Sharon Collon [00:00:00]:
Welcome to another episode of the ADHD Families Podcast. I am so happy that you are here today we have a really special episode. This is an episode I want you to share with your child's grandparents or your parents. This is a request from one of my beautiful members inside the ADHD Families membership, basically giving our parents or our children's grandparents some tools and some information about adhd. Please share this episode and help our beautiful grandparents community understand ADHD and you know, equip them with some information about how to support their gorgeous grandchildren. Let's get to it. Welcome to the ADHD Families Podcast. I'm your host Sharon Collin, an award winning credentialed ADHD coach and consultant and mama and wife to a very ADHD family.
Sharon Collon [00:00:58]:
I am seriously obsessed with making life easier for people with ADHD and those that support them. My business, the Functional Family, provides life changing support and strategies for adhd. I particularly love anything that saves time, decreases conflict and creates space for fun. Do you want a life with your beautiful family that is more functional, fun and full of joy? Let's explore together the wonderful and sometimes wacky world of family life with ADHD in the mix. When I look back at my childhood, I think of my grandparents so fondly. We had such a beautiful close relationship, particularly with both my with all my grandmothers and I have actually have a photo next to my desk of me on my wedding day with my gorgeous grandma. And I loved hearing their stories and what's incredible stories, strong women they were, how they overcame adversity and what they chose to do with their lives and they always had such unique perspectives that made me think and even my own mum said that she enjoys being a grandparent more than she enjoyed being a mother. And I get that.
Sharon Collon [00:02:17]:
I get that because as a grandparent you are there to guide but without all the day to day drudgery. Unless you're raising your grandparents and I know your grandchildren and I know that there are some beautiful grandparents in our community that do do that and I just want to honor them and hold space for them because they are doing an incredible job. But when you have that grandparent role and you are the person that can come in and then go home and still have a full night's sleep and not have to do the worrying load like that, carrying that invisible worrying load, you have an opportunity to really have that connection relationship with your grandchildren and you can almost do nothing wrong. My grandparents in my eyes, when I think back of them were perfect and I'm sure they weren't right but it's that beautiful relationship that I had that I always think of them as being perfect because they had the time to listen to the story stories, they had the time to invest, whereas parents, you know, trying to do like we're trying to have jobs and, you know, packing lunches and doing all the admin stuff. Grandparents seem to have that time set aside to be able to really revel and delight in their grandchildren. And I think that's something that needs to be held in a special, special place. My grandparents lived in, in still in Queensland. And so we would go there for holidays, we would get sent, you know, maybe one on one to spend some time with our grandparents.
Sharon Collon [00:03:51]:
And it was always just such a special time. We were spoiled, completely spoiled. Nothing was off limits and we could really revel in what we wanted to do and spend time, quality time with them. But I think sometimes we forget to talk to our beautiful grandparents about ADHD and educate them about what's going on. And I know that information has changed a lot. You know, if they're looking at ADHD information from when they were perhaps researching it, it's probably not that correct anymore. Lots of things have changed, stigmas have changed. You know, how we treat ADHD in terms of, you know, strategies and things has changed.
Sharon Collon [00:04:38]:
And so this episode is number one to honor our beautiful grandparents that are in children's lives, but also to give them some strategies and skills on how to support our gorgeous kids with adhd, because we know how important that relationship is. And I want to be able to foster beautiful, supportive grandparent grandchildren relationship just like I had with my gorgeous grandparents. So I've got 10 steps today, 10 steps to help our gorgeous grandparents. And I really do hope, hope that you share this episode with, you know, on your socials and on your, you know, send it to your grandparents, your children's grandparents, because I really think that it will be able to help them, equip them with the right tools for supporting our gorgeous kids. So step one, step one for our gorgeous grandparents is to understand adhd. We definitely want to be doing some reading on adhd, what that looks like, and know that perhaps some of the ideas that they have about ADHD or the stigmas or things that they've heard might not be where it's at. There's a lot of things when people think of adhd, we typically think of the hyperactive boy presentation. Now that is, that can be right, that can be true, but it also isn't for a lot of people.
