My daughter was diagnosed with ADD and anxiety disorder last spring. She and I have been learning all we can and trying different strategies to help her at home. As a parent I have been doing much of the stress inducing, heavy emotional lifting while my husband is sitting angrily on the sidelines. When I try to bring up positive ways we can work as a team to help her, he seems uninterested and irritated that I bring it up. She is in therapy, and he mysteriously feels anger toward her very helpful therapist. I have offered him opportunities to speak with her therapist about his concerns (not sure what they are,) but he refuses to follow through. He feels I need to simply toughen up on our daughter, push her harder, and fill her schedule with more activities than I feel she can handle . I have tried to explain that she also needs down time after a long school day or she falls apart. I'm typically left picking up the pieces, helping her through anxiety attacks, on the receiving end of her anger, and doing all of the research. She's a great kid - super funny, creative and does well in her very supportive school. Is he ashamed of her diagnosis? She has embraced it and even works to educate others about it. I'm so proud of her!
I feel I am completely alone with this, and I feel my husband's unwillingness to come to terms with this is hurting our marriage and his relationship with his amazing, daughter. I have expressed this to him, but ... ugh, I'm tired of trying. I have even been to a therapist for myself, but none of it matters if my husband doesn't come to terms.
Anyone else in this boat? I feel like I can't even approach him about this anymore.
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I’m so sorry you are doing most of the leg work. My husband has somewhat of the same sentiment. He wants to jam pack my sons schedule thinking if he’s busy he will be ok. Instead my son has huge tantrums (8yrs old) after school because he is rushed to do homework, eat dinner and off to practice. Then in the morning he’s a mess because he’s exhausted. Im the one dealing with him most of the time. My husband doesn’t get it. It’s like talking to a brick wall. He does see how much worse our son behaves if there is a missed dosage of Adderall. I wish I could tell you your husband will come around but who knows. If and when he does the damage to you and your daughter will be done. I have lots of resentment towards my husband for making me feel like a bad mom for taking our son to see a psychiatrist to help him with his ADHD. It’s a daily struggle with my husband and son Praying yiur husband gets on board and sees that if you both work together it will benefit your daughter
I understand your situation. When our son was diagnosed with ASD and ADHD/Anxiety, my husband and I had two very different ways of handling it. I went into full force Mom mode, researching everything, being very proactive about all the doctors appts, spending lots of time trying to understand our son in a new way, etc. My husband kind of retreated into anger and frustration. Our approaches became so glaringly different that we decided that we needed couples counseling to help us. We worked with a couples therapist for two months, unpacking all that was there for us. The fear, frustration, etc. One thing that came clear through the sessions (which was not easy) was that the diagnosis brought up a lot of things for both of us, in terms of our identities as parents and what we had hoped for our child. We all have things that we think will happen for our kids...and when there is something that calls this into question, that can be scary and threatening to who we thought we were going to be as parents. This can be particularly hard for fathers. In a nutshell, it triggers alot of things. The sessions were no walk in the park...and required both parties to be very honest and willing to participate even when it got hard. We're in a better place now and it feels like we're on the same team more. This is not only good for us but also much better for our son as he sees his parents working together not against each other. But we still have to try every day and it takes work. My advice would be to find a therapist for you both who has experience in couples therapy and also some understanding of your daughters particular diagnosis. This part was important because some therapists don't understand the particular challenges of parenting a neuro-diverse child. They should understand what you both are dealing with. I hope this helps and I wish you all the luck.
This was very helpful and where we are. I believe my husband is undiagnosed based on what I've experienced and yet hasn't gone to get tested. We are in couples counseling because it's been very hard to keep doing the work of helping my kids both with ADHD and one with HF ASD. I also have ADHD and have to keep doing hard work of organizing their therapy and work. Your comment hit home.
Hello. Unfortunately this is quite common. It may be that he is having a hard time accepting the diagnosis, and rather than dealing with it, it may be easier for him to just blame you for everything.
I’ve seen it so many times. The child finally gets the diagnosis and one parent backs off and judges the other parent. It is sad and does the child no favors. His ego may be at play here. A professional has said that his child isn’t perfect and needs help. It can be viewed as a personal attack for some people.
