Caitlin Kindred: 0:28

Yeah, sleepy, okay. Hi friends, we are super glad you're here. Hopefully you have more energy than we do. It's okay. If you don't, it's all right, but we're trying to bring it for you today. How about that? This is how to Be a Grown Up. This is the how-to show for women who've texted SOS to their group chat this week or ever, anytime, every day, every day, all the time. I'm Caitlin, and with me today is ariela monti. She's a novelist and a neuro spicy mom of a neuro spicy child, who also happens to be a michelin starred snack of wisdom and wit I love it.

Caitlin Kindred: 1:07

Michelin starred I read a thing about michelin why it's a Michelin starred restaurant, like why is a tire company involved? And it all has to do with promoting tires to travel, to go to restaurants. Oh is that why it's all about. It's all related to that, Isn't that weird?

Ariella Monti: 1:27

It's like when the highway and when the tires and everything.

Caitlin Kindred: 1:30

When it all first started, it was like this is worth driving your tires on. Use Michelin tires to go to this place. I'll find it was an Instagram post that told us all about it. It was a really cool one. I was like fascinated. I'll find it.

Ariella Monti: 1:45

I think I saved it. Yeah, it was really interesting.

Caitlin Kindred: 1:49

Anyway, we should have talked about that on the food episode fail all right that well today we're not talking about that today.

Caitlin Kindred: 2:00

We're talking about parenting the adhd child because, because the sos right, like just because, because it's hard, because you need to hear all these things and you're not alone, and all that stuff. But before we do that, are you subscribed to this show? Make sure you hit. You should be. Yeah, I know right by now. Come on, you need to hit that follow or subscribe or whatever word your favorite podcast app uses to make sure that you don't miss episodes. So take a minute, let's do that now. Great, thank you. Well done, very compliant, unlike the ADHD child. So let's get into it.

Caitlin Kindred: 2:42

I have a bunch of sources today, primarily from Attitude Mag, and a couple of Instagram creators that I really like. One of them is Dr Stephen Storage and another one is NurtureADHD, and these are all the posts that I used are linked in the blog post for the episode. I also would recommend the Explosive Child as a book by Dr Ross Green. He wrote one of the articles in ADHD mag that I used or, sorry, not ADHD mag, attitude mag that I used for this episode, and I was looking at just the summary of it. I haven't read the whole thing. I've read, you know, like a chapter one or something, and so far I'm interested and I would like to keep going, but could be worth looking at.

Caitlin Kindred: 3:26

So again, that's called the Explosive Child. And then we've been talking so much about ADHD that I decided to put together an ADHD playlist on Spotify. So that's also linked in the show notes for this episode and you can grab that and listen to all the ADHD things, pass it along to people who need it, etc. So if you know how to fold a fitted sheet, then this analogy does not apply to you. But parenting a child with ADHD can be like trying to fold a fitted sheet if you don't know what you're doing, while also somehow managing to do it on a roller coaster.

Ariella Monti: 4:01

So just, imagine the utter chaos, Right totally. There's probably a sock stuck somewhere Right.

Caitlin Kindred: 4:08

You're both screaming. You have no idea how other people can make it look so easy and handle it all. So today we're talking about real strategies for raising an ADHD kiddo without losing your own freaking mind in the process. A couple of notes here. These are specific to children with ADHD.

Caitlin Kindred: 4:28

I am very aware that neurodivergent children come in all different spice levels and varieties, but we're talking about ADHD spice in particular because that's where we have the experience and I don't want to make any assumptions about other spice children when I don't have experience with that. You might see some of these characteristics in children with autism or other neurodivergent you know children, I don't. I don't want to speak about that. So this is specific to ADHD and my experiences with my own child and again know that we are not therapists, we're not mental health professionals. We've done the research here because, again, it affects us personally and because we wanted to have something good for you, for the show. But that does not make us professionals. We are just two women trying to do the best we can with what we got.

Ariella Monti: 5:19

This is very much a like. Hey, I read an interesting article that you might find helpful.