Sharon Collon [00:06:14]:
In a lot of people, the hyperactivity actually presents in a hyperactive brain and it looks a lot like anxiety. So the hyperactive presentation is one. But we also know that there is other presentations of adhd. In Australia, we recognise three different presentations. There's inattentive, hyperactive and combined. Combined, meaning inattentive and hyperactive. Hyperactive. Most people are combined, so they have a little bit of both.
Sharon Collon [00:06:45]:
ADHD in females in particular can look really different. Now, this is a. This is just a generalization. Of course we can see the hyperactive presentation in girls as well. But I just want to flag this because a lot of girls get misdiagnosed or they miss out getting a diagnosis because it looks like anxiety. Now, we know that ADHD is largely genetic, so I might be talking to some grandparents that also have adhd. Perhaps they have been misdiagnosed, perhaps they have been diagnosed with anxiety as well. And I just want to flag that because it is largely a genetic.
Sharon Collon [00:07:24]:
There's a genetic component to ADHD here and they think, and they're doing some research now about it being an evolutionary advantage with ADHD and that's how it has been passed along. So there's some things to think about. When we're thinking about understanding adhd, we definitely want to treat it with compassion. People with ADHD go through it like, I've got to say, they go through it, right? Particularly school years. They can be. I know from working with adults that they describe those school years as being the hardest years of their lives. So if you're supporting your gorgeous grandchildren that have adhd, know that they could be going through a really tough time. It is not easy for people with adhd and the more you know about it, the more you understand adhd, the more compassion you have for it.
Sharon Collon [00:08:25]:
It is impossible not to be on the person with ADHD's side. I am always secretly on the person with ADHD because know how hard they are having to work to be present in a world that is not built for them. So thinking about when we were in tribes, right, if we're looking at the. At the ADHD evolutionary theory, right, which is getting a lot of traction at the moment, and if we were in tribes and the people with ADHD would be the ones at the front taking the risks, having really good periphery vision and really good at perceiving threat, so they're on edge, looking for danger all the time. And then there's the follower people that are just happy to go along and just waiting for the other people at the front to let them know it's Safe. So if we take that and we look at those beautiful people with ADHD who are pushing the tribe forward and who are the risk takers and the people who are really good at perceiving threat, they have that heightened nervous system that can do that sort of thing. And now we put them in a classroom that they've got to sit still for all those hours a day, they've got to focus for all those hours on things that are really not very interesting to them. And they all of a sudden we're, you know, putting them in this modern universe, like modern world where there's lots and lots of sitting and boring, mundane tasks.
Sharon Collon [00:09:55]:
They're just not built for that. And sometimes that analogy really helps people understand what it's like to live in a world that perhaps you're just not built for. Now there's a whole lot of stigma that comes along with adhd. People say things like, it's bad parenting or, you know, that they're just lazy. All of that is gone. It is squashed. We know it is actually a neurological difference. There is executive function challenges now.
Sharon Collon [00:10:27]:
Executive functions are things like time awareness, task prioritisation, short term memory recall, emotional regulation. These are the things that are affected with adhd. We know that this is a scientific fact now. And so things like the bad parenting argument or that they're just lazy and they need a bit of discipline. All of that stuff can just get thrown out. We can leave that behind. We know now, now so much more about the brain makeup and the, the relationship between executive functions and the prefrontal cortex of the brain that helps control those executive functions. We know that they are impaired when it comes to adhd.
Sharon Collon [00:11:09]:
So we need to move away from that stigma and move to a more supportive model that helps support our beautiful kids where they are at and where the adults are at at that moment and focuses on giving them the skills rather than judgment. And also another thing that I wanted to point out is there is a bit of a theory about people going out of adhd. You do not grow out of adhd. If you are born with an ADHD brain, it is your brain for life, right? You might mask it really well. You might develop skills to cope with it and you might develop executive function skills and improve those which you absolutely can, but you do not grow out of adhd. It is a neurological difference. It is just like, like, we all have different toes and we all have different hair. Some of us have different brains.
