Having a child with ADHD has been the best thing for my parenting.
As I delved into how to parent a child with ADHD, I learned why consequences didn’t work for my kid. This led me to find a different way, and thankfully, I was introduced to the idea of connecting with my children when they’re struggling, defying, or melting down.
I teach all about that here on my blog and in my courses.
But here, let me break down why consequences don’t work for kids with ADHD:
🔘Kids with ADHD struggle to remember past consequences and apply them to their current choices. So that consequence that makes sense to you now isn’t going to stay with them the next time they face the same situation.
The consequence won’t change their behavior.
🔘Kids with ADHD are often impulsive, so they don’t always think their decisions all the way through. They don’t set out to be naughty. They’re following their curiosity.
Punishing them for the natural way their brain works won’t help them. It’s better to teach skills.
🔘Kids with ADHD deal with emotional flooding. If you give them a harsh consequence, they may be able to focus ONLY on that consequence, and their emotions will explode. Which will lead to more consequences, which will lead to more explosions, which will lead to… you get the idea.
If you’ve been there, I don’t have to explain it anymore. You know.
🔘Kids with ADHD are distracted. So they may make a mistake without even realizing they did it. Once it’s pointed out to them, they get it. They know. And they feel terrible about themselves. A consequence is salt on their wounded self-esteem.
And see bullet point 1: They’re not going to hold onto this current consequence when they get to the same distracted situation in the future. So when they’re met with the consequence again, they’ll just feel terrible about themselves.
Again.
🔘Kids with ADHD hyperfocus. They can get sucked into something that interests them, and not notice anything that’s going on around them. Threatening them with a consequence when they’re in this state isn’t going to help them. It’s just going to hurt them when they come out of hyperfocus and realize they messed up.
Again.
🔘It’s estimated that by age 12, kids with ADHD have received 20,000 more negative messages about themselves than their counterparts without ADHD.
They don’t need us to pile on the consequences. They need us to understand their symptoms, gently guide them to learn coping tools, and connect, connect, connect.
The next time someone tells you to give your child a consequence, give your kiddo a hug instead. Talk gently to them and find out what’s going on in their brain. Then work on a solution together.
Need help figuring out a better way? Check out my course, How to Stop Yelling at Your Kids.
This post tears me in two. I understand that consequences and rewards don’t work for my 12 year old ADHD child and that doing so hurts their self image. But I’m also finding that connection and trying to come up with solutions together don’t work either.
I’m desperate to find anything that works and this post makes me feel helpless and guilty. My son cannot get ready in the mornings to make to bus. This effects my ability to start work on time when I have to wait for him and then drive him to school. I’ve missed meetings and appear unreliable. Sometimes we are even late when I drive him bc he’s taking three times longer to accomplish things than it should. It doesn’t matter if we wake up 2 hours ahead of time or 1 hr. Unless I am constantly redirecting him and only focused on him, and following him from the breakfast table to the bathroom to his bedroom to the kitchen, he is incapable of doing our morning routine that we’ve established for years. It’s just me and him in the morning. God forbid I had another kid to get ready, god forbid I get myself ready in the morning either.
I’m so tired of it. I feel helpless. Hopeless. Frustrated beyond measure .
Tell me what TO Do, not what not to do!
Hi Alice. I get that it’s frustrating when a blog post doesn’t give you everything you’re hoping for. Here is a link to my other posts about ADHD. They may be helpful: https://rebeccabrownwright.com/category/adhd/ To address your specific challenges: I’ve been there with that exact issue. It’s really hard. ADHD affects executive functions. So something that is helpful to remember is that your son is lacking an executive functioning skill here. I find that empowering, rather than demoralizing, because skills can be taught over time. Some questions I might ask myself: Where does the issue begin? The moment he wakes up? At breakfast? I would try to nail down the specific challenge in that way, because understanding where the breakdown happens can help you understand the lagging skill.
Then I would try and think about when/where he is successful. What makes him successful in those settings? How can you bring some of those strengths into this current challenge?
Finally, I might look to apps he can use so that you aren’t the one managing him. Since I’ve been there, I know how this issue can cause a major breakdown in the parent/child connection. An app can remove you and possibly help him develop a skill. Brili is an app that has been so successful for my children. (I used to work for them, but I don’t anymore. I don’t get anything for promoting them. I just really believe in the power of the app.) Individuals with ADHD have an interest-based nervous system, so an app can appeal to that need to be interested.
(Actually, that reminds me: you can also use that knowledge of an interest-based nervous system in your problem solving too. Individuals with ADHD need to be interested in what they’re doing more than an individual without ADHD. How can you make the morning routine interesting and engaging?)
Please feel free to email me at connect at rebeccabrownwright.com