Helping Children and Teens with Attention Deficit Disorder. How to help your child with ADHDChildren with ADHD generally have deficits in executive function: the ability to think and plan ahead, organize, control impulses, and complete tasks. That means you need to take over as the executive, providing extra guidance while your child gradually acquires executive skills of his or her own. Although the symptoms of ADHD can be nothing short of exasperating, it’s important to remember that the child with ADHD who is ignoring, annoying, or embarrassing you is not acting willfully. Kids with ADHD want to sit quietly; they want to make their rooms tidy and organized; they want to do everything their parent says to do—but they don’t know how to make these things happen. If you keep in mind that having ADHD is just as frustrating for your child, it will be a lot easier to respond in positive, supportive ways. With patience, compassion, and plenty of support, you can manage childhood ADHD while enjoying a stable, happy home. ADHD and your family. Before you can successfully parent a child with ADHD, it’s essential to understand the impact of your child’s symptoms on the family as a whole. Children with ADHD exhibit a slew of behaviors that can disrupt family life: They often don’t “hear” parental instructions, so they don’t obey them. They’re disorganized and easily distracted, keeping other family members waiting. Or they start projects and forget to finish them—let alone clean up after them. Children with impulsivity issues often interrupt conversations, demand attention at inappropriate times, and speak before they think, saying tactless or embarrassing things. It’s often difficult to get them to bed and to sleep. Hyperactive children may tear around the house or even do things that put them in physical danger. The impact of ADHD on siblings. Because of these behaviors, siblings of children with ADHD face a number of challenges: Their needs often get less attention than those of the child with ADHD. They may be rebuked more sharply when they err, and their successes may be less celebrated or taken for granted. They may be enlisted as assistant parents—and blamed if the sibling with ADHD misbehaves under their supervision. As a result, siblings may find their love for a brother or sister with ADHD mixed with jealousy and resentment. The impact of ADHD on parents. The demands of monitoring a child with ADHD can be physically and mentally exhausting. Your child’s inability to “listen” can lead to frustration and that frustration to anger—followed by guilt about being angry at your child. Your child’s behavior can make you anxious and stressed and if there’s a basic difference between your personality and that of your child with ADHD, his or her behavior can be especially difficult to accept. In order to meet the challenges of raising a child with ADHD, you must to be able to master a combination of compassion and consistency. Living in a home that provides both love and structure is the best thing for a child or teenager who is learning to manage ADHD. ADHD parenting tip 1: Stay positive and healthy yourself. As a parent, you set the stage for your child’s emotional and physical health. When you are calm and focused, you are more likely to be able to connect with your child, helping him or her to be calm and focused as well. Keep things in perspective. Remember that your child’s behavior is related to a disorder. Most of the time it is not intentional. Hold on to your sense of humor. What’s embarrassing today may be a funny family story ten years from now. Don’t sweat the small stuff and be willing to make some compromises. One chore left undone isn’t a big deal when your child has completed two others plus the day’s homework. News evaluated 38 of the most popular diets and identified the best. Find which top-rated diet is best for your health and fitness goals. Vitamins & Natural Supplements for ADHD. Studies show that nutrition can improve symptoms of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) such as inattention. ADHD Parenting Tips Helping Your Child or Teen with Attention Deficit Disorder. Life with a child with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD or ADD) can be. Vegetarian Diets: Advantages for Children. Nutrition Panel: Patricia R. Bertron, R.D., Carol M. Coughlin, R.D., Suzanne Havala, M.S., R.D., L.D.N., F.A.D.A. SOURCES: WebMD ADHD Guide: "Topic Overview." WebMD ADHD Medications and Treatments Blog, Richard Sogn, MD: "ADHD Natural Supplements and Nutrition" and "Food Coloring. A great read, thanks Laura. The excellent thing is ADHD is now recognised and something can be done to help the children, whereas in the past it would have been a. ADHD in Children Recognizing the Signs and Symptoms and Getting Help. Español. It’s normal for children to occasionally forget their homework, daydream during. Life With ADHD. Get tips for living with ADHD, including how to navigate jobs and relationships and get more organized. What It's Like to Have ADHD Some people with. Introduction Oppositional defiant disorder(ODD) is a disruptive behavior disorder of children. The cardinal characteristics of ODD include obnoxious aggressive. Scientists have suggested, “children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) should be put on a restricted diet for several weeks to establish. If you are a perfectionist, you will not only be constantly dissatisfied but also create impossible expectations for your child with ADHD. Believe in your child. Think about or make a written list of everything that is positive, valuable, and unique about your child. Trust that your child can learn, change, mature, and succeed. Make thinking about this trust a daily task as you brush your teeth or make your coffee. Take care of yourself so you’re better able to care for your child. As your child’s role model and most important source of strength, it is vital that you live a healthy life. If you are overtired or have simply run out of patience, you risk losing sight of the structure and support you have so carefully set up for your child with ADHD. Take care of yourself. Eat right, exercise, and find ways to reduce stress, whether