Parenting Strategies

justasmallpiece · May 27, 2010, 03:07 PM

What are your best ones with respect to children/teens with ADHD.

I have a question regarding the venting/anger? It gets scary sometimes. What do you do about that?

I am losing the will... I know I have to keep on and not take this all so personally, but it is hard.

Aunt Donna · Jun 02, 2010, 11:30 PM

I wish I could help you. I don't have any children, but I have ADD. Try not to let this get the best of you. You can try posting in the parenting forum for more help.

justasmallpiece · Jun 02, 2010, 11:42 PM

Good suggestion!

AAAAA · Jun 03, 2010, 12:48 AM

How old is your child? What discussions do you have after the event? With my youngest son I let him blow himself out, then I sent him to his room to calm down and think about what happened.

Later we would discuss several things without blame (this is very important) like when/how did this situation go from a normal “angry” to “code red”. There were times when he was so angry beyond reason that he reached the point of verbal abuse, and was quickly heading to physical. I can’t actually verbalize what those boundaries were, but I knew them at the time. Those times I sent him to his room, I let him know that I loved him but that love was not going to permit him to be abusive to me or his siblings and he was not to come out of his room until he was ready to discuss what was going on in a rational manner.

I emphasized that when he is out of control angry, that someone/something else is controlling him. He can only change his own behavior, that there will always be things that he finds frustrating, irritating and annoying but he has a choice how he responds to those stimuli. I pointed out that he’s miserable when he gets that way and he does whatever he can to make everyone around him just as miserable (which he sincerely regrets later) so avoiding those situations when he can is a good idea.

We worked a long time to try to determine what triggered him from just being angry to out of control and tried to think of things HE could do to avoid getting to that point. One thing that my son found very helpful was that he had the option to say “I’m having a bad day and need some time to calm down before we address this.” As a parent, I had to be as committed to this process as he was, so even though I received a letter in the mail that stated he wasn’t turning in his homework (that I KNEW he had completed), and I wanted to address it immediately I had to respect his decision.

What I found was that we were both in a better place to work things out. That time he took (anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours) to center himself didn’t mean he was getting away with anything, it was actually more productive.

It has taken years for him to get to the place he is now, and I’m extremely proud of him and what he’s accomplished. He’s also found that exercise helps. When he’s extremely angry and having a bad day, he’ll put his ipod on and go for a run.

On a side note, he did not evade punishment because an aspect of his condition is anger. When we discussed what had happened, what rule he broke, we would discuss an appropriate punishment. Often his suggestions were much more severe than I had planned. I believe it is important for children to realize that there are consequences to their actions. Was that fit worth losing your phone, video games, and being grounded?

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