I am the mother of three kids. Two of which have ADHD and dyslexia diagnoses.
I struggled to parent on my own while my husband traveled for work and was only home on weekends.
Realizing I could include my husband in decisions and disciplining the kids via telephone was a game-changer.
Why do ADHD Kids Need Parents to Parent as a Team?
ADHD kids can try the patience of saints! Parenting as a team gives parents short breaks from difficult kids. It gives disciplinary action and family decisions more weight when the kids know you are both on board, and it’s a great way to reinforce positive parenting!
In this post I am going to discuss…
- How to parent as a team when your spouse is away on business/work trips.
- How to parent as a team when you are both at home.
- How to parent as a team if you’re a single parent.
If one of these situations doesn’t apply to you feel free to scroll down to the appropriate heading for your family situation.
Parenting as a TEAM, My Experience
After many years of trial and error I realized that it’s important to parent as a team even when one parent is routinely on work trips.
When my son, Lage (13) was eight he was diagnosed with ADHD. I (along with his teachers) decided that he needed to be screened.
I went to all the doctors appointments, all the testing, all the meetings with therapists and psychologists associated with an in-depth screening process. I did all of this without my husband, who was working away from home.
I sat and cried by myself, in the doctor’s office when Lage finally received a diagnosis.
My husband (David) had a hard time with the whole process because he was not at home to see how badly Lage needed to be diagnosed!
I knew that Lage needed help and needed it fast, but I did a poor job of communicating to my husband how bad things actually were!
David was worried that having the label ADHD would hurt Lage long term. ‘’What if Lage can’t get a job because we decided that he needs an ADHD diagnosis?’’ He was mainly worried about the future.
I worried about the here and now! His behaviour was out of control and I was the one dealing with it by myself!
- I worried that my younger girls weren’t getting enough attention.
- I worried that Lage needed to be held back in school.
- I worried about why he continually hit his friends.
- I worried that he would hurt the girls or himself.
- My worry list went on and on. I worried about EVERYTHING!
If you have many things that worry you about your kids try writing them down. If there are several, where action on your part will help you worry less then do something about them!
When you worry excessively about things, you have no control over, it’s NOT healthy!
Talk to your spouse or a close friend and get it off your chest. Then think of one small step you can take towards making something better.
During this time Lage was talking about hurting himself and committing suicide! This was shocking to me because he was only eight!
He would say, he was going to drown himself in the river behind our house or jump in front of the train which was only a short walk away!
Then he would run off and I didn’t know where he was!
I had to leave my one-year-old in the care of my five-year-old while I ran around in a panic hoping I would find him alive!
It usually took me 20 minutes to find him! This happened at least every other day for months! The adrenaline rush and panic followed by an emotional crash when I found him continually wore me down.
I felt like tears were always EXTREMELY close to the surface.
After a few months of this behaviour I started to notice a pattern.
He was never by the train tracks, and I never found him standing by the edge of the river ready to jump in.
I started to feel that he wasn’t actually going to hurt himself. Maybe this whole scene was just his way of trying to get attention?
The next time he said he was going to hurt himself I went with my gut feeling.
I looked him in the eyes and said that if he continued to say that he was going to kill or hurt himself I was going to call the doctor’s office immediately! We would go in for the next available appointment! I told him that his behaviour was not ok!
Of course the doctors knew what he was doing because I was open about everything in our appointments, but I didn’t get any real advice on how to handle the situation.
Lage’s Doctor said, that it was good that he talked about his thoughts on sucide because very few kids who talk about such things actually act on their threats.
Lage didn’t like to go to the doctors and from one day to another he quit running off and talking about sucide.
My husband who had not been at home for any of these episodes, had only heard my panicked accounts when I was in the grip, of a flood of emotions!
I was probably hard to understand and I was definitely not logical!
It wasn’t until months later when David actually saw Lage in the midst of one of these suicidal episodes that he realized how bad things were and how important it was for Lage to have an ADHD diagnosis.
I slowly realized that I was going to have to do a better job of communicating with David if I was going to get the support that I desperately needed!
David and I began to talk things through when he was home and brainstorm some strategies for the next week.
I began to call him when I could talk logically and not just when I was in the grip of panic.
I found that when I needed to discipline Lage or when he did something that was harmful for himself or others. I need to call David immediately and tell him what had happened in front of Lage.
