Taylor Allbright, PhD has written us an honest and thoroughly researched article (with citations) that ultimately offers enthusiastic, evidence-based encouragement for practicing mindfulness, which she says contributes to “an upward spiral for the whole family, helping everyone’s mental health and wellbeing.”
Check out Taylor’s Substack: ADHD Unpacked.
“…when parent mental health is addressed, we see better results for both the parent and the child.”
Taking Care of Parents Helps Everyone
My mental health has always been precarious. But, before I had kids, I managed pretty well with a substantial mix of therapy, medication, meditation, and exercise…
Then I became a mom.
First a step-mom, then a bio-mom. Enter step-parenting stress, parenting stress, postpartum depression, fluctuating hormones, sleep deprivation, and chronic pain.
My carefully curated pre-parenthood self-care regimen was decimated.
The cruelest, harshest, and most desperate voices in my brain grew louder and louder. My well-being cratered in a way I had never experienced before motherhood.
The screaming is the hardest for me.
The crying newborn who just cannot latch. The kindergartener who wants more screen time. The toddler who wants Daddy, but I’m the only one there. The preschooler who doesn’t want to wash their hands.
When my child is emotionally flooded and a meltdown begins,
my stomach knots,
my heart pounds,
my own emotions begin to flood, and
my body longs to scream, cry, and kick right alongside my distressed child.
When I make attempts at my own self-care, there’s an onslaught of guilt.
“How dare you use precious daycare minutes for a workout or a nap – if you’re not working, you should pick up your child early! What kind of mother leaves her child for a weeklong meditation retreat?”
(Sometimes I don’t feel guilty, but then I feel guilty about not feeling guilty, which amounts to the same thing!)
The thing is, I know that when I’m in a good place, I’m a better parent.
I’m more present, more patient, more kind. And when the meltdowns start, and my own nascent meltdown rises, I’m able to access the calm, compassionate core deep within me that actually has the capacity to take care of both myself and my struggling child.
For this post, I sought to do a deep dive into contemporary scientific research on parenting ADHD kids. I’m an ADHD coach, and many of my family members are neurodivergent, so I wanted to learn about this on both a personal and professional level.
And what really stood out to me, as I read study after study, is that parent mental health is kid mental health.
If we’re talking about supporting ADHD kids, we’re also talking about supporting their parents, and vice versa. (While I was focused on research about parenting ADHD kids, it seems to me that this likely applies to other neurodiverse families as well.)
Here’s a summary of what I read in the research:
Parents (especially mothers) of ADHD kids experience way more parenting stress than parents of non-ADHD kids.
Parent mental health struggles are hard on kids. Mental health challenges affect parenting practices and parent-child relationships, and they make it hard to implement new parenting strategies.
Supporting parent mental health supports family mental health. Research shows that giving parents mental health support along with parenting training helps both parents and kids.
Parent mindfulness benefits the whole family. Mindfulness is linked to warm, consistent parenting, lower parent anger, and higher child emotional self-regulation.
Parents of ADHD Kids Experience High Stress
Study after study after study has shown that parents (especially mothers) of ADHD kids report much higher levels of parenting stress than parents of non-ADHD kids. Parents of ADHD kids also report lower self-esteem, higher rates of depression, lower rates of social support, and higher levels of conflict between co-parents.
When asked about why they’re so stressed, interviewed parents talked about feeling…
Inadequately supported by educators and medical providers
Triggered by kids’ emotional or physical outbursts
Overwhelmed by the amount of parenting labor and lack of support
Saddened by their kid’s self-criticism, depression, or other painful struggles
Hyper-vigilant of their child’s behavior and moods
Pressure to be a perfect parent
Frustrated when friends and family misunderstand ADHD
Fed up dealing with social stigma
“ADHD is heritable, so parents of ADHD kids are very likely to have ADHD themselves – and adult ADHD is itself linked to both depression and increased parent stress.”
