Children with ADHD are unique creatures. Not just different from their peers, but different from other children with ADHD as well. The disorder affects each individual who has it in a unique constellation of ways. For instance, my son, Ricochet, has combined-type ADHD,  but also anxiety, sensory processing disorder, dysgraphia, written expression disorder, significant executive functioning deficits, a gifted intelligence, and possibly high-functioning autism. He is also super-sensitive to medications, vitamins, and supplements, so uncovering effective treatment for him has been a huge challenge. I would venture to guess your child has some of the same challenges as Ricochet, but not exactly the same list. And your child may have some challenges that mine does not as well. That’s  why ADHD and Autism are often referred to as being on a spectrum, because there are many presentations and different levels of severity of these disorders.

One thing you and I can likely agree 100% on though, is that raising a child with any degree of ADHD is overwhelming, exhausting, and down-right tough. This parenthood is exponentially more demanding than raising a neurotypical child. {Can I get an “amen?”}  Parenting a child with ADHD requires more physically, mentally, and emotionally. The time it requires also means we don’t typically care for ourselves as we should as we must. We are run down and let the challenge of our child’s ADHD overshadow our own selves (I wrote about that in the book, “Easy to Love but Hard to Raise.”) We build up this thick armor to aid in survival  in these trenches called special needs parenthood andwe lose who we are deep down, aside from the role of parent.

At the heart of our similarities is the emotional turmoil, guilt, and isolation that most parents of special needs children experience, especially those with neurobehavioral disorders. When you raise a child with special needs, you begin to find it difficult to relate to parents who haven’t walked a mile in similar shoes. At some point, most of us quit trying to relate — we just don’t have the energy. Then we’re left feeling like the only parent in the world with a child that’s so difficult to raise day-to-day. We are not alone though. There are thousands of parents raising a child with ADHD who visit this website each month, and tens of thousands of others on a similar parenting journey. It’s crucial that we connect to each other for support and community, even if that opportunity only exists online for you. While our kids with ADHD aren’t exactly the same, the emotional experience of being their parent is a common thread we can all relate to.

I just released my first book, Boy Without Instructions: Surviving the Learning Curve of Parenting a Child with ADHD. I have been absolutely stunned by the number of moms who have read the book and sent me a note to say it felt as though I had written the book about them. Knowing how different each of our kids with ADHD are, I never imagined this type of feedback from a book about my own experience learning to parent my unique and challenging kiddo, and ADHD’s effect on our family. After I received this same feedback the third or fourth time, the light bulb lit up and I realized that the emotions of this parenthood transcend the differences in our children’s challenges, our everyday lives, the structure of our families, where we live, our beliefs and faith, our personality and temperament… This parenthood is hard on each and every one of us.

You, fellow Warrior Parent, are most definitely not alone.

My college-age son, Clark Kent, has ADHD and Asperger’s. Many of you know him from The Clark Kent Chronicles, which I’ve shared a few of in ADDitude Magazine and here over the years. Some of you have even wondered how college has gone for him, since his miraculous admittance into Texas A&M and even more miraculous graduation from high school. I’ve stayed cagey about it until now, though. That’s because Clark Kent caught up with Superman, and his golden years at Texas A&M ended in only four months. He and his genius brain are back in Houston, working and taking classes at University of Phoenix.

When the events that triggered his return came to pass, he was at first devastated and determined. That was quickly followed by denial and contentment in the status quo. There we have languished ever since.

At first we allowed him to live at his father’s “halfway house,” where he was supervised one week and solo the next, and so on. We gave him a checklist of daily life and ADHD management tasks to live by, and required him to get a job and take classes. His tasks included going to bed at a reasonable hour, getting up by nine a.m., drinking coffee and eating protein in the morning, minimizing his gluten/soy/dairy/processed food intake, supplements that would help his brain, 30 minutes of aerobic exercise four times per week, basic hygiene, basic contributions at home, eating good carbs in the evening, using lists, keeping a calendar, answering texts, and not gaming. He refused to resume meds or to see his old doctor, claiming he “needed a fresh start.” (Read that as “didn’t want to tell anyone what happened.” At first, that included his girlfriend of three years, too.)

That didn’t work real well.