Somehow, when Lage saw that more than one person knew he couldn’t use his Ipad or that both his parents were sad because he hit a friend at school it helped change his behaviour.
It’s important to call your spouse and let them know when your child does good things. Try to call with good news more often than bad news!
If you are working on positive parenting and are trying to reinforce good behaviour, calling to tell your spouse that your child got a good grade or helped pick up the toys (when your child is watching) can be a great extra reward for your son or daughter!
(Just a side note Lage did start talking about suicide again, several years later when he hit puberty, but this time he was not running off. We handled it differently the second time around because he was older and more mature.)
Strategies for How To Parent as a Team when your spouse is away
(scroll down to find strategies for parenting as a team when your are both at home and for single parents.)
1) Keep the lines of communication OPEN!
Make it a priority to talk to your spouse regularly!
{If you are a single parent (or a military spouse) ask one of your parents or a close friend or sibling to partner with you to help your child. Make sure you keep them in the loop!}
2) Communicate clearly!
Often we think we are communicating clearly, but the person on the other side of the telephone doesn’t really understand what is going on or what we need help with.
How to clarify over the phone
- Summarize the essence of what your partner just said and ask them if you understood correctly.
- Ask your spouse if there are anything specific ways you can help them even if you are not home.
If they are so exhausted that they can’t think of anything try asking them some questions.
ask if you can…
- Make an appointment for one of the kids with a doctor or dentist.
- Call the child’s teacher.
- Sit in on a virtual parent-teacher conference.
- Call a repairman.
- Schedule a tire change on your spouse’s car.
- Order groceries online to be delivered.
This list could go on forever.
There are literally loads of things spouses can help with even if they are not at home.
Thanks to developing technology it’s easier to stay in contact with those you love and get things done virtually than ever before.
Make sure you tell your spouse you love them and that you appreciate the job they are doing at home.
3) come up with a strategy together.
Brainstorm ideas for how to help your child succeed. Write everything down. Pick one thing that you want your child to work on for the next six weeks.
”Trying to modify too many behaviours at once will just end in failure.”
If you ever saw the movie What About Bob with Bill Murry, think about your child moving forward with Baby Steps.
The point is to move in the right direction in a way that will not cause you and your child to give up right away!
You can use ideas from your therapist or from books on positive parenting if you need help coming up with a solid plan to help your child.
4) Hold each other accountable to keep your plan in motion.
Make a plan for how you are going to hold each other accountable.
Things won’t automatically happen. You may need to set alarms on your phone, to call and ask your spouse how the plan is going.
5) call your spouse often when your child is watching.
This helps your child know that you are a team and that he needs to get through both of you if he/she wants to put up a fight.
Call your spouse when your child is in earshot when…
- When your child does something good.
Tell your spouse in front of your child. Try to do this more often than calling your spouse to give bad news.
- When your child does something disappointing.
(For example, you call to say that your child hit a friend at school and you are going over to apologize.)
- When your child needs discipline.
(For example, your child bit a sibling and you call to say that he/she can’t have the ipad for 24 hours.)
6) Find someone to partner with you when your spouse is away from home.
If at all possible find someone close to you who can give you a break from your kids every now and then.
This person can be someone you call (when your child is in earshot) if you can’t get a hold of your spouse.
Your spouse may be sitting in a meeting, on a military mission, doing underwater construction, or a number of other things and can not answer the phone. When this happens it can be good to have someone else to call.
Many ADHD families have poor contact with their extended families.
Either something had already gone wrong in the families that the parents grew up in or well meaning grandparents, who don’t think ADHD is a big deal, continually ask you to discipline more!
Either way parents (of ADHD kids) who come from such families are not likely to ask their own parents for help.
Try to find someone you know and trust to partner with you and your spouse.
It is in your children’s best interest for you and your spouse to get out of the house and have some fun together without them.
Couples with ADHD kids have a higher rate of divorce! 22.7% of parents of ADHD children are divorced by the time the ADHD child reaches the age of eight.
If you take into consideration that parents of kids without a diagnosis have a divorce rate 12.6% if you have an ADHD child the likelihood that you will separate from your spouse is almost double the average.
These statistics were published after a study done by the University at Buffalo in 2008. You will find a link to the source at the bottom of the page.
