ADHD!! What would you do??

[justabitnuts]

Me and my partner have been communicating with the school and my ds9 is on waiting to be assessed for ADHD.
We have not told him, I don’t know if this is the right thing to do, but we feel as a family it would be best to wait for the assessment and then tell him if he does or not,
he came home today asking me if I have heard or “ADHD” I said yes and asked him why, he replied “the teacher said I might have it.
iv had to have a quick conversation with him that I am not ready or prepared for, before I go off to work…
now, I understand she might not know we haven't told him, however aibu to be absolutely fuming? Would you be?

Bit of a odd thing to keep secret from
him. Yabu.

Yes to this. The very fact that op agreed upthread with a poster who said what kid doesn't have ADHD these days indicates that op is one of the ADHD "non believers"...

In my child's class/school 1-3 kids per class are on the pathway to diagnosis, which tallies with (conservative) psychologist estimates of 10-14% of the population having ADHD... It's about time people stopped dismissing neurodiversity as a fad, IMO.

Edited for typos, and to delete a possibly unfair emoji!

ADHD is not a fad it bandwagon, OP, and is nothing to be afraid of, it just means that your child - along with many other people - is just not ideally suited to sitting in a classroom all day 🤷‍♀️ as an adult, they will unlikely be the kind of person who enjoys and thrives sitting in an office all day! With the right support and guidance (& understanding from you!) they will be able to use this information and work With their natural instincts and characteristics to find a lifestyle and career suited to "someone who can't sit still"... 😂

In the right environment" ADHD " - awful description - is an asset not a burden 💪 try to encourage your child to understand it that way, is my advice.

All of the children in his cohort will have missed out on stuff because of covid. If his teachers have identified difficulties that aren't reflected in his peers, then it makes sense for these to be investigated.

i mean this applies to most medical situations u til an assessment/tests take place. It’s fine to discuss and consider why this is happening.

i mean this applies to most medical situations u til an assessment/tests take place. It’s fine to discuss and consider why this is happening.

I totally agree, he does need to be assessed, and if he has got it, he definitely needs to know, and I am so happy the school are supportive, however I don’t think saying your might have it, and then waiting for ages to actually find out, would benefit him, I also did not want him to find out the way he did.
i wanted to explain it to him, when I understood more about it, in a way I knew he would be good with.

And if he doesn’t have it?

I feel like too many agencies are quick to assume ADHD before the relevant tests have been completed. It’s not about behavioural issues or refusal to do as instructed

No different to ‘your x ray is clear, your arm isn’t broken’ or ‘blood test is fine, nothing to worry about’

But the school is already making adjustments for him, as they are legally required to do when they have identified a suspected disability. Surely it was inevitable that your bright little boy would query this at some point?

And yes, it's possible that he could have been fobbed off for a while with the non-explanation that his brain just works a bit differently, but I'm not sure how that's better or worse, really, than telling him that he might have adhd. The point is that he will already know that he is different. I can't see any real benefit in denying him the language and the understanding to be able to talk about that.

If he doesn't have it, then I guess they would need to start exploring alternative explanations for the things that he struggles with.

ADHD is not all that common. It is not a fun quirky personality trait, it’s a debilitating sensory disorder that has significant impact on the lives of the people who genuinely have it.

if your child is struggling to interact with his peers and experiencing genuine difficulties with concentration, retaining information and executive dysfunction then he must be assessed. Telling him he might have it and leaving him to struggle will have huge consequences a long time to come.

I agree either way you op. It’s a conversation that needs to be well handled.

You have not read this thread properly, he is on the waiting list to get assessed, and I didn’t want to tell him he might have it and then waiting two years for the assessments,
he is getting support,
I was going to tell him nearer the time of the assessment.

You haven't failed at all, OP. Kids don't come with an instruction manual, and we all do what we think is best with the limited knowledge and understanding that we have.

You felt that it was better not to tell your ds before a diagnosis. Regardless of whether or not that was the right or wrong decision, that ship has now sailed because he is now aware. What some of us are saying is that this may actually be a good thing for your ds if it can help him to understand himself better.

Lots of people are immensely successful despite having adhd - it isn't a curse and it doesn't have to be bad news or something to worry about if you present it to your ds in terms of helping him to better understand how his very special and unique brain works. The struggles that go along with adhd are the things that he is struggling with anyway, so there isn't anything to fear!

@justabitnuts I understand not wanting to tell him until you are sure, but if he does turn out to have ADHD, it really will be okay. 💐
Lots of people who have ADHD go on to have very successful lives. It's only if it goes undiagnosed and untreated that it's more likely to cause him problems in adult life. I know several doctors who have ADHD.
I know you mentioned the covid lockdowns, but they were five years ago; they aren't going to be causing his difficulties now.
Have you had a look on the Mumsnet neurodiversity and SEN boards? There are lots of posters there with children who have ADHD or who have it themselves. If you chatted to some of them, it might help it seem a bit less frightening. X

That's not what you'd be doing, though.