It took him three months to find a job, and he only managed two classes all Spring because he couldn’t get it together to sign up for them on time, and we weren’t going to do it for him, because we only want him doing what he is capable of, not what we engineer for him. Social interaction is a necessity for him so that he won’t replace it with gaming, but he hid from people because he didn’t want them to know he was back home.

The life management checklist? Gaming all night and sleeping all day weren’t on it–and were the cause of his rapid departure from Aggieland, in case you hadn’t guessed that yet– and none of the things that were got done with any regularity, if at all.

The good news? He has made an A and a B in his two classes, and he finally landed a job he hated, at Walgreen’s, only after we told him that he would either get the military or Peace Corp in one week if he didn’t find one after three months. (Surprise! He did, in three days!!) And he’s a super nice kid who doesn’t have substance abuse, gambling, or criminal issues. He’s just an ADHD hot mess without meds or lifestyle management, and that makes for a tough time for him and those around him.

We tried an ADHD coach, to work with Clark on the compensations he could make to augment his lagging executive functions. For the most part, this wouldn’t be anything different than the skills we and past counselors/therapists/psychologists had tried to instill in him, but now he was older, and they would be coming from a new source. Well, this guy did his best, but ultimately he said Clark Kent didn’t appear ready for reality yet, and without reality, coaching was a waste of time and money.

“Give him a few more years,” he told me. “Most kids like him are ready for the responsibility of a normal 18-year old by the time they are 25. Send him back to us when he’s a little older.”

Gut punch.

He went on. “My ADHD son is doing great now and finally succeeding full time at school, but he still lives at home.” The son is 25.

I felt like puking.

A relative told me a story about a co-worker of hers. “He was absolutely brilliant. And he didn’t go to college until he was 27. Same story as Clark Kent’s.”

I wanted to cry.

We reset our expectations and tried to get him to reset his.

“I want to go away to school,” he insisted. “As soon as possible.”

“Will you accept accommodations?” his father and I asked.

“No.”

“Will you reconsider meds?”

“I want to try a holistic approach.”

Fancy words, but this was five months into his rejection of his lifestyle changes, whether intentional or because he couldn’t manage them. “You haven’t so far,” I said.

“I want to go to a new doctor and I’ll do whatever they say.”

“Including meds?”

BIG BREAK THROUGH MOMENT: “If they say so.”

“Maybe you would be able to manage the holistic method with a med jumpstart,” I said. “You don’t have to take them all your life. Just when you need them. And we all need something, right? I need hormones, your stepdad needs blood pressure meds, your dad needs occasional sleep and anxiety help.”

“Yeah.”

“But, no matter what, you won’t be moving out next fall. If you can show us by August that you are ready, we will consider January. But we’ll know whether you’re ready by what you have done to make a January move-out happen. And January admittance into another school. You need a lot more hours this summer, with As and Bs, if you have a chance of getting in anywhere.”

He agreed.

“You’ve failed at the halfway house, so it’s time to move back in with your mom and surrender all your electronics,” I told him. (I’d asked for him to surrender them every week, but his father hadn’t cooperated up until then.)

And so, Clark Kent is back home. My house is a wreck. I’m a wreck. His sister is a wreck, and we won’t even talk about my husband Eric  (Just kidding. Clark Kent and his stepdad do better together than any of the rest of us.) Clark Kent quit his job at Walgreen’s, with our permission, and is lifeguarding and teaching swim lessons this summer. He finds out soon if he can take a full load each summer session at Houston Community College.

We have him seeing a new doctor, but they won’t even consider meds until he is re-tested for ADHD in July (it’s now May) at an uninsured cost of $1200. We already know he has ADHD. I am one whisker away from overruling the new doctor and sending him back to the old one. {Parents of young kids, just wait until that 18th birthday when you are no longer allowed to attend their doctor’s visits without their permission, and they tell you they won’t say a word if you do attend. Those are some fun times.}

And it is OK. If he doesn’t take another class in the next 18 months and he slows down and just matures and works, it is OK. If he is happy and developing, it is OK. I can’t enforce my expectations on him. Instead, I can relax, or try to. I can accept. I can enjoy him, and laugh when he shows up at Fadi’s Mediterranean Restaurant to meet us for dinner with his PedoBear half-shaven look, his teddy bear sweater in 90-degree weather, hair standing on end, shorts on backwards and his phone in his “front pocket” looking like a snake fighting to get out of a bag attached to his behind as he walks. It is OK. He is OK, and I have found that I am, too.