Caitlin Kindred: 5:28

This is like the Michelin star Instagram post of ADHD children, right Like me, just like putting pulling out things that I found fascinating, interesting, helpful for me, sharing them with you, okay. So I want to start with this. You need to start by managing your parental expectations. Okay, I understand that many of us, as millennials, have boomer parents who had parents who were part of the greatest generation. There is a level of parenting, learning and unlearning that comes generationally, and so there was a time when immediate compliance was the expectation. But the things that ADHD people struggle with, like executive function challenges, sensory overload, emotional dysregulation, are all things that ADHD kids struggle with, and because they're children, it's worse. So that means that there are a few things that you just simply cannot expect an ADHD child to be good at right away. The first of these is compliance, in particular, immediate compliance. So if you have that expectation and your child has ADHD, get over it, because it ain't happening.

Caitlin Kindred: 6:45

It's so unreasonable. Why would you ever Perfect execution of any sort of task? Unreasonable to expect that Impulse control. Completely unreasonable Staying organized Some of us my particular flavor of ADHD has a compulsion to organize, but then I make folders for my folders for my folders and I overcomplicate. So staying organized is very difficult for me, as it is for many ADHD children. Being on time, why? Because time doesn't exist if you're not looking at it. So multitasking and or following multi-step directions kind of unreasonable to ask of your ADHD child and emotional regulation specifically pertaining to frustration, tolerance and or constructive quote unquote constructive criticism those are all things that it's pretty unreasonable for you to have an ADHD, for you to expect your ADHD child to be good at Right Automatically.

Ariella Monti: 7:49

Absolutely yeah.

Caitlin Kindred: 7:51

So, that said, there are a few behaviors that are especially challenging for me, and they are probably for you too, and so here's the list and how to a couple of. I'm going to say these as quick fixes. They're not quick fixes, I'm just offering them to you as a tip you might want to try. So the first of them is the I asked you 47 times problem.

Caitlin Kindred: 8:16

Parents get frustrated because asking over and over again feels like defiance. It's not defiance, it's neurology. The reason it happens, the reason you have to ask 47 times, is because ADHD kids struggle with working memory and task initiation. So you might try a couple of things that would help. One of them is being one request plus a visual cue. So you say shoes on and you point to shoes right, dishes away, and you point to shoes right, dishes away, and you're carrying your dishes to the sink Something that shows them what you're supposed to be doing. Also, using timers with physical reminders, like put a timer next to the backpack and a countdown timer that has some visual aspect to it, where they can actually see the time disappearing, could be very helpful for the asking 47 times. Mine is not just that I asked 47 times, it's that he also uses that time to think of all the things he has not yet done in the day and do those instead.

Caitlin Kindred: 9:24

So it's like go take a bath and it's like mom, do you want to go outside and play with gracie? No, I want you to go take a bath. Dad, let's go hit baseballs. No, it's time to take a bath. Did you know that you could? And I'm like, bro, this is not the time. So that's why we end up asking 47 to 10.

Caitlin Kindred: 9:42

Speaking of that transitioning from task to task another challenge for many ADHD children Once again, parents are frustrated because you're asking over and over and over again, and when you try to help with the transition, it often turns into an argument, at least at my house. I don't know, I'm asking for a friend, it turns out. Here's what I learned it turns out that transitioning from one test to another is way more complicated than we thought it was. Because of course it is. Why wouldn't it be? Because a neurotypical person can do it and it's so much more than that. So there are three types of transitions from task to task. One of them is physical, mental, the other is emotional. So those are three, and a single transition might have all three of these included. Yay, and there are three phases of a transition. So, making the initial move away from the activity, navigating the path between the last activity and the future one and then starting the new activity, right? So all three of those steps require say it with me executive function executive function.

Ariella Monti: 10:49

We don't have executive function, right so?

Caitlin Kindred: 10:53

yeah. So the the fixes here are. They sound easy and they're not, so just again, I'm not trying to oversimplify, I'm just trying to offer quick tips. Establish routines. Okay, always do this thing after that thing, and adhd brains hate routines, but they do best with them. So it's just what you're going to have to do. Every time we come home. We always wash our hands. After we wash our hands, we always have a snack. Just keep it consistent as much as you can.

