615- Mapping a Smoother Back-to-School Transition

0:00Cheryl Chase: This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game? Well, with the Name Your Price tool from Progressive, you can find options that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try it at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states.

0:26Welcome to the Attention Deficit Disorder Expert Podcast Series. by Attitude Magazine.

0:36Everyone, I'm Carol Fleck, and on behalf of the Attitude team, I'm delighted to welcome you to today's ADHD experts presentation titled, Mapping a Smoother Back-to-School Transition. Leading today's webinar is Dr. Cheryl Chase. We are so excited to welcome her back. Dr. Chase presented in 2024 on managing students' emotional dysregulation in class. She provided excellent recommendations for parents and teachers, and you can listen to it by searching AttitudeMag.com for podcast 521 or by subscribing to the ADHD Experts podcast on most streaming platforms. Dr. Chase is a licensed clinical psychologist specializing in the diagnostic and neuropsychological assessment of ADHD, pervasive developmental disorders, learning disorders, and emotional concerns.

1:32She works with children, adolescents, and young adults. Dr. Chase also leads workshops on executive functioning, dyslexia, and dysgraphia, and offers creative ways to support those who struggle in school. She serves as an adjunct instructor at several colleges in the Cleveland, Ohio area, and is a member of the International Dyslexia Association, the American Psychological Association, and the Learning Disabilities Association of America. Not surprisingly, few kids are happy about the end of the summer break, but for students with ADHD and learning differences, the back-to-school season may bring on an especially high level of anxiety and stress.

2:18Today, Dr. Chase will discuss how to reframe the back-to-school transition as a full cognitive reboot with her brain-based action guide, and she will provide practical tools to help your kids settle into the school year with confidence. So without further ado, I'm so pleased to welcome Dr. Cheryl Chase. Thank you so much for joining us today. Hey, everyone. Thanks, Carol. Great to see everyone. back to school. Look, I know, I apologize. It's sunny out and beautiful where I'm at here up in Cleveland. And so the thought of back to school makes me bristle a little bit, but that also tells us about the children that we have and the individuals that we're serving.

3:08We need to be thinking about this kind of stuff, even in the off season, weeks in advance. And I want to invite you to think about our youngsters with ADHD a little bit differently than maybe you have become accustomed to. When we're talking about back to school, it's not just this fancy date on the calendar that you kind of count down to. It's a huge cognitive overhaul. And the standard way of interacting with individuals with various neurodiversities, let's stick with ADHD in particular is to figure out, okay, so if it's a cognitive overhaul, how do we change the kid? How do we take the child and make them less neurodiverse and more neurotypical so that they can have an easier transition back to school?

4:05And look, as a clinician and as a parent, I can tell you that the neuroaffirming approaches are better. They're just more successful. And what that means is accepting the child exactly as they are, recognizing where the challenges lie, and doing what we can to improve the fit between the child and the expectation, rather than this approach of, well, we need to change them. How about we accept them and we change the situation, the setup, the environment, the situation, the task demands a little bit. So when I talk about a huge cognitive overhaul, I'm talking about what we are expecting of this brain changes dramatically between summer and the school year.

5:00so the first weeks feel hard because there's multiple system spikes what does that mean the operating system of the brain think of it like your phone or your laptop it goes from summer operating system which has certain demands and expectations and a pace and a vibe and the way things go in the summer to the school operating system, which has a different pace, a different level of stimulation, a different vibe, a different feel. So kids and parents are shifting from a very low demand, flexible summer rhythm to very high demand, very structured school expectations. And I want you thinking, this is a whole brain shift.

5:45and I want you thinking rather than how do I change my kid how about how do I improve the fit between this little human that I have and the situational demands placed upon them so many approaches as I said are about somehow changing the child to be less neurodiverse but they're beautiful exactly as they are. So maybe there's more we can be doing to change the expectations, the demands and smooth out the transition for them, with them. So what do I mean by fix the fit? Fix the fit. How do I improve the fit between my child as they are right now and the current situation that they are in? So let's be really concrete for a second.

6:38If I have a wheelchair user and the building I go into has a set of stairs only, that's a poor fit. The wheelchair user cannot meet the expectation or the demands placed upon them. So what do we do? We don't think twice about building a ramp for that wheelchair user to be able to access and have a better fit between the environment and their limitations or capabilities. I want you thinking about your child with ADHD in a similar way. This is the way they are. It doesn't mean they'll be this way forever, but it means this is who they are today. So how do I build a ramp to the world around them rather than repeatedly saying to the child, well, you just gotta try harder.

7:25Well, you just gotta suck it up. Well, you just gotta go to bed earlier. I think we can do better. and that's what this program is based on. So I developed this idea of fix the fit, which is a framework for understanding people and improving performance when there's a neurodiversity that is butting up against the demands and expectations. I'm going to explain this fix the fit framework in a broad level and then we're going to apply it really specifically to the back to school. So it's a practical neuroscience informed way to understand behavior without judgment. Let's take away that not trying, not motivated, being difficult, attention seeking.

