Need help now?

ADHD

Discussion forum for parents in Australia

Reply
Scribe
jamesmatt

ADHD

My 9 year old stepson has adhd and he is in therapy, he is also taking proper medication that has made a world of difference for the positive. So the issue is that he is constantly misbehaving. He is a pathological liar and a thief. He has gotten detention for taking iPads from one class in school to recess and then claiming other teachers let him do it. He has taken money from my room, nothing major just enough to buy snacks or book fair items. He takes candy in basically any form and will steal it from his siblings or us if its left out. He also has a history of bullying. I have tried every way possible that I can think of to get this kid to see the error of his ways I have given him chores to do. I have grounded him. I have lectured him and tried to really connect with him. I have tried to get him to do outdoor activities work on cars with me and other men to see good examples other than me. There is no punishment no positive reinforcement that can get his brain to see consequences for actions it's like he has a reset button and nothing works. Please help.

Prolific scribe
Andrea-RO

Re: ADHD

Message contains a hyperlink

Hi @jamesmatt

 

Thank you for contacting us and asking us for support. It sounds like both you and your son are having a really tough time at the moment. I am very glad to hear that medication has been helpful for your son, even though he is still struggling with some behavioural issues. First of all I would really want you to keep trying with positive reinforcement, trying to connect with him and doing activities. This will really help demonstrate how much you care about him, and want to support him. Unfortunately any sort of behavior change takes a huge amount of time, effort, and energy. The most important thing is to be patient and consistent. 

I do also want to acknowledge that this must be very stressful for you and your family, so it's really important that you are also supported during this time. I've seen that you live Tennessee, so I've found a couple of resources that might be helpful for you. STEP offers workshops and 1 on 1 support for parents. Kid Central Tennessee also has a huge amount of information and resources, including information about where to get family support, as well as information on managing challenging behaviour. Let us know how you go.

Parent/Carer Community Champion
JAKGR8

Re: ADHD

Message contains a hyperlink

Welcome to the forums! It sounds like you are ready to tear your hair out and you have tried everything. I wonder if the ADHD is actually linked to the lying and stealing or whether is exacerbates the behaviour – lack of impulse control. Tricky…

Most kids lie or avoid telling the truth from time to time. It’s likely that your child is having trouble coping with challenges related to ADHD. Kids with ADHD might lie, not to get out of doing a task, but to hide that they’re struggling with the task. It’s a way of coping with challenges. And they may not even realize they’re doing it.  Their difficulties with starting tasks and planning them out makes it hard for them to do what’s asked. Kids with ADHD struggle with executive functions;

- Connecting the now to the future

- Thinking of, or remembering, consequences

- Organization and time management

- Understanding how they got to the place of lying to begin with

- Understanding that it’s the lying that got them in trouble

- Knowing how to fix the original problem

Also, some kids with ADHD can be unrealistically optimistic. They may think everything will just fall into place on its own.

It may help to anticipate areas your son might struggle and give help. Look for patterns in when your child lies so you can figure out where there may be trouble spots.

Try not to take the lying personally. Focus on what led to the lie rather than the lie itself.

Remove the shame of lying. Don’t excuse the lie but show that you understand how your child came to do it. You could say, “It sounds like you were struggling. Let’s figure out how you got to this place to begin with. Then let’s figure out how to get you back on track.”

Help your child make connections. Talk about what happened and help your child recognize what went wrong. That includes what happened when your child lied.

Try to focus on his strengths and give helpful types of praise when your child does positive things. As Dr Ian Lillico says,

The behaviour of boys should be modified through praise - never through sanction or punishment. Punishment may contain a boy’s behaviour but not modify it. Punishment can actually be a reward for a boy as this can secure his prestige in the eyes of his peers. We must endeavour to catch our son doing something right and praise him for it and (generally) try to ignore when he does things wrongly.

Continually punishing or sanctioning boys can contain poor behaviour but won’t change the behaviour. If you really want your son to do things better you must contrive situations which enable him to do the right thing. This is the time to praise and encourage him. This brings long-term improvement.

Many parents fall into the trap of continually chastising boys and punishing them when they misbehave. However, in order to have a less stressful family life, and to change his behaviour, we should concentrate on positive reinforcement when he excels at being good.

Home rules written as negatives such as “No this or No that or Don’t this or Don’t that” should change to positives. For example rules such as “No chewing gum in the house” should become “Please place gum in the bin when you enter the house”. You can reinforce the second version by praising your son for putting his gum in the bin. Rules are of no value unless they can be reinforced through praise and a simple re-wording into positives can bring major change in a family of boys as their behaviour can then be modified. For example “We treat everyone in this family with respect - we do this by waiting our turn at mealtimes” etc etc. When your son does this well you reinforce the rule and modify his behaviour.

Boys who misbehave can often become heroes in front of his immediate peers. Boys who are publically chastised both at home, in the neighborhood or at school, often have a high peer esteem and their poor behaviour often continues to give them feedback - even if we see it as negative. Boys should never be publically scolded as this tends to raise their peer esteem and, hence, their poor behaviour continues. Public reprimand also severs relationships between the scolder and scoldee as boys are shame-phobic and (if we inadvertently shame boys in front of their friends) we frequently do more harm than good. Let’s be mindful of boys’ feelings and chastise them without breaking their sensitive and delicate spirits.”

I don’t agree with everything he says but it is something to strive for I suppose. He does work with ADHD children and will respond to most emails.

The combination of ADHD with other disorders often presents extra challenges for children and parents. It is important for healthcare providers to screen other disorders and problems. In this case, you may wish to speak to your healthcare provider about Conduct Disorder, although it would be a mild case.