Caitlin Kindred: 11:24

Be sure to give visual and audio cues before and during transitions. Okay, in five minutes we are done with screen time. Here's the timer. Here's the five minutes it's counting down. The timer makes a noise. Hey, that was your five minutes. Now we're done with screen time. Now we're going to, and then whatever the next activity is, I also like using timers that include songs.

Caitlin Kindred: 11:48

So what I did this with my students. A lot would be like okay, you have two minutes to clean up your space, get your notebook and be ready for our next activity. Our next activity is going to be XYZ, and then I would play a song that lasted the amount of time that they had, and then it would be like the same song you know every day, for a week, for a little while for each class, and then I would move to another song. But then by the time I had gotten to, like you know, a couple of weeks in, we could I could use three or four different songs and they would know how much time each one of them had, because they had heard it sometimes to know what each one was, so that might be a good way to do that too.

Ariella Monti: 12:27

I like timers that like the OK to Wake clocks, and timers the ones that have not only sound and light. Those are extremely helpful. We use ours during the school year and we haven't been because it's summer. But I'm realizing now that we are in camp and camp has a very similar like school schedule to it. But I haven't put on the the, the lamp Like I. Yeah, I have trouble transitioning because all of a sudden, where I used to have something that said, hey, you've got 10 minutes before you have to leave, like now, it's just like, oh crap, we're gonna be late, like Yep. Those visuals are so important.

Caitlin Kindred: 13:21

Yeah, there's also one that I used to have for myself when I was teaching. That was like, okay, if I wanted to have a lesson that was going to be no more than 20 minutes so that my kids could have XYZ amount of work time. It would like be green during the first 15 minutes and then turn yellow when I hit five minutes left, and then it would turn red in the last minute.

Caitlin Kindred: 13:44

So that was super good for me. And those exist, so that it might be really good to see the actual time change in that way too, not just something that ticks it down. So good one. The next one is the emotional tornado which we've discussed in the past.

Caitlin Kindred: 14:03

But these are things. Parents get frustrated because the meltdowns that are happening seem to happen over, quote unquote small things, right, like the wrong color cup. When they're two, the wrong color cup makes sense, right, those are like. Those are the why my kid is crying thing. Because I wouldn't let my kid eat the mail, you know, whatever it is, which you know, of course we've seen I wouldn't let my child, you know, eat the dirty sock, whatever it is. That makes sense when they're two, but when they're nine and they're upset about the wrong color cup, it's a little bit crazier, right. So it happens because of that emotional dysregulation that ADHDers have. But also there's sensory sensitivities that go into that and there could also be some RSD, that rejection, sensitive dysphoria coming in.

Caitlin Kindred: 14:54

So fixing this is not easy, right. But there are things you can do, like name it to tame it. You're not saying, you know, wow, you're mad about that. You can say, wow, your brain is really mad about that cup. Let's find a solution to that, right? Or we've talked about naming your guilt and naming the ADHD gremlin that you have, gladys, right? You can say, wow, you know, snoop is really upset about that, right, I don't know what you're going to name it, but let's find a solution. You can also offer some sort of sensory reset. Maybe that's a crunchy snack or a cold washcloth which you've brought up before. Maybe it's jumping jacks, maybe it's something to get the wiggles out. Whatever it is, but some sort of sensory vagus nerve stimulation, anything like that that might help calm that tornado, would be a good thing to apply here.

Ariella Monti: 15:57

It's the lizard brain, dysregulated, just they're, they're all fight or flight. The end, that logical side is just non-existent. I mean, I mean, kids already have a, an underdeveloped, you know full frontal cortex, yeah, that, yeah, thank you um and then you throw in, you know, emotional dysregulation, and they are just all lizard brain so you know, they're basically a little tyrannosaurus rex, and so to get them back from a tyrannosaurus rex into, I don't know, a cuddly chicken, then I don't know what was the first thing that came to mind.

Caitlin Kindred: 16:47

I mean chickens are descendants of dinosaurs, sure, why not?