What to do? Keep doing everything you can for your daughter without him. She needs your help and being her rock is priority number one, not trying to convince an adult to have a certain opinion. Yes it’s tiring and frustrating but you have to keep going. You’re all she’s got. There’s your motivation.
Hopefully, in time, he will see that what you’re doing is working. Maybe he won’t. Some people think they know better than everyone else, even more than the experts - which is of course ridiculous. Be gracious to him and don’t respond to his anger. In other words, be the adult. Don’t discuss it with him anymore in detail unless he expresses an interest. Keep it basic. We’re going to therapy, etc. He is not on the team and isn’t a good sounding board right now.
He is dealing with his own issues. Leave him alone to process them. Try leaving a book about adhd on his desk or nightstand or on the back of the toilet! You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink. He knows where the Internet is too.
It can be tough, really tough, but stop trying so hard to change his mind. Accept that he can’t embrace it and move on. Continue moving forward in therapy and the new parenting strategies and hopefully at some point you will see him silently join in.
I think what you wrote is VERY helpful advice. All I can do is move forward and put my full energy into my daughter. (Many others said the same on this thread.) I'll keep searching for a middle ground with us, but hopefully he can find a way to meet us where we are... or at least half way. I just don't want him to check out on our daughter. I did convince him this morning to check out the ADDitude podcast and suggested an episode about home life strategies. (He has a road trip this weekend with nothing to do but listen to podcasts.) I just ordered a bunch of books and I'll trying leaving them around.
similar story here. My daughter was diagnosed with Anxiety and Depression at 13, and on anti-depressants that didn’t help so my husband was convinced that she was faking it (and she heard him say that) Her doctor took her off the meds since they went helping reinforcing his belief. She managed to hold it together for a while until another psychiatrist told me she was having suicidal ideation and she needed to go to the mental hospital. My husband thought the dr. was being alarmist and maybe so but I couldn’t risk her hurting herself so I convinced him she should go. He was furious at me. Finally she was diagnosed with ADHD this year and those meds have helped but every step of the way it’s been a battle with him. I’ll do research and share it with him to explain her behaviors and suggest ways to handle it and he gets upset - telling me to quit trying to diagnose her. I could go on, but I feel your pain. Hang in there for her.
I'm so sorry about your lack of support. It sucks. Thanks for sharing as it makes me feel less alone. My own experience has been that some people are very uncomfortable with mental health issues. It's not like a cut or broken bone you can easily see. There's so much more awareness now about mental health, but it often doesn't feel like enough.
I am so sorry. Marriage is very difficult. Sadly your situation is more common than it should be. My husband and I were on that boat for awhile but he did come around. We are also in therapy together. Maybe since your husband believes in “toughness” you show him some? Stop talking to him about it, tell him since he has decided to learn nothing about it, he can’t make decisions about it. Maybe your daughter doesn’t come to him to talk and only comes to you and her support system. This might not all be the best course of action but that’s what I would do. Cut him off from the topic and stop going to him to convince him Of it. There are consequences for beliefs and actions and if he decides not to learn and be supportive then he can’t be a part of it.
I apologize if my advice isn’t good. I want to just throw out that disclaimer before people being attacking me. You don’t have to take my advice at all and it’s just what I would do if my husband was acting like this.
It just sounds like he’s closed minded and old fashioned and doesn’t care to learn and be there for her. I also think you need to surround yourself with positive people who do understand because his attitude towards you, your daughter, her struggles really stinks. Best of luck to you.
My final statement… you are right on this one and your husband is wrong. LOL.
I wouldn't attack you for saying this. In fact, it isn't too dissimilar from what others are saying. It's the tough love version of these struggles. At times, I do check out on my husband to do what needs to be done so I don't feel emotionally pulled in multiple directions.