Sharon Collon [00:12:05]:
We all have different brains. And when we think of it like that, it makes it so much easier to understand that we are all different in this world. We all have different ways of processing information and of course our experiences and our strategies have a part in that. But we are all different. And what an incredible world to live in. When you think about it, people with ADHD have done some. You only have to google famous people with adhd. They have done some truly spectacular things and we want to make sure that everyone is welcome here to participate in this incredible life with their different brains.
Sharon Collon [00:12:43]:
The next step that I want to talk to you about is using a strength based approach. It is so super crucial because people with ADHD get a lot of negative feedback and corrections all the time. So we get a lot of corrections from the world. A lot of put that down. You can't do that. You know, what are you doing that for? Like there's a lot. And they get a lot more than their neurotypical peers and they often have that, you know, drive to push and see their limits of things, right? And so they're getting feedback from the world that is negative all the time and it can really affect their self esteem. And we definitely want to focus on a strength based approach.
Sharon Collon [00:13:30]:
So if you've got the option between doing a correction and telling your child the things that they've done wrong or picking out what they did right in that instance, go with the right, go with the bit that pleased you. Go with the positive. Always lead with the positive. Because we know with ADHD becomes they have a negativity bias in their brain. Their brain goes. Or all brains have a negativity bias. But with, for people with ADHD they tend to hold on to that negative negativity a little bit more. So we want to talk about what they did, what was right about that? What did they do well, what did you like about that bit? What, what bit did they show strength in? What bit could you see from that incident that they handled really, really well? We definitely want to focus on their strengths.
Sharon Collon [00:14:20]:
An example of this is I know that my children are really good at motocross. They're really, really good. And so if there is an opportunity to praise them about that or incorporate a little bit of that thing that they're good at and pull that across into perhaps an example of something that they are struggling with. I will use that every day time. So I might say something like, you know, when you're in motocross and you don't want to put all the safety gear on, but you know how important that safety gear is to keep you safe that is the same as a seatbelt in a car. We know. So I'm using that example and something that they are interested in to, you know, engage them in the new thing that they might be struggling with. And I definitely want to highlight things that they are doing exceptionally well.
Sharon Collon [00:15:09]:
I see saw how hard that was for you to share your toy with your brother but you did it. And I just want to say how incredible that was that you were able to share in that instance. You know, definitely highlighting and flagging all those strengths and things that they are great at. We definitely want to balance out some of that negativity that they're getting from the world. The next one is, you know, and some of these are really quite hard to do. I want you to know that no one succeeds at all of these things all the time. But we do have a tendency in human nature to compare, compare our child's development with other children's development or how they are going. So you know, you might be at the shopping centre and bump into your friend Joan and she's talking about how great her grandchildren are doing at school or XYZ and we walk away thinking oh gosh, you know, we have that comparison going on in our brain and I want you to know that with ADHD comes a 30% maturity delay.
Sharon Collon [00:16:24]:
So they are 30% behind their peers. So if you've got a 10 year old grandchildren, they are really have the maturity of a seven year old. It's very, very hard for them to measure up with their peers. The worst bit is they know it, they know it, they know that they are outmatched in maturity and often it can lead to more trauma and more self esteem issues that come along with adhd. I just want to level it up. And in fact things like, you know, yelling at your, you know, yelling at a child with ADHD for their ADHD symptoms in my opinion is the equivalent of yelling at a child in a wheelchair for not being able to walk, which we need to be able to change this model to supporting them rather than constant corrections and being frustrated at where they're at because there is that delay and what my worst parenting moments and I want you to know that I have done so many, so many terrible parenting moments is because I'm comparing, it's that comparison. So I see other kids or other families being able to do things easily and it comes out of frustration that my kids can't do it or we can't do it, but we can't do it yet. It's not that we can't we won't ever get there.
