Parents of neurodivergent DC: How have you altered your parenting?

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Question for parents of DC with ASD & / or ADHD who are moderately affected (so still in mainstream education), how have you adjusted your parenting?

@Catladyagain thanks for waking this thread up! Really interesting to read back. Primary school was a nightmare. Utter torment. Middle was slightly better. Senior school is OK.

We parent very differently to how I patented my older dc. It's now more about managing DS environment, ensuring he can manage what's expected of him. Distraction and redirection, lots of praise and encouragement. Trying to keep his anxiety levels down so he can manage day to day. Dh is mostly on board but occasionally struggles as he grew up in a "do as I say" household.

School can be a challenge it really depends on the teacher each year. This year has been difficult . For example recently ds is very time oriented , assembly ran past 330 and ds was struggling as school ends at 330. The class was then asked to tidy their desk at 340, ds melted down , teacher tried to restrain him and he kicked out and caught her leg. Now obviously he will be disciplined for his behaviour but I can't help but feel they knew he was struggling , they know class running over is challenging for him. Why set him up to fail?

@Catladyagain We went down a similar trajectory to you in that DS was happy in nursery and reception but found transition to year 1 impossible. School refusal and lots of tears. He is a champion masker so nobody connected all the little signs that were there - hypemobility (struggled with all sport), sensory issues (didn't walk or play on grass!), irrational and intrusive thoughts, sleep issues and on and on.

Also DS doesn't meltdown, he shuts down - so we just didn't know what was wrong. We changed schools in year 3 and last year aged 10 he finally received an ASD diagnosis. School have been very supportive and accommodate his need for order and time.

We constantly change the way we parent - especially communicating with him. And we have had to unlearn the whole "do as I say" "children must be seen not heard" narrative. But the change in DS is remarkable. The 'knowing' that his brain is wired differently and our attitude, he is definitely happier.

6 year old ADHD son. I'd say aged 2 was the hardest for me, he would bolt and I was very pregnant and the stress this caused me was immense.
However, as he grows he is maturing and starting to recognise when he needs time to regulate himself. This week I caught him in his room on his wobble board swinging a fidget, I asked what he was feeling and he said he felt wobbly so got on his board...this is a big leap.
I've learned at weekends to always have one day at home. He likes to chill, watch TV, play and potter outside.
No adjustments to food as not required and sleep not impacted, he has combination adhd.
I won't lie, I get nervous at parties and tend to helicopter...trying to reduce this as actually nothing has ever happened.
We use timers for transitions, no matter how small, always a warning to set expectations.
I'm firm but fair in my parenting, a first aider...steri strip lover, and his advocate.
We are very fortunate that his disability allows him to experience a more NT way of life, however, always mindful that he may be masking but doesn't have the skill set to communicate that yet.
To us, life skills are so important and he likes to be involved. Does jobs around the home for pocket money, such as tidying his room (accepting his level of tidy) loading the washing machine and helping with cooking, washing the car etc.
We've tried 3 lots of medication but the side effects for him were so intense, we've decided to wait until he's older and can understand how to manage these better.

@MrsTerryPratchett thanks for sharing. I'm so sorry it was a nightmare for you guys but glad you gradually got on a better footing.

I forgot to say in my post how much I appreciated the sense from everyone of confidently realising they had to move to the beat of their own drums BUT clearly did not step out of mainstream society. The FB group Not fine in school is very sad in that there are a lot of people clearly so traumatised as parents by their kids' problems (& probably their own school trauma) that life appears to have become a huge fight with victim hood and caving to anxiety at the centre. I have huge sympathy with everyone there annd there are plenty of cases where people are completely justified in that response, but you've got to work hard at having measure and balance in tough times to make life manageable and to remain in other humans' company.

I had to get go of my completely practical no fuss way of living to bend and be more sensitive and accommodating than I would naturally be. For example table manners, which have always been important to me, we something we completely ditched because my son wouldn’t eat anything until he was six. He’s now 12, eats fabulously and table manners are now coming along nicely.

ditto my expectations that my children would muck in at school and join clubs etc - it’s only just now something they can handle. My younger son was always sick through prep which I now see was kind of social exhaustion - and we’ve had to keep our home life massively stable - I haven’t worked in ten years which I don’t regret as he’s gone from border line needing SEN school to thriving at secondary.

But for anybody in my shoes - nobody will employ you if you’re out of work too long - wish I’d been back at work a few years ago but I can’t change it now.

And that's not to say that there's anything wrong with stepping out of mainstream society. There's a lot wrong with it! But if you need to earn money and want to participate then I guess we all need to support each other with balance.