Ariella Monti: 16:54

listen works for me there was a pheasant in my yard the other day and I don't know how you can look at some of these birds and not be like yes, that was a dinosaur at one time for real, but any case, yes. So anything that can kind of like shock your kid out of that lizard brain is going to help, you know, get to the get out of the emotional tornado and like into whatever they need to be.

Caitlin Kindred: 17:28

And it's so hard too, because our default is to like try to reason with it. But I keep coming back to like there have been some parents in my teaching career where they were legitimately borderline crazy, and I don't mean like needed mental health, like there was some sort of concern, I mean like this person is actually mad, like a hatter, like this person is gone, and I would just tell myself, okay, remember, you can't reason with crazy. You can't. Crazy doesn't respond to reason. So if you tell yourself my child is crazy in this moment, you can't reason with crazy, what do you have to do to calm them down? Like that that might be a good, I don't know, I'll do that with him. I'm like okay, remember, can't reason with crazy. Do you want a snack? Are you hungry? And then that usually will turn into an argument. So let's talk about the next challenge, which is the incessant arguing. It feels like defiance. Right, it does. And the times that I've told myself you are blatant. This is what's the line from the Lion King you deliberately disobeyed me. No, I didn't. You deliberately disobeyed me. Yes, you did right. So it happens because and this is according to the Instagram creator, dr Stephen Storch ADHD brains crave stimulation and, believe it or not, arguing boosts dopamine.

Caitlin Kindred: 19:02

This is why ADHDers love to have that shower argument that we always win right. It gives kids a sense of control. It gives you a mental challenge and a hit of excitement that their brain finds rewarding. So it's not necessarily defiance, it's dopamine-seeking behavior. So that means in order to fix it, you have to start by reframing your own mindset. Caitlin and other moms out there okay, arguing is often a stressed or under-stimulated brain. It's not a disrespectful child. So the fix here is give two choices that you can live with. It creates structure, boost dopamine without the conflict and helps build flexible thinking. What I mean is do you want to use the red toothbrush or the blue toothbrush? Not, you know. Do you want to brush your teeth? Because that's not negotiable.

Caitlin Kindred: 19:59

What's negotiable is how they brush their teeth. Okay, do you want to use your mouthwash first, which is what you're supposed to do, or brush your teeth first? Which one it's not. And whatever the lesser of two evils is, you can include it in there. It doesn't matter, you just have to give them something that they can choose from. And it sounds like it's not going to work on an older kid, because I think we hear this piece of advice for toddlers all the time. Right, it's like which cup are you going to use? The red one or the blue one? And they get to choose. But it does work for older children as well. So keep that in mind and you can let them help come up with the choices. Right, as they get older. They can do that Like well, I don't want to use my mouthwash first or brush my teeth first. I want to scrape my tongue off first. Okay, great, scrape your tongue off first and then brush your teeth and do it whatever order you want. I don't care, just do that. Offer them that.

Caitlin Kindred: 20:58

The next challenge as kids get older is homework. Hell, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, the reason parents get frustrated is because it feels like every other challenge combined into one right. There's arguing, there's transitioning, there's the emotion, there's the redirecting 47 times. It's really hard to get through homework, especially especially for ADHD kids, and ADHD brains crave novelty, which a worksheet or a workbook is not. It's torture for a kid, right? Yeah? So the way to fix this, homework doesn't go away. That's the problem with this is like they have to understand that while there are lots of teachers who don't believe in homework, there are just as many who still do. And it's not going to go anywhere. And you know, when you are an adult, homework just becomes work you have to do to try to get paid for. So, like you just need to understand it's not going anywhere. So you have to try to make it fun for yourself.

Caitlin Kindred: 21:59

Maybe you turn a boring task into a silly challenge. Can you do your multiplication table flashcards while also bouncing on one foot? Can you hop on? Can you do it five times and then hop on the other foot five times? And then we'll do three more flashcards. Whatever it is, try to turn it into something fun. Okay, you can break it up into manageable chunks. This is a good thing. Teachers understand this very well. You take 10 minutes of work. They get a five minute dance break. Or one of the things I like to do is I'll take a manila folder and I would cut it up into thirds so that the backside is still the same, like the backside is still one piece but the front side has like three different flaps on it and I would hover, so like I would just close the first two and then uncover that that top third of the page would be covered or uncovered and they could do that part.