It seems like I just keep relearning the same old lessons, like him.

So, who has a story to share about the late teen years in your ADHD household?

Not without reservations, of course.  I worried: Will anyone take care of my kids the way I can?  Will Marco still feel loved?  Will his babysitter “get” him?  Advocate for him? Push him and nurture him? If I am not present constantly with his teachers, will he fall through the cracks? Worry, worry, worry.

I’ve only been back at work for a few months but I am happy to say that so far so good.  And here is the thing I didn’t realize until I started working again: my self-esteem had taken a horrible beating from being home full time with my son and all of his needs.  I put all of my eggs into the mommy basket and, then, when my son struggles the way that he does, I feel like a failure.

Now that I’m working again, I have one place where I can feel successful.

I realize that I am very lucky to have had the choice to work or stay home.  Many people do not have this option.  Perhaps you have to work because financially you cannot make ends meet if you don’t.  Perhaps you can’t work because your child’s special needs are so great that it doesn’t allow you to work outside of the home.  But I challenge you to do this:  Find something- ANYTHING-that makes you feel successful.  My job now does this for me.  But when I think back to the past year I also notice one other success story.  I also have to say that YOU all have done that for me too.

I want you all to know that, even though we have never met, you are an invaluable support system for me.  I cannot tell you how much it has meant to me to read your comments after I’ve posted something and feel that we’re on the same page.  Raising our children is a wonderful adventure but a challenging one.  To feel that we’re in this together (even if just through a website) is a blessing.  I am amazed by your dedication to your children and your strength and perseverance, for waking up every morning to climb Mt. Everest again and again.  Every day.  Our kids are lucky to have us.  Let’s not forget that!  Let’s celebrate our successes with one another.  We deserve it!

So, job or no job.  Hobby or no hobby.  Outlet or not outlet.  Thank you, out there, for making me feel successful again.  Thank you for giving me perspective and for reminding me that I’m never (ever!) in this alone.  Do you have something or someone that does that for you?

I’m going to reveal my age with this but do you remember the movie Freaky Friday?  It starred Jodie Foster and Barbara Harris as the mother and daughter duo that swap places with each other after lamenting that the others’ life is easier and wishing they could trade spots.  They did a remake with Lindsey Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis but the one I grew up watching was the one with Jodie Foster.

I’ve decided that I want my super power to be my own version of Freaky Friday.  I want to swap places with people who don’t get it:  with a mom who takes it all for granted. The mom who has the luxury to assume that school will be an easy and happy place.  The mom who takes for granted that her child’s work will be the best on the bulletin board in the hallway at school.  The teacher who says, “I don’t believe in medication.”  The mean man at the grocery store who gives me the evil eye because my son is a tad hyper.

I want them to see what it is like to try to get an unmedicated child to sit at the breakfast table and eat breakfast so he doesn’t have to take medicine on an empty stomach.

I want them to see how it feels to pick your child up from school and rush to therapy appointments day after day after day.

I want them to see how it feels when another mom judges you because your child is not as mature, or advanced or successful academically.

I want them to see how it feels when another mom judges your child because he can’t write as well as the other kids on the assignments hanging up in the hallway.

I want them to see what it is like to do homework with a child that needs INTENSE support and is unmedicated by the time we can sit down to do it.

I want them to have to help with the extra homework because the therapists give homework even though he is already overwhelmed with work as it is.

I want them to feel the internal struggle of wondering if your child will grow up to be happy and independent.

There are so many millions of details that I attend to on a daily basis that they don’t have to deal with.

Please don’t misunderstand me, I am not wishing pain or struggle on anyone.  I just think that when we walk a mile in someone else’s shoes we often become more compassionate.  And my kid could use some extra compassion a good deal of the time.  You know what – I could use some extra compassion a good deal of the time.

