Submitted by Hopeful Heart on 04/11/2018.
https://www.additudemag.com/too-much-drama-relationships/
i think many of us can relate to this article.
https://www.additudemag.com/too-much-drama-relationships/
i think many of us can relate to this article.
this would be my son. Thanks
Submitted by barneyarff on
this would be my son. Thanks for the article
This was my son, too.
Submitted by Hopeful Heart on
This was my son, too. However, my husband intervened and did something really radical in an effort to try to break him from that behavior. It worked and we've been ODD free for over a year. I wrote a post about it before and copied it here so you could read it. I don't know if your sons problems are as severe as mine, but I thought you might find it interesting.
Many children suffer from ODD (Oppositional Defiant Disorder) in conjunction with their ADHD. ODD is a condition that causes them to hate authority and hate rules. Some of these kids have trouble with all authority and rules. Some kids only have problems at home. Our 17 year old son has ADHD and ODD. He behaves quite well at school, work, church, camps, etc., but he has been discontent and miserable at home every day of his life. All day, every day is filled with adversity and chaos. He has been a teenager and a toddler to the extreme all wrapped up into one for his entire life. It has been an emotionally, physically, and mentally exhausting experience. It was compounded by the fact that for the first 15 years of his life my husband refused to acknowledge that there was a problem. I was our sons primary caregiver and I was the main target for his defiance, adversity, and chaos.
We recently figured out (with the help of a book) that he was using "chaos" as a drug. He was using it as a stimulant the way some people use aderall or coffee. We learned that it was possible to break him of the "chaos" habit by removing his ability to create chaos. Basically, we would hav to detox him from his drug of choice. It was very difficult to achieve this in our family home because there were too many distractions and too many people. My husband and my son moved out of our family home and into a farm house in the country. First, my son was stripped of all electronics (no phone, no tv, no computer, no internet, no video games). He had weights and a heavy bag and the great outdoors for entertainment. Second, my son was required to take care of himself. He had to wash his own clothes, wash his own dishes, clean the house, etc. Lastly, when he tried to be defiant and create chaos, my husband refused to react and completely ignored him. All of these things were much easier to achieve in a very basic and simple setting with only two people. It was difficult and stressful for my husband. Much of the time my husband lived in a dirty house with piles of dirty clothes and dishes because my son refused to follow the rules. But, my husband never lost his cool and never gave him the reaction that he was looking for. My son wasn't allowed to go anywhere or do any activities until he followed the rules, which was very rarely. After three months, my husband got shingles (stress). At that point we abandoned the "experiment" and they returned to our family home. They have been back for about a month now and shockingly, my son is like a new person. He is calm, mature, and cooperative. The change is nothing short of miraculous. He even said to me just a few days after they returned, "I feel like I'm out of my miserable stage." I don't think he really understands the extent to how miserable he really was.
Thank you for writing this.
Submitted by barneyarff on
Thank you for writing this.
What a brave soul your husband was to take that on. Was your son in school at the time? How did you keep your son from just walking off?
We had to lock up the kitchen knives and hide the car keys.
Our son ran away from home (we knew where he was) during his senior year. He dropped out of school and went to live with his boyfriend and the boyfriend's mom---both of whom had told him school was stupid.
He had torn up our home, stolen money, got in trouble with the law and stolen our cars, took drugs, smoked cigarettes. The chaos was at a level that I don't how it didn't kill all of us.
Of course my ADD husband would agree to strong boundaries then let our son get away with all kinds of stuff. His excuse would be that he wanted to give our son the "benefit of the doubt" I still shake my head over that.
But when he turned 18, I "freed" myself from his chaos. He was a legal adult and no longer my responsibility It's interesting...... he lost everything eventually, including his boyfriend. I offered to drive him to the homeless shelter because I simply would not allow him back into my house.
He is staying with friends now and doing some manual labor. He calls me several times a week and is quite talkative. I try to tell myself that I care. But his abuse as an angry chaotic teen has pretty much killed any affection I felt for him. I feel very terrible about this but it is the truth.
