Unsung struggles of parenting an ADHD child

My son was only 9 months old when he started to walk. At birth, he had colic and wasn't satisfied just sitting; he had to be entertained, constantly. As first time parents my husband and I didn't think much of it, we just thought he was a needy baby. Now looking back, I realize that many of these traits are early indicators that your child may have ADHD. Please don't misunderstand, these things don't always indicate ADHD, but they can. It wasn't until a few months ago when we put our now four year old son in tee ball that we really realized the difference between him and other kids his age. While the other children were somewhat distracted (they are four year olds after all!) most of them at least grasped the concept of what was going on. They were distracted, but present. Our son, however, was just plain distracted. No matter how much coaching he received he never really seemed to grasp any of it. He just went through the motions as he was told to do. We saw a great difference between him and the kids around him. We saw him struggle with simple tasks and directions, though not for lack of trying or being obstinate. We quickly learned that his struggles, while they seemed so small, were monumental to him. We learned that life with him would be much different than we expected.

When I brought up this observation to his daycare provider she mentioned that she had wondered for a while if he might have ADHD. With his first year of school looming ahead my husband and I were faced with a decision: do we get him an official diagnosis before he starts school and give his teacher that information right away? Or do we give him a chance to figure it out and adjust to school on his own and see how he does? We ultimately decided to let him go into school as any other kid would, and see how he did. The first week or so went really well, but after that it was downhill. He was struggling with staying in his seat, finishing his school work, and communicating effectively with other kids, which resulted in him hitting out of frustration. At our first parent teacher conference the teacher let us know that he was "extra wiggly" and "had a very short attention span". She let us know that, while she wasn't a doctor, as his teacher she might recommend that we get him checked for ADHD. We trusted her opinion over that of many people around us. After all she works with children his age all day, year after year, and should have a good idea of what average is. After that, we had a consultation with a behavioral specialist who was able to officially diagnose him with ADHD, suggest some therapy for us, and give us a little more insight into our son's mind.

This is where life starts to get a lot more complicated. Now ADHD is more than just a wiggly kid, this is my child. My child, who is coming home from school crying because he's sad he got in trouble. My child, who wants so badly to be successful in school and please us, but sometimes he literally cannot help himself. His struggles in school were already so real. I recall one night he was particularly down, so I asked him what was wrong. After a little prodding he burst into tears and declared he didn't know how to be good while standing in line. Small things in school, like standing in line, that came as second nature to other kids were a very real struggle for him. We were faced with a new struggle of our own at this time: how do we punish him for things he fails to control due to his ADHD? His issue of standing in line often turn into him pushing the student in front of him, which would result in him getting sent home with a "red card". My husband and I were at a loss of how to handle this. We didn't want to punish him for something he couldn't help, but we also had to let him know that those actions weren't okay. So how do you punish a child for something they can't, or don't know how to, control? We have been walking this very thin, very complicated line. We have learned that it's important to let him know that his actions weren't okay, let him know that he handled his feelings poorly but don't always necessarily punish for his indiscretion.

After seeing his struggles in school we were faced with another hard decision; should we look in to medication or not? We had no idea where to even start with the option of medicating him or not. An internet search revealed there are a plethora of options on the matter. This created almost an over saturation of information, making a lot of good information hard to find. We initially were absolutely against medication. We would try any natural remedy in the book but we had all but closed the door on the option of medicating. But every natural remedy we tried fell flat. And once his struggles in school became more intense, we re-evaluated. Was it fair to him for us to deny him of something that might help him? Clearly he was struggling, and his struggles were very hard and very real to him, so why would we deny him the opportunity to clear some of that stress away? Before we had to parent a child with ADHD we thought that we would make a decision and that would be final, we never considered that something we were so sure of might not be the best decision. It was hard to come to terms with the fact that we didn't have a clear image of what was best for our child.

Upon our search for what was the best route for our son we discovered that many people don't take ADHD seriously. A staggering amount of people shame parents for having their kids diagnosed and/or medicated. They believe that the parent is just too lazy to deal with their children's behavior issues so they medicate them into submission. Some people take it as a joke, and think that ADHD is something to laugh about. Some people just plain don't believe ADHD is real. That is what cuts the deepest for me as a parent of an ADHD child. My child is struggling through real issues that are very hard for him, and my husband and I have struggled through decisions we have had to make regarding our sons care, and some people just write it off as fake or judge us as lazy parents. People are discrediting the hardships that our family has, and continue to, go through. They fail to see the very real struggles that are associated with ADHD. People need to understand that ADHD is indeed real, and is more than just a wiggly, spazzy child. It comes with real struggles, tears, and hurdles that other children and parents don't have to deal with. We could all benefit from being more understanding and compassionate to people who are going through a struggle that we might not understand.

For ADHD information, visit http://www.chadd.org/

I'm still here! Consolidated update

I'm alive! I know I haven't written in a month but I just plain didn't feel like it. My life has been kind of all over the place and I just haven't had the urge to write. I'm not even sure where to start with all of it.