Caitlin Kindred: 22:57

And then we take a break and then they uncover the next part, they see that they've already done half of the work, because the first you know third is done of those two thirds. Okay. And then when they open up the last third, wow, look, I've already done all of this. It's just this much more to go, I'll be fine, I can do it.

Ariella Monti: 23:15

So that's when I do it. That's good, I like that?

Caitlin Kindred: 23:18

Yeah, I would highly recommend that one. It helps a lot. My one caveat here about breaks especially for an ADHD parent sometimes the break is a little longer than you anticipated because of time blindness. So either have a timer set for the break or take their lead on the break or do something. That's a break in that it's not completing the homework, right then, but it's similar, right. So it's not like you go from doing math facts to a total dance party or a dip in the pool. They need to kind of stay close to each other in relation so that you can get them back. Otherwise you're faced with that transition challenge again. So, like you know, if a dance break works, great, but if it's too different for them to resettle, then maybe consider something a little closer to the assignment. Maybe they get to color on the folder for five minutes or something. I don't know, but just something to think about.

Caitlin Kindred: 24:19

This next challenge is being called the forgetful professor syndrome. So like, very smart child, more than likely a brilliant child, but who, like, drops everything and is kind of a hot mess because executive functioning skills aren't there. So this is lost. Permission slips, the occasional missing shoe, just the one shoe, not not both unfinished chores, stuff like that. So again, adhd brains struggle with executive function and these are all the things that require executive function to be done. So if we don't have dopamine, we can't hang on to permission slips. You can't remember to find the other shoe, whatever it is.

Caitlin Kindred: 25:00

The fix is externalizing memory. Do not rely on your brain or your child's brain to remember things. Now my son has just enough anxiety that if I say please remember to look in the lost and found for your sweatshirt, he probably will do it, but only because there's a piece of anxiety that's behind it. Otherwise he wouldn't. You know what I mean. He wouldn't remember. But do whatever you can to externalize that memory. So maybe you have a launch pad of all the things that need to be done before school in the morning backpack, keys, shoes, spot by the door, whatever. Like I have my keys by the door, I have my purse by the door. Why wouldn't he also have his stuff by the door?

Ariella Monti: 25:38

Right, yeah, we have a drop zone by the door right? Yeah, we have a drop zone. Yes, exactly yeah, that's where comes in shoes. Come off. Backpack, backpack goes in the kitchen. It's just the same routine every single time yep, because if not, like somebody's forgetting to pull the homework out, somebody's going to forget the food in the lunchbox until the next day. That's me, that's a big problem.

Caitlin Kindred: 26:08

Yeah, I do that too. But yeah, visual checklists are also helpful here. So, like, don't just say get your backpack ready. Take a picture of what a ready backpack looks like. Ready backpack has the lunchbox inside with the homework folder and the planner that the kids are filling out in school. Take a picture of that open and then another picture of it closed, with the two next to each other, and then say backpack ready. That's what that looks like, showing them what ready means in addition to having the instruction there, and they'll be able to start to put that together.

Caitlin Kindred: 26:46

Okay, the last main challenge I'm going to talk about. We have others, of course, but the last one is social speed bumps. This is frustrating for parents because kids interrupt. Adhd kids in particular are notorious for this. They miss social cues. Sometimes they do things that are like kind of cringy, they overshare stuff like that. It happens because navigating social interactions requires various mental processes, not the least of which are related to executive function skills. All of them come back to executive function skills and remember, adhd kids lack executive function skills. So there's a few ways to work on this. One share your internal dialogue to model POV thinking right. Wow, that was so nice of Ariella to let Brenna use her umbrella. I bet Joey really saw how nice that was and appreciated it too.

Caitlin Kindred: 27:49

Right, like something that shows what it's like to experience something you can role play scenarios. Right, like what, if your friend's face looks funny that day because there's a booger hanging out of it? What would you do, right? Would you point and laugh or would you say, hey, you have a bat in the cave, let's fix it. We talk about that with ours. It's like if it takes less than five minutes to fix, then you should tell the person that they can fix it. But, yeah, teach social scripts like can I play too? Instead of barging in right, or sorry to interrupt, what were you guys talking about? Something like that would be helpful.