The point is that having a child with special needs takes extra energy! It’s easy to give, give, give to your children and never take the time to take care of you or your relationship with your spouse.
”If you want to be one of those couples who make it through the trying years of parenting together and come out stronger, you are going to have to make leaving your kids with a babysitter and getting out of the house together a priority!” Annie
Getting away from your kids for short periods of time will recharge your batteries and help you to be a better more patient parent!
7) give your spouse a break by talking to one of your kids on the phone.
It will probably be most helpful if you talk to the child who is demanding the most attention/causing the most trouble, so your spouse can spend some time with the other kids or have 10 mins to drink tea and look at a magazine.
8) Do homework with your kids over the phone, on WhatsApp, or Skype.
You may need to ask the school to help your child do homework at school, if you are struggling with extreme ADHD behaviours at home. As parents you will both need to be on the same page when you approach the school.
ADHD kids will probably struggle with having a virtual helper, but you can always give it a try. If you have several kids and not all of them have ADHD try giving your spouse a break by doing homework with the kids who can concentrate.
A note on ADHD kids and Homework
My husband and I found it was almost impossible for both of our older children to do homework at the same time if we didn’t each help each child in separate rooms (both our older children have ADHD).
We went through a couple years when our son’s anxiety was off the charts.
He was talking about suicide, and it was impossible to do homework with him at home during this time. We had too many other problems we were trying to deal with.
We had to call the school and tell them that we could no longer do homework at home with either of our grade school school kids.
We explained that we were dealing with a child who wanted to hurt himself and a child who didn’t get enough attention because her brother was demanding most of our attention.
We didn’t want to spend the little time we had with our daughter forcing her to do homework!
The school understood and they did their best to accommodate our children getting their homework done at school.
A family we know have a middle schooler with ADHD. Their child psychologist prescribes that their son should not be required to do homework at home.
When they were able to implement this change they found that they were able to be better, more positive parents because they were not fighting about homework all the time.
If you think that the absence of homework at home could help your family call your school and try it!
I had to let go of my fear that my child would need to be held back in school, if we didn’t do homework at home.
In fact, I found the opposite was true! We quit having heated conversations about completing homework and we could concentrate on helping our son with his anxiety problems.
He did better homework at school because he tried his best at school! He fell apart as soon as he came home. He was probably worn out from trying so hard all day.
If you add to that, the fact that most ADHD meds wear off in the afternoon before kids start doing homework getting homework done at school sounds more and more reasonable!
Read how we do homework with our daughter (who has ADHD) Check out my post How to use reward charts effectively for homework We are doing homework again read how in the post above.
9) play a game with your child online.
Spend some virtual time together and give your spouse a break!
10) When your spouse is at home play tag.
Sometimes it’s not any better to have two parents dealing with a very trying kid at the same time.
I found that things could be worse, when we were both in a parenting nightmare.
I suggest that you and your spouse play tag and the ‘IT’ person takes care of the kids for a set amount of time or until they feel they can not handle the kids without exploding!
Then call the other parent and say your IT! Don’t explode. When you feel you can’t be a nice parent any longer than it’s time to switch!
11) try to take a family outing every time your spouse is home.
You should do this together as a family.
Often Single parents (Or parents who are single during the work week) don’t have the energy to take their rambunctious ADHD kids out for outings!
Especially if you have a ratio or 1 adult to 3 kids or higher! You only have two hands, and if you can’t handle the stress of going on outings by yourself plan them with your designated helper or when your partner comes home.
It’s important to get out of the house as a family even if other parents look at you critically or if you get mean comments from relatives or strangers about how your child is acting.
All ADHD parents are going to get mean comments about their kids! This is not nice or helpful, but know that you are not alone!!!
Remember this happens to all parents who have kids with diagnoses. Let it run off you like water runs off a duck!
Don’t dwell on it! Remember those critical parents have easy kids to raise and they have NO IDEA what they are talking about!!!!
Strategies for Parenting as a Team when your both at home
(Scroll down to the next major heading if you are a single parent)
1) Keep the lines of communication OPEN! Make it a priority to talk to your spouse regularly!
Sometimes this is harder to do when you are in the same house!
If your child is acting out more when you are both home, inorder to get extra attention from the spouse who is usually away, you may both be incredibly exhausted!
