ADHD diagnosis and difficulty managing anger?

[Coffee_lover91]

Hi,

After years of second guessing myself and wondering whether my son (8) is displaying choice behaviours or struggling with ADHD, he received a diagnosis of ADHD this week.

I’m in shock as I’d convinced myself I was just being overly critical. Part of that is because he’s started at a new school and is doing really well - he’s behaving at school and getting lots of praise, pretty much every day.

When he comes home he’s his normal very active, non-stop self, but he’s also started becoming very easily angered and really struggling to handle how he feels - lots of stomping of feet and shouting. I think maybe because he’s working so hard to mask in the day (because he wants to make a good impression and have a new start), he’s burned out when he comes home.

Does anyone have any experience of this and/or ideas to help?

TIA

[ADHDuderino]

Hi Coffee_lover91, I think you have nailed it! All children, in relaxed caring homes where they feel safe, let the "mask of conformity "slip and can be more challenging. I remember a friend saying of his 10 year old " I know he loves me and knows I love him, thats why he told me to F**k off!" And this is exactly what he meant. ADHD kids are trying so much harder to keep it together each day and mask their differences/struggles. A new school is new rules, different teachers with different rules, different peers with different rules, even the toilets are in a different place!! Its exhausting!! I certainly have experienced this with my boy (has ADHD). Every wednesday at home is like a Friday night level exhaustion and he struggles immensley through the next two days until he can rest a bit on the weekend. I am quite anti-TV when it comes to the kids and think they should be engaging their creative brains more, but I am coming around to the idea that they need a chunk of passive entertainment to reset and recharge, something that doesnt "require anything of them" (I would rather it was watching a river flow, the clouds pass etc. But hey, Im a hippy at heart🙄).As long as he gets time to rest it shouldnt become "fatigue rather than tiredness". And we get to look forward to being told to F**k off at some point in the future,because they trust us,love us and feel safe to challenge us😵‍💫🤣🤣

All the best to you and yours,

🐒🌈🦄

If you can do nothing else, be kind.

[Fish1fish]

Yep, I think you nailed it!

That is/was our situation. Our daughter is 11 and when things go south at school she takes it out on us. Its been a few years since we realized that, things are a bit better now with proper meds and we have the school on board with an IEP/504 plan. Def talk to the school!

[WYMom]

I've posted about this before but we teach and model emotional coping skills at home. They vary by age. Stomping circles were popular when they were little as were jumping jacks. Now they do deep breathing and run our path. I personally choose to demonstrate deep breaths and jumping jacks when I get mad. When the jumping jacks come out they know they've gone too far.

It helps but you'll have to remind and demonstrate a lot.

[WickNeo]

My eldest son used to be very well behaved at school. Then, he’d come home a throw long loud tantrums. His teachers never believed it until I dragged him into school after a doctor’s appointment. Yes, he’s adhd, plus bipolar and borderline personality disorder. A methodical schedule is important for his stability. It took a while for us to figure out his needs with the help of therapy, soccer, running and more food. All that energy required more protein than we normally had in the house. We reduced sugar, removed chocolate and added vegetable proteins.

My suggestion is to get to know each of your children as individuals. Siblings are similar but not the same. My boys are older now 26, 23 and 21. Their little sister is 9.

Parenting is like being a mad scientist who experiments on their own children.

[Knitting20projects]

Definitely. I think they use all their resources getting through school & are depleted upon return home. We truly thought our son was being difficult on purpose for years and are still trying to stop feeling bad about it 💕