I frequently get asked by clients and friends whose kids are diagnosed with ADHD for clues to distinguish when the behavior is caused by ADHD and when it is caused by general naughtiness. Child hasn’t cleaned up his toys or her room even after you’ve asked umpteen times. ADHD or a kid who plain ole’ doesn’t feel like cleaning up? Child just whacked brother across head with a tonka truck because he was mad. ADHD or an angry kid who should’ve known better?
I think what the question is really asking is: Should I be forgiving of this behavior because it is outside my child’s control or am I allowed to get angry at him?
It is pretty hard not to get angry at behavior like that, no matter what the cause. And if we examine the anger for a minute, where does it come from? I think it comes from feeling disrespected. You asked a million times for something to get cleaned and it didn’t. You feel disrespected. You’ve said “no hitting your brother” another million times and he did anyway. You feel disrespected.
People get really angry when they feel disrespected. We recently visited my husband’s family and discovered a number of his siblings are squabbling over the family cabin. The squabbles center on beds not being made correctly, firewood not being left, advice not being taken on how best to reconfigure the outhouse (yes, there is an outhouse at the family cabin. Joy.) But the squabbles aren’t about any of those things. They are really about each person feeling disrespected by another.
Which leads me to intentionality. I wonder if the siblings understood that the beds got made wrong unintentionally, and the firewood was an oversight by someone who simply forgot, and the potty advice didn’t get taken because the group felt pressured into taking different advice, if they’d wind up being so mad. Because we all do stupid stuff unintentionally. We all forget. We all can make a bed wrong (especially if we let our 9-year-olds make the bed). We’ve all felt peer pressure. Probably none of those things were done while someone thought “I’m going to mess this up on purpose.” Does it still feel like disrespect then? In fact, the real disrespect comes via the accusation that the other did, in fact, do it wrong on purpose.
So back to your naughty kid. I’m going to say, Yes. She is probably not cleaning her room intentionally. But—her ADHD makes it extremely difficult to wrap her mind around organizing that room, so she’s probably too overwhelmed to figure out where to start. If you want the room clean, you are going to have to scaffold room cleaning (do it with her) for a long time. And, No. He probably didn’t whack his brother intentionally. How can you tell the difference? Timing. The whack was quick, likely impulsive.
But—neither are meant in disrespect. Both are cries for help in different ways. The ignoring what you asked a million times is your kid’s way of saying “I just don’t know how to do it.” And the whacking is your kid’s way of working out his own feelings of being disrespected by his brother. He needs a better coping skill. Maybe my husband’s family does too…
Merriam Saunders, LMFT 