Don’t forget to communicate even if some days you only talk for a few minutes after you crawl in bed!
2) Communicate clearly!
Often we think we are communicating clearly, but the other person doesn’t really understand what we are communicating.
How to be sure you understood your spouse correctly.
- Look them in the eyes!
- Take turns talking.
- LISTEN carefully!
- Summarize the essence of what your partner just said and ask them if you understood correctly.
- Be attentive to your spouse’s body language. If they act like something is wrong you may need to do some educated guessing to get to the bottom of what they are having a hard time communicating.
Make sure you tell your spouse you love them and that you appreciate the job they are doing.
3) come up with a strategy together.
Brainstorm ideas for how to help your child succeed. Write everything down. Pick one thing that you want your child to work on for the next six weeks.
Trying to modify too many behaviours at once will just end in failure.
If you ever saw the 1991 comedy movie What About Bob (Bill Murry), think about your child moving forward with Baby Steps.
The point is to move in the right direction in a way that will not cause you and your child to give up right away!
You can use ideas from your therapist or from books on positive parenting if you need help coming up with a solid plan to help your child.
4) Hold each other accountable to keep your plan in motion.
Make a plan for how you are going to hold each other accountable.
Things won’t automatically happen. You may need to set alarms on your phone or put things in Google Calendar.
5) call or talk to your spouse often when your child is listening.
If your spouse is working outside the home (but home every evening) and is at liberty to answer you may need to call them throughout the day.
If they can’t answer try asking one of your parents, a close friend, or a sibling to partner with you to help your child.
Make sure you keep them in the loop, and that you are free to call them while your child is listening.
If you are both working from home and have the kids at home
I suggest you make a schedule and you take turns having time to concentrate on work and taking the main responsibility for the kids.
It can be helpful for the parent concentrating on work to sit behind closed doors, but they can still have their phone on incase you need to call them.
This helps your child know that you are a team and that he needs to get through both of you if he/she wants to put up a fight.
Call your spouse when your child is in earshot when…
- When your child does something good. Tell your spouse in front of your child. Try to do this more often than calling your spouse to give bad news.
- When your child does something disappointing. (For example, you call to say that your child hit a friend and you are going over to apologize.)
- When your child needs discipline. (For example, your child bit a sibling and you call to say that he/she can’t have the ipad for 24 hours.)
6) Find someone to partner with you who understands and likes your kids!
If at all possible find someone close to you who can give you a break from your kids every now and then. This person can also be someone you call (when your child is in earshot) if you can’t get a hold of your spouse.
Many ADHD families have poor contact with their extended families.
Either something had already gone wrong in the families that the parents grew up in or well-meaning grandparents, who don’t think ADHD is a big deal, continually ask you to discipline more!
Either way parents (of ADHD kids) who come from such families are not likely to ask their own parents for help.
Try to find someone you know and trust to partner with you and your spouse.
It is in your children’s best interest for you and your spouse to get out of the house and have some fun together without the kids.
Couples with ADHD kids have a higher rate of divorce! 22.7% of parents of ADHD children are divorced by the time the ADHD child reaches the age of eight.
If you take into consideration that parents of kids without a diagnosis have a divorce rate 12.6% if you have an ADHD child the likelihood that you will separate from your spouse is almost double the average.
These statistics were published after a study done by the University at Buffalo in 2008. You will find a link to the source at the bottom of the page.
The point is that having a child with special needs takes extra energy! It’s easy to give, give, give to your children and never take the time to take care of you or your relationship with your spouse.
If you want to be one of those couples who make it through trying years of parenting together and come out stronger, you are going to have to make leaving your kids with a babysitter and getting out of the house together a priority!
Getting away from your kids for short periods of time will recharge your batteries and help you to be a better more patient parent!
7) give your spouse a break and take one of the kids out to do something fun!
Sometimes the dynamics between siblings can completely change when you remove one child from the mix!
I have seen this in action in my own family. During some of our most trying years with our ADHD kids. All three of my kiddos fought like cats and dogs when they were at home together!
We live in an exceptionally small house considering we are five people. We have a 1,076 square foot home.
There is not a lot of space to get away from siblings and the kids rooms are small!
I found that if my husband and I took one child with us to the grocery store or out to do something fun the dynamics between the other two completely changed!
It didn’t matter which child we took out of the mix if there were only two kids at home it was suddenly peaceful!
