When you have a child with ADHD, parenting and disciplining become a bit more complicated. Understanding your child with ADHD can improve your parenting strategies to give your child better tools to manage their behavior more effectively and preserve the delicate parent-child relationship.

Kids with ADHD may have trouble sitting still, completing tasks, managing impulses, and following directions. And none of these are things they purposely do to upset and irritate you. These are the results of the shortcoming of the ADHD brain. 

Adjusting your parenting expectation for your child with ADHD will help significantly help you develop your own discipline strategies for your own child. 

One of the most important things about parenting kids with ADHD is that you, the parent, need to believe that your child can achieve anything in life and have the same potential to succeed as much as any neurotypical child. 

ADHD is a disorder. It is not a disability. Even with a disability, anyone can become anything as long as they believe in themselves. 

If Helen Keller, who was blind, mute, and deaf, can become a writer, telling your child that he or she cannot become a great person because of his or her ADHD is criminal. 

A child learns to develop their self-image from how their parents see them.

I have a friend who, every time I see them at parties, both the wife and husband would non-stop talk about how useless their son is, good for nothing, poor grades, etc., etc., and that it would be a waste of money to send him to college, and that he should just join the Air Force or start his own business.

Their son is the same age as my daughter. You can see how embarrassed the boy felt from his shrinking body language. 

If you treat your child like they’re trouble-maker, they’re a failure, that’s the image of themself they develop. 

With kids with ADHD, parenting becomes more complicated because they cannot control many of their actions.  

Instead of focusing on your child’s ADHD, focus on your child as a unique individual and not compare him or her to other kids, and creating the right environment that your child can thrive in.

When you catch your child doing or being good, point it out. Praise motivates your ADHD child to behave and be good. Praise your child for following directions, playing quietly, and sitting still, and you’ll encourage them to keep it up. 

Be sure to make your praise specific. Instead of saying, “Nice job,” say, “Great job putting cleaning up your room when I asked you to.” 

Kids with ADHD often exhibit attention-seeking behaviors. Any attention, even when it’s negative, encourages those behaviors to continue. Therefore, frequent positive feedback toward positive behaviors is important.

Ignore mild misbehaviors, such as whining, complaining, loud noises, and attempts to interrupt you. Ignoring mild misbehaviors teaches them that obnoxious behavior won’t get them the desired attention. Eventually, your child will stop.

Pick your battles wisely for your peace of mind and preserving your relationship with your child. Not every battle is worth fighting. It was always a pain to get my daughter to brush her teeth and shower. But I only pick the more important battle, making her brush her teeth and let her go to school without a shower. 

The consequence of not showering is less than the consequences of not brushing teeth. 

Not brushing her teeth put her at risk for dental caries. Not showering won’t hurt. One of her friends may eventually say something that will make her shower on her own. 

Allowing some behaviors to slide can help both of you. You don’t want your child to feel as though they can’t do anything right or that they are constantly getting into trouble. 

Parenting a child with ADHD is like being a plant parent. Some plants like more water, some like less, some likes to have sun all the time, and others prefer to have no sun. 

Accept your child the way he or she is and work with what they have. Boost their strength while helping them to mitigate their weakness. Better yet, turn their weakness into strength. 

Ok, there you have it…

I hope you find this information helpful. Let me know what you think and comment below. 

Remember ADHD does not doom your child to a life of under-achievement. You know your child is bright, full of potential, and deserves the best. In fact, many of the world’s most significant discoveries and inventions were made by people with ADHD.

I helped my crazy wild child who couldn’t read or write when she was little, overcome her learning difficulties and become a merit scholarship student majoring in premed at Loyola Chicago University.

So don’t give up; everything is possible. 

If you’re just starting on this natural ADHD treatment journey and still in the research phase, check out my new book, Eat to Focus.

Inside this book, you’ll learn why your ADHD child is always hungry, why he or she seems addicted to milk and bread, the reason why most ADHD treatments do not work, and the exact four strategies I’ve used for my daughter to help her calm down to focus and finally learn normally.