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Guiding parents and teachers to navigate the challenges of ADHD

ADHD is a medical condition marked by developmental delays in children and teens, and often leads to challenges in parenting. It tends to be greatly misunderstood by medical and therapeutic providers, who may develop treatment plans that rely on medication as a sole source of treatment to the exclusion of behavior management training in parenting. Parenting interventions are effective, recommended, and have been proven to improve symptoms for children and teens. Most experts agree that ADHD is much (cont'd below)

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Leading Articles about Managing ADHD

Sandy Maynard

Motivate ADD/ADHD Kids: Catch Them Doing Something Right

By Sandy Maynard

Parenting a child with ADHD is no easy task.  It’s at least double the work than typical kids. On the…

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Steven Richfield

Bullying and The ADHD Child

By Steven Richfield

Some children are at greater risk of being bullied because of their ADHD. An impulsive moment — an inappropriate remark…

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Steve Peer

Don’t Believe Everything Your Brain Tells You

By Steve Peer

Many of us believe everything we see, hear, and experience. It doesn’t occur to us that we never really perceive…

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Is it the ADHD

Is it the ADHD, or Something Else?

By Diane Dempster

Filling In The Blanks I often hear parents ask. “Is it the ADHD or is it something else?” I can…

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Melinda McNeal

Improving Organization in Kids

By Melinda McNeal

Organization seems like it is just a series of steps…first, next, then finally. Yet it is actually much more complicated…

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Dr. Erik Fisher

4 Lessons to Learn from Your ADD/ADHD Kids

By Erik Fisher

In the two decades I have been helping kids and parents improve their relationships, I can’t count the number of…

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Wendy Blumenthal

Help Your ADHD Child Succeed: Tips From a Therapist/Mom

By Wendy Blumenthal

Raising my son with ADHD has been full of inspiring, albeit challenging, parenting moments. While preparing for a dessert party…

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Sarah Wright

A Brief History of ADHD (& ADHD Awareness Week)

By Sarah Wright

This week is ADHD Awareness week. In some sense, it actually finds its beginnings in 1902, the year that one…

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coping with adhd

Tired of Coping With ADHD?

By Diane Dempster

Sometimes, I gotta admit, I get really tired of coping with ADHD. It’s exhausting. It’s all-consuming. It Is relentless. And…

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(continued) more than a ‘deficit of attention.’ Instead, ADHD can appear as a rather complicated collection of symptoms, manifesting somewhat differently for each individual. It may more easily be understood as a brain-based developmental delay in executive function. It can also be confused with or compounded by the many co-existing conditions that are common for people with ADHD, including anxiety, learning disabilities, depression, asthma, allergies, autism, Tourette syndrome, as well as newer (and less-well-known or researched) conditions, such as rejection sensitive dysphoria (RSD).

Executive functions are responsible for how we think, feel, and act. They’re how we get ourselves to do (or not do) absolutely anything. Therefore, the symptoms that lead to an ADHD diagnosis are not just whether or not someone can pay attention, but whether they can self-regulate – whether they can decide what to pay attention to, stick with it, finish what they’re focusing on, minimize their impulses, and avoid getting distracted in the process. That’s what makes parenting so difficult.

The five areas most commonly reflected in ADHD symptoms rely heavily on executive function: attention (focus), impulsivity, organization, emotional intensity, and (sometimes) hyperactivity. Again, when kids, teens or young adults struggle with these issues, it can cause significant challenges in parenting.

Whether parents are trying to get life moving in the mornings or just help their kids and teens manage any or all of their responsibilities, ADHD is best treated by a combination of medication and ‘behavior therapy,’ otherwise known as parent management training, or behavior management training. With training, parenting can work with medication (when relevant) to teach children and teens skills in self-management, and ultimately improve outcomes for the whole family.