"Mom, I Made a New Friend!"

"Mom, I Made a New Friend!" - THE #1 sentence any parent of an ADHD’er would love to hear.

The anxiety I feel over my child sitting alone at recess and having to resort to reading books in a quiet corner during lunch because he has no friends – indescribable and heartbreaking.

We’ve discussed about what makes a good friend, and which behaviors are, and are not, appropriate. He and I have had several conversations about ‘how’ to approach other kids who he’d potentially like to form a friendship with. I’ve encouraged him to make eye contact, not interrupt, to think before he speaks and to listen more than he speaks.

Because many ADHD kids lag behind their peers in social skills, they tend to be more immature than those without ADHD. The problem here is that despite immaturity, he is super intelligent and wants to discuss concepts and topics far beyond his years – the younger kids just don’t ‘get’ him.

His class teacher and I have discussed pairing him up with others in the class to complete tasks and projects but it all comes down to the same bottom line…

He doesn’t quite fit in anywhere.

The thing with children is that they generally have no buffer for comments that point such things out “James is weird” ; “James can’t focus and his fidgeting is annoying me” and “I don’t like James”

I could bang on about how our school’s motto is respect, responsibility and resilience – and while I go out of my way to instill these values (along with many, many more) within my own children, it seems many parents these days, don’t bother teach their children the fundamental basics of acceptance.

The bottom line is that children are children and they learn from the adults around them (as well as from other children). We as adults have the responsibility to teach our children to respect each other no matter our differences, to be responsible for our words and actions and understand that while we have the right to say what we want, we have the responsibility to accept the consequences and understand that consequences sometimes hurt other people – and that is our burden to carry.

So, the next time that your child mentions that James was reading by himself at recess or lunch time again or that he wasn’t picked for a team during sports and had to be the ‘assistant referee’ to his class teacher or that he had to walk up the front of the line with the teacher because nobody wanted to pair up with him for the walk back to school from the sports field, perhaps you can talk to your child about being a good friend.

Encourage them to talk to my son or offer to pair with him during a class project because your child will soon find out that he is highly intelligent and loves marine life, dinosaurs and science.  That he could talk the ear off an elephant if given a chance. Your child might realise that he is a fierce friend who is loyal to a fault and super protective over the people he cares about and that he has the softest heart and cries when you accidently squish a bug.

My child wishes it were easy for him to make friends but he has no confidence and no self-esteem and does not believe that he deserves for someone to give him the time of day. He is only 10 and has had a tough start. As a parent of a non-ADHD child (or any other autism spectrum disorder) wouldn’t you want other parents to encourage their children to give your child the chance to make friends?