Top 10 things Dads of sons with ADHD should know - ADHD Dude - Ryan Wexelblatt

hey dads my name is ryan wexleblad otherwise known as adhd dude i'm a licensed clinical social worker a certified adhd professional and i'm also the father of the sun today we're going to talk about the top 10 things fathers of sons with adhd should know about so stay tuned i know that dude medication combined with learning practical strategies which is my part of this is the most effective intervention for adhd adhd medications are the most researched medications in the psychiatry field they are also the safest and if it has been recommended for your son then he start on an adhd medication and you're saying no because you have not done your research or because you've received misinformation or opinions from a family member who tells you you know he shouldn't take that i want you to understand that your son is not learning to the best of his ability it could be affecting his social relationships he is more at risk for substance abuse problems later on more at risk for accidents and really what we know is that for individuals with adhd who are unmedicated they are at risk for a much more challenging life ahead of them okay adhd medications are safe not every medication works for every kid but they are an essential part of adhd treatment for most kids adhd is a misleading name so over the years adhd has had a number of different titles originally it was called minimal brain dysfunction then we went to attention deficit disorder then attention deficit hyperactivity disorder so what i want you to understand is really what adhd is is what's called an executive function developmental delay meaning the prefrontal cortex the part of the brain that controls executive functions is developing slower than the rest of the brain there are some other parts of this as well that i'm not going to get into just to not be too technical and you can research but really what we're talking about here is that somebody who has adhd their prefrontal cortex is developing two to three years behind the rest of their brain so i want you to think about this if your son is 11 his prefrontal cortex or what i call his executive functioning age is really more at about age eight or nine the prefrontal cortex does catch up eventually but it's still going to be affected as a result of adhd from most individuals into adulthood intelligence has nothing to do with adhd you know a lot of times i'll hear your father say things like he's so smart i don't know why he keeps making the same mistakes over and over or he's so smart i don't know why he can you know figure out how to you know build uh this you know complicated thing in minecraft but he can't figure out how to do long division adhd has nothing to do with intelligence and intelligence has nothing to do with executive functioning so keep that in mind difficulty with emotional regulation if your son has difficulty controlling his emotions sometimes if he tends to be overreactive understand this is a really normal aspect of adhd it is more prevalent in kids with a more impulsive profile of adhd what i want you to understand is that his emotional regulation skills are not going to improve through punishment or lecturing or anything like that i'm not saying don't hold him accountable no we still have to teach him what's expected in terms of expressing our emotions in an age-expected man most importantly what i want you to understand is don't try to reason with him don't try to talk to him when he's escalated or when he's upset because he can't learn when he's in that state and you're most likely just exacerbating the problem wait until he's calm because that's when he's most able to hear you and when he's mostly able to learn from you reaction to perceived criticism people with adhd tend to be very reactive to what they perceive as criticism regardless if it's criticism or not there's actually a term for this called rejection sensitive dysphoria so if you find your son tends to get defensive really easily you find that he tends to feel rejected by other kids really easily understand that this is part of adhd kids with adhd tend to live in strong emotions so understand that if he seems to be reactive to something you're saying he's hearing it as criticism even though that might not be your intention so just keep that in mind and think about you know maybe you need to approach things or address things at a different time when he might be able to hear it better or you might have to change the words you use to approach things a little differently with him at certain times the most helpful thing you can do here is when you have to give your son some constructive feedback do it in time when he's calm and most importantly give him some praise and recognition for things he's done well very recently before you give him the constructive feedback because that's going to help him be able to hear you better difficulty with social skills so if your son has difficulty making or keeping friends you've probably heard people say you know he has difficulty reading social cues i wish it was that simple it goes so much deeper than that many guys with adhd but not all of them don't learn social information intuitively from a young age as well as their peers who don't have adhd so what we have to do is we have to help him develop perspective taking skills so understanding others thoughts and feelings and understanding how he's coming across to others based in the context of the situation the most helpful thing you can do here is help teach him context and help teach him how others might perceive his words or behaviors based on the context of that situation the more you can help him develop his perspective taking skills the more you're gonna help him improve socially disrespect and lying if your son has a propensity to be disrespectful when he gets upset if he has a propensity to lie understand he's not doing that maliciously it's most likely a reaction an impulsive reaction i should say to having to transition from a preferred test to a non-preferred task or his perception that he's somehow being criticized when you personalize his disrespect and you begin arguing with him what happens is you're actually exacerbating the situation the best thing