Can somebody help me learn how to not rea | ADHD Information
Ok, I know as an adult (And as a mom of an ADHD daughter on Concerta) that one of the worst things to do is actually react when she is saying things to push my buttons...But I do . I need some advice, some good tips on how to not react. I can't seem to be able to ignore her sassiness, the arguing, the everything... I get so frustrated!!!! Of course, I have discipline that I use for these behaviors - but the yelling and arguing is getting soooo old. She is only 11, if this is what she's like now, what am I going to do when she hits the teen years??? God help me
I know how you feel. My daughter is 9, and it's the same situatjion here. The arguing, the attitude! And I react, too, and she knows it. The worst times are the mornings - I'm totaly exhausted by the time the bus comes at 7am - and homework in the afternoon. Every day I come sooooo close to loosing it. 
Some friends tell me it's pre-puberty hormones and it will only get worse- I'll move out then!!!!
Sorry, that I don't have any advice. Hopefully some will. Just know that you're not alone.
I can totally relate. My daughter is 9 and has ADHD. For us the mornings can be pretty bad. i am not sure who is is worse for her or us. The morning problems usually stem from her not getting ready for school, you know being on her own agenda. One of the greatest suggestions her psychiarist had for us was to wake her about 20 minutes early to give her meds. She can either go back to sleep or anything else. This is her time to wake up and basically give her meds time to start working. Something so simple for us to do and implement really has made a world of difference for us. Now I am not saying things are always perfect, but it sure is better.
On the other hand it is great to hear that we are not the only parents that are feeling out of control or should we say lack of. She also pushes our buttons along with her teenage sister (now that is another story
).
For me I have found that I need to take my frustrations out on the
treadmill. The worst part is when i see her and mu husband
reacting to one another. He also has ADHD and dyslexia it is like
watching two soda pop bottles just waiting to explode. I try to
not get in the middle, but as we know when emotions get out of control
so do other things.Anyone have any advice?!?!?!?!?
Shelly
IMac38945.6233796296Well sometimes you just cant ignore the behavior because he/she may think it is acceptable and it is NOT...have you thought about a reward system especially for the problem times?..Our mornings are fairly smooth ( we had to figure out a routine) ....my son has some alone time in the bathroom...after breakfast and meds he goes in the bathroom with a favorite book...he spends some quiet time ( about 20 minutes while the meds kick in)..then washes hands, face brushes teeth, and then joins his sister to watch a disney show before school...we get up fairly early to have the time to do thisBoy do I know how you feel. My son is 15 and I've had many years of practicing to not react. I still fall off the wagon occasionally. The big turn around for me was when my reacting actually made the whole situation much bigger than it actually should have been. If I reacted the kid would keep it up longer and he would sometimes have a big tantrum. Since around 8 years old, when the big light bulb went off above my head, I say "I'm not argueing with you", and I walk away. My other key words to myself and him is "I'm not talking about that right now-after I've given one explanation. He would continue to try to get me involved, if I couldn't ignore it, he would be sent to his room for a brief time out, so I could calm down. I also wrote down what he'd do that would get my blood boiling, and changed my reaction when he did these things. Then it would take practice, practice, practice to stick to my plan. He still does things that irritate me, and will ask Am I bugging you?, I say no and ignore it, then he stops. I only ignore it if its minor annoyances, I don't ignore it if its inappropriate behavior- I act instead and send him to time out. If its a bad day and I think my tolerance is nil, then he goes to his room more often, because I know thats when we could get into yelling, screaming etc, which escalates his negative behavior. I hope this helps, I know it takes an awful lot of self restraint, but in the end it works, and he's learned that its his problem not mine. In other words he's learned that he is going to pay the price and its no skin off my .... momiss238813.2683333333daughter 14 here!~ and being tested for adhd...... you have to ignore some things, plz pick & choose your battles.......i can definately relate! being a parent of a teenager is very frustrating at times.....
Sounds like a good idea to wake them up and give the medicine and let it start working, but they already have to get up at 6. I get up at 5:30, I need at least one cup of coffee before I can face them. What doesn't help the situation either is, that I'm going through early menopause, my patience and tolerance level is almost nonexistent - I'm seeing my ob next week.
I eliminated dealing with school stuff in the morning from the beginning, if it's not taken care of in the evening - to bad! We also lay out clothes for the next day at bedtime, no changing minds, unless there is a severe change in weather.
I tried the classical music in the morning - I posted about that before - and it worked great for a couple of weeks, and then they started to hate it and turned the stereo off themselves.
What irritates me the most is the constant reminding. Becca put socks on! Five min later, Becca put the other sock on, and so on untill she's dressed. She just sits there and stares holes in the air. The girl is 9 yrs old for gods sake!
stopwhining38813.5382175926The sock story sounds like my sock story, but I used to lean against the door jam with half closed eyes.
we ended up giving meds about 15-20 minutes before he needed to get out of bed and did that for many years.
I noticed that premenstrual days were horrible with me always apologising for blowing it. I learned not to react those days.