At the end I know I would still want to swap back because as hard as it is sometimes I love my kids just the way they are and I’m certain my Freaky Friday counterpart will be ready to go back to his or her life as well.  But I think it would offer a good perspective shift for both of us.  And maybe my imaginary super power could save the world one special needs child at a time.

Those of us who are already parenting these kids, already have super powers that we use every day just to make it through the day.  But what additional super power would you wish for?

I asked our community on Facebook how they found resilience as parents of children with ADHD and other neurobehavioral differences, and they came through in a big way! Courtesy of A Mom’s View of ADHD Facebook page,  here are 30 ways our readers foster resilience in their lives:

1. Talk with friends who understand.

2. Pray.

3. Take 5 minutes to read the Facebook page for A Mom’s View of ADHD.

4.  Take your camera, hop in the car and spend an afternoon capturing images of nature that soothe your soul.

5.  Remind yourself that you are enough. When you know better, you do better. It is a journey.

6.  Crank the dance music and have a dance party in the kitchen! (And if your kids are around, ask them to join you!)

7.  Read a book, alone in a quiet place.

8.  Every day, take “me” time to let frustration and anxiety go. Take 5 deep breaths.  Tell yourself during this time: I am not a perfect parent, I am a good parent. My kids are not perfect. They are good boys. Perfect is boring.

9.  Have your child tell you what he or she thinks is awesome about themselves.

10. Sleep!

11. Create a good support system who may not live it but they love you and your children and they honestly listen.

12.  Find reasons to praise your child’s special qualities to build him up.

13. Knit! It gives you something to focus on and create while still being able to be present in the chaos that often is our lives.

14.  Remind yourself that your child’s struggle is his struggle and he is not defiant or difficult by choice. It’s about him, not you. That helps you not take the daily struggles personally, and lets you celebrate the daily mini-victories (like matching socks- on a good day!) with him.

15.  Alone time.

16.  Get a massage.

17.  See a psychologist or therapist.

18.  Take time with your husband, wife, or partner after the children are in bed.

19. Girls night out with your best girlfriends! Nothing like hearing you aren’t alone in your troubles!

20. Go out a night or two a week!

21.  Celebrate the good times with scrapbooking, photos, home videos.

22.  Play music very loud when alone in the care.

23.  Join a tennis team (or another sport). You’ll see a great group of women every week, it gets you out of the house to exercise, and keeps you focused and balanced. It is a low commitment with a high pay-off.

24.  Silence.

25. Go to the movies by yourself.

26.  Admit it’s ok to not be ok every once in a while

27.  Tell yourself that if your kids are angry with you it  means you’re doing it right!

28.  Accept your reality.

Me: Spell ‘cat’

Marco: C-A-T

Me: Good.  Spell ‘bat’

Marco: B-A-T

Me: Good.  Spell ‘hat’

Marco: H-A-T

Me: Good.  Spell ‘rat’

Marco: R-Q-F

Me: Marco, think about it.  All of your other words followed a pattern.  Try again.  Spell ‘rat’.

Marco: R-N-J

Me: Remember, you spelled bat, B-A-T.  Use that to help you.  How do you spell ‘rat’?

Marco: B-R-L

Me: Marco, you’re not trying.  Stop and think.  How do you spell ‘rat’?

Marco: W-G-V

Me: That’s it!  Forget it.  We’re not doing this if you’re not going to try.  (escalating from here to total ugliness)

The next day when his tutor arrived I vented to her, “I just don’t understand it.  He’s so inconsistent.  I feel like he’s not even trying.”  And on and on.  She so perfectly responded, “Well of course, for Marco to remember things he needs he needs multiple sensory inputs for it to go into longer term memory.”

A huge serving of humble pie for me.

I was crazy to think that I could quiz him on his spelling words verbally while I clean up the kitchen from dinner.  On what planet would a kid with ADHD and possible auditory processing problems be able to practice spelling words in that way?  What was I thinking?!

But the humble pie didn’t stop there.

I couldn’t stop myself from thinking:  Why did I forget to modify the instruction? Why didn’t I use different strategies to create success for him? How did I not consider that he needed visual input to practice the skills?  I would have done it for a student in my classroom and yet it didn’t even occur to me to try it for my own son.