We found that giving each child some regular one-on-one time calmed some of their anxieties and helped our children function better.
Three out of ten ADHD children struggle with anxiety according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Our son was extremely anxious and this was one thing that helped him.
To read more about how we helped Lage with his anxiety you can read my post on Limbic Bonding How Limbic Bonding Transforms ADHD Children
The link to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the stats on anxiety is at the bottom of the post.
8) Have a family homework time, or ask the school to take care of homework at school.
If your spouse takes on most of the responsibility for your ADHD child’s homework they probably need a break!
Doing homework with a child who…
- Doesn’t want to do homework
- Who doesn’t care if the homework gets done
- Who doesn’t care if he/she gets a good grade
Is very frustrating! I know I have been there!
Try setting a specific time to do homework. If you have more than one child in your home who needs help with homework try sitting in two different rooms.
It cuts down on distractions, if one parent sits with the child who has the hardest time completing homework, in a separate room with the doors shut.
One parent may need to help more than one child.
A note on ADHD kids and Homework
My husband and I found it was almost impossible for both of our older children to do homework at the same time if we didn’t each help one child in separate rooms (both our older children have ADHD).
We went through a couple of years when our son’s anxiety was off the charts. During part of this time, he was talking about suicide. It was impossible to do homework with him at home during this time. We had too many other problems we were trying to deal with.
We had to call the school and tell them that we could no longer do homework at home with either of our grade school kids.
We explained that we were dealing with a child who wanted to hurt himself and a child who didn’t get enough attention because her brother was demanding most of our attention.
We didn’t want to spend the little time we had with our daughter forcing her to do homework!
The school understood and they did their best to accommodate our children getting their homework done at school.
A family that we know have a middle schooler with ADHD. Their child psychologist prescribes that their son should not be required to do homework at home.
When they were able to implement this change they found that they were able to be better, more positive parents because they were not fighting about homework all the time.
If you think that the absence of homework at home could help your family call your school and try it!
I had to let go of my fear that my child would need to be held back in school, if we didn’t do homework at home.
In fact, I found the opposite was true! We quit having heated conversations about completing homework and we could concentrate on helping our son with his anxiety problems.
He did better homework at school because he tried his best at school. He fell apart as soon as he came home. He was probably worn out from trying so hard all day.
If you add to that, the fact that most ADHD meds wear off in the afternoon before kids start doing homework getting homework done at school sounds more and more reasonable!
9) play games with your child.
Playing games together is a great way to bond with your child. You can bond over Video games and board games.
Playing board games as a family strengthens the family bond, helps kids work on cognitive skills and attention spans while having fun!
You can use board games for the whole family to spend time together or as a way to give one spouse a break.
Either way there are amazing benefits to playing board games with ADHD kids!
You can read about the benefits of board games in my post Games transform Kids and get som great games tips!
10) Spouses play tag.
Sometimes it’s not any better to have two parents dealing with a very trying child at the same time.
I found that things could be worse when we were both in a parenting nightmare.
I suggest that you and your spouse play tag and the ‘IT’ person takes care of the kids for a set amount of time or until they feel they can not handle the kids without exploding!
Then they call the other parent and say your IT! Don’t explode. When you feel you can’t be a nice parent any longer than it’s time to switch!
11) Take a family outing every week
Often parents don’t have a lot of energy to take their rambunctious ADHD kids out on outings!
Parents of ADHD kids often despair of the critical looks they get from other parents when their kids misbehave in public!
Sometimes complete strangers feel the need to make mean comments about your parenting in front of your kids!
I know how it feels to want to hide at home, but if you have ADHD kids you are going to need to develop a thick skin.
Don’t let the negative looks and comments hold you a prisoner in your own home!
Getting out is a great way to teach your kids social skills. Your kids need to get out of the house as much as you do!
All ADHD parents are going to get mean comments about their kids!
This is not nice or helpful, but know that you are not alone!!! Remember this happens to all parents who have kids with diagnoses. Let it run off you like water runs off a duck!
Don’t dwell on it! Remember those critical parents have easy kids to raise and they have NO IDEA what they are talking about!!!!
Lean on your spouse and help one another find a way to let go of the negative comments and not let it ruin your day.
Strategies for Parenting as a Team when you are a single parent
1) Find a friend who can partner with you to help your kids!
