Dr jenniferdilts

20,000 more negative comments by age 10 or 12, compared to their peers without ADHD?!? This isn’t okay, and I don’t share bad news just for the heck of it. I share this stat because I think we need to know our current state in order to make things better.

1️⃣ Recognize that many kids with ADHD hear a LOT of negative comments.

2️⃣ Praise the heck out of kids with ADHD. Catch them doing something good every chance that you get.

3️⃣ Help your child learn about his/her ADHD brain. Yeah, there are challenges of having ADHD in a world that’s not really geared towards that. But also? Kids with ADHD have some really wonderful strengths.

4️⃣ Having ADHD means that your brain works in a different way, has a different operating system. It is NOT- laziness, stupidity, not trying, etc. Two of my favorite books for this are the kids’ book “Different Thinkers” by Drs. Katia Fredrickson and Dr. Yael Rothman, and the “ADHD is Awesome” book by Penn and Kim Holderness. The Holderness book isn’t a kids book but there are lots of things in that book that you could discuss with your kids.

5️⃣ Make sure that you have a doctor who discusses your child’s strengths at every visit as well as the struggles and challenges, and reminds your child that we ALL have strengths and challenges.

6️⃣ Kids deserve the best possible treatment for their ADHD. This often means meds and non-med strategies. Meds are safe and effective. They’ve been around for a long time and have been studied extensively. When a child’s ADHD is managed effectively, he or she feels more confident and successful in school and at home and socially. 💕

Other great resources: Additide’s ADHD Experts podcast episode #505, #491, #420.

➡️ Episode 44 of ADHD Mom Docs ⬅️

⭐️ I get to talk about the intersection of two of my favorite topics: migraine and ADHD!

⭐️ A lot of people who have headaches don’t realize that their headaches are MIGRAINE attacks. This matters because there are lots of great treatments for migraine!

⭐️ We want to treat migraine early, because treatments work best when we start them before someone has had really frequent migraine attacks for a long time.

⭐️ Listen to the full episode wherever you get your podcasts! 😊