The 5 Key Ingredients for Your Child’s Grit and Resilience
AcademicAlly, LLC: April 17, 2024
As AcademicAlly, LLC marks Amazing April, we highlight the many gifts that come with having ADHD. This week, we home in on resilience and grit.
When I was growing up, there was a sweet, inspiring song I would sing whenever I fell down: “Pick yourself up dust yourself off, and start all over again.” Whether I was learning how to ride a bike (and falling into the clutches of my mother’s rosebushes) or mastering my soccer footwork (and kicking an opponent’s toe instead of the ball, breaking my own toe in the process), this little ballad encouraged me to literally pick myself up off the ground and try again. This hard-learned lesson has far-reaching implications for virtually everything we attempt in our lives. We won’t always meet with success. Social circles may reject our very genuine attempts to integrate ourselves into a new group of friends. Bosses may critique our presentations intended to woo a prospect to our firms. And on a more basic level, an attempt at a new recipe may end up burnt to a crisp! But in the end, we must find the fortitude to stand up again, learn from our mistakes, and press forward.
Kids who have ADHD are very familiar with this pattern of failure. They arrive late to class or call out in the middle of a teacher’s lecture. Assignments are intermittently late or missing. Test scores are abysmal due to poor time management or a complete lack of awareness that the test had been assigned. Teachers frequently label these kids “lazy” or “defiant” failing to understand the nuances of the neurodivergent brain. They lose their tempers and frequently humiliate the children in front of their peers. Justifiably, our educators grow resentful of the disruption and seeming disregard for their classroom rules and standards of behavior and performance. In the social arena friends start to pull away because of impulsive interruptions of conversations. They resent the frequent last-minute change of plans, and eventually, the poor kid who struggles with executive functioning, is left out in the cold, without a single friend to help them rebound. Yes, ADHD students know what it means to fail day after day. They know the heartache that comes with realizing they have let down yet another person in their lives. The guilt they inflict upon themselves is more powerful than anything anyone else could possibly impose upon them.
And yet, these neurodivergent kids keep coming back swinging because they have more grit and determination than anyone I have ever met, including the Flyers mascot, Gritty. So, what is the secret sauce? What empowers these kids to dust themselves off in the face of falling down? Here are the secrets our ADHD friends use to develop their grit and resilience:
Learn from mistakes:
ADHDers are well-versed in making mistakes. But those who are self-aware view each disappointing outcome as a teachable moment. They put on their analytical thinking caps and examine the situation: What went wrong? What were the obstacles to success? How could these challenges have been addressed? Could they be avoided? What steps can be taken to create a better outcome? Instead of viewing each mistake as a catastrophic self-defining moment, they use the experience to grow. They use their experience, they don’t allow their experience to use them.Birds of a feather:
If you are interested in succeeding, you need to surround yourself with people who share the same values and personality. People who are optimistic instill enthusiasm in others. Debby-downers only serve to squelch hope and optimism. Kids who are neurodivergent know this, and in many cases have experienced the former far too often. Too many people have doubted their ability to succeed; some have even gone so far as to broadcast this pessimism in a public forum. Whether it’s the athletic field, a classroom, or a hallway, at some point, someone has publicly humiliated them, creating their own sense of self-doubt. The gritty kid has somehow managed to see past their low self-esteem and surround himself with friends and adults who believe in his ability to succeed. In doing so, he starts to believe in their positivity and uses his newfound self-efficacy to guide him through the rigors of each day.Lemons and lemonade:
The resilient student knows that any failure and any challenge does not need to define her. She knows that even with failure she can take the lemons and make lemonade. In fact, some kids are so gifted at this feat that they take it a step further and create a beautiful lemon merengue pie! In this kid’s eyes, there is always a silver lining to be had, she knows she just has to look for it. Such a positive attitude breeds confidence and the belief that almost anything is possible.Self-compassion:
We probably all agree that we are our own worst critics. For many students who have ADHD, perfectionist standards muddy waters that are already murky. The bar is set too high, and, in the end, the kid is doomed to fail from the outset. The resilient kid has processed this tendency and recognizes the importance of having compassion for himself. I am not talking about giving himself an easy out when the going gets tough. This student knows the importance of positive self-talk and taking his time to process a situation before acting on it. He readily accepts that a task might be difficult, but patience with himself and the allowance to make mistakes empowers him to find confidence in his pursuit of success.Passion projects:
ADHD kids can be very rigid when it comes to engaging with an activity or a group of people. The mental energy it takes to focus runs on short supply, so any topic or cause that does not appeal to her will frequently be rejected. This student knows that about herself, and when she has the luxury of free time, she will passionately pursue that which she enjoys. As discussed in our previous blog post (“Four Reasons Why Your Child’s Hyperfocus is Advantageous”), this resilient student will thoroughly engross herself in projects and topics she enjoys, empowering her to become an expert. If you think about it, this is a remarkable gift considering so many of us either don’t know where our passions lie or we do, but we don’t always take the time to pursue them!