So I’m writing this as a confession:  I’ve been expecting Marco to live in my neuro-typical world with his neuro-atypical brain.  Simply not fair to him.

Now I’m trying hard to modify the homework just as I expect the teachers to modify the instruction while he is in class.  His IEP requires it at school – how dare I not also do it at home?  I won’t say that we don’t have any more homework battles because that would be a lie.  But he is learning his spelling words more peacefully now that he can use his dry erase board to help him.

And whenever my husband and I notice that we’re having a moment where we’re expecting him to live in our neuro-typical world, we call out a secret code word.  Ours happens to be “Hallowell” after the amazing and inspiring Dr. Ed Hallowell, ADHD expert.  My son doesn’t understand why we randomly say this weird word but it reminds my husband and me that WE are the ones that need to adjust in that moment and not my son.

“Hallowell!”

The neurologist says we just need to find the right medication for the ADHD and he’ll be fine.

The Occupational Therapist says its sensory and he needs a better sensory diet to help him feel calmer.  It is not ADHD, its sensory.

The optometrist says he needs vision therapy to help with visual tracking.  This doctor says that signs of visual tracking weakness are often misdiagnosed as ADHD.  It’s not ADHD, its vision.

The pediatrician says he’s perfectly healthy, if not a slight bit underweight.

The international adoption pediatrician says he has encephalopathy.

One family member says that he is autistic.

Another says he is just being a boy.

And another says he’ll grow out of it.

The stranger at the supermarket says he probably has Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.

The neighbor says I’m the one who is being dramatic.

The school says nothing.

Feeling overwhelmed.  How does a mom know what to do?

Let me preface this by saying that my husband is a wonderful man and an excellent father.  He is kind and patient and spends every moment he can with us as a family.

But my husband is only human.  He is allowed to get frustrated – as I do.  And there are many moments that managing my son’s behavior can be difficult.  And so I’m sure, if he ever reads this, I will be in trouble for saying the things I am going to say.  But I need to say it anyway.

My husband works all day and comes usually just in time to put our older boy to bed which means he sees him very little during the week.   Occasionally in that time when he is putting our son to bed my husband will lose his temper.  Usually my son (who by that time is no longer medicated) is having a difficult time calming down for the night, or gets distracted 400 times on his way up the stairs to brush his teeth and my husband – who has also had a long day and is tired and hungry – gets frustrated.  I do it more than I care to admit too.  But I’m the one who is with him all the time.  I’m the one who gets him off to school in the morning, gets him to his various therapy appointments, who feeds him dinner, helps him with homework (which is no small accomplishment) and gets him bathed and ready for bed- all while also chasing the two year old!

He always defers to me on every decision about our son’s treatment too.  He says that since I used to be a teacher I know more so I know what is best to do.  But it is different when it is your own child and I don’t like feeling the burden of these decisions on my own.  I appreciate the vote of confidence but we’re supposed to be in this together.   He has never been to an IEP meeting.  Or even a conference with a teacher.  Or read a book about ADHD.

And so sometimes I feel that I have to be the mommy to 3 boys: my wonderful ADHD boy, my 2 year old and my husband.  It can make me feel very alone.

Just needed to let it out.  Thanks for listening.

Last summer I went on a book tour: 60-cities-in-60-days. Each of my young adult offspring was with me for two weeks at a time. They took turns being my driver, assistant, and keeper, as in keeper of my sanity.

Well, one of my kids is my 6 foot 2 inch ADHD/Aspie WonderSon, Clark Kent, who had recently pulled off a miracle and graduated from high school, but was on a self-imposed, semi-permanent medication break. And it turned out that life on the road was very, very hard, and the closer we got to Clark’s stint, the more worried I became about how helpful his help would be. Because I needed help, a lot of help. Organized, consistent, self-initiated help to get me in and out of TV and radio interviews, speeches, and bookstores, and on to new towns each night, while somehow getting “life” done in between scheduled appearances. Not only that, but during my time with Clark, I was going to be finishing a book that was due to my editor. I needed Super-Sized help during that period.

I confessed to my husband Eric, “I am scared about Clark coming. Does it make me a bad mother that I’m not sure I want him with me on the road?”