it means taking a nightly bath or practicing morning meditation. If you do get sick, acknowledge it and get help. Seek support. One of the most important things to remember in rearing a child with ADHD is that you don’t have to do it alone. Talk to your child’s doctors, therapists, and teachers. Join an organized support group for parents of children with ADHD. These groups offer a forum for giving and receiving advice, and provide a safe place to vent feelings and share experiences. Take breaks. Friends and family can be wonderful about offering to babysit, but you may feel guilty about leaving your child, or leaving the volunteer with a child with ADHD. Next time, accept their offer and discuss honestly how best to handle your child. Tip 2: Establish structure and stick to it. Children with ADHD are more likely to succeed in completing tasks when the tasks occur in predictable patterns and in predictable places. Your job is to create and sustain structure in your home, so that your child knows what to expect and what they are expected to do. Tips for helping your child with ADHD stay focused and organized: Follow a routine. It is important to set a time and a place for everything to help the child with ADHD understand and meet expectations. Establish simple and predictable rituals for meals, homework, play, and bed. Have your child lay out clothes for the next morning before going to bed, and make sure whatever he or she needs to take to school is in a special place, ready to grab. Use clocks and timers. Consider placing clocks throughout the house, with a big one in your child’s bedroom. Allow enough time for what your child needs to do, such as homework or getting ready in the morning. Use a timer for homework or transitional times, such between finishing up play and getting ready for bed. Simplify your child’s schedule. It is good to avoid idle time, but a child with ADHD may become more distracted and “wound up” if there are many after- school activities. You may need to make adjustments to the child’s after- school commitments based on the individual child’s abilities and the demands of particular activities. Create a quiet place. Make sure your child has a quiet, private space of his or her own. A porch or a bedroom work well too, as long as it’s. Do your best to be neat and organized. Set up your home in an organized way. Make sure your child knows that everything has its place. Lead by example with neatness and organization as much as possible. Avoid problems by keeping kids with ADHD busy! For kids with ADHD, idle time may exacerbate their symptoms and create chaos in your home. It is important to keep a child with ADHD busy without piling on so many things that the child becomes overwhelmed. Sign your child up for a sport, art class, or music. At home, organize simple activities that fill up your child’s time. These can be tasks like helping you cook, playing a board game with a sibling, or drawing a picture. Try not to over- rely on the television or computer/video games as time- fillers. Unfortunately, TV and video games are increasingly violent in nature and may only increase your child’s symptoms of ADHD. Tip 3: Set clear expectations and rules. Children with ADHD need consistent rules that they can understand and follow. Make the rules of behavior for the family simple and clear. Write down the rules and hang them up in a place where your child can easily read them. Children with ADHD respond particularly well to organized systems of rewards and consequences. It's important to explain what will happen when the rules are obeyed and when they are broken. Finally, stick to your system: follow through each and every time with a reward or a consequence. Don’t forget praise and positive reinforcement. As you establish these consistent structures, keep in mind that children with ADHD often receive criticism. Be on the lookout for good behavior—and praise it. Praise is especially important for children who have ADHD because they typically get so little of it. These children receive correction, remediation, and complaints about their behavior—but little positive reinforcement. A smile, positive comment, or other reward from you can improve the attention, concentration and impulse control of your child with ADHD. Do your best to focus on giving positive praise for appropriate behavior and task completion, while giving as few negative responses as possible to inappropriate behavior or poor task performance. Reward your child for small achievements that you might take for granted in another child. Kids with ADHD: Using Rewards and Consequences. Rewards. Reward your child with privileges, praise, or activities, rather than with food or toys. Change rewards frequently. Kids with ADHD get bored if the reward is always the same. Make a chart with points or stars awarded for good behavior, so your child has a visual reminder of his or her successes. Immediate rewards work better than the promise of a future reward, but small rewards leading to a big one can also work. Always follow through with a reward. Consequences. Consequences should be spelled out in advance and occur immediately after your child has misbehaved. Try time- outs and the removal of privileges as consequences for misbehavior. Remove your child from situations and environments that trigger inappropriate behavior. When your child misbehaves, ask what he or she could have done instead. Magnesium Deficiency Linked to ADD and ADHD in Children. News. Target) Our children are born into a world where conditions like Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) are diagnosed at an escalating rate. These conditions are often hastily medicated while parents are given a few vague lifestyle suggestions, with the main advice being to accept the condition and the bottles of pharmaceutical drugs it requires. Many parents and care givers are unsatisfied with this type of solution, and understandably seek out natural treatments for their children. One crucial step in naturally treating ADD and ADHD is to make sure your child is getting enough magnesium. Compared to past generations, we live in plentiful times where food and shelter are readily available. Yet