My 9yr old son has the HARDEST time making a decision. This has gone on since he was very little. If we go to the store and I let him pick out a toy he will look at everything forever, narrow it down and then go back and forth between 2-3 toys. He will make the decision and then panic and bring it back to trade it in for something else before we get to checkout. His ears get red and you can feel his anxiety. Sometimes he even breaks down in tears. Shopping is quite literally traumatic sometimes! I try so hard to help him but it's like his head is literally spinning and I lose him.
Anyone else deal with that? I'm not sure if it's just an anxiety thing, and ADHD thing or something else??
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Willowbee37
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That sounds very stressful, I am sorry you and your son go through that. My guess is that it is a bit of both anxiety and ADHD. The anxiety is fueled by the ADHD in that he can imagine a lot of scenarios with the different toys/treats and then can't choose between the multitude of things in his mind. You see 2 or 3 toys and he sees many more combinations of how things can play out.
The anxiety is making the "wrong" choice. A couple of ideas I can think of are to ask if he would like a toy/treat and then say you will surprise him with it at check out - you have to gauge if you think that would go over well. Or start with just two choices that you have determined and remind him there is no wrong choice, both will be great (that may or may not help in the moment).
The other idea is to give him choices at home - red bowl or blue bowl type choices - and when he chooses tell him he did a good job making a decision. Allow him low-stakes choices, like bowl color, and have him acknowledge that he did a good job deciding. The more he practices the more he will start to realize that he can and does make decisions all the time.
You could even play out both scenarios. Using the bowl color as an example, give him some food in the one he chooses, say the red bowl, then give him some food in the blue bowl and ask him if there was a big difference between the two. Show him it is low stakes and ok to make either choice.
If he can, have him articulate what was going through his mind when he got so frazzled. He may say "I dunno" with a shrug but push him to see if he can come up with something that can give you some insight into what is spinning in his mind that is so stressful. Even if he can only come up with a color for the stress, you can ask him "Oh is this the blue ball of stress you described to me before? I'm sorry it is back and rolling around. How can I help?" That may help him know that you understand some of what he is going through which can help calm him down a bit.
You can also practice breathing exercises each day before bed. Something super simple and quick like 3 to 5 long breaths in through the nose and even slower out through the mouth. You can time it and see how long he can breath in and if he can breath out even longer. This is a sneaky way to introduce the idea of meditation to their young mind and to show them they can control their breathing, if nothing else, any time they want. Three long slow breaths changes the chemical balance in your body and it is hard to stay stressed out when breathing slowly.
New brain science shows that anxiety and curiosity cannot coexist. It's like a one lane bridge they each have to take turns and can't travel the bridge at the same time, together. If anxiety is getting to be too much see if he can get curious about something - pretty much anything - like how a toy actually works, or how many colors he can name. Or you get curious about something in the store "Oh my gosh, I wonder how this works? Hmmmmm" and he may be able to change gears with you and get curious about how the thing you pointed out works. It may be just enough to short circuit the anxiety and help him calm down. Then you can throw in a couple of long slow breaths to really get the calm to take over.
Lastly, you can let him choose for a certain amount of time and then it will be your turn. For some kids they don't want you to decide even the small things and that gives them enough motivation to make a decision. Other kids like the pressure being relieved when you make the choice for them but you gave them a chance to practice going through the motions of decision making. Explain that it is OK they didn't quite make it to a decision, it is a learned skill and they are getting good practice and getting better/closer each time.
Keep reminding them, with any choice, that there is no "perfect" answer or that they can't get it wrong. The more choices they make the more comfortable they will become with the process and hopefully will feel less stressed in the "high-stakes" decisions like which toy to take him
I hope some of that works for you or sparks some ideas of your own to try. Good luck!
BLC89
Full disclosure: I am an ADHD Adult and Parent coach and have been married to ADHD for nearly 30 years. I have raised two kids with ADHD (20 & 22) and am CCSP certified.
Such an amazing response, thank you!!! His doc has wanted us to try Zoloft for awhile now and i keep putting it off. It just scares me. Hes medicated for the ADHD but she says the anxiety is constantly fueling the adhd. Seeing how miserable he can get over really trivial things makes me see how he could benefit from it. He’s in therapy and very active with outside activities so I’m running out of help for it on my own. Poor kid, got the adhd from his dad and anxiety from his mom! Thank you again!!
Willowbee37,Think if the Zoloft as just for now, not forever. If you or he don't like how he is on it you can stop it. But, if it takes the edge off that would offer him some relief give it a go.
He is young and his little brain is growing and learning new things including how to manage his systems. When he is on medication - ADHD or otherwise - his brain has a chance to learn positive habits. Those will stick allowing for changes in medication in the future.
Think of medication as allowing him space to learn other tools to calm himself. Like an anti-nausea medication allowing you to eat foods to help heal you - I hope that makes sense.
Hang in there and stay curious, your son is lucky to have you on his team.
My 7yo son with ADHD has been like this, although I do think he's getting better. Honestly, sometimes I am this way, and I don't have ADHD. I just give him time to choose and insist that he walk away with one, not two, items. I think practice deciding has helped him. I do often help him by pre-narrowing the choices, just so it won't take him so long, but sometimes he'll ask to see the other options, just so he can be sure for himself that Mom really did pick the 3 best for him to choose from. It also often helps him for me to either offer an opinion (that doesn't mean he'll always take it but it helps him realize whether he feels relieved or anxious by my suggestion), or helping him list out the pros and cons and letting him weigh their importance.
It's so interesting to me to watch my 5yo (who does not have ADHD) take one look at the options, debate for about 5 seconds, select one, and never ever waver or change his mind.
I don't think it's an ADHD-only thing, because my 5yo's behavior is the one mind-boggling to me!
I don’t have another kid so I have nothing to compare it to regularly but I’ve taken my niece shopping and had to laugh at how simple it was. I’ve heard of adhd paralysis where they get overwhelmed and kinda just freeze. It’s sort of like that but anxiety is definitely at play with it. So strange.
my son is 16 now but we lived through this phase for years. It was frustrating because he’d delay us leaving the store when we were late for something. Sometimes we’d leave without anything and that’s fine too, a different learning moment. Finally I came up with a game we’d play. Pick your top three toys to battle it out. You choose one vs the other and decide why one wins over the other. Then go to the next toy and do the same. These kids struggle to problem solve using logic so it’s a good skill to build into a game.
My 15 yo daughter has an inability to choose between things and it stresses her out, sometimes to the point of tears when she was younger. She has gotten better as she’s gotten older. I am like this too, drives my husband nuts. Neither of us has ADHD, my son has it. I echo the other comments about helping with decision-making, such as okay if not perfect, battling one choice against another to find the top contender.
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