ADHD can be a challenging condition for the whole family to deal with. With help and support you and your child can find ways to help them become much more than their condition. Below you’ll find a number of tools and techniques to help your family live life well with ADHD.
Xenidate XL contains a medicine called methylphenidate. When methylphenidate is taken for a long time it can slow the growth of some children. Your child’s doctor will watch their weight and height carefully while they are taking Xenidate XL. They’ll also watch their blood pressure, pulse and their appetite to make sure they’re healthy. To keep a record of your child’s development yourself, you can find a printable measurement tracker in the support section.
Your doctor may recommend your child occasionally takes a short break from treatment (sometimes known as treatment holidays). For example some people stop taking their treatment over the weekend or for the whole of the school summer holidays. Treatment holidays can do several things: test whether your child still needs to be treated for their ADHD, they can give them a short break from possible side effects (e.g. reduced appetite), or they might help with the changes in growth that methylphenidate can cause in some children.
Simple on-the-spot exercises can help improve your child’s ability to use self-control, whether that means helping them to pay attention in the moment or helping them to calm down. You don’t have to have ADHD to use these exercises, they can help anyone who needs a bit of calm.
Look at the animation. Match your breathing to the way the shape moves – breathe in until the shape
is at its biggest and then breathe out until the shape is at its smallest. Keep going for as long as you can – it should help you feel calm.
Pick something natural that you can see around you and look at it carefully for a couple of minutes.
It could be a leaf, an animal or even the whole sky. Explore every bit of it – ask as many questions as you can think of, for example:
Get your child to focus on the centre of the moving colour pattern.
Explain that they should just let their brain think whatever it wants but they should notice what thoughts are popping into their mind.
Make sure they’re careful not to get lost in thought – the aim is to just let their thoughts pass them by.
If they struggle to get past a particular thought or feeling talk to them about what it was and why it got stuck.
Try this exercise when a thought or feeling keeps happening over and over again and is beginning
to get a bit too much. Name the following, either out loud or in your mind:
things you can see around you
e.g. a car, the road, a chair, my mum)
things you can feel right now
(e.g. my feet in my shoes, my arm on the table, my hair on my neck)
things you can hear right now
(e.g. birds, washing machine, car)
things you can smell right now
(e.g. grass, coffee, clean clothes)
thing you like about yourself
(e.g. I’m really good at maths, I made my sister smile this morning)