Caitlin Kindred: 28:32

And I have to say this extracurriculars for ADHD kids, they're a must, like it doesn't matter what the extracurricular is. They need to be hearing instructions from someone other than their parent, other than their teacher, and they also need to be in these spaces with other children where adults are not always hovering, because the only way for them to get better at social skills is to practice social skills. Right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right, right. I would highly recommend, especially if your child is hyperactive, physically hyperactive, find a sport for them to play. Find some way for them to unleash creativity. I know Killian does pottery, sam likes to play basketball. These are all things that are really good for these kids.

Ariella Monti: 29:36

You have to let them practice these social skills away from their parents, away from their parents, especially when you consider COVID and the pandemic, and like kids lost. So especially kids our age, because it happened during preschool, where they learn a lot of those early socialization skills and everything went online skills and everything went online. It's it makes all of that practice, that socialization practice, I think, even more important, because we're almost like making up for what all of those kids missed and it's not like they're a lost cause, of course, no, of course. But I think that that's also something that we have to like keep in mind when we talk about modeling socialization and putting our kids in in. You know why it's so important to do. It's like that extra layer of why this is important.

Caitlin Kindred: 30:42

Agree. There are a few other frustrations I wanted to talk about. The primary one for me is punishments that don't work, are hard to punish because ADHD brains struggle to connect the behavior that's happening now with a consequence for the future. For example, your kid mouths off to you and you take away their screens for a week. Well, how does mouthing off to you in this moment result in no screens for an entire week? That doesn't seem fair to them, right? Kids in general have a very real sense of what's fair and what's not, and then when you add this time issue to kids, it becomes even harder.

Caitlin Kindred: 31:37

The other punishment that doesn't work, aside from taking away screens for days or weeks or whatever it is, is long lectures, and I always come back to the Bluey episode, and my son will come back to this episode too. But there's one where where they're trying to teach bingo, how to do show and tell and how to talk, and her mom starts talking and over time it starts to sound like the charlie brown. It's like it takes like three minutes, not even it's like 30 seconds and she's gone Right. She's not paying attention to it.

Ariella Monti: 32:07

Listen. And then the last line is always something ridiculous Yep Solitary confinement.

Caitlin Kindred: 32:13

And you're like what's Bingo?

Caitlin Kindred: 32:15

saying Sorry, it's so good, so it's the cutest stinking show. Okay, so long. Lectures don't work. They tune out after 15 seconds.

Caitlin Kindred: 32:28

What feels like a teachable moment for you is really just static Charlie Brown noise. So instead use a short, immediate consequence that's tied to the behavior. For example, they mouth off. You want to take the screen away. Do it. Take the screen away right then, and then they don't get it for the rest of the day. That day you could give it back the next day, right as they get older. Of course you can go longer or whatever, but do it right then in that moment. It has to be immediate. The other thing you should do oh, look, there's the thumbs up again. Sometimes my screen does thumbs up and I don't know why, but whatever, I can never re-trigger it, so that's fine. The other thing you can do is praise effort when you see it. Catch your ADHD kid being good.

Caitlin Kindred: 33:13

Adhd kids rarely hear their names in a positive tone. Say their name in a positive tone, and I don't just mean like sing-songy, like Sam, thank you so much for doing. No, I mean like hey, sam, I saw you do this, that was amazing, thank you so much for doing that. Or when you do that. It shows me that you can handle more independent tasks. Something like that that lets them know you see what they're doing. That is a good thing. It's good for all kids. It's especially good for ADHD kids. They respond really well to praise and they don't often hear their names said in a nice way. So another one to think about Some other tips that work generally that I've found One is create a yes space, create a place in your house that is a chaos-friendly zone.

Caitlin Kindred: 34:03

They have a trampoline, they have a fidget zone. They have a trampoline, they have a fidget bin, they have a climbing rope, they have a basketball hoop attached to the door, whatever it is where all the feelings and all the activities are a-okay with you. You have one of these in your house, don't you? You talked about this.

