the day. He plays hockey and loves to be MOVING.

Sport like cricket is excruciatingly boring for him.

I think it is wise to not only encourage sport but also to find out what sport suits.

Our other son is struggling to find a sporting activity that fits him. We are rolling through them. His little issues are related to the engaging in the activity struggle that ADHD brings AND sensory overload issues.

A good OT friend with an excellent knowledge of ADHD and neurons was helping me think through activities.

Squash brings a confined space with little distraction for the ADHD child and swimming is excellent because it allows the brain to ‘ switch off’ and just go. The repetitive motion through the water is extremely healthy for brain activity and soothing for the senses.

Healthy perseverance is something we are trying to help him with. So, yes he is not enjoying the activity A but we need to just go to then of the term or season so that the brain also learns about perseverance – good neurological connections and good God given habits.

Phew!! So much to ponder, think through and work out. And while your doing this - get moving!!

ADHD - Hot tips for parenting that we have learnt along the way -and are still learning.

I love the ADDITUDE sub title for ADHD…

It is Living Well with ADHD. 

This is the deep desire of my heart for my husband and my children.

The question around discipline always comes up on ADHD issues.

So, 

What about discipline?

       I am writing a bit about disciple here BUT really pleading with you to hear me . I can not tell you how and what to do. You will have to figure out what works for you and your family. As a Christian we know that it is our job as parents to disciple our children but not to exasperate them.

However I have learnt some hot tips with ADHD…. Dr.W. Dobson add to these ideas and re-enforced what we have experienced in practice.

Children off medication have little or no impulse control . Children off meds can be very difficult and their behaviour can be tricky to manage. This needs to be taken into account when disciplining ADHD children. They can be angry, argumentative and unco-operative. We have experienced that the old fashioned TIME OUT really does work. Dobsons encourages ALL involved to take some TIME OUT until emotions calm and then we can deal with the issues at hand. This is totally our experience. 

Some things we have learnt along the way...

love  boldly and often

*

Do not expect your family to look like anyone else's

Pick your battles.

Remember who is in charge.

One size approach does NOT fit all children

Take time to cool off.

Plan for outings

Talk about expected behaviour

never stop talking and sharing

adjust and change when things do not work

apologise

forgive 

*

love madly and completely

 

 Planning for outings

 

Here he was so very helpful …. He went on to encourage parents to plan times that might be difficult for ADHD children. A large gathering of people like at a party can be sensory overloading for ADHD children and behaviorally tricky. These are opportunities for friction and bad behaviour which will mean that the experience is overall negative.

The aim of these occasions is for the family to have a good time. These points of stress have often been times of extreme stress for our ADHD children.

Dr Dobson’s suggestion of…

1.    planning

2.    talking about possible problems

3.    setting goals or I would say expectations – realistic

4.    make sure that the child is rested and has eaten

5.    plan ahead of time an exit strategy

These are probably things we have been doing one way or another but it was so good to hear it and note that these are indeed good things to practice..

 Do not expect your family to look like others

One of the things that was very painful and indeed futile was trying to get our discipline and indeed parenting to fit someone e style and way of doing it. This was frustrating and damaging. I decided not to read self help parenting books where people do not have to deal with ADHD. It is far more helpful to get hot tips and try things written by those who understand and know how tricky it is to deal with an oppositional child. 

That we must deal with him is a fact but HOW we do it is really up to us. People who have walked this road before us have lots of helpful suggestions. Those who have not often write about a one size fit all approach and quite frankly this does not work when dealing with ADHD children.

Remember who is in charge

The social struggles of children with ADHD can sometimes rule. What I mean by this is if our ADHD child has 'had enough' and wants to go home he can become very annoying in his desperation to go home. While we understand sensory overload and boredom , we also can not be ruled by his need to leave. So we plan and we meet him half way. 

The other night we were going out. Our youngest son hates transition and change. He really can not cope with it. So he did not want to go out with us. It was a family outing to dinner and he really needed to come with us. To be with us was important. He could not rule the decision to go and he could not stay. I understand he does not like all the noise and there are too many people so we took some games with us that we could play together. we spent the whole time playing UNO and the like with him. Despite the noisy restaurant he coped well. We made it a short visit .We can not be ruled by the struggles ADHD children have but we CAN work with them to help them have a good time within a safe space. 

ADHD - Hot tips to help children engage.

Hot tips to help ADHD children engage in the mundane and other stuff!!

From the talk by Dr. William Dobson

I have had the great fortune of listening to a free pod cast by Dr William Dobson on the ADDITUDE web site. I encourage you to listen to it for yourself.

However…. Here are some tips I gleaned and would love to share with you. Some of these are not just from the pod cast.