I could have written this! Although he is now my ex-husband, in part because of this. Things have gotten a little better because I can no longer (and refuse to) run interference for him in their relationship. He at least will admit she has struggles. I am still the one who does all the things: therapy, messages to teachers, fill prescriptions, deal with the meltdowns, etc. It is SOOO hard. I hear you and I'm so sorry you are in this place. It's hard to do all alone and it's hard watch your spouse do such a poor job of loving your child. It sounds to me like he needs a therapist to deal with his anger--probably fear and shame--that his daughter is not who he wants her to be. Have you told your husband how you feel? That it's hurting your marriage? I'd hope that would cause him to rethink his behavior. Although clearly for me no threats helped. He just left when it got too hard for him. Will your husband read books to "convince you" there's nothing wrong? Or talk to a doctor? I asked my ex to read "Girls with ADHD." He listened to it--as opposed to me who read it twice and took notes--but it was something. I am thinking about family therapy so that we can all find a better way.
The other thing I have done for my daughter (same diagnoses as yours) is accepted that I am alone in this with her and it will be all on me. When I get angry about this, I have a really good cry and then I do the next right thing. Because she deserves the support and love. She needs help and down time and compassion and someone fighting for her. I've stopped trying to turn him into someone he's not.
Wow, I'm really feeling supported reading these answers. AlexaKmom & Run_, I really feel your pain & frustrations in having to do all the parenting yourself. My daughter was diagnosed in Feb this year, and by April, she was living with me full-time & has barely seen or talked to her father since then. (we were already divorced) I'm the one who's done all the research, made all the phone calls, taken her to the appointments, got her the IEP at school and every other thing to help her since then. I'm the one who found the right NP to prescribe meds after her Peds failed attempt at putting her on a stimulant. I'm the one who's still up with her every night because she can't sleep through the night. It's a mountain of responsibility to have to hold by ourselves, but we do it because they need us to. When there is no one else, we are the one they can count on through everything. I hope the two of you can find your way through this difficult time ❤️
Thank you for making me feel less alone. It may not have been your intent, but your final few sentences are empowering. There's so much to personally unpack as a parent going through this.
It's tough to hear, but I think you are right. I can keep trying with my husband, but in the meantime I need to do "the next right thing" for my daughter. I sometimes simply feel like I don't have the time/ energy to try to get him on board. Thank you for your support!
This same thing has come up in our family. Some days it seems my husband is open to hearing about our (myself, and two daughters') struggles with ADHD, and yet, the other day he lost his temper because he was "sick of the fake crying and deliberate disobedience" which blew my mind. Of course our 6 year old is not trying to be a "bad kid", she is trying her hardest and yet he's feeding the fire that just kills her self esteem. He refuses to read anything about it and clearly doesn't fully understand it. I believe deep down it brings up a lot of childhood trauma for him that he is unwilling to navigate. So I get your situation and I hope more people respond with some ways to manage it. I love a lot of the other comments about continuing to be an advocate and parent that your daughter can come to. If anything at least one parent on her side who gets it is better than zero, but I also struggle with the long-term effects it may be having on our kids when we aren't parenting on the same page despite our best efforts.
I think my husband grew up in a tough household, and I wonder sometimes how that impacts him. Thanks for telling me I'm a "great mom." (I might put up a post it somewhere to remind me. )
I hope your situation gets better, and you are right. One parent is better than zero.
Omg. Reading all of these takes me back. It's a dark and lonely place. I wish I could say our story ended with a positive ending. It has not.
My son is 18 and its still a huge weight. He not only has ADHD with borderline asd tendencies, anger and social anxiety. He also has had type 1 diabetes since he was 3 years old. He was diagnosed with ADHD @ 7. He's has other medical issues too, since birth actually.
I worry, that because my husband didn't get on board, has said most of what you all have said and worse. He didn't believe it. Then because I was the one going to all the therapy sessions and doctors appointments, dealing with the school he would constantly berrate me. My parenting was crap, I was coddling him. I defended him too much, which obviously gave our son more reason to "be lazy" and not do as he's told. Eventually, my oldest son, who is 2 years older, started saying similar things. It makes me so angry and sad that he chose to not learn how to help our son, instead only made it worse.
My son has serious anger issues and self confidence issues because of all the arguments. He had struggled all through school, while I fought for and with him, alone.
