Hi, I am taking part in a research project and for that I need to conduct a very small survey. It is about the daily challenges faced by parents raising children who struggle with ADHD and aggressive behavior. My goal is to better understand the specific difficulties families encounter, so we can identify and develop more effective resources and support.
We are currently in the very early phase where we conduct this survey and later, me and my team will be working towards creating a technical solution (most likely an app) for emotional fitness and mental health for this.
Thanks in advance for taking the time in filling out the survey.
Here are the questions:
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What are the most challenging moments or behaviors you encounter with your child on a typical day?
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How does your child’s ADHD and aggression impact their relationships with you, their siblings, friends, or classmates?
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What strategies or methods have you tried to manage your child’s aggressive behavior, and how effective have they been?
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How does your child’s condition affect your personal life, mental health, and/or relationships with others?
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What resources, support systems, or information do you feel would help you most in managing your child’s challenges?
Keep in mind that, it is obviously anonymous and you don’t have to answer all the questions, just as much as you can answer. So no pressure!
ADHD dad with 15 year old ADHD son here (also, I have a severely ADHD dad… undiagnosed / untreated, probably like most boomers with ADHD). Second what other’s said. My son is like the least aggressive person ever. Observations of his childhood vrs my childhood vrs stories of my dad’s childhood make me STRONGLY believe aggression in ADHD kids is environmental / cultural in nature… for whatever that’s worth.
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Homework and chores, hands down. My son says he’ll do it, and doesn’t want help / doesn’t want to be reminded. But GFL unless I sit down and do it with him.
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Son is an only child, but he gets along REALLY well with his 9 year old cousin (who also has ADHD) and his friends. My son runs LARPs for them. If my son gets angry / aggressive toward anyone in the family, it’s his mother, who sets the strongest boundaries with him. It’s been like that all his life. Mostly they have a good relationship, but whatever social strain he has going on, it’s there.
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N/A. My son is not aggressive (and never has been). When faced with aggressive behavior from other children, he tries to talk them down and withdraws / gets depressed if it doesn’t work. Again, I attribute this to his early childhood education and to the culture he grew up in. I would say changing the culture / teaching self management and communication tools EARLY is the best advice possible.
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Worst case, my son and I can enable each other with some of our dysfunctional ADHD behavior and tendencies and we need help from other family members to keep us all on track.
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See above about culture and education.
Thanks so much for writing this detailed response. I really appreciate it!
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My ADHD kids are not aggressive, on the contrary. And each one of them behaves and reacts differently, especially without/after medication.
I’ll try my best to give some answers.
- Lack of focus, getting lost in thoughts, or hyper focusing on the wrong thing at the wrong time - my kids get up at 6:15am to catch the 7:25am to go to school, and somehow that’s still not enough time… Also, taking 4h to do homework that otherwise would take 30m.
- Like I mentioned, my kids are not aggressive or hyperactive, they are on the other side of the scale - while my boy has a large group of friends, my middle daughter has none (she is also diagnosed with ASD), and it’s really difficult for her to fit in. My little daughter does have a bit of an extroverted personality, and she really tries to fit in and grab the attention of people, but most kids push back. She fits right in with the adults though, becoming fast friends with our (the adults) group of friends.
- Nothing in regards to aggression, but my son and middle daughter go to therapy, my middle daughter also goes to group therapy (for kids with ASD). Also, they all take Ritalin in the morning, and that helped quite a bit, especially at school, but it was not a “fix”, just a helper.
- It can be overwhelming at times - mood swings, overreacting to the smallest issue, crying for hours for not finishing the test in time, or forgetting the school account password… We have many talks, trying to reassure them as best as I can.
- We did a lot of reading, from online articles to books about ADHD, talking to a couple psychiatrists, but probably the best resource was my wife’s own ADHD diagnosis. She did a lot of research!
If you have any questions, please ask.
That’s not a 2-3 minutes survey 😅 Each of these questions would take significant time to answer.
PS: Don’t you have an survey-taking tool? Asking raw on lemmy like that seems…sub-optimal.