8:05We're not going to use those terms. It reduces friction. It reduces overwhelm and creates environments where the individuals as they are now can function at their best. So there's three major components, the streams, what I call the seven neurocognitive systems that shape everyday day functioning. So as a psychologist who focuses on testing assessment and neuropsychology, I took all of those different domains, all those different tests that we give, and I boiled it down to what are about a handful of the most relevant cognitive things your brain's got to pull off for you to function every day.

8:43It's not everything that we assess, but I want you thinking in these major categories. Sensory and input, thinking speed and efficiency, retention or memory, executive functioning, accessing symbols and language, mood and regulation, and social understanding. So those are just the general categories. Then the signals. So the behaviors that tell us, hey, something's up. There's some brain strain here because behavior is data, plain and simple. We want to remove those assumptions that go along with behavior that they're unmotivated, unwilling, not trying hard, all those attention-seeking things.

9:21And I want you thinking when the child is exhibiting these signals, that's a red flag that something's going on with those streams. Think of it as like the dashboard lights on your car. You don't exactly know what's up with the engine, but you know something's up with the engine when those lights come on. That's what these behaviors represent. And so I keep pressing the down arrow. So when they're stalling and stopping, when they should be continuing to work, when there's inconsistency, gaps, glitches, noise, overwhelm, avoidance, anxiety, language and logic breakdown, social misreads. Those are your dashboard lights that something's up.

10:00And then the my best strategies. So five strategy families that support better functioning. So basically what's your toolkit and I'll introduce that to you. And then through the fix the fit system, you would learn how to identify the signals that are telling you what's up with the streams and then what my best strategies to employ. Hey, Chicagoland, the Wayfair store is in your neighborhood at Edens Plaza and Wilmette. Finally, you can feel the fabric, sit on the sectionals and even open the refrigerators. Plus, our in-store designers will help you bring it all together with free one-on-one design support for any project on any budget.

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10:52That's the overarching system, but we're going to jump right into what are the likely things given the streams and the signals that we can expect during those back to school few weeks. and let's talk about those my best strategy families and how to employ the best intervention strategies given what we know about this individual in their brain. So the big idea, behavior isn't about attitude and motivation. I want you thinking load, capacity, and fit. What is the load I'm expecting my child to carry right now? They're shifting from summer operating system to back to school operating system. That's a pretty heavy load.

11:32What is their capacity to make that shift? Some people can adapt pretty smoothly. Our kids don't. And then how do I improve the fit between what they're expected to carry and what they're able to carry? So when you learn to fix the fit, you improve communication, strengthen relationships, increase follow-through, and really unlock the hidden potential because you're, rather than butting up against, I have to change them, you're saying, I'm going to accept they are exactly who they are and work with that. And through that, their gifts and strengths will also blossom. Okay, so with that in mind, let's turn specifically to take the fix-the-fit system and apply it to back to school.

12:19So again, thinking cognitive overhaul, but why? What's actually changing? First of all, the sensory load. We're talking new classrooms, new sounds, new layouts. After school meltdowns are often just overstimulation from the school day. Lots of different voices, lots of different names, lots of different sights and sounds. New classroom sensory systems go from a 2 out of 10 to an 8 or a 9 out of 10. And after school meltdowns are often just a sign of being exhausted. Emotional regulation load. So they got to hold it together all day. And that can lead to after-school crashes, especially when our kids have learning and attention challenges, and especially if they're masking all day.

13:03They're trying to put their best out there, which is what we want for them to be doing. But then when they get home, they can unravel and be their true selves. And I got to tell you, as a mom of neurodiverse individuals myself, when they come home and they show us their not-so-pretty sides, that actually means they feel safe. That's actually a good thing. I know it's hard to hear, but it means that they feel safe to really let themselves unmask and drop their shoulders. The social load, new peers, new classmates, new teachers, monitoring, interpreting, it's just all exhausting. The cognitive pace, summer is slower, even if they're going to summer camp, even if there's structure every day, the pace is slower.

13:50School, we've got rapid transitions. We've got deadlines. We've got shifting, opening different mental file cabinets. I need to go into my language arts file cabinet. Wait, now I need to go into my math file cabinet. Wait, now I need to go into my history file cabinet. And of course, the EF load, initiating, working memory, planning, flexibility. The kids hit their EF fatigue by the end of the school day. And then they have to come home and do hours of homework. so you can see when we talk about that adjustment the cognitive load is just a lot heavier we feel it i remember when it was time for my kids to go back to school when they were much younger um me thinking like okay i i gotta get my game on because the things i was getting away with i i can't quite get away with anymore the kind of slower mornings and the um you know a little bit later bedtimes that no, we got to be on point now.

14:46So I call it the three-week adjustment curve because week one is just, there's a sense of shock. Everything spikes at once. We're talking the sensory load, the emotional regulation load, the social load, the cognitive pace, the executive function, thinking speed, working memory, all of those demands on the brain increase. kids are running on their summer operating system but they've got to shift over into that back to school operating system and oh my word morning is so early it is and and not only do you have to be you and i our kids we have to be functional and ready to go by 7 30 8 o 'clock in the morning if not even earlier sometimes uh and i know a lot of schools put sports before school So we're talking about even earlier than that.

