What Your ADHD Child Wishes You Knew

July 16, 2018
Saline, a psychologist with more than 25 years’ experience working with school-age children and teens with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, offers parents concrete tools for creating a compassionate and supportive parent-child relationship so that kids with ADHD can learn to function in the world. On the premise that most parents don’t understand what having ADHD is like, Saline gives kids a voice in the book, sharing vignettes and interview excerpts to showcase experiences from various ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds. In part one, she lists the “Five C’s of ADHD Parenting”—self-control, compassion, collaboration, consistency, and celebration—and, in a particularly helpful chapter, shares facts about the ADHD brain and feedback from kids about medications and therapy. Parts two and three address challenges at school and home, with solutions and advice on using the five-C method. The book would have benefited from greater attention to what it means for a parent to have ADHD—particularly because some evidence now suggests a genetic component. However, its recommendations for an attentive and involved, but not overbearing, parenting style will be well-taken. Saline’s prescription is simple, easily adopted, and highly convincing.