This is a kid who had everything. We had saved up enough for him to go to college without student loans, we were going to buy a condo for him to live in and give him my old car.
We traveled. We gave him flying lessons when he wanted them. We tried to give him boundaries. I was a "mean Mom" (and now I'm the one he calls. He rarely calls his dad) We didn't spoil him but we wanted to give him every advantage we could.
He threw it all away.....for what.......
And he threw away any love I had for him too.
When my son was a sophomore
Submitted by Hopeful Heart on
When my son was a sophomore he was hanging around the wrong crowd. He told me one night that he was going to go out with one of his friends. I told him no because I knew that that friend was only 15 years old and didn't have a car or a drivers license. He snuck out and went anyway. He unknowingly got into a car that had just been reported stolen and the police were actively looking for. We were in the process of reporting him as a runaway when he came back home. Thankfully, he didn't end up getting into trouble with the law because he wasn't actually involved in taking the car. After that incident, he realized that he didn't like being lied to and manipulated by his 'so called' friend. He also didn't like getting into trouble with the police involved. It was a really good lesson for him at just the perfect time. However, he still made our home life completely miserable. About four months later my husband intervened and took him to the secluded farmhouse.
He never became violent with us. However, as he got older and bigger I was afraid of him. I would be so exhausted and frightened from his harassment that i would lock myself in my room and call my husband to come home and help me. He could have easily picked the lock, but he never did. He just stood there and yelled and banged on the door.
I know what it's like to not want your own child. I begged my husband many times to send him away to a school for troubled youth. I didn't only want relief for myself, but I also wanted relief for my son. He seemed to be so miserable and genuinely seemed to hate us. I thought he would be happier in a different environment. My husband never agreed with me and I guess in the long run he was right.
He still likes and needs a lot of attention, but now he tries to get attention in good ways, instead of creating chaos.
My heart breaks for you. I know the pain that you feel when you give your child everything that you can and they hate you for it.
No Words
Submitted by phatmama on
Barneyarff, there are no words to describe how profoundly affected I was by your post about your son above. That is the tragedy of ADHD in a nutshell--broken families, broken dreams, broken lives. The chaos and its toll on our spirits is enormous. When we wake up on day and are 45 or 50 or 55 and realize the best years of our life are gone and this is what is left--the fallout from cognitively challenged, emotionally dysregulated people and their burdens we have shouldered. The life force we have given away, or had taken. The feeling of having squandered our youth, talents, abilities, and LOVE on people who never gave back even a fraction of what they were given, or, in some cases like yours, actually gave back in spades--but nothing good, just more soul-crushing drama and emotional abuse and exploitation. It is devastating to give a child everything and then watch it be for naught. The flying lessons--we are currently giving our 21 year old daughter those--plus college-- and that is not cheap. What could that money have bought YOU (or in my case ME) that would have made you happy? Where could you have gone--a cabin in the woods for two weeks? an oceanfront condo? a tour of the Irish countryside? Would you have liked to have upgraded your car or your home or saved more money or put more away for retirement? All of that spent for a failing child in an untenable situation adds up to things we did NOT give ourselves and can't get back. There a lot of emotional and despairing posts on here, but your matter-of-fact, calm recitation of the damage done to your life by your DS and your DH's inability to back you up has just really touched me to the core. As a woman, we give until it hurts, and I am just really questioning that right now . (In fact, I am in Celebrate Recovery for Codepedence--should have done it 30 years ago not three weeks ago).
My ex-husband's: "It's your
Submitted by PoisonIvy on
My ex-husband's: "It's your fault" and "My thoughts are more terrible than your thoughts."
It was always interesting and frustrating to me that my ex would claim to hate fighting and disagreeing but would always find something to be oppositional about with me.