today's children are more prone to magnesium deficiency than ever before. This happens for two primary reasons: Stress. The number of stressors in our children's lives is unprecedented and seems to increase with each generation. Think about it: soccer practice, body image, loud music, math exams, peer pressure, disturbing images and events that occur every day - our children are being hit with stress from every possible angle. And children who have been diagnosed with ADD or ADHD deal with a level of stressors even more difficult to face. This never ending stress, with its accompanying flood of adrenaline, drains the body of magnesium because this mineral is essential to the release of hormones like adrenaline. Since magnesium is used to calm the nervous system, the more stress children experience, the more magnesium their bodies use. Poor nutrition. Children's diets today are filled with processed foods, refined sugars and food additives. This type of diet depletes children of magnesium in two ways. First, this diet is extremely low in magnesium to begin with. Secondly, refined sugars and food additives can actually stress the nervous system, causing the body to use up magnesium supplies as it tries to counteract this effect. Junk sugars and food additives are known to contribute to ADD and hyperactivity because they stimulate the nervous system and cause blood sugar fluctuations. Improving the diet is one of the most effective ways of dealing with ADD and ADHD in children. By replacing junk foods with nutrient- dense alternatives, you can naturally increase your child's magnesium intake in addition to giving all of the important benefits of eating a balanced diet. How Magnesium Calms Hyperactivity Symptoms. Magnesium relaxes the mind. The body uses magnesium to facilitate sending messages throughout our nervous system. Magnesium is also used to calm the nervous system, which is doubly important in children with hyperactivity disorders. With the right amount of magnesium present in the body, children can think clearer and concentrate better. Magnesium is also a key factor in the production of serotonin, an important neurotransmitter that provides a feeling of calm and well- being. Low levels of serotonin are associated with irritability, moodiness and depression. Magnesium relaxes the body. Magnesium is essential for the relaxation of muscle fibers. Without this essential mineral, spasms and twitches are a common problem. Magnesium helps muscles in the body relax and function properly without disturbances. When the body feels calm, it is easier for hyperactive children to behave calmly. Of course, there are dozens of other health benefits that come with getting plenty of magnesium, and here are just a few examples: - Magnesium is essential in regulating blood sugar, which can prevent highs and lows.- It helps absorb and utilize other important minerals and nutrients.- It activates enzymes that manage energy production, nutrient absorption, hormone production, and much more.- It's a powerful antioxidant that protects the body from free radical damage. All of these factors can improve the overall health of our children and help manage conditions like ADD and hyperactivity. Find Foods Rich in Natural Magnesium. The best way to increase your child's magnesium intake is through food. Roughly fifty percent of the magnesium found in food is absorbed and utilized by the body, which is a much higher percentage than magnesium in supplement form. Choose organic foods whenever possible, as organic practices often increase magnesium content in foods. Here is a list of foods naturally rich in magnesium: - Kelp- Green vegetables (like broccoli)- Whole- grain wheat, rice, oats, and rye- Almonds- Cashews- Brazil nuts- Pumpkin seeds- Molasses- Brewer's yeast- Buckwheat- Peanuts- Pecans- Tofu. Magnesium Supplements for Children. Although a nutritious diet rich in magnesium is suggested in all cases, most parents of hyperactive children find it helpful to supplement with additional magnesium. The easiest way to give a child magnesium is to use magnesium citrate powder, which can mix easily in pure fruit juice without much influence on the taste. How much magnesium a child should take varies, but the recommended daily allowance (RDA) of magnesium for children is: Ages 1- 3: 8. Ages 4- 8: 1. 30 mg. Ages 9- 1. 3: 2. 40 mg. The common method is to give a child no more than their RDA in supplement form (magnesium from food does not have to be limited at all). But some experts like Dr. Leo Galland, author of Superimmunity for Kids, say hyperactive children may need as much as 6 mg per pound of body weight per day. In either case, start at a low dose and increase over a period of days to avoid digestive upsets. Dividing the full amount into 2- 4 doses per day is recommended for optimal absorption. Loose stools may be a sign that a child is taking too much magnesium overall, or simply that the amount needs to be divided into smaller doses. If the child is already taking divided doses and still experiences frequent loose stools, then the dosage level should be lowered. Another way to slightly boost children's magnesium intake is to add a cupful of Epsom salts to their evening bath. This has an incredibly calming, detoxifying effect that is especially beneficial for hyperactive children. Remember that eliminating magnesium deficiency in children is a multi- step process: work to remove stressors that cause magnesium deficiency, avoid processed junk foods and refined sugars, eat nutritious foods rich in natural minerals, and use supplemental magnesium as needed. Implementing all of these elements can dynamically change your child's physical and mental health, and can be a healing balm for the entire family. For More Information: Dean, Carolyn. Published by Ballantine Books. Elizabeth Walling is a freelance writer specializing in health and family nutrition. She is a strong believer in natural living as a way to improve health and prevent modern disease. She enjoys thinking outside of the box and challenging common myths about health and wellness. You can visit her blog to learn more: www.
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