Try to find at least two helpers.
One should be someone who lives close to you who can come over and babysit the kids from time to time.
The other person or persons can live far away if they are willing to put in phone time or skype time with you and the kids.
If at all possible find someone close to you who can give you a break from your children every now and then.
2) Keep the lines of communication OPEN! Make it a priority to talk to your ’Parenting helpers’ regularly!
Make sure that you keep the person or persons that you are partnering with to help your kids in the loop.
Don’t just call them when it’s a total crisis!
3) Communicate clearly!
Often we think we are communicating clearly, but the person on the other side of the telephone doesn’t really understand what is going on or what we need help with.
How to clarify over the phone
- Summarize the essence of what your helper just said and ask them if you understand correctly.
- If you are not sure that they are understanding you, you can say that you are not sure if you are making sense, and ask if they got your point?
If you take the humble approach it will be much easier to communicate, and your helper will be more attentive to you than if you criticize them for not listening.
If you need help be specific!!!
ask if your helper can…
- Call a repairman.
- Schedule a tire change on your car.
- Order groceries online to be delivered.
A friend probably can’t schedule a doctor’s appointment or call your child’s teacher, but if you are swamped and need help with extra things that they can do, don’t be afraid to ask.
It’s much more likely that you will get help with things that overwhelm you if you are very specific.
4) Brainstorm a strategy for helping your child together with the people who are going to support you.
Brainstorm ideas for how to help your child succeed. Write everything down. Pick one thing that you want your child to work on for the next six weeks.
Trying to modify too many behaviours at once will just end in failure.
If you ever saw the movie What About Bob with Bill Murry, think about your child moving forward with Baby Steps.
The point is to move in the right direction in a way that will not cause you and your child to give up right away!
You can use ideas from your therapist or from books on positive parenting if you need help coming up with a solid plan to help your child.
5) Hold each other accountable to keep your plan in motion.
Make a plan for how you are going to hold each other accountable.
Things won’t automatically happen. You may need to set alarms on your phone to make calls and schedule things on Google Calendar.
6) call your helpers when your child is watching.
This helps your child know that you are a team and that he/she needs to get through all of you if he/she wants to put up a fight.
Call your helper when your child is in earshot when…
- When your child does something good. Tell your friend in front of your child. Try to do this more often than calling your friend to give bad news.
- When your child does something disappointing. (For example, you call to say that your child hit a friend at school and you are going over to apologize.)
- When your child needs discipline. (For example, your child bit a sibling and you call to say that he/she can’t have the ipad for 24 hours.)
7) Ask one of your helpers to talk to one of your kids on the phone.
(This doesn’t need to be a person who lives close to you.)
It will probably be most helpful if your helper talks to the child who is demanding the most attention/causing the most trouble.
This allows the mom/dad to…
- Spend some time with the other kids
- Have 15 mins to drink tea and look at a magazine
- take a bath
- fix something
- do dishes
- work out
8) Find someone who can do homework with your kids over the phone, on WhatsApp, or Skype.
ADHD kids will probably struggle with having a virtual helper, but you can always give it a try.
If you have several kids and not all of them have ADHD try having a helper do homework with the kids who can concentrate.
A note on ADHD kids and Homework
My husband and I found it was almost impossible for both of our older children to do homework at the same time if we didn’t each help one child in separate rooms (both our older children have ADHD).
We went through a couple years when our son’s anxiety was off the charts. During part of this time he was talking about suicide.
It was impossible to do homework with him at home when he was extremely anxious or having panic attacks.
We had so many problems we were trying to deal with homework seemed the least of our worries!
We had to call the school and tell them that we could no longer do homework at home with either of our grade school kids.
We explained that we were dealing with a child who wanted to hurt himself and a child who didn’t get enough attention because her brother was demanding most of our attention.
We didn’t want to spend the little time we had with our daughter forcing her to do homework!
The school understood and they did their best to accommodate our children getting their homework done at school.
A family that we know have a middle schooler with ADHD. Their child psychologist prescribes that their son should not be required to do homework at home.
When they were able to implement this change they found that they were able to be better, more positive parents because they were not fighting about homework all the time.
If you think that the absence of homework at home could help your family call your school and try it!
I had to let go of my fear that my child would need to be held back a class in school, if we didn’t do homework at home.
