I have two ADHD girls and I love Facebook! A lot of what they do is entertaining, even if it’s exhausting. Both of my daughters can be very negative like your son and it’s a huge drag. But Facebook status updates don’t have to be about your kid, they can be about you. If my kids do something crazy or funny or mischevious, I’ll post about it and people love it. But a lot of times I’ll just post something like “Aaaaaackkkk!  Get me out of this house!” because I need a break or whatever. I’ve found that many people relate to the stress, guilt and not so perfect parts of parenting that I post about more often than they relate to just bragging. I always try to keep it light but people know my kids are hard. And yes, I am a saint!  LOL!  Hang in there, mama.  hugs.

Check out the FB page “Easy to Love but Hard to Raise”.  It is based on a book by the same name, which I highly recommend.  It is for parents of kids with “invisible” disabilities like ADHD.  It has become a tremendous source of support and encouragement to me.  Everyone there “gets” it - you are not alone!

I agree check out FB for some parents of ADHD kids support groups there are some excellent ones and Easy to Love Hard to Raise is an excellent book and FB community…you will feel a big sigh of relief if you read the book and the posts there and know you are not alone.  and guess what ?  I FB post all the time about my son’s accomplishments how minor they may be in comparison to neurotypical kids….I AM A PROUD MUMMA !! no matter how hard to raise he is.  Try to stop comparing your child to children who dont have the same difficulties as yours does, and you will feel better.  I dont let those other posts bother me….its like comparing apples to oranges !  Hang in there !!

Please remember that many people make their lives look so much better than they really are. They certainly are not going to let you know about the difficult times and things they are going through. EVERYONE has difficulties no matter how perfect they make their life seem! 

Oh, mama.  I have been exactly where you are so many times and the heartbreak is almost indescribable.  There have been many days of my heart breaking over my child being left out, singled out, and just plain dropped out.  I am here to tell you that today I am in a much better place!
We have done several things to help pull us past this.  One-we have a very strong faith that God does not make mistakes.  He chose my son for me and me for him.  There are many lessons I learn through him and I am a much stronger person because of it.  I know that I have the skills to be HIS mom. 
Two-we have gone to some great therapists who have helped him see the positive side of ADHD.  He can now celebrate his spunkiness and own his impulsiveness.  Therapy has helped me love the child I have, grieve the child I don’t, AND, most importantly stop comparing my child to other people’s kids.  I know my son will blossom where he is planted but it won’t look like my friends kids-and that’s OK.
Third-we have kept him in cub scouts and now boy scouts even when he wanted to quit-and he did want to quit many times.  He is now loving it (he’s 12 1/2).  He was even “suspended” for two months last year for punching a kid but we encouraged him to come back and he did.  I was allowed to educate the leadership on ADHD and that helped tremendously.
Hang in there.  I know there is disappointment and heartbreak but there are also celebrations and accomplishments of his own kind.  You just have to focus on the positive and pray about the negative.

I just want to say. I hear you. You are not alone. I also know what it feels like to have my friends tell me how great their kids and feel bad because I have nothing good to say about my kid. You wanna be happy for your friends, but inside you’re sad because you can’t relate.

I just celebrate every little victory. For now, that has to be enough.

Susan

I stopped facebook for a year and after I came back I visited it not as often, read updates on those I enjoy hearing about and hardly ever posted an update. Don’t worry about what to post just visit your close friends sites and don’t think of compairing your son to others. It’s ok to have differences, matter of fact your son might be the next Steve Jobs.  I think it’s not all about sports it’s about what they enjoy the most in life! Think about cutting back on visiting and also think about not worrying what you should post. Most recently I posted something and I hardly do and the topic was “how do I get gum out of my daughters hair”.... Use the site as a way to keep in touch with those you love and as a helpful device for you not a hinderance.

Don’t give up- your son is only 10, there are lots of things he can still get into and excel at.  Have you tried martial arts?  I know how you feel though.  Recently my husband was out with a friend, and he was talking about how hard it is to raise an ADHD teen boy and then his friend told him about how one of his sons is playing the clarinet and composing music 4 hours a day and the other, only 11 just finished the trigonometry module at the Kahn academy.  Yikes it’s so hard!  Hang in there, have faith he will find HIS way and it will be good. 

Sending out a compassionate hug to you and all who read this post.

Plaksin is right, everything looks pretty and shiny on FB! No one is posting their meltdown pictures!