15:37Whereas in the summer, you can be up and functional, but it's kind of okay if your brain is still waking up. What do we expect? Week one, fatigue, irritability, meltdowns, clinginess, inconsistent performance, and excitement. remember that it's entirely possible to feel stress because of good things and because of not so good things so this is a brain and a nervous system and a body that's under a lot of stress but a lot of it is exciting the fact that they're excited about their classmates they're excited about maybe the transition to middle school or high school or a new school or a new teacher or they like the kids in their class or maybe they don't like the kids in their class but the fact that good things and exciting things are happening doesn't remove the stress from it.

16:28So then the second week, we're talking friction and fatigue. It's a hard week and it can actually be the hardest week depending on a few variables. So some folks around the country, y 'all are going back in two weeks, three weeks. Here up in Cleveland, it's typical to go back at the end of August. And a lot of schools will roll it in so that the first week is a four-day week, or the first week is a three-day week, and then the second week is a four-day week. And so just really depending on when you go back and how you go back. But that second week can be the hardest. And part of it is because the novelty is worn off.

17:07And the routines aren't quite automatic yet. So all the adrenaline and excitement and enthusiasm of going back to school and the new backpacks and the new gear and the new classmates, that's not as exciting anymore, but I don't automatically know all my routines quite yet where I'm supposed to be. And guys, morning is still so early, even that second week. So what are we looking for? We're looking for resistance. We're looking for emotional volatility, homework battles, sleep disruptions. These are those signals that the brain is on load, that there's a lot of brain strain. And it's not, again, I want to just caution us.

17:48You're here probably because you know this, but it doesn't hurt to say it again. These are signals of brain strain. And we want to lean away from the attributions about motivation, work ethic, caring, don't care, motivation, and all those other things. week three things will start to stabilize so systems are recalibrating the brain's starting to be able to get the juices going and the networks where it needs routines are starting to stick oh wait i know i have this class after that class and i learned last week that i don't have a lot of time between those two classes so i have to take all my books for both classes with me to algebra because i don't have time to run back to my locker before i have to go to language arts So they're beginning to make those adjustments and those routines will begin to stick.

18:39With repetition, those EF demands will decrease. So as they're getting used to a lot of these routines and habits, things will become more automatic, which is wonderful. And I always go back to the way that repetition can build executive functioning. These routines, when they become well learned and rehearsed, the morning routine, the pack my snack routine, pack for soccer routine, go to bed routine. The more you do them, the less frontal lobe involvement there has to be. And they become more automatic. Just like when you were learning how to drive. When you first were learning how to drive, it seemed like I'm never going to remember to check my mirror before I change lanes or, oh, I forgot to put on my turn signal or, oh gosh, I pulled out the driveway without my seatbelt on.

19:25And now, boom, we get to our destination and we realize we haven't even consciously thought about all those things that are now automatic. So this is why keeping up these routines until they become automatic can really decrease the EF load. So the emotional and cognitive load is starting to decrease by week three. And as a result, we can start to have more automaticity and things become more stable. So what are some strategies knowing what we know now that this is a cognitive overhaul? This is a big reboot. How can we use some of these my best strategies? So what does my best stand for? My is modify the environment.

20:09So the first strategy family, whenever you're thinking about my child's not meeting an expectation, the first thing I want you thinking of is how can I modify the environment? That's quick, it's easy, and it's under your control. So things like setting up your morning launch pad to reduce clutter and multiple harvesting locations. I got to grab my glasses. Oh, I got to run in my room. I got to grab my wallet and my keys. Oh, wait, shoot. I forgot to grab my lunch. I forgot. So the way that I explained it when my kids were younger and the way I do it with my patients is if you woke up five minutes before the bus was to come or five minutes before you had to leave the house, could you get out the door?

20:52In theory, that is how ready I want your launch pad to be. So if you have to keep your lunch in the fridge or your snack in the fridge or whatnot, I get it. But you want your launch pad area to be that ready. Not I'll grab my gym uniform in the morning or I'll throw my shoes in 100 % ready to go that you could be out the door in five minutes. Simplify the bedroom and the bathroom. So in other words, do a nightly reset. So there's not as many distracting things around the child. Lay out their clothing for the next day. lay down the socks and shoes, in the bathroom, get rid of any of the cosmetics or the products or things that they don't use on a regular basis.

21:33Only things on the counter should be the things that they absolutely have to use at night and absolutely have to use in the morning. Noise dampening tools at home, at school, in the bus or in the car. So remember that when they're at school, they are steeped in constant stimulation. When I go and I do in-school observations, I'm repeatedly floored at how overstimulating those environments are. Visually, auditorially, even smell-wise. And I know a lot of our kids are very sensitive to smells too. They'll hear the buzz of the fluorescent lights. They'll smell the food in the cafeteria or they'll smell the perfumes that other people are wearing or the hair care products.

22:18And so trying to make home and the car ride or the transport to and from the bus ride as minimally stimulating as possible. Low stimulation mornings. So minimal chatter, low light, soft lights. This was really critical for me when my kids were day in, day out going into school, especially at those younger ages, a soft place to land after school. In fact, I remember calling a seasoned veteran mom colleague of mine and explaining to her that my youngest, who's now 19, would just be a bear when I picked him up from school when he was four and five. And she said, you need to have a snack in the car.

