Hard to believe that in some places (like Arizona), summer vacation is coming to an end! Whether that brings up excitement, relief, and/or a little sadness, we always say that all feelings are allowed :) 

If your family is anything like ours, the summer has much less structure than the school year. That is totally ok! But it means that the first few weeks of school can be a tough transition. Waking up earlier, packing lunches, getting everyone dressed and out the door... it's a lot to keep track of! Today, we are sharing three tips to help you with this transition. 

1) Start working toward a functional sleep schedule.

Summers are all about late nights! Again, no judgement over here. If your child has been going to bed later than their "school bedtime," you will want to start slowly working their sleep time up. 

There are different ways to do this, depending on how much time you have. If you have a few weeks, you can slowly move their sleep time by small increments, like 10-15 minut...

Have you ever experienced anxiety so terrible that you felt like you spent every moment of every day worrying? That the daily feelings of panic you experienced would never go away? That basic activities that you used to do with no problem seemed entirely insurmountable?

Well I have, and it started the day we launched The Childhood Collective. Well, to be honest, my anxiety has been around for most of my life, but the launch of our business brought it all painfully to the surface.

I know with this past year, many of you might be experiencing an increase in your own anxiety and depression. When you have a child with ADHD or anxiety, parenting is A LOT. Most of the time, your own mental health gets put on the backburner so you can attend to your kids. But I can tell you from experience, when you do take the time for yourself, you can free up a lot of bandwidth to focus on so many other things in your life—including your children.

How My Anxiety Started

My whole life I would have be...

Children with ADHD are amazing at living in the moment, which makes them a lot of fun! It also means that they can struggle to plan for the future, even if the future is a few minutes away. The result? Forgotten lunchboxes, messy bedrooms, last-minute panic over a late assignment, and chaotic mornings!

Children with ADHD can struggle with time blindness, staying on task, and avoiding distractions. To help them be more successful, our goal as parents is to externalize these concepts, making them clear and predictable, creating structure in your child’s world.  

One of the easiest (and hardest) ways to do this is to set up routines. While routines can be incredibly overwhelming at the beginning, they ultimately help children with ADHD be more successful because they know what to expect. To help YOU start off on the right foot, here are some of our favorite tools for building routines: 

1. Consider what your child is (and isn’t) capable of right now – and then grow from there.

Think a...

Do you find yourself laying next to your child for what seems like hours every night because that is the ONLY way you can get them to sleep? And once they finally fall asleep, are they are back in your room a few hours later trying to crawl into your bed?

Getting your child to fall asleep and stay asleep in their own bed can be an epic challenge.  

Today, I’m going to let you in on a simple, science-backed intervention that we love to use to tackle some of these bedtime struggles…

The Bedtime Pass

The Bedtime Pass is a science-backed strategy that we use with families. It helps kids fall asleep alone, while feeling safe and secure in their own bed. It’s basically a get out of bed free card that you give to your child at night before bed.

The Bedtime Pass gives children the security they need, but provides them with boundaries to put a limit on those seemingly constant trips out of bed. Most importantly, it is a tool to teach your child to fall asleep without you having to lay next...

Some days it can feel like your child with ADHD has a vendetta against you. You tell them to go out…they go in. You say stop…they go. You tell them to start their homework, and they look at you and turn on the television. When our kids show defiance and go against our warnings or directions, it can feel downright infuriating. And it can make you question whether you are even a good parent.

First, let’s normalize this: you are not alone! Defiance is one of the most common challenges faced by parents and teachers of children with ADHD. As a psychologist, whenever a parent tells me that their child is defiant, I always try to dig a little deeper to find out why?

The truth is that defiance is often a symptom of a larger problem for the child or with their environment.

Today, I am sharing four possible reasons for defiance in children with ADHD.

1) Executive functioning differences

I remember testing a young girl and asking her to complete some math facts quickly for 1 minute. Af...