Sharon Collon [00:17:55]:
We just can't do it yet. Right. So we're going to work on it, and we're going to support our kids to get there eventually, knowing that there's that 30% delay, knowing that they have additional challenges, knowing that they are trying so hard to show up every day and be able to participate in some of these things that are very, very hard for them. My tip number four is about supporting parents of kids with adhd. Because as beautiful grandparents in our community, and I know how many of you guys play such an integral role in your grandchildren's lives and how important that role is. And thinking back to, to how important my relationship was with my grandparents and how much I valued that, I was thinking about, you know, what we could do to lighten the load for the whole family. And really, one of the best gifts that you can give a family that has ADHD in the mix is, number one, is to look after yourself. Because I know that a lot of you are really helping and supporting your grandchildren and the whole family and doing a lot of the running around.
Sharon Collon [00:19:22]:
And, you know, I'm really, really invested in your grandchildren's lives as parents are working and taking to appointments, and you guys are really helping, and I want you to know how much that is valued and appreciated by this beautiful community. I'm not sure that we could do it without you guys. Like, this is, you know, it's. It's taking a village to raise a child with adhd. My friend Jane from the ADHD Mums podcast, she talks about how raising one child that is neurodiverse is the equivalent of raising three children with neurodiversity. So by that measure, I'm raising nine kids. I need help. I need help.
Sharon Collon [00:20:05]:
I can't do it alone, right? And I will only burn out if I try. So the first thing is to look after yourself. You are doing an important, crucial role, and you're giving your beautiful grandchildren a beautiful place to land. And it's a beautiful relationship that needs to be nurtured. But also if you are in a position to give the parents a little bit of time away, we know that that gives, Gives them, allows their brain to have a break from the pressures of raising kids with extra challenges. And we know that it helps them be the best parents that they can be. So we need to have, we all need to have time away, time alone. We are our own people with hopes, dreams, and things like that, living under incredible, often incredible challenges and pressure and a world that is quite Judgy.
Sharon Collon [00:21:04]:
And if you are in a position to give the parents a break so that they can go and reset and be able to have some time away from their kids. I am such a better mother when I have a little bit of time away, so it might be just a couple of hours on the weekends. I can just have some time to go shopping without taking three kids around or go and get a foot massage or something to have some time. But that also applies to you. You know, we really want for parent, grandparents that are super involved to be able to have breaks and time to reset. We all need that, that gift of having a little bit of time away from kids as well, so we can refill all of our cups. Number five is to stress how you are so important. We know that it takes a village and what grandparents are, and I see this in our community so many times, is that they are a safe harbour for our kids.
Sharon Collon [00:22:16]:
So for parents, when you're this close, you know, you're so close to all the problems all the time, all the challenges that come up when you're parenting, you're very close. You're getting all the negative feedback from the teachers, from the coaches, from the. From all of the stuff. You get the negative feedback from the world. It can feel so overwhelming. But when you're a grandparent, you have the opportunity to be a little bit further back from that and be that safe harbor of, you know, someone who. Who has a little bit of extra time, who perhaps has a little bit of extra time, who has that, you know, luxury of being able to hear the stories and delight with all your years of experience and being, you know, having gone through the parenting journey yourself, you know, having that wisdom, sharing your stories and being a safe harbor or even an anchor with beautiful traditions and things like that that you have established for your gorgeous family. And I can't tell you how valuable that is, knowing from coming from someone who had such a beautiful relationship with my grandparents, how precious those memories are.
Sharon Collon [00:23:29]:
And that's, you know, something that our beautiful community really values. Number six is connection over correction. Any day of the week. Any day of the week. We've talked a lot in this podcast episode about how people with ADHD get a lot of corrections. They get a lot of it. And if you've got the opportunity to choose connection, choose it every single time. It is less important to be right or teach our kids a lesson or, you know, be focused on that discipline model of, you know, like, they've got to learn, they've got to learn respect They've got to learn.