1.        How do I get my ADHD child to engage in things he is not interested in but actually have to get done? ( like cleaning teeth)

*The answer lies in understanding that motivating the child by reward or punishment will not bring the desired lasting effect on behaviour. 

This is so helpful to me. 

The mundane is not interesting and so not really relevant to the ADHD brain. The problem is these things are relevant and important in life. Paying bills is important as is regularly brushing teeth.

One of the helpful things I learned was that we need to try and make the mundane interesting. I have to say that my heart literally sighed with the heaviness of this until Dr Dobson explained what he meant.

Somehow we need to appeal to the emotional connection that the ADHD child has with the activity. In other words…. Make it real!! Give it an emotional purpose. The living reason behind why we are brushing teeth. The child and adult on the ADHD spectrum has a very real and rich emotional life and this is where we are to invest our focus, especially as parents. Because healthy life patterns ARE established in the young life.

We want our children to make healthy life choices that are good for them including the mundane. So we need to tap into the emotions and draw the important link between caring and doing. In other words…… The child will do the mundane if they care about doing it.

I know this sounds other and indeed it is but it makes sense to me. If I ask my son to do something that is not …

·       challenging

·       urgent

·       interesting

·       novel

well I have already lost ..

but if I invests in the reason behind healthy life style choices – like brushing teeth

well then these become part of the required behaviour  FOR the child and not simply because I am asking , reminding , cajoling , moaning  , so that he does it.

We want children to own their healthy, mundane behaviour for themselves. 

We want them to just do it!!

The mist is clearing - Understanding all things ADHD....

On becoming more clear on things ADHD

Today I clicked on something that has both encouraged and helped me understand ADHD a lot more!! We listened to it in true ADHD fashion… I listened to it… Doug listen to bits of it and then I filled in the gaps for himJ

It was a pod cast by a man called  DR. William Dobson.

It was long and I ended somewhere through the question time. It was one of the most informative and helpful talks yet.

The research around ADHD is really mind blowing.  Excuse the pun!

Some of the ideas and understandings of the way the brain works and ADHD plays out have refined and shifted.

I find this all very exciting and extremely helpful.

What I hope to do now is to take some of the ideas Dr. W. Dobson explored and share them including some personal aspects as illustrations.

One of the fabulous things is that, although the debate still rages around medication and ADHD in the PUBLIC domain, the science of it seems pretty settled.

Therefore, it is not a belief system but a fact.

ADHD is a function of the neurological system.

We can know that most people in the world have a typical way of neurological functioning but that about 10% have an atypical brain neurological function. This is called ADHD.

The impulsivity

Hyperactivity

Inattentive

Aspects of the ADHD brain are the impulse control that medication serves to help.

Some of the things around these key 3 aspects of ADHD have shifted and are shifting as we all understand what they are exactly. I love this.

So… inattentive does not mean that a person can NOT focus but rather that he or she finds it difficult or nearly impossible to focus on something that is not interesting TO them and does not grab them. So it is more about interest and therefore engagement.

ADHD people can engage on things perfectly well.

JUST as long as it is

1.   challenging even competetative

2.   interesting therefore engaging

3.   urgent

4.   novel – unique

This was so helpful to me. In our home we struggle with …

So the difference is about engaging with a task rather than not being able to focus at all. If you have an ADHD child you will know exactly what I mean when I say that they absolutely CAN engage and do. This is called HYPERFOCUS and is confusing because it makes them look as if they are just not ‘trying hard enough’

So we find our ADHD children struggling endlessly with being able to engage on all tasks or finding a task to engage with and of course the old ADHD friend

BOREDOM.

These two things are linked and play out on a daily and even hourly bases in our home. If something is mundane it will fall into the non-engaging category and therefore is not something worth doing.

Dr Dobson explained how the typical brain will do a task because it is important to do – no matter who needs it done. Perhaps a parent, boss or teacher requires something done. Therefore it is important. Our eldest son illustrates this well. He will get on with his school projects and learning regardless – EVEN if he is not particularly drawn to the task. It simply must get done. It is important to do it.

The ADHD person is not motivated to do a task because of  its importance.

Important things are not going to engage the ADHD brain

The second way a TYPICAL brain works is by reward. The reward of a job well done or some kind of external reward like good marks etc is a motivation to do the job and do it well. My brain definitely works like this.

Any task is worth doing because of the internal of external reward from doing it.

The ADHD person’s brain is NOT at all called to engage in a task because of reward. In fact research shows that any reward based system used with ADHD children and adults has no lasting effects on behaviour.

This made so much sense to me.