In fact, I found the opposite was true! We quit having heated conversations about completing homework and we could concentrate on helping our son with his anxiety problems.
He did better homework at school because he tried his best at school. He fell apart as soon as he came home. He was probably worn out from trying so hard all day.
If you add to that, the fact that most ADHD meds wear off in the afternoon before kids start doing homework getting homework done at school sounds more and more reasonable!
9) Have a helper play a video game or a board game with your child.
Let one of your helpers play a video game with your child. Many of these games can be played over the internet and you don’t need to be in the same place.
Spend some virtual time together! Screen time is not all bad.
If you have a helper near you who can come over for a game night try to make it a regular event!
Playing games helps kids develop their brains, and work on attention spans all while having fun!
If you want to read more about how games help ADHD kids read my post Games transform Kids You’ll get some great games tips as well!
10) Have an emergency plan!
If you have a helper who lives near you sit down with them and talk through what you will do if you have an emergency!
Emergencies WILL HAPPEN!
I have had all kinds of emergencies because my oldest is extremely impulsive!
Everything from him setting fire to an anthill close to our house to him running off and hiding in the cellar after telling me he was going to drown himself!
Sometimes it’s an emergency because my second child is very angry and she is hitting and kicking me!
I have had to call my husband to come home from work and pull her off of me! She was mad because I was not my husband and she wanted daddy!
A note about kids who hit and kick adults
This doesn’t happen very often, but sometimes my daughter who has ADHD inattentive becomes extremely angry with me or my husband. Usually, it’s a fit of unnatural anger about something totally unreasonable!
She never gets this angry or abusive with anyone other than my husband and I.
She is usually a very calm child. When this happens (1-2 times a month) she is always extremely tired and sometimes it’s a combination of her ADHD meds wearing off and tiredness.
The last time this happened she was angry because she noticed a ladder was moved into our yard. She got extremely angry at my husband when in reality it was the repairman who had been there earlier in the day who had moved the ladder!
At this point there is no reasoning with her. We usually just have to let her anger peak and talk to her when she has calmed down.
If this happens to you make sure that the other children in the family are safe, and call someone to come over immediately!
Kids are often stronger than you think and it can really HURT to be kicked and hit even by a grade-schooler!
My daughter is not usually angry very long. Often after half an hour the episode is over.
We usually don’t make a big deal out of it even if she doesn’t act sorry right away.
Talking about it the next afternoon after school has often worked better than trying to make a point that hitting is not ok when she is still in an unstable mood.
11) try to take a family outing every week.
If you have a helper who can go on an outing with you once a week or once every other week it’s good to get out of the house and help your kids work on social skills!
Often Single parents don’t have the energy to take their rambunctious ADHD kids out on outings!
Especially if you have a ratio or 1 adult to 3 kids or higher! You only have two hands, and if you can’t handle the stress of going on outings by yourself plan them with your designated helper.
It’s important to get out of the house as a family even if other parents look at you critically or if you get mean comments from relatives or strangers about how your child is acting.
All ADHD parents are going to get mean comments about their kids! This is not nice or helpful, but know that you are not alone!!!
Remember this happens to all parents who have kids with diagnoses. Let it run off you as water runs off a duck!
Don’t dwell on it! Remember those critical parents have easy kids to raise and they have NO IDEA what they are talking about!!!!
Conclusion
Having someone to partner with you to make parenting as a team possible (even if you are single) can be life-changing for you and for your children!
Parenting ADHD kids is hard!!! Being the best parent I can be for my kids is the hardest thing I will ever do in life! Nothing else even comes close. -Annie Eklöv
If I didn’t take short breaks from my kids I would have burned out a long time ago!
Let others know you need help!
If you need some ideas for how to keep your head above water as a parent read my post 21 ways to care for yourself while caring for others.
These are some of the things that I did to keep myself from falling into a full fledged depression!
Minimalism helped me have more time for my kids.
Having less stuff meant…
- I spent less time picking up things off the floor.
- I did less laundry.
- I had better mental clarity to deal with my ADHD kids in a positive way.
Click here to read about ADHD and Minimalism, and how it helped me be a better parent How Minimalism can Reduce ADHD Symptoms
If you need more info and book tips check out our page Our Favorite Resources Our Favourite Resources
Copyright Annie Eklöv