23:00You need to have a snack in the car. It was life-changing, you guys. It was amazing. When we got in the car, I gave him a snack right away, and you could just see his shoulders drop and his face was less tense. He needed a snack. He needed a soft, quiet place to come into, his blanket, a stuffed animal. It made a big difference that when he got in the car, I wasn't going, hey, buddy, how was your day? What's going on? What did you do? No, mom. No motor mouth chatter, mom. Dial it back. Give me a snack. Give me my soft blanket. By the time we got home, he was my boy again. Consistent low distraction homework space.

23:37As much as you can possibly create a low distraction consistent place to get their homework done. And then just limit competing stimuli during transitions. TV off, siblings redirected, fewer choices. One of the things for me as a mom, and I go back to that experience as much as my patients, but because I lived it. My oldest and my youngest are eight years apart. And so their developmental needs when they got home were very different. And I had to be really aware that I had to have three different zones for three different kids because developmentally, what they needed and what they wanted were very different.

24:17So the my best, the my is modify the environment. B in best is break down tasks. So we want to turn get ready for school into a bunch of little steps because getting a big job done is actually just getting a lot of little jobs done. So what does that involve? Get up, go to the bathroom, brush your teeth, get dressed, have breakfast, grab things from your launch pad, and get out the door. And the E in my best is externalize important information. So this broken down, get ready for school in the morning is written on a list and they can just follow the steps. So what does it mean? And you can do it however you want.

25:06I love picture lists. And so a lot of families I work with, we take pictures of the child doing the things. So middle of July here, you have your child, show me what it looks like when you wake up in the morning and they stretch and you get a picture of them. then show them, you know, pointing to the toilet or walking into the bathroom, take a picture of them, take a picture of them brushing their teeth, take a picture of them pulling a shirt over their head, sitting at the breakfast table, grabbing their backpack, and then a picture of the door so that they know that those pictures are their sequence in the morning.

25:40And if you want to break those things down even more, go right ahead. So brush your teeth might show toothpaste, toothbrush, and the act of brushing. Getting dressed, you may want to demonstrate all of the pieces of clothing. So you want to do the same thing for get home from school, for get your homework done, for take a shower, for get ready for bed. Break these bigger tasks down into their subsequent steps. The way that I advise most families to do it is pretend like you have a babysitter coming over or pretend like you have your one and all expenses paid trip to Paris and you're going to be leaving for a few days.

26:22What would you tell that person step by step by step is the routine? And ask your child. So my nephew is now seven, going on 36. And I was over there babysitting not long ago. And he was like, no, that's not how we do it. You do this and then you do this and then you do that. I was like, dude, that is so helpful. I'm going to write that down so that the little steps that they think are important are really what are important. Break homework into startable bites. We always want to lower the entry point to get something started. Remember, initiation, task initiation is an executive function that our kids with ADHD struggle with.

27:06So getting started, you want to make it as little of a first step as possible. Break down homework into startable bites. Write just one sentence. Do just three math problems. Do just five minutes of reading. Use first, next, and last language for routines. So instead of rambling off three or four different steps, which this woman is very guilty of, first, I want you to take off your shoes. Next, I want you to hang your coat on the hook. Last, I want you to put your backpack on the hook. First, next, and last. preview the day in small pieces or chunks rather than the whole day. Again, I was really guilty of this because it was in my mind this way.

27:50So I, it would just come out my mouth that way. And I often had to remind myself, especially when driving to school and I am rambling off to my kids, what we're up to today, they would start to feel the overwhelm. And I realized that that's just me and the way my brain works. I don't want to do that to them. So this morning, I'm going to drop you off at school. Then when I pick you up from school, we'll talk about what's going to happen the rest of the day. If they want to know if they're old enough and they're capable and they want to know, hey, do I have soccer tonight? Is dad picking me up from school?

28:19Hey, is grandma coming over? Answer those questions, but let them determine what they want to know. And then break down emotional tasks. So if you're going to meet a new teacher or go into a new building, do that ahead of time, if at all possible. So when there's a big, heavy loaded emotional task, contact the school. Hey, I was wondering if we could come to meet the teacher the day before class begins. Or, hey, can we tour the building? Can my daughter see her locker? As much as you can interact with school into multiple small exposures, that's really, really helpful. And school usually is willing to work with you, especially if you have a plan in place.

29:00So my, modify the environment. B, break down big tasks into smaller steps. Now let's go on to the E, externalize supports. Remember when we're talking about ADHD, we're talking about limited working memory capacity. Working memory is that kind of mental counter space where you hold in mind what you're thinking about and processing right now. The best example that I can use is it's like baking in a camper. So if you're baking grandma's chocolate chip cookies and you're baking in a camper, you just don't have enough space to hold everything, manipulate everything. Eggs are falling on the floor. You don't remember what the next step is.

29:39Your working memory capacity is very limited. And that is what we know with ADHD is one of the primary cognitive challenges. If you're baking in a food network kitchen, fantastic. You've got all the space that you need. You can line up your ingredients. You can weigh and measure and blend the ingredients and make your cookies without losing important information or dropping your eggs on the floor. But if you're baking in a camper, you need more space. How do you get that space? You take things out of your brain and you put them up in your environment for easy, quick referencing. So we want to visualize the morning routine posted at eye level.