Sharon Collon [00:24:19]:
They will absolutely get there, but they won't absorb any of it if they don't feel like you're on their team. And your beautiful relationship is one that is all about connection. Now, our kids will always do more for people who they believe are on their team or have their back. That connection part is so, so important. And I love a collaborative approach. So I don't know you guys, but, you know, there was this, like, you do it because I told you to kind of model going on, right? I'm the authority, and you do that. You do what my request, because I told you to. That doesn't work with kids with oppositional behaviors.
Sharon Collon [00:25:03]:
What we see there is when you have a child with, you know, oppositional behavior who wants to fight against authority, all it does is create a divide between the person that is the authority and the person who is being told to do the thing. They just want to rebel against it and they don't even know why. Right. It's just part of the brain makeup. And for children that have that oppositional behavior, we really want to talk to them and collaborate with them about what's going on because we don't want our kids to do stuff just because we told them to. We want them to be problem solvers and think about what they can do because they're going to have challenges that come up their whole life. We know that these executive function challenges are going to follow them around. So we want to be able to equip them with problem solving skills so that they can solve their own problems and know that they can fail spectacularly.
Sharon Collon [00:26:01]:
And we are going to be there to support them and pick them back up because we are their safe harbor. We are their safe place to land. So how that looks like collaboratively working with your grandchildren is a problem comes up. You wait till they're regulated. Emotional regulation is a big issue for adhd. So we don't do things when things are escalated. We just manage when it's escalated. If your child, if the grandchild is in meltdown or you can see that they are emotionally dysregulated, you know, their body language is tense, they're not coping in the environment.
Sharon Collon [00:26:32]:
We just manage that and offer connection, you know, by just waiting for that moment to pass and saying, you know, I'm here if you need me. And then once they are regulated, I can't stress to you how great a, you know, a drink bottle with iced water is for regulation is to say, like, you know, I could see that you were really struggling there, you know, can we work together to see if we can find out a way that we can do that better next time or make that easier for you next time and say, what ideas can you tell me a little bit about what's going on for you? What things could we try to make that easier for you and listen to what they have to say and see if we can workshop it to come up with a bit of a plan for next time? And what we're doing there is we're teaching our kids how to be problem solvers. They're going to have struggles that come up in their life, and we want them to be thinking about, how can I make this easier for me next time? So it's not about coping in the moment. It is about teaching them the skills for planning for next time and helping them regulate, supporting them through that and then getting them to think about a plan for next time and knowing that they can fail and that we will be there supporting them the next one is going to be tricky. It's going to be tricky because, you know, our default is always to default to how we were parented, right? And this can be hard. This can be hard because, you know, you guys have got the experience. Perhaps you even raised children with ADHD yourself. But most people, especially people in the ADHD community, they don't love being told what to do, right? So being told what to do, you almost want to do the opposite, and you're not even sure why that is.
Sharon Collon [00:28:31]:
But a really great tip is to not jump to problem solving super quick. So if there's something going on and you can see someone struggling, saying something like, I can see this is really hard for you, I want you to know that I'm here. Listen. Okay? So this might work great with your own children and might work great with your grandchildren as well. Not jumping to advice or problem solving, because what happens when we jump? This is something that I had to learn so incredibly. This is an incredible tool for coaching. And what I do as an ADHD coach is when we go straight to advice or straight to problem solving, it makes the other person feel invalidated. It makes them feel like we haven't really listened to where they're coming from and how could we possibly understand what's happening for that person? So if what we.
Sharon Collon [00:29:27]:
What we want to do is actually just let them know that we are a support person and that we are here to listen to what they have to say and that we're hearing them, so, you know, perhaps your. Your own son or daughter might be talking about their problem, you know, some of the problems that they might be facing raising their kids with adhd. And we, our tendency, and mine as well, is to jump in with all this advice and strategies of what they should do. But it's jumping too quick to problem solving. That advice thing is really, really tricky and it makes them feel invalidated, like we're not listening. So you're better off when someone is talking to you, feeling honoured that they, that you are a safe person for them to express some of their frustration and concerns with and just saying, I am here, I am listening, you know, can you tell me about what's going on for you? And that make holds a space for the person that is expressing their concerns. And if, you know, once they have spoken about what's going on, you might say something like, what do you think is the best course of action for this? Rather than going in with the, well, when I was, blah, blah, blah, this is what we did. Or perhaps jumping in with, you should, you should do this, blah, blah, blah, blah, because it can really, you know, not encourage that problem solving part of the brain and can make the other person feel invalidated.
