Calling all parents of children with ADHD.......advice needed!

[martini82]

hi my ds aged 6 has ADHD he was diagnosed when he was 4 and he is not on any meds.

he has become a lot more argumentative, destructive and seems to go out of his way to defy me.

i need some advise on how to control/discipline him as he becoming more difficult to handle. i have tried reward charts, marbles and special treets for good behaviour and time out for bad. it works for a week or 2 then he couldn't careless.

also how do you know when it is just 'normal boy' behaviour and when its more the 'adhd' behaviour? is there a difference? because when i tell him off for doing something he says 'i cant help it'. its becoming more frequent so has i just become an excues???

i'm so confused and need to be pointed in the right direction.

I don't have any advice I'm afraid, I just wanted you to know that you are not alone. My ds is almost 8 and is exactly the same, with some 'I'm going to kill myself because you don't love me!' thrown in for good measure.

Hopefully somebody will know some helpful suggestions and can point you in the right direction

thanks pinkfluffysheep, it is kinda nice to know i'm not alone in this!

hi, I have the same problem, my ds is 6 too.

We have now started on meds which is helping with concentration but behaviour is still hard to manage and I have to be endlessly creative and on alert all the time.

Most time I use variations on reward charts, at the moment it is ticks in a shape and each tick equals 10p at the weekend.
we have also had sucsess with a reward box filled with little toys (pound shop stuff) and getting ten tokens to swap for a dip in the box.

I have to endlessly remind him that he needs to behave in order to get the reward and if he does break rules he has time out or confiscation of something valuable to him, usaully current dvd he likes.

I do also tell him his adhd is not an excuse for bad behaviour and that he can be good it's just that he has to try harder than other kids to be good so he will get more praise and rewards for all his extra effort if he is good.

We have good and bad days or even good and bad hours and I find it all very tiring. It's hard work always noticing the good and rewarding it but it's also hard work coping with the out of control stuff when I am not on his case.
Hardest of all is when he goes into meltdown mode and we have massive tantrums over trivial things but I think that may be asd not adhd, don't know yet.

Anyway what I am saying is perhaps you have to keep changing the rewards to keep his interest and find something he really wants to keep him motivated, keep it small and consistant (easily said I know and I wish I could follow my own advice).
Find something he likes to confiscate if he breaks the rules too, making sure he knows the consequences of rule breaking.

And don't worry about small stuff, lower your standards a bit. My ds gets away with things his older sibs would never have.

And try and get a break for yourself to recharge your batteries. we are on half-term at the moment and it's tough.

Good Luck.

Pick your battles.

Reward charts only work if they are totally specific and have clear outcomes for example: Clean teeth in the morning, earns 20 tokens. Clean teeth at night earns 20 tokens, - vary the tokens (or points or whatever) but it needs to be that specific - with about 4 things only. Let your Ds choose what he will do with his tokens, or points, if he collects 50 tokens he chooses to go to McDonalds (or whatever). You can't take tokens (points) away once he has earned them. Let him choose the amount he can earn and what the 'prizes' are (obviously within reason).

We have been told to forget about what is the adhd and what isn't - it's all ds at the end of the day. That has helped. I also did an parenting course specific to adhd which was very helpful.

Will second picking your battles. DS1 has ADHD and ASD, so it's a particularly explosive combination, some days. Certain things we never tolerate, such as being cruel to his brother. If he's destructive (usually with his toys) we take them off him, after a warning.

Those things that can lead to battles, but which must be done, we make easy for him to complete. If he's having a hard time motivating to get dressed, we hand him his clothes the right way around in the right order. Tidying up can be a flash point, so we break it up into small tasks and choose a time when he's going to be motivated, such as if he's asked to use his computer or play with his lego.

It helps to be selectively deaf, sometimes and not rise to the things that are said in the heat of the moment.

this is a great article, btw. Well worth reading.

The 123 Magic Book by Tom Phelan is very good.

I have an 11 year old with adhd who isn't medicated and I know how tough it is. He manages to hide it very well at school, so we don't get any support from the so called health professionals and each day is a struggle.

Try not to act with emotion because they seem to feed on it and it just gives them a sense of achievement if they can see that they've managed to wind you up.

Try to get enough rest as well. You need to recharge your batteries in order to be able to cope.

It's difficult to decide what is 'normal' behaviour and what is linked to the adhd, but just trust your instincts - if it feels wrong then it's probably the adhd manifesting itself. I've only really realised just how much my ds is affected since having a second child.