H heart, wow great article
Submitted by dedelight4 on
Wow, I have heard SO MANY of those same phrases (that the doctor was talking about) from DH, over the years. The EXACT same words......amazing. Great article.
Article Response
Submitted by phatmama on
Seeing this link, right now, is my "wink" from the universe today. On the way to work about 30 minutes ago, I was talking in my video diary (I record my thoughts every morning on the way to work on my phone for my family someday). Anyhoo, today's topic for my 30 minute commute was MY MOTHER and how just yesterday she goaded me and goaded me and goaded me until I blew up AGAIN despite the fact that she has been doing this to me my whole life and I have promised myself a million times that I am NEVER GOING TO LET HER PUSH MY BUTTONS AGAIN. And then what happens, an innocent conversation turns toxic in a split second when for no reason that I can fathom, she does "her thing" and takes a simple comment and turns it into a weapon. What is really creepy, and has damaged me over the years more than anything, is THE LOOK ON HER FACE WHEN SHE IS PROVOKING ME--she loves it!!!!! LOVES IT!!!!!! The more upset I get, the more she gets off. You can almost see her little ADHD brain firing up and coming to life the more escalated I get. After these interactions, I always feel so violated by her and ashamed of myself and degraded and damaged by the whole situation. After 49 years of this dynamic, I feel like I should be farther along in having a way to unhook as soon as she gets going, but she is sneaky and very, very good at what she does as this article states when it says "The individual with ADHD senses vulnerability in others and works on them until he or she explodes"---YES!!!. And I am like an idiot who gets dragged into it EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Because I have PTSD (from her, ironically) , my reactions are intense and fast and huge and according to this article EXACTLY WHAT SHE WAS LOOKING FOR. This just totally sucks and I feel awful today. When she attacks me like this, I feel drained and powerless for days. I know this is a marriage forum, but I just had to respond to this article because it is literally exactly what I am dealing with right now and actually have been my whole life with her. The rest of the article actually does hit the nail on the head with my dynamics with my ADHD older daughter ("I Say the Opposite of What You Say") and my ADHD spouse ("Let's Call it Even" ) also. You would think that after being raised and traumatized by a parent with ADHD that I would run for my life instead of marrying someone with ADHD and having children with ADHD with them. I guess we are all just a hot mess. Sorry for all the "CAPS" but I am still very upset and feeling very escalated and intense today after being triggered yesterday, too, a day after this happened. #ADHDlife
Oh the drama!
Submitted by Dagmar on
This is just what I needed to read. Thanks! Things have been relatively drama-free here for a couple of weeks because during our last fight, I just focused on the drama aspect.
After being jobless for two years, he found a job. The job wanted him to move. He didn't think it was necessary to give me details about the move and so I found out that "I told them I couldn't move my family until summer and they said they would work with me," actually meant that he was moving in two weeks. Then, thankfully for me, they fired him the day before he was supposed to leave.
I just couldn't deal with the drama. So instead of hounding him to get a job and working myself up to deal with his garbage, I suggested we go away for a couple of days and just ignored everything else. I know he was sad about losing the job, and I didn't want to rub in his face that I was going to spend the months that he wasn't living with the family figuring out if we should just stay apart for good.
Everything was really great. Then, I found the email. He had purchased some expensive music equipment. After about 15 hours of fighting and drama, I got out of him that he had cashed in his retirement to pay off over $10,000 in credit card bills that I didn't know about, and had a little left over. All of this was terrible, yes, but the thing was, that if he had just talked to me about all of this, none of it would have been this much of a problem. We may have come up with better solutions, but the main was that he just didn't tell me.
So instead of focusing on what he did, I focused on the fact that I just couldn't take all this drama and I was sick of it. It seemed to click. Of course we're far from being out of the woods. I recently found out that "the unemployment office needed more stuff" meant "I was denied and assumed you knew that." But instead of becoming defensive, arguing semantics, and using circular logic on me until I lost my mind, he apologized and said that he was trying not to cause drama and was upset that he did again.