by Fatima Malik
“Punishment and rewards don’t work.” – says Parenting Coach Ani Spooner, a Dialectical Behavioural Therapy (DBT) Trainer specializing in Compassionate Communication.
Ani Spooner wears many hats, and for the purposes of this article, she wore the hat of a parenting coach who works with parents of emotionally dysregulated children. To learn more about her other hats, here’s her website.
Parenting has been changing with each generation, and each time it is excruciating to learn all the things parents were doing wrong in the previous decades, not realizing that we’re probably one of those generations ourselves, in this never-ending graph of parenting evolution.
Ani Spooner debunks some major mainstream beliefs around children. For example, “Children misbehave for attention.”
“Every child needs discipline.” And, of course, all the varying definitions of ‘discipline’ are a problem on their own.
There is, of course, an ongoing need to truly understand ADHD. ADHD is a neurodivergent brain, causing symptoms – it’s not a mental illness. If you google that, it might show up as a mental disorder or a disability, but it isn’t a mental illness.
ADHD is not the child’s fault, and it isn’t the parent’s fault either. Because the fact is, “there is nothing a parent can do to cause ADHD. Bad parenting, lack of discipline, and lax parenting cannot and do not cause ADD/ADHD,” says Ani Spooner, a parenting coach by day and a motivational speaker who is a radical self-acceptance advocate by night.
Emotional Dysregulation and ADHD
A child with ADHD has a neurodivergent brain causing emotional dysregulation.
Whatever behavioural issues a child with ADHD might have are not because they are defiant, attention-seeking or manipulative.
The behaviours are just a symptom (a fever) of an ADHD brain. The child would communicate differently if they had the skills to respond more effectively to problems and frustrations.
When a child with ADHD is ‘acting out,’ what they are really saying is, “I’m stuck. There are expectations that I’m having trouble meeting.”
It’s essential to have your child with ADHD get into therapy as early as possible because it will help them gain skills to navigate their childhood and eventually adulthood.
Psychotherapies like Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and Dialectical behaviour therapy, in addition to psycho-educational counselling sessions on social and emotional skills, can be very beneficial. Both child psychologists and psychotherapists would be able to assist.
Okay, so let’s dive right into the 10 tips for parenting a child with ADHD:
1. Why punishment and rewards do not work
Children do the best they can because they want to do well. No one likes not to do well, and no one sets out in life saying, “I do not want to do well.”
When we understand that children responding poorly to problems or frustrations is because of a lack of skill, not a lack of motivation, the motivational strategies like punishment and rewarding become useless and do not work.
So the first tip for parenting a child with ADHD is to eliminate the whole punishment and rewards program because it is failing.
2. Emotional Language
Children with ADHD are extremely sensitive, in an article he wrote for the ADDitude Magazine, R.A Barkley suggests, there are deficiencies with the following four components of emotional self-regulation:
- Ability to inhibit inappropriate behaviour triggered by strong emotions. Barkley argues that this emotional impulsiveness (EI) is an aspect of poor inhibition associated with ADHD that is illustrated by low frustration tolerance, impatience, being quick to anger, aggression, greater emotional excitability, and other negative reactions, all of which are related to the impulsivity dimension of the disorder
- Ability to self-soothe and down-regulate a strong emotion to reduce its severity
- Ability to refocus attention from emotionally provocative events
- Ability to organize or substitute more moderate, healthier emotional responses in the service of goals and long-term welfare
The second tip is that very emotional children need to have the words/vocabulary to express their emotions. Therefore parents are encouraged to use the Feelings & Needs Lists (NVC) as early as possible to help their children gain the appropriate language skills.
3. Managing sensory issues
A lot of highly emotional kids also have sensory issues. As a parent, you’d need to be aware that they are not being difficult, but that much of what they feel might be heightened, for example, food texture, tags on clothing, loud places (school auditorium), smells, needing to be held (pressure is calming).
Once again, it boils down to understanding ADHD and its symptoms. When you realize your child has sensory issues, you understand that they aren’t trying to make your life difficult. Do you know why? Because making your life difficult is making their lives difficult. Kids only want to make their parents happy.
So the third tip is to make your child comfortable. Their feelings (emotionally and physically) are different than yours (as an adult with or without ADHD). They need your care more than they need you to ‘toughen’ them up or force them to ‘try new things’ – some things will just never feel right in their mouths or on their bodies.