Early in December Anthony had ear surgery. Two years prior to that (almost exactly two years to the day) he had ear surgery to put in tubes because he got frequent ear infections. The tube in his right ear never fell out,  and actually turned sideways blocking the drainage. We gave it a few months to try to allow it to fall out on its own but it didn't happen. So the dr went in and took it out. Easy peasy. He seems to be doing better and has a follow up appointment with his ENT specialist tomorrow.

Christmas was hectic and wonderful as usual. The kids were spoiled rotten, my husband spoiled me rotten and I got him a few small things then two worthless pieces of paper that I paid $200 for. I got him hockey tickets but thanks to the lockout, the game I got the tickets to got officially cancelled just a few days before Christmas. So basically I owe him a Christmas present still.

Our new years was pretty uneventful. My mom took my kids and we went to a friends house where I drank a little too much and had a headache the next day. Happy New Year!

The least fun thing I have to update on is my own surgery. The day before Halloween I went into my OB/GYN for my annual pap. I was shocked when two weeks later he called me to tell me it came back abnormal. They reassured me on the phone that it was "barely abnormal" and "just above average" and they were sure it was nothing, but they scheduled me to come in three weeks later for a biopsy anyway, "just to be safe." I was confused and scared because just one year prior was when I had Noah and had my post baby exam that showed nothing, so how could something happen so quickly? And honestly, that question still lingers, we still have no idea how it all moved so fast. I went in for my biopsy as scheduled and exactly one week later I got a call from my doctor saying that the biopsy "came back more abnormal than the pap did" and that I had high-grade moderate dysplasia. That means I had pre-cancerous cells growing on my cervix that needed to be surgically removed. If you have low grade, mild dysplasia normally the plan of action is to just watch and let the body correct the issue itself, but mine was high grade, moderate which meant that the cells needed to be removed before they turned into cancer. So we scheduled it then and I had my surgery on Jan 10th. During the surgery they took more cells from deeper inside the cervix to ensure that there weren't more cell and that they weren't further progressed than the biopsy showed. I go in to read the pathology report and get my post-op exam this Thursday.

So 2012 ended and 2013 began with a little bit of health issues but I have full confidence in both my doctor and in Anthony's doctor that everything was taken care of and settled in both our surgeries. I'm ready to put it all behind us and move forward.

Moving forward for me means more school, and working on my photography. God willing and hard work put in I should be done with school in about a year and a half at the most. I realize I'm behind about 90% of my high school graduating class in getting my degree, but I figure better late than never, right? Then I got a gracious offer from a talented friend to build a website for me and my photography and I may take her up on it. (IF the offer still stands, that is. ;) We'll swap, pictures for a website!) I've been taking some pictures for friends and family, trying to build up a portfolio basically. I really need to decide how serious about it I want to be basically. I would love to go full speed ahead and try to launch a whole business but I don't know how realistic that is. First of all, the market for photographers in San Diego is pretty saturated, and I feel like no matter how much effort I put out I'll still be just part of the crowd. Second of all its not like time is on my side, in a sense that.. I don't have any. I would only be able to shoot on weekends and even then I would be sacrificing time with my family (Which is something I don't get a ton of) to do these shoots. So I think the plan right now is just to get the website built, get my portfolio built by offering cheap shoots at work and photographing friends and family and just basically do it on the side. If I seem to catch attention and business comes in, then I'll think about getting more serious about it. If not, then I'll just keep taking pictures of my family and whoever happens to ask.

I may have lost it.

My life is pretty busy. I wake up at 5am, scramble to get myself and my boys dressed, ready and dropped off at daycare, commute 40 minutes to work where I proceed to spend 9 hours, then commute another 40 minutes back home. Once home I usually stand in the kitchen in my work clothes and toss together some sort of dinner, hoping we can sit down and eat before 7pm. After dinner is a whirlwind of baths, showers, and stories that usually results in me not getting into bed until about 9:30pm. I manage to get my schoolwork done during slow times at work, which is really the only reason I'm able to be in school at all. I seem to have a routine worked out so I can cram it all into one day. It's madness, but it works.

So what do all sane people do when they have a routine that works? Change it, of course. I decided that another two years of school was just a little too daunting for me. You see, I was late to start college. I thought after high school that I was just too cool for school, but it turns out that I'm really not. So basically I did a little research and found that my last two general education classes and my first few major specific classes are available online at a local community college. I can take them concurrently with my current classes and transfer the credits, speeding the process up a little bit. Then in light of some issues my school seems to be having, I think I've decided to transfer to National University, which is on a 4 week per class accelerated schedule. So basically I'm going to speed up the planned classes, then add two more classes per semester on top of them. Normal, right? Right. The end result though, is that I should be finished with school in just over a year, effectively cutting my time nearly in half. I'm hoping that seeing the growing light at the end of the tunnel will be the motivation I need to keep holding on to this crazy train. Sleep is overrated anyway, right?