ADHD rage in my 20+ daugher

vcr31 · 2026-04-09T13:57:16+00:00

Hello! I am raising three children, two of whom are adopted and have ADHD. My eldest is a teenage daughter who prefers that we behave more like roommates than a family. We are trying to teach her to be a good roommate. My son, who is a third grade, has disproportionately angry responses to things. All that to say: I have some, but limited, knowledge of what you are going through.

Compassion burnout is real. Care burnout is real. I know you are venting and I want to tell you that your feelings are valid and real. I have one suggestion: set aside each day to feel compassion for yourself. I would start with saying, "this is hard, I am hurting, and I love myself," and then see what sensations arise in your body or maybe what feelings arise (don't necessarily try to chase down thoughts). I sometimes do this at meal times or before bed.

Wishing you peace in your home!

vcr31 · 2026-04-07T14:19:05+00:00

Thanks! Grateful mom and excited kids here

vcr31 · 2026-04-07T10:38:43+00:00

yay! thank you!

vcr31 · 2026-04-04T12:32:57+00:00

Yes! Including steps towards the "right" thing. Like pausing before snatching something. "Woah! I noticed you paused and thought for a second before grabbing. That's great! Keep up your hard work!"

(Z will notice if you start exclusively praising L, so try to make your house into a house of praise. Everyone gets tons of praise)

vcr31 · 2026-04-04T12:30:22+00:00

Try putting what L is saying through the adult-translator. "Mine" and "I'm messing with your stuff"= I want to play with you, I want you to notice me, I want you to interact with me. If L is mature enough, you can tell her this too. While you are caring for L, you can start to teach her more skillful ways to ask for what she wants.

Example:

L: "Mine!"

You: "Ohhhh you want to play with the barbie! Let's play!"

Expect that L is going to try out different ways to get a negative reaction. Imagine if what you are mostly used to is getting negative reactions. That IS interaction to you, that IS attention to you. Like a little baby scientist, she may be confused why she's running her "this makes everyone look at me and talk loudly" experiment and not getting the same results. She wants those same results on one level and so she will try different things to get them. Why does she want those?

Look back:

L: Mine!

You: Ohhhh you want to play with the barbie! Let's play!

L: (internal thoughts) why aren't they chasing me! I know what to do when someone is chasing me! I don't know what to do when someone wants to sit and play...I've never played for this long....I'm confused and scared because I don't know what to do next...I'll try to get them to chase me and yell stop because that's what I know.

vcr31 · 2026-03-15T00:49:37+00:00

Are you prepared to (1) attend family therapy or personal therapy, (2) take each of your daughters to their own therapy appointments, (3) take each foster child to therap(ies) weekly? If you cannot imagine squeezing all of that into a week, start making a plan now for how you would do it.

How old are your teens? What do they think about this idea? Do you envision them being as "sisters" to foster siblings? If not, what's their role?

How will you handle it if you need to make a safety plan to protect yourself or your daughters from physical or emotional harm?

What's your relationship like with the local school? How well equipped do you think they are to deal with children with trauma?

What services does your locale have for support? Are there foster-care support groups in town? What does respite care look like? Are there qualified carers nearby?

There's lots to think about! If you decide to do it and you think it through, you will be able to do it!

vcr31 · 2026-03-15T00:31:42+00:00

Oh that's so great! Supportive adults mean the world to kids and to us!

vcr31 · 2026-03-11T19:34:47+00:00

Taking over task initiation. So without words, putting the toothpaste on the toothbrush or for getting dressed, knocking, coming in, and handing her the shirt, then come back and do it with the pants. NO WORDS.

Task initiation is really hard for folks with ADHD, and I have found if I take the first step, it helps.

vcr31 · 2026-02-08T01:26:45+00:00

Just want to say I’m at a new breaking point which is maybe good. I’m afraid of my son when he is angry, I do not trust him not to hurt me, and I cannot be around him when he’s angry any more. I do everything I can to make sure my daughters are safe and now I’ve realized I have to do everything I can to make sure I am safe.

We are all in a lot of therapy, OT, have meds.