Sharon Collon [00:31:07]:
Most humans don't love being told, so we, we definitely want to support them to come up with their own solutions. Our kids and our grandkids are super clever, they have incredible problem solving brains and we need them to come up with their own solutions and be invested in trying those solutions. And it usually isn't. When we come up with it, we need them to come up with it themselves. We really want to recognize that the can't versus won't, okay, the won't versus can't rather. So it might look like your grandchild won't do something. So it may look like they're just, you know, they don't want to participate or they don't want to do your request. And this can be a really, really tricky thing to notice, but it actually is that they can't do it.
Sharon Collon [00:32:05]:
They haven't got the skills yet to be able to do that task and so they might just need that extra bit of support. We know with the executive function challenges that come along with adhd there can be a lot of can't, right? They can't do it and they just get stuck. Maybe you say something like, you know, you need to go in and clean the room, but to a person with ADHD and they have task prioritisation issues and they also have time awareness issues. So for them it's either now or not now and plus, that cleaning the room thing is so broad that they. That just feels so overwhelming that you're better off saying just giving that one step instruction at a time, like, hey, you know, we're going to work together to clean this up. Can you please pick up all the Lego off the floor? Like, just do one thing at a time or what? Even better yet, if you want to take it the next step above, what do you think we could do first? Or can we start this together, get them to problem solve what bits they can do first. There is a tool or an app called Goblin Tools that is really great for breaking tasks down if you wanted to put it in there and let it section it out. But I always love to involve the kids as well.
Sharon Collon [00:33:19]:
Or you might say something like, we're just going to give this a go for five minutes and see how that goes. Because. Because we're taking the time pressure off it and we're breaking it down a little bit. So it makes it much more achievable for people with adhd. So we know that there's some really common trigger words that we probably shouldn't say when we've got ADHD in the family. Potential is one of them. We've all got those report cards that say they have so much potential, if only they applied them themselves. Very damaging.
Sharon Collon [00:33:55]:
And for a lot of people, that can be quite a hefty trigger word. So potential is definitely one of them. Let's just scrap that. Everyone is doing the best they can with the skills that they have. If they are not, you know, succeeding, it's about supporting them and helping them develop the skills rather than potential. I'm always wary when someone says should. So in coaching, really, really wary if someone says I should be able to or they should be able to, usually if I catch myself doing shoulds or even phrases like why can't they? It's coming out of an old parenting model and it's not about giving the kids the skills anymore. It becomes about my own frustration of them not being able to.
Sharon Collon [00:34:41]:
So look out for the word should. If you catch yourself going, they should be able to like, or, you know, like, so and so can do this. It's. It's about comparison at that point. It is not about supporting that individual child and helping them keep the skills. So I always try and avoid the word should. And usually with an adult, if they say adult with adhd, if they say I should be, you know, I should be able to do that. I'm always very wary about it, about their internal motivation we know intrinsic or internal motivation is super important for adhd.
Sharon Collon [00:35:13]:
And so just be on the lookout for when you say that to yourselves or when you hear that as well. And the. Why can't they? And the other word that I find is a little bit of a trigger word is discipline. Discipline is, you know, that we've all heard it, you know, like ADHD kids, they just need to be disciplined. Oh, it's got so much nothing to do with discipline. Parents of kids with ADHD are working so much harder than parents of neurotypical kids. We know it is significantly harder. Burnout is high.
Sharon Collon [00:35:50]:
Divorce rates are high. It takes a whole lot more energy than raising a neurotypical kid. And so they are disciplining their child. They are supporting their child. It might look a little bit different to what the models are because traditionally that, that, you know, that role of, you know, the boss and the person who's doing, you know, the. That hierarchy role of, you know, I'm the parent, you should do what I say. That kind of discipline model just doesn't work with kids with adhd. All it does is tear apart relationships and cause trauma.