Ariella Monti: 34:17

Or when Killian was little, you had something like this, like a calm down corner or something like that yeah, he had a calm down corner that we worked on, but basically just like his room was the place that he would go. When you know, he was just like really emotionally dysregulated and as long as he didn't as he didn't like do any kind of like real damage to anything, like really everything was fine, like we.

Ariella Monti: 34:53

Yeah, he drew all over the walls in there and we're just like, okay, like I bet that felt great 40 yeah, yeah, like, I'm sure you know, like, do you feel better now that you were able to, you know, do some drawing, um, you know stuff, stuff like that. Like, as long as he's not, I don't know as long as glasses and breaking it's probably fine right like yeah, as long as he's not breaking a window to like launch himself out of it on the second floor. Like basically, basically okay.

Caitlin Kindred: 35:23

Yeah, something like that. Just call it, and call it the yes space. You know, name it. This is your space. Like do what you're going to. You know, do what you need to do here. Two, bribery is ethical in your own household. Your child's not a politician, so do what you need to do to get them to do what you want right. Reward effort over results. Hey, you focus for 10 minutes. Hey, you finished your homework without fighting with me more than two times? Sure, you can have an extra 10 minutes of screen time today. It's fine. The last tip I'm going to give you is just pick your battles. This is so hard for every parent. We've talked about this before. You don't have to attend every argument you're invited to, which is really hard for ADHDers because, again, argument is dopamine seeking. But is he going to wear pajamas to school? Fine, right, because he's going to school. Who cares? Save the argument for what shoes he's going to wear, because if it's raining, he cannot wear his like fuzzy slippers.

Caitlin Kindred: 36:26

Don't stress over the little thing. Find the thing that actually matters and focus on that. Put your energy there and there's a good chance they won't fight that one as much. And if they do decide, when it's raining, to wear their fuzzy slippers with their other shoes in the backpack and be like okay, fafofo, go for it, do your thing. I put other shoes in your backpack. Bye and don't, yeah, because you have to preserve your own sanity too.

Ariella Monti: 36:56

So this is we we do this with jackets during the school year because he hates wearing jackets and I like to get out the door and in the like two seconds it takes to get from the door to the car and then from the car to the door at school, like if he wants to be cold, fine, be cold, right, be cold, it's fine, and I put his jacket in his backpack so he's got it. But if he does not want to wear it on the way to school, like whatever, yeah, be cold, it's fine.

Caitlin Kindred: 37:36

Yeah, don't care. So I'm going to wrap this up before we take a break. But look, parenting is really hard. If you have an ADHD child, your kid is not a bad kid. You're not a bad parent. Chances are, if you're listening to this show, you're actually a good parent. You're probably a mom who loves your child with your entire heart and you're just doing your freaking best because it's really hard. You're not alone in this, Arielle, and I feel your pain, we feel your struggles. We feel your pain. We feel all the good things too, so we get it. We'd love to hear your stories so you can send us a DM. Follow us on Instagram that's the easiest place to get ahold of us is Instagram or threads at CK and GK podcast and at Ariel underscore Monty.

Caitlin Kindred: 38:24

Parenting an ADHD kid is not about fixing the kid. You can't do that. It's chemistry. You don't have that ability right. It's about giving them and you the right tools to function. So next week we're flipping the script a little bit. We're going to talk about what happens when you're the ADHD parent, and so make sure you're subscribed and tune in for that. We'll be right back. Hey y'all. Pov you find a diary exposing forbidden magic and the hot museum caretaker's life depends on you burning it Roots and Ink. The debut novel by Ariella Monti. Novel by Ariella Monti is the fantasy romance for rebels. Use promo code CK and GK to get 20% off your copy at AriellaMonticom. Again, that's all caps C-K-A-N-D-G-K for 20% off on AriellaMonticom. Get your copy for 20% off today. Get your copy for 20% off today. Okay, we're back and I don't know. We can talk about hyper fixations, we can talk about things we got done, or we don't have to. That's totally up to you.

Ariella Monti: 39:47

At this point I don't really have a hyper fixation. You know, no same same. Did you watch the new?