This is why star charts do not work with our ADHD kids. The novelty wears off and it all fades to nothing. It has worked on occasion if it is short and sharp but the effects on behaviour are not lasting. I was trying this approach this week. I am trying to get our little one to read a book a day . He is struggling with learning to read – another ADHD thing- and so I thought up an extra motivation through reward. I decide to pay him R10 for every 10 books… then I upped it to R50.  Still nothing….

The reason I upped the amount was because I thought that the reward was too small and so was no hook at all. In actual fact, as I learnt this morning, reward is not going to bring an engaged interest in learning to read. It just is notL

So, back to the drawing board.

Being a parent with ADHD children requires a great deal of trial and error approaches. In other words try lots of things and see which on works.

It sure is an adventurous life!!

The ADHD Adventure!

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The Adventure called ADHD

Having an ADHD family is both an adventure and a journey.

Understanding the how and why of ADHD is both liberating and empowering.

I have written quite a collection of posts on ADHD from our perspective as a family who has one spouse on the spectrum and 2 of 4 children on the ADHD spectrum.

I began writing these posts as a real heart response to both our own experience of ADHD but also to those who God has brought along the way , who are on a very similar journey.

I have a profound and deep love my family.  I think coming from a family that split and broke in divorce I really KNOW the special thing that is Family. I really want us to treasure and hold it – lightly so that it does not become and idol but deeply so that it remains precious.

We have been on this extraordinary ADHD journey now for the last 6 years.  The more I read and learn about the way the ADHD brain functions, the more excited I become. It all makes sense.  It might not be easy but it at least makes sense.

 My hope and prayer is that the things I write will both educate and encourage. Perhaps even help those who are faced with the ADHD journey personally and need some advice.

Loss of One Kind or Another

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This is for all who have and will experience LOSS of many kinds. 

We tend to talk and think about loss in relation to death only. While this is one of the types of brutal loss in this life, there are actually many other areas where people experience the pain of loss.  The loss of a dream or a hope. The loss of relathionship. The loss of work. The loss of being able to work. The loss of sound and rational mind; physical strength and health; loss of a childhood; loss of wholeness and broken emotions. All these , and more are different types of pain and loss. Grief rules this life. Jesus is the healer.  He is the one and only saviour!!

Loss of One Kind or Another

Today I felt your presence again

that sad, grey cloak that

comes 

and presses  in on my body,

the arms of which carress my soul.

You bring along a friend called hoplessness,

another called loneliness and sorrow.

these cling like a glove to a wet hand

When will you leave?

Today you paid me a visit, again.

you called out and reminded me

of hoplessness

of sadness

of lonliness

again

you called out and reminded me 

of all the loss

of lost dreams and broken hopes.

You laughed while you sank you teeth deep into my heart.

Again.

Can sorrow and pain not be quenched.

Can sadness and loneliness  not stay away?

Are the patterns of broken relathionships,

of  hollow promises,

of lack of commitment,

to be the order of the day.

whatever happened to trustworthy

faithful

hopeful

kind and really caring people?

where have they gone?

Have I died along with all of you too?

Is true friendship real?

Do people count for anything anymore?

or is it just all about My felt needs

and My comfort now?

How sad a world we have created.

I am reminded of  loss again...

I miss you so much.

I really do.

My hear aches to breaking with the loss of you.

that which could have been

that which should have been

but for brokeness that came in and cut us off from one another

so I can long for you
but

you do not come 

you can not come

you are no more.

Who can hold my breaking heart?

who can touch me in that deep place where that little ,dancing light 

has been snuffed out.

Can this loss be found?

Can it take on a new shape

a bold and beautiful shape

called LOVE.

I do not know the answer to this.

And yet there is HOPE

for all those who come to HIM

Does anyone care anymore?

Is anyone faithful anymore?

Is there one who is trustworthy?

Is there one who will fight for us?

My hear cries out - there just has to be?

Yes!

He is the suffering servant. 

He came to die that I might have life in him.

He totally understands 

He was broken and bruised and left alone.
Even his friends deserted him.

He was beaten and mocked and killed

He knows our pain 

He feels our loss

He is the one!!

He is powerful and bold.

He holds all things together by his word.

He is tender

faithful

and kind.

and he loves us more than we can ever imagine

or understand.

He is the one in whom all loss has meaning

in one way or another

perhaps even at one time or another.

He is the answer.

He is the one who holds me 

when it is too hard to get up

to hard to live and love again.

He is the one.

I have seen him fashion his love to hold those who have loss

of one kind or another.

He is so gentle and kind.

he cuts off options .. for some

and opens doors for others. 

He is at work and in control

with kindness and courage he moulds and shapes

faith

trust

steadfastness

truth

hope and peace

back into the heart of the broken one.