Sharon Collon [00:36:29]:
And I don't think there, there are some psychologists and psychiatrists who, who believe that kids with adhd, you know, that that whole discipline model doesn't exist, shouldn't exist at all. I don't necessarily agree with that. I think when it comes to safety, we really have to have those parameters around it. And we have. We focus on values rather than the discipline models. So for me and my kids, all I care about is that they are kind and respectful. They're our two family values. And as long as those things are being adhered to, I don't really mind too much else.
Sharon Collon [00:37:05]:
It's working out what bits are important for your family, what values you have, and then working out what. What are the serious things. So, you know, things like, you know, hurting each other or swearing, perhaps they are things that, you know, wouldn't align to those values. And so those things do have a consequence in our house. But we are prepared to work with them and give them the skills for supporting them in developing those skills around those things as well. The other thing that I wanted to talk about is rejection sensitivity dysphoria. So we know that this goes hand in hand with adhd. So people with ADHD often have this thing called rsd, rejection sensitivity dysphoria, where they perceive or are hypersensitive to rejection.
Sharon Collon [00:37:55]:
So as a beautiful grandparent of kids with adhd, they are, you know, sensitive to Rejection. They almost, you know, are hyper vigilant to perceived rejection. And so, you know, if you haven't heard about that yet, I would really encourage you to have a look at rsd, do some more research about that, because it definitely plays a role. The easiest way for me to explain RSD is we might send a text message that says something like, hey, I'm going to be late. Start without me. Right? And that's how we read it in our brain. A person with RSD might pick up that very same text message and read it like this. Hey, I'm going to be late.
Sharon Collon [00:38:41]:
Start without me. They read things, they read into things with tone, and they're hypersensitive to rejection. So it's important when you are thinking, thinking about, you know, that's why it's so important with the language and, you know, really letting your grandchild with ADHD know that they are welcome and safe in your presence because they are perceiving rejection, rightly or wrongly, because there is a lot of rejection when it comes to adhd, you know, socially and in the school environment and things. But knowing that they are safe with you and that you know that they are welcome in that environment that you have for them. And the final point is to be on their team. You know, you might have a bad day with your kids with adhd, and there might be a whole host of things that are. That's going on and it might be really stressful. And, you know, I want you to know that, that it is the same here, right? You can do.
Sharon Collon [00:39:44]:
You know, everyone has those days where you're like, I can't handle this. And, you know, I didn't handle it how I wanted to. But we can do resets, right? So we don't have to be perfect parents or perfect grandparents. We can do resets so we can say something like, you know, after a truly awful car trip with the boys, where they've been awful and I've lost my cool and everyone's dysregulated, you are able to turn around and go like, hey, I didn't handle that how I wanted to. I'm really sorry for that outburst. I'm gonna try this, this, this the next time. And what we're doing there is we're showing our beautiful grandkids with ADHD that you can make mistakes and you can come back from them. You can apologize and you can come back from them, and it's to make mistakes.
Sharon Collon [00:40:39]:
And that repair is important. And, you know, if there's been a challenging day, you can always say at the end, tomorrow is a new day and I want you to know that you are welcome here and that I love having you here. And we're gonna re, we're gonna hit the reset button. And next time you come to visit me, you know, I want you to know that I'm not gonna hold on to any of, we're not going to hold on to any of this that's happened today. We're going to hit reset because that unconditional regard component and knowing that you know that you're on their team and you've got their back and you love them no matter what, that your love is not based on behavior. You're not like Santa, you don't come if you don't, you don't show up. If the child is good, you are there to support them no matter what the behavior is. You're their grandparent, you love them no matter what.
