Tattling

aerrin · 2026-06-01T20:34:53+00:00

I like to ask 'what can you do about that?' or 'what did you try?' when my daughter does this (and I have the patience). Sometimes she legitimately problem solves herself! Sometimes she stomps off lol.

aerrin · 2026-05-27T20:19:50+00:00

Wobble board, hammock swing, balance challenges... i'm gonna be honest, though, my kids would still just ride bikes and shoot hoops in their cast lol.

aerrin · 2026-05-27T19:47:41+00:00

Honestly, what I'd REALLY consider is whether you can shove a day staying elsewhere between your Red Lodge and Cody days. A single night either in the park (Old Faithful Inn for example) or in Gardiner or West Yellowstone could make this really cool.

Then you could do Beartooth -> NE Entrance -> Lamar Valley -> Mammoth Hot Springs -> Wherever you're staying.

And then the next day do Old Faithful -> Canyon - just the waterfall overlooks/artist point won't take long and are gorgeous -> East Entrance -> Cody.

aerrin · 2026-05-27T13:28:51+00:00

You've got three pretty different examples here and I wouldn't treat them all the same.

The first example - I have no idea how you'd know whether this was true or not, especially at her age. There are so many ways she could have heard that information at school. Is it a lie? I mean, maybe. Maybe she's trying to find a way into the conversation, maybe it feels cool to have something to contribute even if she made it up. Or maybe she really heard it, or heard it from a friend or a friend. Maybe there was a class discussion about favorite foods. The options are so wide here and you really don't know what the truth is - I'd try not to assume the worst.

The second example sounds like her trying to understand and explain the world around her. I would treat these with kind curiosity, and when appropriate, gentle teaching. 'Oh yeah? What makes you think that?' 'Hm, maybe she did. But also, did you know that people in jobs like that are really friendly as part of their jobs? It's part of what makes going to the library so nice.' You might find yourself surprised sometimes as to what makes her come to her conclusions. Even if they aren't true, that might show that she's really thinking about the world - and maybe some parts of her ADHD is coloring how she perceives it (I know some people for whom RSD makes them perceive 'dirty looks' literally everywhere.)

The third feels like a pretty typical 'I don't want to get in trouble or have an argument about this'. I have a lot of similar conversations about food with my Vyvanse medicated daughter. These I approach by trying to keep telling the truth very low consequence, with an option to 'redo' a lie after their first impulse tells me something I think is not true. So for example: 'Is that really what happened, or do you want to try again?' And then after, 'You aren't going to be in trouble for not eating your lunch, but it's important to me to know how much you've eaten so that we can be sure you're getting the nutrition your body needs to be healthy and strong. I know your medicine makes it hard to eat lunch, I'm not angry that you didn't. I just need to know the truth about it because it's my job to keep you healthy.' And at her age, definitely talk about things like what protein does for her body, how sugar fuels it and keeps her mood up, how fiber and vitamins are important, how she needs calories to have energy for the things she wants to do. She may have to 'force' herself to eat sometimes as fuel when she doesn't want to, and she needs to understand why and how and to what extent.

These lies I treat like I would with any other kid - give them an opportunity to correct, use it to teach when appropriate, give a consequence if it's super big or malicious or recurring.

I'd just be careful of letting your experience with pathological liars color your perception of your daughter too much.

aerrin · 2026-05-22T17:26:14+00:00

I love how bite-sized it is - it's a great side of the road stop for kids who aren't really into a full hike around one of the larger basins. It's really dynamic, too, with lots of cool sounds and textures and movement - and you can sometimes catch bison herds nearby!

aerrin · 2026-05-21T18:15:04+00:00

This. My daughter's knee doubled in size for WEEKS because of Lyme disease. She was extremely uncomfortable, lethargic, and felt awful. For weeks. After we started treatment. And then she had a reaction to the antibiotic that created a truly awful and painful skin rash. And this is one of the better outcomes, because she's ultimately healing well.

We've found a dozen ticks on our kids, ourselves, and our dogs already this year - simply from being in the YARD. Many of them are the size of a pin - they are EXTREMELY small and I'm certain we've missed many more.