But you have got to shift your perspective or your son will absorb your sadness about what he is not as disappointment from you, then he will learn to be disappointed in himself.

By the way, you should let your son try lots of things but not let them quit. What I mean is, teach him how to committ to something and see it through. My kids always wanted to quit things when they were little. So find term limited classes and activities. My son takes golf, when we sign him up he has to committ to all 8 weeks. When my daughter wanted to take dance at an open ended studio I told her she could quit at any time but she must finish out the month that was paid for. And if she committed to a performance she had to see it through. I’m proud of them of course, but it is not my life to judge. We are meant to celebrate who they really are not be disappointed in who they aren’t.

I totally feel the same way.  I have a 10 year old son with ADHD and it ha been very difficult to raise him, even from the start (he was colicky and cried non stop).  I, too, love to spend time on FB, keeping up with everyone’s lives and connecting with people I haven’t seen in years.  But, I also feel like you…when people are posting all the accomplishments of their kids, etc.  We have struggled for so many years with my son’s behavior, doctors, medications, false hopes, the impact of his behavior on our family, my marriage, etc.  He is super smart and has an awesome sense of humor, so I love to post funny things that he has said or done to make people laugh…humor always helps me get through the difficult days. With all the struggles we have, it is really hard for me to stay positive.  Trust me, I know how you are feeling you are not alone!!!

You are not alone I too feel like closing my account w/ FB because if you post something nobody comments and make me feel left out. But, I also realized that how can they comment if they’re not going through what we went through they cannot relate. Besides on FB people just write nonsense like look what I bought my new tech toy.
To me FB is like being in HS all over again. I don’t take it personal anymore. My advise to you is forget about it celebrate life to the max and every milestone your child overcomes. Never compare yourself or your child to anybody because then you will never be happy. Remember those are just pics that you see but, are they truly happy sometimes you see those pics and months later the very happy couple is posting their divorce. Always be proud of your child and yourself as a mom.

Hmmm.  One of the ways that I have utilized Facebook is to post articles from additudemag as well as other things to help folks think about, understand, and respect families who have kids with ADHD, learning disabilities, etc.  It is amazing to me how many people have made comments (some even good friends) regarding struggles they have in their own families. 

Most of what is posted on Facebook is what I call the “highlight” reels in our lives.  Rarely do people post the nitty gritty stuff that we all go through.  No matter how great you think others have it, they are facing their own demons or struggles as well. 

I think that having a kiddo with ADHD and another with dyslexia has given me wonderful opportunities to reach out to my friends and acquaintances to educate them, teach them empathy, and also help them feel more comfortable sharing their own struggles. 

I love this venue for feeling connected to other parents with the same struggles that I have.  It helps me immensely in knowing I am not alone.  But I also need to acknowledge that others face things too.  Let’s not be naive and think that we are the only one’s facing difficulties because Facebook posts are only highlight reels. 

We can all have compassion for each other no matter what the struggle.  I encourage you to step out and educate people in a nonconfrontive way about the things that make life tough for you as well as the things that you celebrate in having kids with struggles.  I think you might be surprised at how many people can relate.  Those that can’t relate to a struggle are surely hiding something.

I made a photo album on why I love my son. Once I started to focus on how much I love him it helped me a lot. Now, I post loads of information about ADHD. I think the world needs to know more about things like this, I also hope that what I post might help someone else. We seem to be a group of silent mothers, isolated by the difference ADHD makes to our lifes. If our children had cancer we would get help but as ADHD is mostly invisible we get scorn.
Use the FB to enlighten the world about the suffering and the joys of ADHD.

A lot of ADD people don’t do well in sports and activities with lots of rules, or where focus is needed even when you are not part of the immediate action. A kid who might be able to throw a 720 jump on a snowboard might miss easy catches in a ball game. As a kid, I could never work out why I was great at soccer when kicking a ball around with one or two friends, but felt totally useless playing in a team at school. Even things like competitive swimming and running (which we tend to think of as individual sports), are difficult because you have to participate using someone else’s rules.

I grew up thinking I wasn’t cut out for sports, even though I longed to do something exciting. Then in my twenties, I started to discover adventure sports. The only competition is with yourself. the only rules are those which nature imposes on you. I think excitement and risk are very important factors. Often though, the perceived risk is much higher than the actual risk. Sports like white water kayaking and climbing are particularly good because although they are not team sports, they involve working with others for mutual safety.