“Our kids love each other, right? I mean, they definitely don’t seem to like each other lately, but do they love each other?” The other day, I (Katie) was listening to my children arguing in the backyard and I looked at my husband and literally asked this question. It seems like my kids (who are 2.5 years apart) operate in two different modes: best friends or mortal enemies. And some days, it is exhausting for me as a parent!

On our social media, we consistently hear from you about arguments between siblings. When you are raising a child (or more than one child) with ADHD, this can be even more complicated! We definitely haven’t figured out the secret sauce to help our kids get along all the time. But we wanted to share a few tips to help support you in your journey.

1) Prioritize 1:1 time for each child.

Maybe we should make t-shirts that say this… or coffee mugs… hmm… but we say it ALL OF THE TIME because it’s parenting gold! The truth is, this is easier said than done. If you are...

I (Lori) grew up in a family of 7… with 4 brothers… and some of them had ADHD. Chaos was constant in our home. All I can say is, my mom was a saint. The seemingly endless daily reminders, meetings with the principal or teachers, school suspensions, yelling, and constant wrestling matches in the living room…it was a lot! And though my brothers were some amazing athletes who were so fun to hang with, they required a lot of my parent’s attention. When you have 5 kids, it can be a real challenge to find the time to give all of that attention.

If you are a parent of more than one child with ADHD, we know how exhausting (and fun!) your life can be at times. Here are a few things to keep in mind when parenting multiple children with ADHD:

1) Help Yourself Before You Help Your Kids

The research is very clear that ADHD is often passed down from parent to child. In fact, nearly half of parents who have a child with ADHD, have a diagnosis of ADHD themselves (Starck, Grunwald, & Schlarb, 201...

Does your child struggle with writing? If so, you are not alone! When kids come to my (Katie's) office for testing, they are usually happy to play with toys and look at pictures... until I get out a pencil and tell them we are going to write! Writing can be challenging for so many reasons.

I constantly talk with parents who are stressed and overwhelmed every time their child brings home a writing assignment. Don’t worry, we are here to help you understand why this is happening and how you can support your child! 

Writing and language are connected

There is a strong link between writing and language. In many ways, writing is the academic form of speaking, so children who have a language disorder are much more likely to struggle with writing. One longitudinal research study revealed that “among children with speech and language impairment, the cumulative incidence of a writing disorder was 61.4% for boys and 55.1% for girls at age 19 years” (Katusic et al., 2009).

If you are worrie...

Years ago, I talked with a friend about her daughter with ADHD. She was very concerned because her daughter was lying frequently at school. The teacher had now come to her mother wanting to address the problem, but they were both overwhelmed and unsure of how to address lying.

After talking with many families over the years, the concern about lying is a common one for our kids with ADHD. When children lie, we as parents (understandably!) tend to overreact and assume this type of behavior will only lead to other concerns, such as stealing or total lack of concern for others. The truth is, lying can be a reflection of a child’s ADHD brain and differences in executive functioning skills. 

Why Kids with ADHD Lie

First, it’s important to note that lying is a normal part of cognitive development as young children (around 4-6 years of age) learn that others can’t read their mind and that their thoughts are private. It’s an exciting development for kids, albeit a frustrating one for pare...

Between the constant teacher calls about problem behaviors, the meetings with the principal, or the suspensions, the process of supporting your child with ADHD can not only feel overwhelming…it can feel hopeless. To top it off, sitting in meetings with various teachers and school professionals can be really intimidating. Even if you may feel like your child needs something more or something different, you question yourself or struggle to speak up. The truth is, it is intimidating for us too, even with our knowledge of special education laws and ADHD!

If you want to help your child, you have to begin educating yourself about your child's rights at school. And even though it might not feel like it, as a parent of a child with ADHD you have a LOT of rights.

Today, I am going to be sharing with you some key information from a very important letter that will help you feel a little more empowered to support your child with ADHD at school.

The Dear Colleague Letter

In 2016, the U.S. De...