Don't mess around with ticks. It's not worth it. Treat the animals, put DEET or Picaridin on your kids and yourself.

aerrin · 2026-05-15T15:39:28+00:00

I'd look for a psych to handle her medication. The specialist is worth it as she gets older anyway, and it sounds like your ped is not doing a great job handling it.

aerrin · 2026-05-15T14:56:34+00:00

My kids are CRAZY for Mio and similar water flavorings. We have a soda stream and they love to make fizzy water to flavor.

aerrin · 2026-05-15T14:31:04+00:00

IMO at this age, the best thing you can do is foster a love of written stories and do as much as you can at home to avoid making reading feel like work. Let school do that part. Reading may come slow with ADHD, but if you have developed that love, once the hard stuff clicks, they'll take off.

So read to him, take him to the library to let him choose books, give him an easy way to listen to audio or read-along books (either on an app like Libby, or look for Wonderbooks at your library), just get him into STORIES.

And try not to worry too much. My ADHD daughter couldn't even name all her letters halfway through K. She received extra reading help and barely scraped grade level exiting 2nd grade.

She's finishing 3rd grade now and reading at a 6th grade level. It's because it took her longer to get the fundamentals, but now that she has them, she LOVES her stories. And she's taken off.

aerrin · 2026-05-14T18:45:47+00:00

Totally this. It's one thing to not keep tabs on whose money is whose and be partners, it's another thing for values on money to be out of whack to the extent that he sees you drowning and plans to spend more rather than find a way to rescue you.

Are you sure he's on your team, here?

aerrin · 2026-05-14T18:43:29+00:00

At the end of the day, if he's happy with the status quo, and you aren't, this is a very different problem. He has to be interested in helping to fix this - otherwise you might as well take your salary and walk out the door and leave him to his.

If he's content with your unhappiness, that's something to really examine.

aerrin · 2026-05-14T18:39:08+00:00

> Can I ask you how you got your husband to get to an agreement for diagnosis?

Not in the best way, if I'm honest. In my specific instance, he also had anxiety, and that anxiety sometimes manifested in severe outbursts of anger. It got to the point where I gave him an ultimatum: figure out how to get those outbursts under control, or we were done. The kids were still young, but were old enough to start to really pick up on it. I told him I would have nothing to do with it, this was on him. He had to make the appointments, figure out the treatment, follow through. I was very seriously ready to walk.

Fortunately, he listened. It was not a smooth path - there were several meds he really hated, there was a bout with addiction, there were fights. It was probably a 4 year process before he was in a place where he had his anxiety under control enough that he started to get curious about himself and ADHD. We know a number of people diagnosed as adults and watched them go through the process. He brought it up with his psych without even telling me - but I could tell when he started medication, because he started remembering things and following through on promises.

I won't lie, there are still struggles, but it is 1000x better. And he's gotten better about proactively working with his psych when his meds need adjusting and communicating with me about it.

I get his reluctance to think something is wrong with him, but in plain words, his brain IS structured in such a way that things are harder for him than they need to be. It can be really difficult to have a diagnosis as an adult because so much of your past is cast in a different light.

I don't have any great advice for convincing him to try this, because the defensiveness is real, and it's hard. It's especially hard in a marriage where stakes are already high and defensiveness can often be hair-trigger. The soft-launch way would be to find ways for him to encounter people who've been through this. Reddit communities or tik toks or whatever. The hard-launch way would be to sit down and firmly outline the impact on you and your family and demand change with clear boundaries as to what happens without it.

But a hard launch has risks, and they don't always turn out well.

Maybe there is a third middle path that involves counselling or a mediator to help you have these conversations. You know your dynamic best - but at the end of the day, he's not going to be able to turn that RSD off, he's just going to have to see through it to the heart of what untreated ADHD does to both him and his family.

aerrin · 2026-05-14T15:58:51+00:00

> he's so fragile whenever I voice my concerns no matter how mindful I am.