30:19Pictures are better than words. So what does that mean? that list of what is my morning routine, you put that up at eye level that they can reference at any time. That way they're not holding. Remember, cognitive load. I want you thinking this is really heavy for my kiddo. Cognitive load. Let's ease that cognitive load and take morning routine out of working memory and put it out in the environment somewhere for them to access and see. A written homework plan. Again, pictures over words. So you work with your child. What's a good way for you to get your homework done. What's the first thing that you think you want to do?

30:55What works for you? You interact with them and then you can make that into a list. Timers for transitions. Put time out of the brain and out externally. Remember, time blindness is a real thing. So five-minute warning, start the timer and go. Color-coded binders, folders, bins for each subject. Super helpful. It doesn't have to be overly complex. Visual weekly calendars for when they have practice, when they have tests, when they have appointments, and you'll need to guide them through what they write down. So my 19 year old, we now have his calendar in the kitchen and I'm working with him. His school has done it, but he just graduated.

31:35So now he needs to figure out how do I have my external calendar for my life, like doctor appointments and I need to be at work and my brother's wedding's coming up and how does an adult calendar. So that's now in our kitchen around the corner and him and I are working on that together. Checklist for routines that you broke down before, as I said, take pictures of your kids doing it. Body doubling. So if you're not familiar with body doubling, I recommend you look into it. It's pretty cool. So you have a second person nearby, but they're not directly helping you. Body doubling is great for those of us adults who are struggling to get the garage clean or organize our kitchen or, you know, clean out our gift cabinet or whatever you want to be doing.

32:23Or for me, it's laundry and putting laundry away. Having another person present. They're not even folding laundry. They're not even helping you clean your garage. They're just present. That activates more areas of the brain and you're able to get the task done. So body doubling is just having someone present. So yes, I do want them to have a low distraction, fully stocked and ready to go homework area. But if body doubling trumps that, having you present while they're working helps them stay on task longer and more focused or having a peer available, start looking at options where you're working alongside them.

33:04So when my kids during COVID, I have a home office and there I move their stuff into my home office with me. So we're all working, but we're working in the same space. Body doubling is quite helpful. It's quite a phenomenon. Okay. So my was modify the environment. B was break down tasks into steps. E is externalize supports. Take it out of working memory and put it out in their environment. S in my best is structure time. structure time. So create predictable routines and rhythms. Protect sleep. Guys, if you hear nothing from me today, make sleep a non-negotiable. Protect sleep. Non-negotiable bedtime window those first three weeks every day.

33:49Within an hour of going to bed and waking up, even on the weekends. Build in decompression time after school before homework. Timers, timers, timers, timers, timers, timers. So you can look up visual timers online. You can use a phone. You can use a clock. You can use a time timer, sand timers. Make time visible. Get it out of their brain. Make it visible. Dr. Barkley says it. I can't help but repeat, Dr. Barkley. If you say to a child with ADHD, you have five minutes, five hours, five days, five weeks, five months, five years, that's all gobbledygook to them. You need to make time external. You can use music to structure time as well.

34:33So a set playlist or countdown, a song, use consistent morning routines, but you want to time it without stress. So for some kids, yes, I know you're thinking my kid gets really stressed out with beating the clock and things like that. So music could be a better,

34:54breakfast. And so you start the song. It takes a couple of days for them to learn how long that song is, but set a homework start time window. So I want you starting your homework between six and six 30 or between, you know, three and three 30, depending on when they get home from school. My youngest was adamant. He wanted to come home, have a snack, change his clothes, get his homework done. He was adamant. He wanted his homework done before dinner. My middle, she was great with it after dinner because she wanted to come home. She would go to sports, come home, shower, eat, and then do her homework.

35:27Use time anchors. So homework begins after snack, shower begins after dinner. So that one activity anchors the next activity. And if you know anything about habit stacking and habit building, if shower comes after dinner, then as I'm having my dinner, I'm starting the preparatory mental behaviors for that shower because I know it's coming next. Keep weekends structured enough so that Monday's not a shock. And then on Sunday or whatever day you choose over the weekend, make that a reset. So set a clock, put on some enjoyable music, make it silly, but together you want to pack the backpack, check the schedule, preview the week, lay out clothes and uniforms, put in about an hour, 45 minutes.

36:18I know at our house, I would do the snack restock and the lunch restock. So I would make sandwiches for the kids. I would fill their snack bins so that the night before they could pack their lunches and they could pack their snacks. And then T. So my is modify the environment. B is break down the task. E is externalize important information. S is structure their time. And then T, last, is teach the skill. So the reason that teach a skill is last is because you cannot teach into an overwhelmed brain. It doesn't work. So think of it like this. You're out boating, you got a buddy in the water, and he starts drowning.

37:05That is not the time to say to him, hey, let me show you how to swim. So you want to turn your head? No, you don't teach an overwhelmed individual the skill you want them to have until they are in the boat, calm, safe. And then next week, we'll go to the Y and sign you up for swim lessons. So you don't want to teach an overloaded brain. You want to put the my, B, E, and S strategies in place first. Then when the brain is calm, ready to acquire new information, then you can start trying to teach some new skills. Teach them how to use those visual checklists with a sheet protector. Do it together.