Caitlin Kindred: 39:52

did you watch the new happy gilmore? You mentioned that you were gonna watch that yesterday no, we're gonna watch it tonight though.

Ariella Monti: 39:59

Um, yeah, we're gonna watch it tonight, I think. I think that's the plan, but plan.

Caitlin Kindred: 40:03

But I'm looking forward to it, is it? Yeah, I think it's available on Netflix, I think so.

Caitlin Kindred: 40:09

Okay, yeah, I don't know either, but I think so you know what we just actually got back into as a family. We've talked about this show before on our show, but it's called Somebody Feed Phil. Have you heard of this show? Maybe on our show, but it's called somebody feed phil. Have you heard of this show? Maybe? If you need like wholesome, precious content but you but great british baking show is like too far, then this is the show. So like, think, like anthony bourdain, like parts, unknown meets great british Hearts, unknown meets Great British Baking Show, they smoosh them together. It's Phil something. I forget his last name, but he is the creator of Everybody Loves Raymond, okay, and he travels all over the place and there's like a little happy song that's very like 1970s sitcom reminiscent and it's just very sweet and he like learns all these new things and tells jokes and it's, it's precious and sam really likes it. So I guess that would be the closest thing. But it's so cute, it's a cute show that sounds really familiar.

Ariella Monti: 41:16

We've had on not my hyper fixation, but my child's hyper fixation has been nailed it the baking show on yes yes, um, yes, that has been.

Ariella Monti: 41:30

That has been playing on television all day, every day, and sometimes I will actually sit down and watch it, and what I appreciate about that show is everybody's just like there to have fun and nobody's taking anything seriously. Yeah, like you know, and yeah it's, it can just be really really funny to watch and delightful in in so many, so many ways. But I, I, I do need to stop hearing it in my house like from 8 am to 7 pm we had a.

Caitlin Kindred: 42:13

We had a. A run of um. Is it cake oh? Yes, and I don't mind that show, but I also like don't need to hear Mikey Day ask if it's cake anymore. I don't have to. Sorry, the name of Phil's name is Philip Rosenthal. Phil Rosenthal is the guy who does the show. Anyway, it's a cute one. If you haven't watched it before, you should. But that's really all I have. I don't have any. There's nothing new in my life. I didn't get anything done. Nothing new in my life. I didn't get anything done.

Ariella Monti: 42:47

I didn't barely got these notes done so like let's be clear, I I started reorganizing the craft room downstairs because it's also like our our all purpose room.

Ariella Monti: 42:58

It's where we were.

Ariella Monti: 43:01

I was trying to figure out a new system for where we keep the cat food because my darling dog I love her with all of my life and heart and soul, but she's a counter surfer and she will try to get the cat's food all the time and so we've always had to make sure it was high up and we.

Ariella Monti: 43:24

It was fine when we had a baby gate, but now we don't have a baby gate there and all these things. So I finally started moving stuff around so that I think we might have a system, because the other issue here is making sure my oldest cat can climb up, get up Right, because we're she's starting to have like arthritis in her legs, so we have to make sure that she's still able to like get up wherever anything is. So I think we I think I figured it out, but of course it's a matter of everything is messy before it's organized and and that's kind of where I'm at now it's just like piles of stuff that I need to like donate and everything. But we don't have a garage so I don't have any place to put this stuff, so it's just sitting in the room. But I started.

Caitlin Kindred: 44:23

I started, if you figure out a solution, let me know, because Gracie is also a surfer, like she will. She'll go for it if she can. So right now we have their food on the island. I hate having the cats on the kitchen island. It drives me insane Because I don't like stuff on the island, and not only is stuff on the kitchen island. It drives me insane because I don't like stuff on the island, and not only is stuff on the island, they are too, and I can't. I can't stand it. So if you figure out a solution, let me know. Anyway, I think I think that's all we have. Guys, aren't you glad you stuck around for this? All right, make good choices, as Jenny would say. You're not a bad parent, your kid's not a bad kid. They won't be a serial killer Like 99.7%. Sure, no promises, it's all good. Okay, love, you mean it, and bye.