Don't fume. And for God's sake don't show DS that you find this idea upsetting. Just tell him it is a name for how some - quite a lot - of people's brains behave that is a bit different from most brains. That because schools are designed to work best for most people, it can mean that people with ADHD-type brains might need adjustments - which means things being slightly different for them, so they can learn more easily.

Explain to him (personally I think this is MASSIVELY important and often overlooked - I speak as someone with late-diagnosis ADHD whose mother had quite profound ADHD and with a DS who also has ADHD) that people with ADHD can find they struggle to do things that other people find easy but that's okay. They just need to spend more time learning those things. It's stuff like: being organised, following instructions, listening and remembering things that are important etc. Remind him that people without ADHD also struggle with lots of things - they may find reading hard or sport or maths or drawing. Point out that everybody finds some things hard to do and that's normal. So if he does have it, you just need to find out what things he most needs a bit of help with.

Also tell him ADHD people often have special talents - often excellent at either sport or music or art and design or computing and coding. They (we) have hyperfocus where we get really concentrated on a single thing and that makes us very good at it. Find out some famous people who have it (there are loads of famous sportsmen, music stars, some actors, tech gurus etc) It helped DS a lot to realise that it could be a strength as well as a bit of a hurdle.

Thanks everyone for you advice, iv actually just got some booked to read with him from the library, and found a documentary to watch with my partner,
if I’m honest it’s something that just didn’t cross my mind, so I think I am just a bit overwhelmed by it all. When I grew up it wasn’t something that was talked about. So I didn’t have much info on it all, any recommendations would be appreciated ☺️

Holderness Family: How to Build Confidence in Kids with ADHD https://share.google/vZbxwwa9FBTbggX5

This is from ADDitude magazine, which I've found helpful at times.

Smart but Scattered, Second Edition: The Revolutionary Executive Skills Approach to Helping Kids Reach Their Potential: Amazon.co.uk: Dawson, Peg, Guare, Richard, Guare, Colin: 9781462554591: Books https://share.google/zyMKQavV28XKmDMtw

I also found this useful - it has a quiz you can do with DH.

New Forest Parenting Program - Helping Children With ADHD https://share.google/dyhPBf28NHbOk8o92

Your LA children's department may offer this programme (I don't know if it's any good or not as ours only offer it on a weekday in termtime and we're teachers 🙄).

I'm going to @BertieBotts as she often has great resource suggestions.

You don't know he doesn't have it, though. Someone who has ADHD has it whether diagnosed or not. Nothing physically changes at the moment of diagnosis. Same with autism, or something that can be confirmed with a test like a genetic syndrome. After diagnosis, especially if it comes later in life, it's common to look back and see life events through a different lens and this can be a helpful process because knowing that you actually had ADHD and that probably impacted that event can help make sense of things.

It doesn't harm a non ADHD child (esp if they are struggling with similar issues to ADHD) to be offered strategies or supports at school which are helpful for children with ADHD. It is cruel IMO and makes no sense to deny children access to these supports who may benefit from them because the waiting list is long. Yes, I can understand that some things may be reliant on funding which may only be accessible after diagnosis and of course the same for medication. But there are other things which shouldn't be gatekept behind such a long wait.

OP I can see why you didn't want to tell him but since he is now querying it, I think I'd try to focus on what you DO know, so if he wants to know does he have ADHD or not, you could say well we know you're struggling at school with XYZ, and sometimes those are signs of ADHD, but not everyone who struggles with XYZ has ADHD. The important thing is to support what he's having trouble with, whether he has ADHD or not.

I waited until I had an appointment coming up to tell my son he was being assessed for adhd as I didn’t want him wondering, he was about 9 too. I just sat on the bus with him one day and read out the symptoms from the nhs website and he said umm yes it sounds likely. He also found out by seeing a class list that he was on the asc waitlist. He was a bit annoyed about that, but he was 11 then. But he got diagnosed and it’s all fine. I bought him some sweets! I didn’t make it into a drama and I just said I thought I would wait til nearer the time cos it’s hard waiting for something and he was fine about it. I expect you’re probably not ok with the teacher saying it because it’s such an overstep, but your son will probably be cool with it if you show you are not worried and whatever happens is ok too. Good luck.

I've read a book based on this programme - someone on here recommended it to me - I haven't finished it but I found the bits I did do useful. "Step by Step help for children with ADHD".

I also think the free OU course "Understanding ADHD" is great esp as a starting point.

Russell Barkley is good but IMO only once you've got past the basics - some people find him too doom-and-gloom or too wordy.

Some good things for children themselves are books by Dav Pilkey, whose books aren't about ADHD, but the author himself has it and he tends to write characters who perhaps lean towards ADHD-type struggles so they can be relateable. I also like the look of the resources by "Mr. G Teacher" - he is a teacher who was diagnosed in adulthood with ADHD.

ADHD Dude and Seth Perler are also good. I don't agree with everything ADHD Dude says but he does have some really spot on observations and approaches.

YABVU. Your son has the right to know what he's being assessed for. How would you like it to be treated differently at school, to notice that you are different to the other children, to be taken to assessments and lied to ever step of the way and then finally told that you've now been diagnosed with something? It's really disrespectful to your child. At least the teacher treated him like a person.