37:43Then you do it while I watch you. Now you do it and you don't need me to watch you anymore. So I do, we do, you do. Practice and rehearse transitions. So do the morning routine with them a few times before the first day of school. Teach emotional labeling. Your tummy feels tight. Your stomach is upset. That may be anxiety or overwhelm. Let's take three deep breaths together. Model for them planning. Model for them how to break down a task. Teach problem solving. What are three things I can do if I get stuck? I can't find my gym uniform. Where are three places I might look first? And then make a list.

38:25Teach stop and self-monitor. Wait, do I have what I need? Normally I'm carrying three bags out the door. Right now I only have two. Why is that? What am I missing? So again, remember guys, by definition, ADHD is a disorder of impulse control. So we have to assume and expect they're going to be impulsive and not shame them for it. It is their disorder. So supporting them through that impulsivity with a stop sign on the door, a hold on, hon, stop, look at yourself, look in the mirror. Normally you have three bags, but I only see two. And you can even write on the mirror, three bags on your way out the door, write it on the door, on the way out the door.

39:12These are what I mean by accepting the person as they are and making those modifications that we can support to help fix the fit between the demand and the expectations and the brain that you have. Okay, so how do we put these in place? Week one, they're in that shock. So you're going to be heavy modify the environment, heavy breakdown tasks, heavy setting things in their external world, and heavy structuring time. Not so much teaching, not so much teaching. The focus is on reducing the load and protecting their bandwidth. They got a lot going on and they're going from summer OS to school OS. That is not the time to teach and lecture.

39:52That is a time to offer all those other supports. Week two, remember that could be the hardest week. Be really gentle again with the teaching. You're just modeling and showing them, but not shaming them if they're not picking it up yet. You want to keep up the modifying the environment. Keep up the breaking down tasks. Keep up the externalizing and keep up the structuring time. The focus now is on building stamina, the scaffolding, and again, increasing the predictability of what are the routines and what am I expecting. Now week three, you can start to fade those supports slowly, but as with fading supports, you're ready to put them right back in if needed.

40:32You're increasing their independence, increasing their choice. Remember, the whole thing is about I do, we do, you do. So you're moving into the you do. So the first week is a lot of I do. The second week is a lot of we do. The third week is a lot of go ahead and do it and I'll watch you. You can lean into the teaching now if that feels right, if it feels like they've stabilized and they're not as sort of drowny, overwhelming. So the focus here is on strengthening routines and building those skills. What about us as parents? Back to school struggles are normal. They're temporary. They're predictable.

41:10They're solvable. They are not fun, but we got this. What a plan for it. Plan for your own recalibration. So I know for me, I had to start a couple weeks earlier getting up a couple weeks ahead of time, getting up a little earlier. I wanted to go to bed earlier. So I started shifting my clock to the regular school year clock. So I've worked year round the whole time my kids were in school, but over summer I didn't have to get the kids to school or get their morning routine taken care of before I had to get to the office. So I would often sleep in a little bit more. Then I realized that, you know what, about two weeks before the kids start school, I need to start getting my routine back in place.

41:53They aren't necessarily resisting school. Their brains and their bodies are recalibrating. They may be resisting the routine and all of the brain-heavy work. When we fix the fit, though, our kids can thrive, and we have a lot more control over accepting who they are and modifying the environment, breaking down tasks, externalizing, structuring time, and then beginning to try to teach versus waiting around wondering or trying to shoehorn executive functioning into their brains when their frontal lobes just are not receiving. And independence grows from support. Always remember that. Independence is a scaffolded handoff.

42:35It's not pressure, lecturing, shaming, shooting. So how do you support yourself? Protect your re-entry window. By the way, This is something I learned as my kids were younger. If we're traveling, get home at least a week before school begins so we can start to make that shift. Simplify food radically. So it's not the time to try a new cool viral meal that you saw. Stick with routines, repeat breakfast, easy lunches, freezer meals. Help yourself out during this period. reduce optional life things so say no to anything that's not essential during those first few weeks so know that the quick coffee no to volunteering no to getting together preserve your own bandwidth those first couple weeks your kids need you if your child lives between homes try to align as early as you can if you need to bring in a neutral helper, get one.

43:37I found that after I went through my divorce, it was really, really challenging for my kids to schlep their stuff back and forth. Fortunately, it didn't last very long in that the back and forth thing, because we saw it was just too hard on the kids. But it was always a baseball hat's over there, my laptop's over there, my charging cord's over there. So really work on controlling as much of the communication as you can and get in alignment. Prep for tomorrow tonight. And then lower the bar everywhere you can for that first month. This is not the time to add in a new pre-dawn workout routine. It's not the time to quit smoking if you're a smoker.

44:17This is not the time to try to do something that is high stress, like, you know, I'm going to lose 40 pounds. Lower the bar those first few weeks and be realistic. All right. So hopefully you found some decent strategies in there and things to be helpful. And thank you so much for spending time with me and I'm happy to hear some questions. Thank you for that wonderful presentation, Dr. Chase. I loved that you shared how giving your son a snack in the car after school was life-changing. Wow. And I was almost embarrassed to think about it. I was like, this is my third kid, right? I'm a pro at this, but each one is different.