“It only makes you a bad mother if you cancel on him. It would make you absolutely clueless if you weren’t worried. I’m worried, too. But he is a loving kid, and he’ll take good care of you, to the best of his ability.”

After a particularly trying section of the tour through Alabama where we endured our seventh straight week of rain and found ourselves in and out of repair shops where no repairs actually occurred to our many road-broken parts, I was to drop my beleaguered 25-year old stepdaughter Marie at the Memphis airport and pick up Clark Kent. Remarkably, the sun shone as soon as Clark’s plane touched down. Clark was immediately Clark-like, texting Marie that he had left her a scavenger hunt to find the car and keys at the airport in Texas, and asking me how the weather was in Las Vegas. It was our first few real smiles in days as she and I said goodbye and Clark gamboled up to the Bookmobile, our book decal-decorated 24-foot RV.

The Bookmobile

Clark hopped in with a big grin. It was impossible not to smile back. Petey the one-eyed Boston terrier, my summer-long road companion, danced happily around us.

Petey enjoying fresh air in our first rainless evening in weeks, brought courtesy of Clark.

We had high hopes for our next city, St. Louis, and it did not disappoint. The ADHD mommas represented, too, in the form of Meredith (see top picture). It was an incredible evening. Clark even signed copies of The Clark Kent Chronicles and posed for pictures, a cool half-smile on his face.

“This is how it is,” I told Clark, “The events are mostly fun like this. What do you think?”

He grunted, Clark-like. But I knew that meant he loved it.

We moseyed on. The rain continued. Our dump tanks were full, so I employed the Eric fix: one large tumbler of water in the potty, to seal the chute and prevent odors. When we arrived at our RV park somewhere in Missouri, I noticed something had spilled on the floor. I tracked through it to its source: the potty. I prayed it was only the water I had poured in, but, let’s face it, it was water out of a toilet, and I felt nauseous. I used our towels to sop it up.

I got up early to do laundry, take out the nasty trash, and dump the troublesome tanks. I let Clark sleep, figuring it was less trouble than dealing with him awake. The trash went well enough, but the laundry was closed until 10 am, long after we’d be nearly to Springfield, with our dirty towels. So I got Clark up and sent him to shower.

“I’ll meet you at the dump station,” I told him.

Clark left. He was back 5 minutes later. “I forgot my soap.”

Clark left. He was back 5 minutes later. “I forgot my shampoo.”

I was beginning to feel a bit . . . anxious. Irritable, even. I moved the Bookmobile to the dump station, chewing my lip. I sure could have used some help.

Eric had attached a new collar to our dump house, ostensibly an improvement. It leaked like a mad thing. I prayed the people in the adjacent camp site didn’t notice. I rushed to rinse it with the dump station hose, but no water came out. I tried again. Nothing. I thought about crying and didn’t have the energy. I ferried buckets of water until I had gotten the hose half clean, then stuffed it back in its place to disinfect later. Clark finally finished his ablutions and rejoined me. Ahem. Third try’s a charm, and all. At least he was clean, even if he had been too spaced out to shower, much less help.

So now I had laundry to do in Springfield in addition to the event. We made it there in time to source a laundry mat, which turned out to be in the same strip center as the book store! A positive sign. I tried to employ Clark on a few tasks but finally just sent him and Petey out for a stroll. I dropped in our loads, got quarters and cash from the bank in the parking lot, and went back to get ready.

Soon we were in the bookstore for our event, which went super. I reminded Clark it was his job to take pictures of all the greatness going on. Cool as an extra long cucumber, he reached into his pocket and pulled out . . . a  ham and cheese sandwich.

Everyone stared at him for a moment and then burst out laughing. Even if I don’t have Asperger’s or ADHD, I understood his logic: you never know when you’re going to need an emergency snack on the road. He was a huge hit with everyone in the store, and I realized he was helping me after all, with laughter, mine and my readers.

I had to admit, it was mostly so far, so good with him, but we had a long 12 days left to go, and I had a 17-year history that told me things wouldn’t always go so smoothly with the WonderSon. I knew the boom was coming, I just didn’t know when. Next week: Onward to Oklahoma and Clark’s “vampires.”

Pamelot