The shoes thing is pretty interesting. I do tend to get more basic as I go though. So "put your shoes on" becomes "shoes" via "shoes on" 😂

Things I think I do on a ND basis...

Late bedtimes-If she's not tired, she won't stay in bed alone and just gets upset. More upset than I'm willing to let her be. Or she will lie there chatting to herself for a couple of hours while I waste a couple of hours sitting in the dark. I'd rather we both be in the lounge tbh.

I decide whether I can be bothered with the potential fight before I say no to something. I very rarely give in. If it involves too much money or real danger, it's a definite no. Thankfully bananas are an acceptable snack. And there are ways of saying no and implementing boundaries without having to say no. When she asks for ice cream, I ask when we have ice cream, and she tells me after dinner. I don't even think she's necessarily asking tbf, just wants to talk about what's on her mind 😂

She learns loads of words from TV, so I let her watch more than I really wanted to.

I struggled with this scenario tbh having had three neurotypical dc.
Over the years we have learnt to "pick our battles" with dd 4 who is neurodiverse
Pick our battles and accept that parenting this time is completely different and challenging to navigate
Dd is older now 14 so it's helpful to discuss directly with her when she's calm : boundaries , respect ect
And we have going an evening class on parenting autistic children fantastic

I take my son in school late a lot, need needs the extra time to get ready, he needs to know what's going to happen all day too, he gets a lot of tablet/gaming tim, we have to explain everything to him, and we can't prodd him along or he stops/slows down

My daughter, she needs more slow prodding along, we won't tell her to sit still (she can't) she will carry a toy everywhere, lick everything

Both have sensory issues with clothes, food, textures, sounds both different too

I don't think it's a change in parenting, it's more a adjustment and it's different for each child too

@Catladyagain We changed schools several times with my asd son and it was 100% the right thing to do. They need to find their tribe or even just a friend or two. Changing schools when we realised it wasn't happening worked out well for us. It wasn't easy but it helped him to get better with change and he learned not to repeat the same mistakes in the new school, it gave him a fresh start. He's in 6th form now, went to a new college for that, which he chose after visiting a few, and absolutely loves it. In fact we have to be quite strict about his social life because that's the only part he's interested in now! Big change from the 5 year old who had no friends.

Big change from the 5 year old who had no friends.

DD too. She comes home now and chats about mates at school. So very different to the 5 yo who didn't get invited to parties. I used to throw wildly extravagant birthdays, knowing that it would mean a couple of invitations back. DD said that a friend at school, whose mum was a godsend to me in primary, mentioned her birthday parties the other day. DD had forgotten the dry ice and themed party bags. But the friend hadn't You do what you can.

And we have all sort of landed on low-demand, gentle, boundaried, helicopter parenting by default. Our kids trained us how to parent.

I think a lot of the parents who struggle more are fighting their own battles and can't. A mum whose child got the same diagnosis as mine at the same age... now he doesn't attend school. And is very very unhappy. She's a single mum, trauma-impacted, got some cognitive issues, lives in poverty, not a lot of resources, and was really inadequately parented herself. She shouts a lot and favours her other child. Which I could be judgemental about.

But I recognise she doesn't have the time, energy, resources and support I have. My DD had a tutor (when she was bottom of the class) who was ADHD informed, music classes which changed her focus forever and for the better, her dad did all her covid at-home school, which reset her relationship with school for the better. We can afford to buy the expensive socks and shoes she can tolerate. We can buy the expensive berries so she eats that instead of biscuits when she won't eat apples. There's two of us so when we have lost the plot and have to tap out, there's another parent.

Anyone with a littler one, DD is a teenager now and wonderful. 'Fits' in a way she never did before. I doubt she'd get a diagnosis if you only asked school. Although the skilled teachers know and see it. Her science teacher shared that his daughter has ADHD. He knows

Watching for when she's just about losing it with a task and insisting she stops to calm down/read to reset herself.

Give her more say over what we all eat.

Not buy certain clothing items that irritate her.

Have lower expectations of how well she can regulate her emotions.

Plan trips around her interests but expect her to refuse most food on those trips.

1. Drama club to give confidence in public speaking
2. Daily affirmations: daily chat about what we did that brought joy to others and what others did that brought joy to us, every day before bedtime.
3. Lots of made up musical jingles to remind them how to break down different big tasks into small steps.
4. Having them carry a small doll to vocalise worries and anxieties to throughout the day, encouraging self-monitoring of mental state and giving them more of a chance to take ownership of meltdown prevention.
5. Getting really into whatever they care about and showing genuine interest and enthusiasm
6. Giving them time and space to try things they are initially scared of without feeling suffocated and overly monitored.
7. Repeating back what they say, so they know we listened.