Nervousness in Dad and mom of ADHD Children
Does the back-to-school season fill you with anxiety and dread? Do other parents of teens with ADHD dread the Fall like I do?
This late-summer stress is a somewhat new phenomenon for me. Elementary school was great — truly. Excellent teachers, good class sizes, even programs for gifted students. My daughter was about two grade levels ahead in her reading abilities. She received great remarks during parent-teacher meetings, though there was always a comment about her chattiness. (In retrospect, this was her verbal hyperactivity, which we didn’t know then was due to ADHD.)
But the bomb exploded in middle school — the fallout of the pandemic and puberty. Enter the days of virtual open houses, parent-teacher meetings held over Zoom, books replaced with dizzying learning hubs (what happened to the books?!), and assignments becoming “optional” — a problem when my daughter needed structure. We sat for hours at the dinner table working on homework together. I noticed then that my child had developed a paralyzing obsession with her homework being perfect and had constant writer’s block. How did my gifted student become so stuck?
[Read: 5 Back-to-School Tips to Ease Parental Anxiety]
We were already seeing a therapist for help with sleeping issues when my daughter introduced the idea that she might have ADHD. Sure enough, after a lengthy process, she was diagnosed with inattentive ADHD, which answered so many questions.
Getting her back on track academically should have been straightforward then, right? Nope. How naïve I was. The first 504 meeting didn’t happen until months after her diagnosis. While the school and I agreed on measures they’d take to support my daughter, consistency in applying those supports is an ongoing headache. Also, even with a 504 Plan, no two teachers are the same.
So here we are riding the struggle bus each and every semester. Paper assignments get lost in a black hole, check-in sheets fall through the cracks, due dates and deadlines are logged in a portal somewhere. Or maybe they’re in an e-mail. Or on a white board. Or on a desk calendar. Who knows? Every semester is the same circus of multiple emails and phone meetings with the school to address issues. And adding to the chaos of it all are elements outside of our control, like how much my child likes her teacher. Her success in class pivots on this critical factor.
It’s been a hard road, and I am dreading the start of the sh*tshow yet again. But there are a few glimmers here. We are fortunate enough to have connected with a neurodivergent counselor who sees my daughter weekly for help with executive functioning skills and organization. We spent the summer finding a medication routine that works, and we have psychiatry on board for monthly medication management. It is taking a task force.
[Read: Parents — This Is YOUR Back-to-School Survival Guide]
The thing that breaks my heart the most is that my daughter is so smart — wicked smart. She can out-debate me on any topic, any day, but her grades do not reflect her brilliance. They reflect whether she can turn in items on time and completed, so we are almost guaranteed failure. But as I have since Day One, I will show up for her so she can see that the important things in life are always worth fighting for.
Back-to-School Stress: Next Steps
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