Fast forward/rewind to 3 years ago. My husband was diagnosed with Primary Progressive MS. Again my world catastrophically altered. He had been struggling for a while especially physically. However, he had been working 900 miles away. He was gone for 3 or 4 weeks then home for 1. So the struggles with them were gone, for me. It was easier.
As typical of my personality, I did exactly what I did for our son. I helped with all the scheduling and stood beside him, supporting him. Etc. Although I started to see he wasn't being honest with the doctors all the time. I would speak up for him. Especially, when I was the one at home helping him when he fell or getting him whater he needed because he couldn't. I also started to see more anger and depression. Then came the karma slap. He wanted our son, whom he has no relationship with, to feel empathy and understanding of his condition. Omg. It is absolutely as insane as it sounds. He's been getting worse this past year. My oldest now also can't stand him, and I worry about my 12 year old and what its doing to him.
My son with the diabetes and ADHD, was unable or/mentally shut down and didn't finish his courses to graduate last year. My fault, of course. I didn't make him. 😔 I only have to work full time and literally do everything else. He cant even drive. So this year we had a discussion and I told my son his options. His social anxiety has gotten worse and he can't go back to school. I don't have, at the moment, either the time or money to pay someone to help him homeschool. His dad hasn't and can't work. He's been in disabiltiy for 3 years. Obviously his father is not an option. At this point we are not a couple. We just have to live together. I want to leave. I just know he has no one to help him. I also know my children can't keep living with his cognitive decline and anger. That and I don't have anywhere to go with them. My family has passed mostly. I can't afford it alone. So for now, I am doing what I can. Helping my 12 year old navigate 7th grade. Trying to help my 18 year old, not sink further into himself, and trying really hard to not hate their father. He is still making everything about him, and how its my fault our children dont like him and my fault they turned out this way. It is always my fault.
My personal take away, for you is to try couple's therapy, it didn't work for us (yet), but see if he is willing to express why he feels the way he does. While also allowing you to discuss what you're feeling. In the end if he can't or won't make the effort, you will have to then make the decision of whats best for you and your daughter. Support means the world to us struggling mothers. Having a partner who is there and fully see's the struggles and wants to help would have helped astronomically. For us, I believe had he been supportive, his relationships wouldn't be what they are. He could have helped build him up, instead of making him feel more "less than" than the world already makes him feel.
I love my son, I will continue to try and help him find the path he needs to walk, to make it easier for him, because I know it is not, nor will it be to maintain. Yet, once he finds what helps i hope it makes everyday after that easier and it will then begin to build him up again. Giving him a sense of accomplishment that he needs.
I hope your husband gets in the boat with you, and you can both paddle together. Navigating the unrelenting waters that you're facing as one.
I apologize if this is jumbled my life is as you read, is quite complicated, yet, it is nice to read and know I wasn't alone in that aspect.
Wow, Jodylexx. Thank your for sharing all of this. I hope things do get better for you and your family. If nothing else, it seems you are doing everything you can for your son. I'm going to do the same for my daughter. Huge hugs!!!
I guess I would add.. Everyone processes the diagnosis of their child differently. He may take a while to accept and understand that his child has this diagnosis. It is not wrong it is just different.
I think you said it best he is "angrily " dealing with the fact that his daughter is not neurotypical.
It is important to allow him to grieve/accept things on a different timeline.
Best of luck to you and dealing with this process.
Like many of the other responders here, I can relate to what you are going through.
If your husband is still open to reason, there is a great website (my daughter's psychiatrist's) which has this questionnaire that he makes all parents take ( childpsi.com/vanderbilt.html )
The website explains some of how the diagnosis is made and scores the online questionnaire and shows how psychiatrists use this sort of information to verify the diagnosis of ADHD.
Hopefully your husband is receptive to reason (and data) and filling out this questionnaire and sharing the results might be one step you can take to help him understand what ADHD is and how it's not an arbitrary diagnosis given to kids.
Good luck with everything. I hope your husband comes around. ADHD can be so effectively treated, it would be a shame if his misapprehension of this disorder continued to cause stress in your marriage.
My husband works with data for his job, so maybe this will appeal more to him. I also appreciate the reminder that ADHD can be treated. I know that, but it's easy to forget in the thick of things.