For example, my daughter can not have the whites of a fried egg. Ever since she was a baby, no matter how much I would disguise it, she found the tiniest pieces in her mouth and spit them out. Egg yokes, on the other hand, were fine.
4. Judgement
Kids with ADHD hear 20,000 more negative messages by age 10 than their peers. Let that sink in—20,000 more negative messages in their little ears.
Tip three is that parents need to create a safe space for their kids by being aware that all judgment makes their child feel is shame (and shame is often expressed as anger).
Judgement can not make the child with ADHD change the architecture of their brain. All it does is beat down on their self-esteem and worth.
5. Mindfulness
Mindfulness is known to change the brain so that emotions are easier to regulate. It also raises the brain’s level of dopamine, which is in short supply in ADHD brains.
Research shows that mindfulness meditation can be beneficial in relieving ADHD symptoms. Unlike many ADHD treatments, mindfulness develops the individual’s inner skills. It improves their ability to control their attention by helping to strengthen their ability to self-observe, train attention, and establish different relationships to stressful experiences.
A way to introduce mindfulness into your child’s life is by looking for youtube videos for nighttime meditation or mindfulness. Every night play these before bed. There is no need to watch the video; instead, with the eyes closed, the child should be able to focus and listen to the guided meditation as they fall asleep and slowly learn the skills required to regulate emotions.
6. Validation
Try to validate the valid. Try to find something good to say before pointing out another thing you don’t like.
As mentioned before, kids with ADHD receive 20,000 more negative messages before the age of 10 than their peers. So not only are they being told what they are doing wrong, there is no appreciation for what they are doing right.
Even the simplest ‘ ordinary’ task could be a challenge for a child with ADHD, and their achievements need to be appreciated no matter how little.
7. Parent Coaching
Get some skills under your belt. Parenting isn’t easy, and there’s no school for parenthood, even though it’s probably the most important job you’ll ever have.
Parenting a child without ADHD is a whole mission, so if you’re parenting a child with ADHD, you’ll need all the help you can get. There are parenting classes you could take to help you better navigate the life of being a parent of a child with ADHD.
“Parents can learn valuable skills from an ADHD Parenting coach like me,” says Ani Spooner while she tackles some of my questions around skills for parents.
Studies show that parents who know and use skills to support their children with ADHD will have teens with reduced ADHD symptoms by adolescence.
8. Accommodations at school
Schools can make specific accommodations for children with ADHD. The following are examples of some that you as a parent can request from the school:
- Extra time on tests;
- Instruction and assignments tailored to the child;
- Positive reinforcement and feedback;
- Using technology to assist with tasks;
- Allowing breaks or time to move around;
- Changes to the environment to limit distraction; and
- Extra help with staying organized.
9. Remember to be compassionate
This next tip is about just reminding yourself of what you are dealing with.
Remember that this is someone you love and that they’re doing their best. They need a lot of structure and clear expectations to be able to function optimally. And remember that their optimality might not be what you expect. They will need more support and more compassion from you.
10. Self-Care
“Psychological Wellness studies show that parents of kids with ADHD have high levels of stress and that they lack support.” Ani Spooner points out as we discuss her views on the mental health of the parent of a child with ADHD.
This might not feel like parental advice, but it is. Self-care is important. Your child is dependent on you. They depend on you to take care of yourself because their survival depends on it. If you aren’t healthy, you will be unable to take care of your child.
If you are suffering from depression and anxiety, you wouldn’t be able to parent a child, especially if that child has ADHD. Take care of yourself. Take time out for yourself to relax, and if you don’t have time, then make time.
Who says babysitting is only allowed if you have an errand to run, a dinner to go to or a meeting? Get a babysitter so that you can spend a few hours with yourself. Read, sleep, watch movies, draw, whatever you want to and need to do to relax and lower your stresses.
Nobody is perfect, but kids don’t need perfect parents; they just need happy ones.
Positive Kids is geared towards the support for children with ADHD and their parents. If you require help with parenting a child with ADHD, please contact us at 1-866-503-7454.
We have offices in Mississauga, Brampton, Ottawa, Milton, Etobicoke and Toronto, among other cities around Canada.