The boost to self esteem from finding activities which provide success and achievement can not be overstated. The focus and situational awareness this type of activity imparts, is the type of mindfulness that will carry over into all aspects of daily life. This is important because many ADD kids will become ADD adults.

Anyway, that’s my experience. Hope it might help.

I can understand what you are saying.  However, there must be ways in which your children are good in their own ways.  There has to be a positive way to channel their energy and they probably excel at something even if it isn’t sports.

I’m an AD/HD mom of AD/HD twins.  When they were 10 I worried about those same things—haven’t found their niches, don’t enjoy “sports” so of course they don’t excell in them either, extremely bright but interested in lots of things rather than getting “really good at something,” etc.  I felt like a bit of a failure as a mom, too, for not being able to channel their gifts into some sort of typical suburban ideal image—the kind you “typically” find on FB.

Of course, I didn’t realize they both had ADHD either; I didn’t realize I had it, too.

Regardless, when I look back (they are 13 now) there weren’t nearly as many opportunities for 10 year olds that would have interested them even if I had searched like crazy (and pushed them and over scheduled them).  Once I realized the ADHD factor I narrowed my focus to the lists of only ADHD friendly activities then looked at their interests and strengths.  Voila—two boys in martial arts (honing their skills at focusing & having self-control) who ended up in the Elite Leadership program.  Middle school offers band, and although I could never interest them in playing the piano (I play & we’ve always had one) they took to playing trumpet & French horn immediately (and I didn’t even push them or encourage them to do it they both signed up for it without my knowledge). 

Patience Grasshopper, finding “your niche” is often something we ADHDers just have to stumble upon and then we look a little closer at the thing we tripped over to find it’s this bright & shiny object that keeps drawing our attention.  Just keep your eyes and mind open, try new things, don’t be afraid to fail, etc.

And do NOT compare yourself to the glossy picture perfect FB moments that were so often staged just to make things look so much better than they are.

I agree with soooo many of these posts.  People who are always posting all these achievements a lot of times it is to try to make them look better and they aren’t posting the 10 other things in there day that went wrong.  I know a lot of my friends who do that and I also know their struggles so it isn’t always what it seems.  I also know how you feel having an ADHD child without a lot of social skills and interests.  He doesn’t like to play sports or join clubs but there are still lots of good things our children do too!!!!!  They can be the simple things we see that make us proud.  My son has very few friends but like yesterday he called one of them out of the blew and carried on a conversation.  That was huge for my son but I was proud of him.  I worry because he is 14 and starting HS this year.  I am hoping HS will bring him out of his shell since there is more interacting. 
Our children can be just as successful as your friends children are.  Comparing any children ADHD or not is impossible because they are all different.  I have 2 sons 12 and 14 one with ADHD and one is not.  They are two totally different kids.  My child with ADHD is not socially active or out going and is a home body.  He doesn’t like to participate in sports or school dances, etc.  My other son is my social butterfly, participates in everything and is always having friends over or going with friends.
But on the other hand my ADHD son is organized, does well academically, he is a funny kid and can carry on a great conversation.  My other son is messy, lazy and hates school very smart but doesn’t like home work, etc.
So every kid has good and poor qualities but they are all individuals and are great in their own way.
So look at your child and celebrate the great things your child has to offer and don’t worry about the others.  Actually I celebrate what my friends post about their children accomplishments because my children will have their own accomplishments too!!!!!
And I want to add yes there were a lot of sad times where I cried for my child and their still are but don’t think those other parents don’t have times they cry for their children too, just different reasons!!!!!
From a movie I love this quote…..We only see the good times in pictures, but it’s the bad times that get us from one photograph to the next.  or in this case FB!

Hang in there!!!!!!

Wanted to say a quick thank you to Kellie especially.  My son was just diagnosed and I hang on to the same beliefs that you espouse in your post—- God doesn’t mess up.  He gave me a wonderful beautiful unique and funny miracle and it is my job to help him figure out how to share that with the world.  It is a daunting task, and I am petrified, but it is the most important thing I’ll ever do so I will keep going until he finds his niche and is appreciated for who he is.

Beth, thanks for the kind words.  My kids are awesome; they were chosen especially for me and I know God will equip me each and every day to be their Mom if I trust in Him and ask for His help.  I get tired but not discouraged.  I get down but never beaten.  My kids have taught me so much about myself.  I always say that God’s timing is perfect.  He is never early and never late.  It has been quite a journey, learning about parenting my two boys.  I’m learning more and more how to appreciate the journey.  I pray yours teaches you remarkable lessons too!