Sorry I don't have any advice but just want to say that you are not alone. My case is a bit opposite in the sense that the father (me) is really concerned after multiple diagnosis of ADHD over last 4 years (he is 9 now) and the mom is refuses to accept he has any issues. Vanderbilt forms are not "real" medical tests. Fights with friends (hyper-activity related) are just issues with other kids. Doing bad in tests (missing out of questions he knows answers too) are "one-off" misses! He dropped out of most extra-curricular activities that we had signed him up for because he didn't "like" the teacher or the students but she says "not everyone likes everything". He is regressing a bit in school but she says I just have too high ambition for him and I need to tone it down. Her thoughts are reinforced by our extended family who all tell her that "young boys are always that way and they eventually grow out of it". She loves him so much, she pushes back really hard on meds because she sees the "experimenting" as treating him like a guinea pig. Now my kid shuns the meds and does not want to take it as well. That makes it even more uphill task especially because I am working on full time job and she is a home maker and spends more time with her! We did ADHD therapy together (she agreed to join) but in all the 3 sessions we debated between ourselves (and then after the sessions those debates turned into classic marriage arguments that are less relevant about out kid). This is causing our marriage to be stressed to limits. I sent her a bunch of video, articles to read to see how similar it is to our kids behavior but she either dismisses them as different or ignores it. My worry is that he is going to slipping into anxiety and becoming defiant. He now runs out of the house when she shouts at him to get him to do almost anything. His chores pile up for me to do after work! I am running out of ideas too.
I like the idea suggested by some of the awesome contributors in this thread to do what is needed for the kid regardless of spousal approval and I also like the idea of marriage counseling. I am going to try those things.
Hopefully your husband will see examples and join you in the mission to bring up your kid as a happy independent child. Good luck!
Thank you for sharing your story. I feel like an ADHD "newbie" who is struggling to do her best. I really loved what you said about being an example. It is a different lens for me to look through.
I’m so sorry you are going through this. When first diagnosed it is hard for the whole family. IMO your husband may be experiencing shame and hurt pride. Sometime we feel that our children are a reflection the quality of parent we are and if they aren’t as we envisioned we can feel like it is our fault or we can turn the blame on our partner. Also a lot of parents and friends can give us the “tough love” advice that our parents tried on us - it is hard to shake that idea.
My husband and I had a lot of moments of conflict on how to parent our daughter. In the end we went to a family therapist without our daughter - we still go every other week - we discuss incidents and how we felt about them and she gives us feedback so we can be on the same page. It turns out that I wasn’t being stern enough and my husband was being too stern - once we were able to find common ground and talked about how to handle situations before they happened - things turned around - both for our relationship to our daughter and to each other.
I am also a parenting coach and I help parents learn to trust themselves and to work with the tools they have. Coaching can help parents that are resistant to therapy bacause it does not analyze- it helps parents find their own way with what works for them and not what they are told. Just a thought.
My husband and I have gone into quiet mode for 48 hours now. We went to the school for a 504 plan and the school talked about the relationship of emotions and ADHD and my husband really hang onto it and when we went home and discussed it with our teen.. our teen didn't disagree and the conversation went apart into me shouting to my husband "you have to learn to listen and stop talking"... It is about what you all see here... I want him to be more understanding and he wants me to stop cuddling our kids... Sigh! I think it is time for me to bring up family therapy. I just need the courage or another burst of energy and patience to start another discussion. Anyhow, just want to say that it seems we are not alone and thanks all for sharing. Big hugs to all and stay steady... and give yourselves some fresh air or chocolates...
This is a really helpful thread, thanks for all the contributions so far. I am at a different stage because I strongly suspect my son has ADD but can’t get my partner’s support to go for a diagnosis. He either walks away, shouts at me or blames me for causing any symptoms (including my 8 year old asking me several times if I think he has autism because he’s struggling so much and trying to make sense of it). It’s exhausting- I have taken so much time to educate myself so that I’m not drawing unfounded conclusions and as others have said, he refuses to read anything or engage with the school expert. His reasoning is that if you go looking for problems you will find them and create a problem that wouldn’t otherwise manifest itself.
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