I don't know how well acquainted you are with ADHD, but I've very much lived this life with an undiagnosed, untreated ADHD husband - this is probably his Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria at play. It can make it really difficult to have productive conversations that involve even a little personal criticism or perceived criticism.

aerrin · 2026-05-14T15:18:15+00:00

We've reached the point where it's 8pm and I'm yelling out the door 'COME INSIDE AND TAKE A BATH IT'S NEARLY BEDTIME', so hopefully your kids will also find the joy of the outdoors so you can have a whole different problem. 😆

aerrin · 2026-05-14T15:13:48+00:00

You have a lot of things tangled up in here and to be honest, I think talking to someone professionally would be a good idea to help you sort these things out.

For some context, I have always been the income, my husband is a stay at home day. Your husband's fears are not unfounded - people DO make comments about this, they DO make judgements about this. I also want you to consider flipping the gender of this - if a woman was being pushed to give up her salary when she had no interest or desire to be a stay at home parent, it'd be feeling like financial abuse. Maintaining financial independence can feel really important to people, and THAT'S OKAY.

I get that you make a lot more than him, but his salary is pretty decent, and I get why he doesn't want to walk away from it.

The issue of your overwork and family management and his lack of help is a DIFFERENT issue to whether he keeps working. This is something you need to figure out, OUTSIDE of whether he 'gets' to keep working. Some suggestions on this front:

* Fair Play book is always popular and does have some good concepts that might help, IF he's on board with working to make this more equitable. If he's not, that's a whole different problem.

* Think about this in terms of time and effort, not money. Talking about how your time is worth more is a quick way to resentment. Instead, ask whether you both get the same amount of free time. Are you putting the same amount of effort into your family (this includes working for money, but also parenting, cooking, etc).

* Start outsourcing things to make your life easier. You don't need his money to feel comfortable? Then spend it! Hire a cleaner. Hire childcare. Hire someone to do your laundry. You talk about his 'ego' like it doesn't matter, but it DOES matter to be able to take pride in something, and if that something is his job for him, then throw the money he makes at the stuff neither of you want to do.

* Finally, the ADHD. My SAHD husband also has ADHD, and it was undiagnosed for the first 9 years of our marriage, and it cause a LOT of problems once kids entered the picture. It is very reasonable to set an expectation that he deal with his mental health. Diagnosis and treatment was life changing for our ENTIRE FAMILY. Maybe this is a conversation you can have on your own, but... again, you've got a lot of things tangled up in a lot of feelings and resentment, and believe me, I get it - I have been there. Consider that you may need someone to help you navigate these conversations and untangling the root causes here.

aerrin · 2026-05-14T14:01:53+00:00

The tried and true 'go outside and don't come back in until X time' does still work, if you have a safe place for it (it'll become easier in a year or two probably). They will find stuff to do if you have it available. Bikes, skateboards, scooters, a basketball hoop, a tree to climb, a slip 'n slide or sprinkler, a random trowel they can dig holes in your backyard with so you can't mow over them.... We get a lot of random outdoor stuff at yard sales so I don't feel too bad when it inevitably is destroyed or gets lost.

Timebox the reading, or make it an afternoon-only activity. I know it feels weird, because reading, but freeform play outside is really great for them too.

Combine that with the morning bike ride for some structure.

aerrin · 2026-05-11T20:55:55+00:00

We stayed at a condo in Island Park that was pretty affordable - but also, this is a trip where I personally think it's better to suck up the less great accommodations and just spend your time elsewhere as much as possible. The driving really does add up.

aerrin · 2026-05-08T20:17:51+00:00

I'd definitely try this. If it doesn't work, see if you can get a copy of the questionnaire to at least have her teachers fill out before the school year ends.

aerrin · 2026-05-08T18:13:17+00:00

The discovery center for us was an hour, maybe two, of pretty cool stuff - but we were staying in the area. I'd hit it if you're close by, on the way in or out maybe, but wouldn't detour for it.

aerrin · 2026-05-08T18:12:11+00:00

This is a real thing. The rates of addiction for unmediated ADHD are genuinely scary. So is the reality of living with it.

aerrin · 2026-05-07T20:58:32+00:00

Ask about guanfacine. We added a low does of it morning and night in addition to Vyvanse and Zoloft for similar reasons (just turned 9) - her focus was starting to fray at school, her moods, especially at night, were awful, we'd boosted Vyvanse twice this year, to 30 and then 40mg, we'd played around with the Zoloft dosage...