Not reacting was basically turning my back and going about my business. another technique that helped me not react was to turn my back, slowly count to ten and by then I was calmer collected and ready to deal with the situation. the older sib learned not to react. It took years for the younger sib not to react. We are getting more sincere apologies lately when it is pointed out to ds that he is victimizing the younger sib sometimes.
Remind yourself that children reserve special behavior for parents and with ADHD it seems more extreme.
(when ds was young I used to say that he does everything with 200% the energy and his physical area of influence is how far the walls extend in that room.)
Hi, I have the same problems. Its hit or miss with my son. I try to wake him up earlier to do stuff, some days it helps...some days it doesn't. He pushes all my buttons. I try to ignore it, but most of the time I don't. I have an anger magmt problem myself. He will stare holes in the walls or play or do stuff totally unrelated to what I want him to do. I try to motivate him with rewards, but like I said, sometimes it works and sometimes he just doesn't care. I could promise him no school for the rest of his life and he wouldn't do what I asked. Currently his meds aren't working very well either. Hope you have good success. We are in the same boat over here.
Alicia
I have a 17 year old son with ODD, and he loves to argue and push buttons. If anyone will repeat themselves or argue with him, it always escallates. I find that on certain days, it is more difficult for me to not react, so I will walk away and leave him. If necessary, I will go outside. Sometimes, I just go somewhere for awhile. Usually, by the time I get back, he has either cooled down or has left the house himself. I'm glad I remember the funny times during the frustrating losing my temper early days.When ds was about 4, he was sitting on the couch not doing anything in particular.
I gave him a direction about its time to do this or that.
He just sat there as if I didn't exist.
I waited a moment.
No response.
Irritated, I repeated it with my BIG voice.
"Okay Mom," he said happily
with a big smile.He then unclasped his imaginary seatbelt and hopped off the couch following my direction.
How was I to know he was in a car going somewhere?
He later said something about that he couldn't do it because his seatbelt was on...excuse , fantasy world or both?
jfla238813.7655439815
This thread sounds just like what I go through every single morning with my 8yr. old dd. (ADHD-ODD). She can be horrid and hateful to her brother and me. Some nights can be just as bad. Just started taking her to a psychiatrist and trying get her brother (ADD) and her to see new specialist. They're current specialist is not working out and not listening to what I have to say. The new one was highly recommended. Coming to this site helps me.
Merlina
Hello there...
In the same boat in the mornings. Dressing this morning took almost 45 minutes. Laid out the clothes the night before. Every time I turned around...reading a book, looking at a video case, playing with a toy, etc..... Had to walk away and resist the yelling. I also find at the end of the evening when son is very, very tired (7pm) that the night ends up challenging. Have control over going to bed though and he usually knocks out between 8:30 and 9pm.
Lots of deep breaths and walking away help. 
I could praise him all afternoon for what a good job he did to get ready that morning, but nothing carries over to the next day.I am just now realizing with my 4yr old son how to not get drawn into his battles of "I want or don't want ..." over and over again. It doesn't matter how many times you say no, he will just keep repeating it. I have finally figured out he will quit if I don't react. And the "funny" thing is half the time he will do what I wanted him to like it's no big deal that just a minute ago was the end of the world. And I have also stoped getting upset about how my husband can say just one word and get him to behave, and started using it to my advantage so that I don't have to react. Reading the other post here have helped me figure these things out alot sooner I am sure.
My son is 12 and up until a month or so ago morning were the worst. A fight in the morning is not a good way for anyone to start the day, and kids with ADHD will carry that with them all day. I was not one to get up early to give him his meds because waking him up early would mean that everyone in the house would be up because he is disruptive. However a good nights sleep can make all the difference in the world. For the last month or so he has been on new meds( sqitched from Ritalin to dexedrine) and taking a sleep aid, Oh MY GOD!!! What a difference. He is asleep at 10:00 and not up until 7:30 when I get him up for school. He is generally in a good mood and there are not more arguements about getting ready for school. I think that there are alot of reasons for this. A good sleep is definately one of them because up until now he was probaly getting 6 hours on a good night. Plus I think that with the new meds he is doing better in school and does not mind getting up and ready to go, there is nothing worse than knowing that you are going somewhere that you are going to have problems, I would drag my feet too!!! finally I think that the meds make a difference, quick release can act in as fast as 15 minutes which makes life better for everyone.
Not sure that any of this helps but it is working wonderfully finally for us.
We were having the same morning problems until I started giving my son his meds about 1/2 hr before he has to get up. Since he takes Clonidine at night, he was still asleep but cooperative and it has become habit for both of us. It made a world of difference in our morning routine. He is 9 and was first diagnosed at 4. He is now on Adderall XR which I like much better than Concerta.
We just do shoes/socks in the car ride to school. Both our kids do jeans and tshirts which keeps school clothes simple. Get all together before bed really does help out. Acting to me would be good for all our kids since they are big drama people. We keep breakfast simple.