you can do is not react to it not give attention to it and later when he's calm address it with him and let him know that the way he spoke to you or spoke to his mother his brother his sister whomever it's not okay and that's not the way we treat people in our family the other thing i want to mention here is that even though he might not show it your son probably feels ashamed of his behavior and feels remorse he might not articulate it but know that it's most likely there a lot of times when kids with adhd feel ashamed of their behavior they don't really articulate that because they don't have the language to do so so they might just kind of withdraw into themselves or avoid apologizing because they do feel ashamed of their behavior so please keep that in mind when you address his behaviors at a time when he's calm reinforcing unwanted behaviors one of the things i see fathers of guys with adhd do a lot is they reinforce unwanted behavior so whether it's provoking a sibling whether it's doing something that's annoying to get attention when you react to these things you're sending your son the message that if you behave this way or if you do this i'm gonna give you attention and remember for a lot of kids with adhd negative attention is better than no attention so he'll take what he can get from you what we want to teach him is that he can get attention in more positive ways and more constructive ways difficulty sustaining attention to things that aren't interesting to him and the ability to hyper focus on things that are really interesting one of the things i hear dad say a lot is you know i don't understand why he can't you know get through a chapter of this book he has to read when he can you know do legos for three hours or he can you know work on coding for all this time or play basketball outside in 20 degree weather the reason why is the way the adhd brain works is that you can hyper focus on things that are interesting to you you can pay close attention to details of things that are interesting but you have difficulty sustaining attention to things that are not interesting to you i know this is frustrating for a lot of fathers but understand this is really what adhd is at its foundation along with difficulty with self-directed talk what i call brain coach with kids so if you ask your son why he did something and he says i don't know he really might not know why he did something because he wasn't having an internal dialogue with himself okay before something happened and if you say to him you know think before you act that's unrealistic if he could think before he acted and have that internal discussion with himself he would he's not able to do that yet okay so please refrain from saying think before you act and please don't criticize him for the fact that he can sustain attention to things that are interesting for him and has difficulty sustaining attention to things that are not interesting because that's the adhd this one i say for last because it's most important it's the one i want you to remember the most guys with adhd tend to respond really well to praise and recognition for specific things they've done there's even a term for this called recognition responsive euphoria the best thing you can do to help your son is give him recognition for things that he's done whether it's things that required some resiliency it's things that required him to put some effort into or even just simple daily you know household chores like you know bringing a dirty dish to the sick when you give him recognition for these things as small as they might be that helps him feel good and it helps him to understand he can get attention from you and positive attention by doing small things like helping out around the house so don't take it for granted how important this is you know we tend to focus on kids negative behaviors and not give them enough recognition for really small things but that's what's going to build up his self-confidence and that's what's going to help your relationship with him as well and the last thing i want to mention about this please don't say things to yourself like you're so smart you know or a good job because that's not really meaningful that's what i call empty praise because you're not telling him anything specifically and in terms of intelligence you know intelligence is something that you're born with it requires no effort so we want to praise his effort we want to praise him thinking about others we want to praise him doing anything that could be construed as being helpful you know to other people last thing i want to mention regardless of how old your son is i want to encourage you to spend some time with him before bed i find that for a lot of guys with adhd they really want to talk to their fathers at bedtime and it's really helpful for them and even if it's just kind of him talking at you and kind of getting out all his thoughts from the day that's totally fine you know just kind of listen to him give him that time because i think boys really need that one-on-one time with their father and they really need to feel heard by their father so even if this is something you don't normally do i think if you get in the habit of doing that you know whether you're talking about you know games he likes whether you're talking about sports his day whatever you know just give him that time to listen to him don't criticize him don't lecture him don't try to teach him a lesson then just make it a time when you're present and listening to him i hope this is helpful please make sure to check out the other dad talk videos in the dad talk playlist on my youtube channel and i'll talk to you soon take care you

Channel: ADHD Dude

Views: 54,427

Keywords: ADHD, ADHD Camp, ADHD Dude, Ryan Wexelblatt, adhd diagnosis, adhd help, adhd parenting strategies, adhd social cues, adhd social skills, adhd symptoms, adhd tips, adhd treatment, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, behavioral therapy, executive function skills, executive functioning, how to adhd, parenting adhd tip, rejection sensitive dysphoria, what is adhd, adhd fathers, adhd dude dads, adhd dads, adhd boys, adhd dude executive function

Id: txDL_m2Bi_4

Length: 10min 40sec (640 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 14 2020