44:55And when she said, get him a snack, he's hungry. I thought, you know, it's like an eight minute car ride home, but nope, she's absolutely right so just made a huge difference yeah made a huge difference i remember after she told me i remember with my firstborn my mom used to walk around and tell me feed the bear feed the bear feed the bear and you know i never wanted to develop a habit in my children of seeking food for comfort there's a difference between i'm legitimately hungry or going through an afternoon sugar crash and, or, you know, blood, blood crash versus, um, I'm soothing myself with food.

45:31No, I cut up apple after school made all the difference for us. Yeah. I hope that helps people, um, who drive their kids to and from school. Okay. So we had a few questions around masking and acceptance. Um, how should I handle my daughter's masking at school and in social situations. I don't know if I should encourage her to mask when I tell her it's okay to be who she is. I want her to feel accepted and confident in different environments. How do you sort of balance that? It's a tough question because the answer is going to be it depends. It really depends on your child. And, you know, I dance around the word masking only because we all mask in some way.

46:23We all want our best selves as the self that's out there. What we need to understand is that putting your best self out there is more labor for neurodiversion individuals. And so we certainly wouldn't want, you know, the example that I like to use is like, if your kid has a wart on their finger, you don't want them walking around going, look at the wart on my finger. Look at the wart on my finger. Hi, Mrs. Owen. Look at the wart on my finger. We teach them, like there are things that we keep personal, things that we keep private, things that we keep to ourselves. And there are things that we share with others.

46:59if your child is so desperately exerting cognitive energy to masking to the point that there is just nothing left over um that they are so inside their own head i remember my daughter telling me she's my middle my daughter telling me that just going to school and then coming back home, I'm exhausted from trying to anticipate what the other girls are actually saying and want, what they want from me. What reaction do they want? It was the social piece. So what, if I say this thing I'm thinking, are they going to think I'm weird? And if I don't say this thing that I'm thinking, then I sit here quietly.

47:42What can I say? And that whole mental gymnastics piece. And so there's masking, which is I want to be more appropriate socially. And then there's masking that is completely handcuffing me from being in the moment. So you as a parent need to understand the level of impairment that masking is creating and then have conversations around that. Because I think a lot of masking is the social interaction and wondering how do I get along with other people and be myself while also not overly analyzing and anticipating what they're saying and how I'm going to say it back. So the answer to that really is it depends on how much of a functional impact masking is having.

48:31We want our kids to behave in public. We want our kids to. But if they are so hiding their neurodivergence to the point that they can't focus or think about anything else, then I would really encourage you to talk with someone, you know, an expert who can help them understand and accept exactly who they are as best as possible. So that if I do say something that appears kind of random and out of the blue with my daughter, we always called it lily padding. So somebody said something about their brother. So she, in her mind, is thinking about her brother. And then the conversation she had with her brother, which brings her back to they were in the kitchen.

49:07So then she's going to share a tangential thought. But the people who get you and love you don't mind the lily padding. The new people at school might go, what are you talking about? What does that mean to you? Is it okay if you have kids who wrinkle their eyes and nose at you and go, what is she talking about? Are you okay with that? So to me, it's really what are they masking? How are they masking? Is it the social implications? And then always walk in the line between how much of a functional impact is masking having? Okay. That's a complex answer. A mom says, my daughter's brain turns on at night and her overthinking kicks in.

49:45It's a challenge to get her to sleep before midnight. Do you have suggestions to help with this? Well, depending on age, I highly, highly recommend, you know, first of all, talk with your pediatrician or physician of choice about whether or not there is a sleep condition. Uh, it's entirely possible that there may be a phase disturbance or a sleep challenge. That being said, um, that's also someone you can talk to, not me, but someone, a medical person you can talk to about melatonin or, or some other things, but a couple of big things that I'd like to do in those situations. The first thing is a flat parking lot.

50:25And so I, uh, work with kids to journal, just take it out of here, put it in your book and put those thoughts in the parking lot. They'll be there tomorrow. You can pick them up tomorrow anytime you want, just like your car when you go to the grocery store. You leave in the parking lot. It'll be there when you come back. But take those thoughts and put them in the parking lot for now. You want to balance between I'm searching my brain for things to put in the parking lot versus these are the things that are already circling around in my brain. I'm just going to park them there. But it's a place, a lot of kids that I work with, a lot of adults I work with too, the things that swirl around in their brain, swirl around in their brain because they're afraid they're going to forget them.

51:10And so if you assure them, write those things down, get them written down, close the book, put the book in your desk drawer. Now let's do a set standard routine that involves mindfulness practices. Mindfulness is such an incredibly powerful tool. It teaches, it's you consciously working with your nervous system to calm down. So deep breathing, relaxing music, lowering the lights, good sleep hygiene. But I don't think you can go into that until you've done the thought parking lot. You have to acknowledge and recognize the stress producing thoughts and then put them away. What are some ways, someone asked, what are some ways to coach my child to use their 504 plan in middle school?

