Some days
are harder than others. Some days I am overwhelmed with trying to do the right
thing for my child with ADD. Now that my son is in middle school I have
multiple teachers to communicate with and one terrific special education
professional whom I’m trying (probably unsuccessfully) not to deluge. I also
have to keep in mind that I have a kid who is trying his best to master these
transitions, too. Just the “normal” days are usually difficult enough, but when
I let myself wallow, the guilt inevitably follows. After all, I’m a married stay-at-home
mother with no other children to worry about. I know single moms with children
on the autism spectrum and working parents with children who have Down’s
Syndrome. You don’t have to have a special needs child to be having a rough go
of it. Other people are going through hard stuff, too. Still, some days are
harder than others.
Like
yesterday. I know from past experience that my son needs to do his homework as
soon as he gets home from school. Otherwise, he gets tired, his medication
wears off, and he becomes completely unfocused. What normally takes fifteen
minutes will instead take two and a half hours. That’s not two and a half hours
of him just sitting staring at a homework assignment. That’s including the
fits, the tantrums, the screaming, the crying, and also many minutes of him
staring at a homework assignment.
I don’t
talk about my son’s diagnosis often except with the people it impacts (his
teachers) or the friends whose children unfortunately have that in common with
mine. It’s not that I have any shame associated with the label, it’s that I
don’t care for the generalizations or limitations that label might impose.
That’s what he has, it’s not who he is. I’ve heard “every kid has ADD now,” as
if it’s a trend rather than the unhappy diagnosis after many days worth of testing with
multiple specialists. I’ve seen people whose children are perfectly healthy
demonize the drug industry and those of us parents who choose (nay, need) to put our children on medication.
If my kid had asthma, you wouldn’t tell me I should learn to control it without
medication, so why would that be our only valid option for ADD? Perhaps people
think we give him his pill and it instantly makes him compliant
and docile like a trained circus animal. They scoff and say, “Wouldn’t we all
love a magic pill for our boisterous boys?” But my boy isn’t merely boisterous.
He can sit silently and read for hours but he can’t sit at a table without at
least one foot on his chair. He can be in a classroom but he hums or makes noises,
not to get attention, but as a subconscious way to soothe himself. He doesn’t
do it for laughs or attention. In fact, attention for his tics is the last
thing he wants. He has spent years learning strategies to calm himself when he
gets frustrated, but in the moment, the “energy,” as he calls it, builds and he
has to find a way to release it. He doesn’t get any reward out of jumping or
yelling except for the release of pressure. The medication lessens the feelings
that cause him to have to do what it takes to calm himself. It gives him that
extra moment of thought to control his impulses. It temporarily changes his
brain chemistry to be more like that of a typical child. Trust me, it’s no
magic pill. It helps, but some days are harder than others.
As I was
saying, yesterday was one of those days. He came home from school an hour later
than usual because he had an after school activity. I should’ve made him go
right to his homework. But he wanted to play outside and although he just went
hiking for an hour in his after school club, I didn’t want to deny him outdoor
time. It was a beautiful fall day. He’s a boy. He wanted to be outdoors.
Besides, he was in such a happy mood. Things would be fine. He’d do his
homework later.
But I know
better. Happy has nothing to do with it. He doesn’t resist and make noises and throw
himself around because he’s not happy. He does it because he doesn’t know how
else to say, “I feel out of control.”
By the time
he came in, it was dinner time. We ate together as a family. He got to his
homework right afterwards, as expected. It was a math paper. He stared at it.
He made noises. He started one problem, lost track of what he was doing, then
had to start again.
I read a
blog post once from an adult man with ADD who said to imagine that you have a
sticky note with something you need to do written on it. Now imagine it’s
floating in the air with 500 other sticky notes swirling around it, all
brightly colored, all with other things to read on them, “Look at me,” “No,
look at me”. And even though you’re trying to keep an eye on your one yellow
sticky note, you’ve got to dodge this constant barrage of others vying
for your attention. That’s what ADD is like.
I can
see it in my son’s eyes. It’s different than procrastination. Believe me, I’ve
seen that, too. So I try to help, to keep him on task, “Nine times two. What’s
nine times two?” It’s just a small part of the first equation. He’s no math
whiz but he certainly knows his two’s. “Nine plus nine,” I say it differently
hoping it will trigger a response. Nine
plus nine, he’s whispering over and over to himself. And so it goes until
his frustration begins to overtake him and before we can stop it, there’s the
full-on screaming tantrum. And I’m trying to hug him because I know the
pressure from my body makes him feel more in control of his own. But he’s
crying, “I can’t stop myself. I can’t stop myself.” That feeling of believing he
can’t is just as bad as the feeling itself. And there’s nothing I can do but
hold him until he calms down and finally remind him that he just did stop
himself. Indeed, he did. And we dry our tears and we hug and kiss and he says
he’s sorry and I say it doesn’t matter, let’s move on. We get back to it. It’s
still hard, but he finishes it. He asks if he can go read now and I say yes.
More hugs and kisses and I love you’s and he goes to his room.
I berate
myself for not making him do the homework right after school. It’s my fault.
This has happened dozens of times in the past, I should know better. But,
dammit, sometimes when my kid comes home from school and wants to play, I want
him to be just like any other kid. I want to be a mom who doesn’t have to worry
what time the medication will wear off. But I can’t be. I’m the mom who understands
that almost any toy he’s given will eventually be taken apart and examined piece
by piece. I’m the mom who cringes when he grows out of anything because his
clothes have to be just the right fabric and texture for him not to obsess on
their discomfort. I’m the mom who needs to have much more patience than I do.
Some days are harder than others.
Which
brings me to the title of this blog post: Why I talk about my kid on Facebook. I
don’t talk about the ADD. I talk about the good stuff, the fun stuff, and also
the stuff that drives me crazy (the firewalk of Legos, fellow moms?). I posted
a photo of some “contraband” I found under his bed covers yesterday morning: a
flashlight and a Calvin & Hobbes book. And this afternoon as I sat here feeling
helpless that I can’t make my son’s hardships go away, one of my friends, who
only knows him from my Facebook posts, wrote, “Love this kid.” And it immediately
made me stop feeling sorry for him and for myself, for that matter. I know how incredible he is, but sometimes I worry that that's just a mother’s blind love for her
child. My friend’s comment was a simple affirmation for me that he is perfectly
him. He has so many qualities that will carry him through. I wish I could take his struggles from him, but every parent wishes that.
And I know in the big picture, those struggles will contribute in making him
who he is meant to be. But some days are harder than others, and my friends who
might not even know about my bad days help me to keep it all in perspective. That’s
why I talk about my kid on Facebook.