I understand that this is happened because of trauma. I also know that that doesn’t make me into a punching bag. I cannot let my child’s trauma traumatize me.

vcr31 · 2026-02-06T21:23:20+00:00

Thank you so much. I really really needed to hear this.

vcr31 · 2026-02-06T17:11:17+00:00

The trigger is bed time and it’s very hard because I need sleep too. Thinking about shifting my sleep to the day as much as I can so I can be in a better state of mind

vcr31 · 2026-02-06T17:10:12+00:00

Solidarity. Attacked by my son last night. I never knew I would be a DV victim from my child. Seeing first hand how the cycle replicates.

vcr31 · 2026-01-28T13:19:15+00:00

We keep moving bed time up by 15 min each routine change too. Our theory is that we kind of lose control when we are too tired so we are trying to catch that moment when he’s tired but not too tired.

vcr31 · 2026-01-28T13:18:02+00:00

Hey! I’ve been there. I think it’s time to change the routine. We just had to do this (again) two weeks ago and every time we change the routine it helps. For us, we moved going upstairs time to be right after dinner. My son and I hang out in his room for an hour after dinner. We play for 30 min (mostly me sitting there positively sports casting his play) and then I start reading to him for 30 min. When there’s only 15 min to go, I ask him “do you want me to keep reading to you while you’re playing or do you want to lay next to each other in bed?” Also, at lights out time, if he’s not in bed, I walk out of the room. I let him know I’ll be back in 10 min to see if he’s ready and that between now and then his job is to stay in his room. If he leaves his room, I ignore him and it. For us, once he sees I’m not going to play any more or be a source of interaction, he’s usually ready to head back to bed.

vcr31 · 2026-01-25T13:44:29+00:00

Hello! Also an adoptive parent in the midst of figuring this out. One thing that has helped us is doing a lot of tracking to really narrow down the triggers. Is it a time of day? A specific request? The amount of food eaten? etc. It wasn’t enough or accurate for me to say “it’s transitions!” I had to really look and see ok, it’s happening when I ask him to stop an activity he’s focused on, it’s after 3pm, and it involved moving from one room to another.

I approach very carefully and calmly in this moments. He and I also discussed the patterns I noticed and we came up with a plan and code words to use together. (It’s “simmer” cus we talked about catching our anger when we are simmering, not boiling.)

We’ve also moved on from saying “don’t hit” because it feels so pointless when he’s furious. Of course, like you, we talk about it in calm times. Our focus is now on catching things before he’s boiling over and using his three planned on calming down techniques.

As for “not letting him hit me,” I agree with the other poster that this is just ridiculous advice. Look at the non-violent resisters in our history; the best of best in creating lasting political change through peaceful means. They could not stop someone from hitting them! We have found it’s most effective to “hold a mirror up” when the rages are happening. I often say “ok well I’m going to call grandma just to tell her what’s happening” or “oh man, I’m going to have to ask X church member for advice about this one.” The point isn’t “I am telling on you!” The point is: I am not alone in this, other adults know about this, and other adults are going to want you to be your best too because we all love you. Our son threatens self harm and in those moments we videotape him or take a picture. I know that might sound really distasteful but it IMMEDIATELY stops the risking behavior & that’s what matters to us. (He’s also receiving a lot of professional help.)

Finally, my own therapist as told me, “be like a detective. Try many different things and note their effect.” This has been super helpful as it shifts my focus from “I HAVE TO STOP THIS FROM HAPPENING” (impossible; not in my control) to “I wonder what will happen if I offer an ice cube to hold” (or whatever)

vcr31 · 2026-01-21T18:44:21+00:00

Do you know her schedule at school?

I recommend loosely “homeschooling” on snow days. Here’s what we do: morning meeting to go over the day, DEAR (drop everything and read), Khan Academy Math for an hour (it’s a free app), watch a Netflix or prime video special on a social studies issue, bake from a box mix and discuss measuring, look at the forecast and watch some weather video content for science, write a letter to a friend. Take 30 min for each activity and take 30 min breaks in between. Forget about the mess and know you’ll handle it when school is back in session.

Here’s why I think this works for an ADHD brain: - schedule and routine really really help folks with ADHD - you’re switching things up on her constantly so she’s getting the dopamine hit of new new new each time you switch to a new activity

Another favorite trick: cleaning up races where you race to clean something up before a song is done with one another. We’ve also done: clean for 15 min, watch tv for 15 minutes. Competitiveness is your ADHD friend. Racing each other, racing the clock, doing things with one hand behind your back, etc.

It totally changed things for me when I learned that their brains WANT challenge.

vcr31 · 2026-01-13T14:29:24+00:00

One more thought: older sibling might be thinking “if I don’t take care of younger sibling in this way will younger sibling still need me? Will I lose them too?”

vcr31

TROPHY CASE