Conduct disorder" refers to a group of repetitive and persistent behavioural and emotional problems in youngsters. Children and adolescents with this disorder have great difficulty following rules, respecting the rights of others, showing empathy, and behaving in a socially acceptable way.

Children or adolescents with conduct disorder may

- Be aggressive

- bully, threaten or intimidate others

- be mean to others

- start physical fights

- deliberately destroy other's property

- break into someone else's building, house, or car

- lie to obtain goods, or favours or to avoid obligations

- steal

Maybe he is anxious or has other learning problems as well. Something for the doctor to consider...

Have you considered discussing fish oil supplements with your medical advisor? Research shows that omega supplements increase a low level of omegas in the blood. That can be somewhat helpful in treating ADHD symptoms. One study found that omega-3 helps neurons in the brain communicate better. That may improve attention, focus, motivation and working memory for kids with ADHD.  It is by no means meant to be a substitute for ADHD medication and cognitive behavioral therapy but maybe worthwhile.

If the diet angle interests you then you might like Sue Dengate’s stuff. I don’t agree that ‘many’ children with ADHD respond to the diet, but it can save your sanity if it does work. https://www.fedup.com.au/factsheets/symptom-factsheets/adhd-and-diet

 

Good luck. 

P.S. If you edit your post with a 'tag' that says ADHD it might get more interest from parents with similar issues.

JA
Scribe
Happytimes

Re: ADHD

Hi there

Read your post just wanted to let you know you and your son are not alone with what is happening. Adhd makes life a lot more challenging and interesting that’s for sure. I just wanted to say I have a son with adhd and when he was 13 he really challenged us with his behaviour. In hindsight he was reacting to his father and myself separating. Life was very stressful. (We recognised this pretty early so my ex and I have worked hard to keep things friendly especially for our sons sake. We realised if our son he sees us being angry and not respectful, how can we expect him to be...). As a result he really pushed every boundary possible. Behaviour at school was not good, in fact he was expelled from one school and suspended twice from another school. But we got through it and now he is a lot better. Many people comment on his good behaviour now and his excellent manners and that he is a pleasure to be around. in fact safe to say you would think he is a different child 😉. So what worked for us? In a loving way we stood very firm and we pushed back when he was misbehaving. what I mean by that was we said we love you, we know you love us and we know you have a good heart, but what you are doing is not okay. Also crucial thing that worked for him was we made sure we were hands on in his life. We did recreational things together to reinforce our bond. We were fair, but firm. Also another critical thing was the people he was associating with. The children he was hanging out with at school was so influential in his behaviour. The school he was going to was very rough and there was a lot of fighting. Our son was misbehaving at school so his peers would respect him. So we kept talking to him about right and wrong and about making good decisions. For example, If he wanted to go to a friends for a sleep over we said “is this person a good person” ? If we didn’t feel comfortable we would say no I’m sorry son I don’t want you going there because I do not know that you will be safe. We made him think about his choices. If it was a better choice of friend next time we said okay you can stay at this friends house but only if we can speak to the parents. So he knew we were keeping a close eye on him. As soon as we could we changed his school to a much better school, actually he went to trade college and this also had a big impact for the better on him. Much more positive environment. I’ll be honest there were times when we felt stressed and angry. But we never gave up. A very big thing for you is to make sure you feel supported as a parent. You need someone outside the family that you can talk objectively to. Who you can get support from. You need me time as well so you can relax and this will help you be a calmer and clearer parent. That’s what worked for us. I really think your son will be okay but it’s going to take work. Ask him to look at himself and think about who he wants to be. 9 times out of 10 it will be the right answer. All the best.
Highlighted
Scribe
Noodles

Re: ADHD

Hi I’m new to this site how do I start my son is 8 he’s on meds for his ADHD and I don’t feel like they do anything other than help him sit down in class when he comes home he is ok for a short period if he has a computer in his hand when he plays out he swears so much and when he’s home he swears and me a lot if he can’t have his own way I try my very best to talk calmly but sometimes I do raise my voice I don’t know what to do to help him understand how his words can hurt I feel as now he just thinks it’s ok to call me swear words on a daily basis and as his mum it hurts
Me I feel very anxious all the time any ideas on how to help him swear less ?
Scribe
Mimbulus

Re: ADHD

In most children with ADHD, behavior therapy can be far more beneficial than any pharmacological treatment. There are many child psychiatrists who provide behavior therapy for ADHD. Alternatively, some mental health care institutes also provide parental training for behavior therapy. Behavior therapy can help a child take control of his actions and behaviour. There are also many clinical trials on ADHD that study the efficacy of behavior therapy alone or in combination with medications. 

Active scribe
Ousais

Re: ADHD

It may help to anticipate areas your son might struggle and give help. Look for patterns in when your child lies so you can figure out where there may be trouble spots.
Casual scribe
Natasha1990

Re: ADHD

Hello everybody I'm new here I have a son who is 13 and is awaiting adhd diagnosis I have his first appointment in a couple of weeks and was wondering what to expect and what the process is he also has a mixture of a few other things that has been pre diagnosed by a specialised teacher he has dispraxia dyslexia autism and adhd I'm just really looking to see what the process for his adhd referral will be thank you natasha
Super contributor
Taylor-RO

Re: ADHD

Message contains a hyperlink

Hi @Natasha1990, thanks for sharing your story. I have responded over here on your thread. We hope that you are able to receive some support from other members soon Smiley Happy

Active scribe
beadenn92

Re: ADHD

Following and any advice would help on my end as this is new to me