About half of ADHD kids have at least one ADHD parent. In fact, a lot of adult ADHD diagnoses occur after a child is diagnosed – and this is especially common among women (for reasons I go into here).
When Parents Are Struggling, Kids Are Struggling
Parent mental health struggles are hard on the whole family.
Parent stress is related to harsh, authoritarian parenting practices (including corporal punishment) and poor parent-child relationships.
Depression can make it extraordinarily difficult or even impossible to be loving, present, and compassionate with our kids. Depressed parents are more likely to be withdrawn, irritable, emotionally unavailable, and disconnected.
Taking good care of ourselves – getting enough rest, leisure time, social connection, movement, nourishment, personal fulfillment – helps us reduce our stress and prevent or manage depression. And this makes us better parents.
When you’re a parent, taking care of yourself IS taking care of your kids.
Moreover, cultural and structural changes that benefit parent well-being benefit child well-being. For example:
social programs that reduce financial stress,
robust parental leave and childcare,
workplace policies that prevent burnout,
cultural support for rest
…I could go on and on.
We Have to Treat Parent Mental Health Too
When it comes to kids’ mental health conditions, the first-line recommendations from medical providers are usually about learning and applying new parenting strategies.
However, research shows that it is very difficult for parents with mental health challenges to implement new parenting practices.
When a parent is experiencing stress and depression, it is really hard to apply evidence-based parenting strategies like:
strengthening the parent-child connection,
being present with your kids,
child-directed play,
frequent positive parent-child interactions,
consistent routines, and
gentle yet firm boundaries
Overall, it’s abundantly clear that if we want to support the well-being of kids with ADHD, we have to address the well-being of their parents.
Just telling a stressed, depressed, overwhelmed parent to implement a more consistent morning routine is not going to help them.
We need to think about holistic support for the whole family.
This was really clear in a study that compared two types of classes for parents of ADHD kids. One focused only on parenting strategies. But the other one included therapy for parents’ own mental health alongside the parenting stuff.
The parents in the therapy program saw more improvements in their mental health than the parents in the regular program – and that is to be expected. But what is super interesting is that the parents in the therapy program saw more improvement in their parenting practices and a greater improvement in their children’s mental health.
In other words, when parent mental health is addressed, we see better results for both the parent and the child.
Support your mental health by joining our community of parents who understand:
Parent Mindfulness Benefits The Whole Family
My own mindfulness practice–including the times I’ve guiltily left my kids to attend silent meditation retreats–has helped me enormously with my parenting journey.
There is a ton of research on the value of mindfulness in parenting.
Among parents of ADHD kids, higher levels of mindfulness are linked to greater well-being, more consistent parenting, warmer and more nurturing relationships with kids, and lower levels of anger.
What was really interesting: when parents practiced mindfulness in order to regulate their own anger, they saw greater levels of emotional self-regulation in their ADHD kids.
The causal relationship here isn’t clear – does kids’ emotional self-regulation help parents be more mindful and less angry, or is it the other way around? But I’m pretty sure (and most scientists seem to agree) that the relationship is complex and bidirectional.
When kids are doing well, it helps parents. Kids who are self-regulated make it easier for parents to be mindful, warm, and calm. At the same time, a mindful, warm, and calm parent helps kids be self-regulated.
Mindfulness is thus part of an upward spiral pattern for the whole family, helping everyone’s mental health and well-being.
Thank you for reading this article about parenting ADHD kids! I do these research deep dives regularly in my newsletter ADHD Unpacked, along with an assortment of my own stories and thoughts about mental health and executive functioning.
Connect with Taylor N. Allbright, PhD:
ADHD Coach | taylorallbright.com
Author of the Newsletter ADHD Unpacked
Did any of this research resonate with you? Or did anything seem different than your own experience? Are there things about parenting ADHD kids that you wish scientists would study more? We’d love to hear what you think!
As the mother of 2 ADHD kids who are now in their 20s, learning self-care - me, them, my husband - was a critical strategy for managing our journey through their adolescence. I do believe they now have a strong foundation for their own self-care.