Sharon Collon [00:41:36]:
So conditional love isn't love at all, right? So we're just, this is unconditional love. And we want to let our grandkids know that, that we are there for them no matter what. And kids perceive, particularly kids with rsd, right, they think that if they can't control their behavior or show up in a certain way, that you're not going to love them anymore. That's what they make it mean, right? So we want to make sure that we're highlighting that unconditional regard, that we love them, they can show up how they are, that you are the safe person that's going to have their back no matter what. And I really want to honor our beautiful grandparents in this community because I know from talking to so many of you how beautiful, like what wonderful jobs you are doing with your grandchildren. And it is not easy. It's absolutely not easy at all. And it can be really, really challenging and exhausting and frustrating.
Sharon Collon [00:42:41]:
And you're working with little people that have severe executive function impairments. And that's just what it is. And we all, our job is, is to help them develop skills and coping mechanisms around those impairments. And they will get there. They will get there. But we want to do it in the right way that isn't causing them self esteem issues and trauma and damaging their beautiful spirits that, you know, that they, that they, that they have. You can see how beautiful, what beautiful humans they are underneath all of this, underneath the challenges as well. And you know, I just wanted to honor how many gorgeous grandparents there are doing, you know, a lot of the heavy lifting for their gorgeous grandparents, grandchildren and Even I want to commend you for listening to this podcast to learn a little bit about it.
Sharon Collon [00:43:44]:
And you know, I know this has been a very brief 10 steps and I could probably make this episode episode like four hours. But reach out for support if you're feeling like you want a little bit more information about some of this. Perhaps it's about that collaborative model about how to collaborate with your gorgeous grandchildren when or how to help them regulate if they're not emotionally regulating well or what to do in certain instances. You know, this is what the functional family is actually, actually about. It's about creating not perfect families, not families that look good from the outside. It's about creating families that feel good to be in and ones that support our beautiful family members to problem solve themselves and develop the skills that they need to have a beautiful, functional, joyful life with adhd. So thank you so much for listening and I hope that you took away a few little nuggets of information about supporting gorgeous kids with adhd. So we've got number one was understanding adhd.
Sharon Collon [00:44:51]:
We want to upskill. Thank you know, listening to this podcast, absorbing some of the resources that we have on our website all about adhd. We want to treat ADHD with compassion. It is significant and it needs a lot of support. We want to do have a strength based approach. We want to focus on what they're good at and you know, definitely do lots and lots of praise rather than corrections. Number three is to avoid comparison. We do not want to compare with anyone else's children.
Sharon Collon [00:45:24]:
We know that there's that delay in maturity. All kids will catch up and get there, but we want to not compare. Number four, to honor yourself and give yourself time and the parents who raising the kids some time as well because we know that we are all better when we have a little bit of a break. Number five is to know that your relationship is a safe harbor for your gorgeous grandkids and that how truly special it actually is. It is one of the most beautiful gifts that you can give your grandchildren is to have that close relationship that is safe. Number six was connection over correction. Any day of the week choose connection over correction because that relationship piece is super important. Number seven is to avoid advice.
Sharon Collon [00:46:20]:
We want our kids to be and our and even our kids and our grandkids to be problem solvers. We want them to feel heard and validated. We don't need to solve it for them. We want to encourage them to solve their own problems. And number eight is to avoid those trigger words potential should discipline, lots of things like that. They're coming from an old model that can be quite triggering. Number nine is to read up and understand RSD and how it plays out with our gorgeous ADHD family members and know that they are sensitive, sensitive to perceived or real rejection and it can cause people a lot of grief. Number 10 is to be on their team, have unconditional regard, practice resets when things don't go well, and to let them know that you are there for them unconditionally, not based on behavior but there for them no matter what, through thick or thin.
Sharon Collon [00:47:18]:
Thank you for listening. I truly hope you enjoyed this episode and are taking away one or two things to try at home and support your beautiful families with adhd. Thank you for listening to this episode of the ADHD Families Podcast. If you loved it, please share it on your socials. I want this to start a conversation about adhd. If you want to make this mum do a little happy dance, please leave a review on itunes. If you would like to know more about what we do, check out the functionalfamily.com I truly hope that you enjoyed this podcast and you use it to create a wonderful, effective, joyful life with your beautiful children.