51:58Every teacher is so different and my child gets scared to bring up her 504 plan. Yeah, that's something that I remember really delicately balancing with my own children, with my own kids, offspring of mine. And it's something that we work with in my office a lot. How do you advocate while still being respectful? And if you're talking about a middle schooler, I think one of the things that I would encourage is have a three-way meeting with the teacher first. and let your child watch you advocate with respect and watch you use the language. The next thing is look at the accommodations that are listed or look at the things that are listed on the 504 and have your child explain to you why they're on there.

52:50Why do you need extra time? What does that help you do? Why do you need to have preferential seating? What is that? What does that help you do? If they can take the top three or five or whatever things that are written on that plan and articulate to you why they are on there, what is their challenge? What is the functional impact of their challenge? And how does this accommodation address that functional impact? Once they have that language, then you tell them it is a matter of you educating your teachers about what you need and why you need it. And this carries forward all the way through college.

53:27So if your child's not comfortable sharing their diagnosis, they do not have to. But what they can say is, and what I work with a lot of college students, what we say is, I have some cognitive challenges that have been documented. One of them is inattention. The inattention makes it really difficult for me to stay focused for 30 minutes to take a test. So I get a little bit extra time so that during those 30 minutes, if I need to stress stretch, get up, move around, or my brain wanders, I can still get the test done in the same amount of time that other kids would be given, but I get that extra time to make up for the inattention.

54:08So this accommodation is really important for me to address my cognitive challenges. That would be the kind of thing that they could say to the teacher so that rather than feeling like I'm needing to, and by the way, it is really hard to advocate for yourself to your teachers. And this drives me crazy when I consult with schools or I have a clinical case in my office and the teacher feedback is always, well, she doesn't ask for help. So she doesn't even know she needs help. Like she's so drowning. And so I think it starts with a three-way meeting, you, the child, and the teacher. And then you also working with the child to be able to articulate why those accommodations are there, that they are a direct result of the functional impact of their cognitive challenges and have them make that link.

54:58And you write it down and then you just role play with them. You do role playing and then you can do what we call empty chair. So the child can have three or four standard statements that they make to the empty chair all the time. The extended time really helps me with my inattention because it allows me the time that I need to get the task done and go from there. It is a practice. It is a skill that you can build over time. But it starts, I think, with understanding why that accommodation is there and you modeling for them having that three-way conversation. Okay. Someone writes, how can I help my 15-year-old daughter decrease the academic pressure she puts on herself?

55:37I've told her that I care more about effort than the actual grade and it's okay to fail and make mistakes, but she puts so much pressure on herself and gets anxiety over it. do you have any advice for this? I do. This is very, very common. What I find is a lot of times, even if the school says they're not putting pressure on the kids and the school has this, you know, policy that everyone is welcome here and all these other things, everybody knows who's applying where. Everybody knows who got into what colleges. Everybody knows who's in APs and honors and all those other things. So you can send the message as much as you want as a parent, but by 15, their environment is influencing that even more so than you.

56:25So continue saying those sorts of things. I would not be afraid to work with a psychologist or a therapist on that because what it actually boils down to is the child making self-valuations based on those external metrics. So if I don't fill in the blank, then I am unworthy, unlovable, not working hard enough, whatnot. So the question really comes down to what does that mean to you, honey? So talk to me about this stress. And you have to validate first, by the way, whenever you're working with any other human being who's got concerns about something. Yeah, I can see that's really hard for you.

57:07Yeah, I bet that's really frustrating for you. If you just come right in and counter and go, where's that coming from? What's that all about? You're not going to get anywhere. It starts with validation. I see this is really upsetting for you. I see this is really important for you. Let's talk about, help me understand where that's coming from. Well, if I, you know, am not in the honors class, then I don't have a chance of being in the honors class next year. And that looks really good on my college applications. Okay. And what, what does that mean for you? Well, it means that I'll get into a better college.

57:39Okay. And what does that mean for you? Well, it means I'll be more successful. What does that mean for you? And so really reflecting back to them, the path that they're getting to that this external achievement boils down to my view of myself as valuable and asking them if there's other ways they also feel valuable. But a lot of times that is done with the help of a therapist. Also, sometimes with some kids, I like to read autobiographies of people who didn't meet all of those criteria and see just how valuable their lives were. Right. For inspiration. Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you so much. That has to be our last question because we're out of time.

58:25But Dr. Chase, we appreciate you joining us today and sharing your expertise with our ADHD community. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. And thank you to everyone here today. If your question wasn't answered during the webinar, we do share audience questions with our experts, and yours may appear in a future issue of Attitude Magazine's Ask the Advisor column. If you'd like to take Attitude's ADHD Rising Stars survey, click on or scan the QR code on your screen. If you would like to access today's event resources, visit attitudemag.com and search for podcast 615. The slides of recording are posted a few hours after each live webinar.

59:09If you're listening in replay mode, simply click on the episode description. Please know that our full library of Attitude webinars is available as a podcast. It's called the ADHD Experts Podcast, and it's available on most streaming platforms. Make sure you don't miss future Attitude webinars, articles, or research updates by signing up to receive our free email newsletters at attitudemag.com slash newsletters. Thanks, everyone. Have a great day. For more Attitude podcast and information on living well with attention deficit, visit AttitudeMag.com. That's A-D-D-I-T-U-D-E-M-A-G.com.

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