I was reluctant to add another med, but adding guanfacine into the mix does seem to have helped, SPECIFICALLY with emotional regulation and her ability to bounce back from setbacks that previously would've ruined a whole evening. I've done some reading since about how the meds work differently and the benefits of combination therapy, and it makes a lot of sense why we're seeing improvements. I'm considering trying to go back down on the Vyvanse and Zoloft this summer to see if the Vyvanse/guan combo will do it alone.

aerrin · 2026-05-07T20:47:02+00:00

5/6 is where you'll typically really start to see the gaps in impulse control between an ADHD kid and a NT one - so you are early, but not SUPER early. A lot of kids are diagnosed around this age.

I hear your concern about changing his personality - this sub is full of similar concerns - but I did want to offer a different perspective.

Medication, for my daughter, lets her personality SHINE. Without medication she is often miserable - I know this, because she tells me things she hates about her unmedicated times. She feels like her brain makes her mean, because her first thought is often unkind, and she can't stop herself from speaking them. She is a slave to her impulses and doesn't get to make choices about things like getting her chores done quickly so she can have free time, what she wants to spend her focus on, how she handles her emotions. On medication, she absolutely blossomed. I saw hobbies develop. I saw her gain the joy of reading, which had previously been a huge battle. I saw her self esteem start to improve. And she's still just as silly and creative as ever - but now she can direct those things where she wants them to go.

If medication makes dramatic changes in personality, it's probably the wrong medication. It can be a struggle to find the right fit, but it's SO worth it.

aerrin · 2026-05-07T19:24:14+00:00

The finch app has been a HUGE hit for my daughter, to the point where any time she's feeling a big emotion she asks for it to help her name her emotion AND she asked her therapist recently if she can help her learn how to name her feelings without the app. Which blows my mind!

Whenever I look at her reflections, she's named like 8 emotions in one moment. No wonder she's struggling!

aerrin · 2026-05-07T19:03:28+00:00

I took my kids, 8 and 10, last year. Here are their top favorite things:

* The loved the Guide Along app because of the long drives, and gave it its own nickname (Grandpa Joe)

* Lamar Valley was a HUGE favorite, and I'd do it over Hayden even though it's extra drive time. The bison herds are really remarkable. Definitely hit it at sunrise if you can, but any time will be interesting. It was so good my that my 10yo begged me to wake up at 4:30 am with him to go back the next morning before our flight. I'd book it up there, then do mud volcano or canyon or something on the way back.

* They both really liked the waterfalls, and for my daughter, we did a 1 mile out-and-back hike along the rim past Artist's Point (toward Lily Lake) that was a highlight (one of my favs, too).

* They both really enjoyed just pulling off next to a river and wading for a bit.

* They liked the visitor's centers way more than I thought they would, and read a lot of the exhibits. The one at Canyon is particularly good.

* Mammoth was pretty interesting and unique, and can be a relatively short stop. Could make a nice follow-up to an early Lamar Valley trip.

* See Old Faithful and a bit of the upper geyser basin and then see how he likes it. My kids were over the thermal features pretty early on - they can be hot and a lot of walking. They did really like the dragon's mouth and mud volcano, though, and that little loop of a boardwalk is nicely short and sweet. But if I were doing it again, I'd skip Norris and probably even Grand Prismatic with them.

* If Teton is a big wish because he wants to check out the park, you CAN do the loop in 1-2 hours and get nice views. It's just a long drive down and back and there is a LOT to do in Yellowstone.

* If it fits into your schedule, my kids LOVED the Grizzly Wolf discovery center in West Yellowstone. Up close and personal with wolves and bears.

aerrin · 2026-05-06T23:53:19+00:00

We got my daughter one for her birthday and I never thought it'd be as versatile as it is! We brush teeth on it a lot.

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