Expert: Sarah-Jayne Caroline Bass from www.adders.org - 10/16/2006

Question
My son (15 and with ADD)is now a sophomore in high school. He is doing poorly in two classes this semster and also struggled in some classes last spring. He is certainly bright enough to achieve A's and B's, but seems to lack self-discipline and motiviation. In addition, he becomes angry whenever his father or I try to discuss the situation with him. Unfortunately, a lot of the foundation that we would like to have for our son was not really laid as we were struggling with just keeping him in class when he was originally diagnosed with ADD. Now that it is far more under control we are trying to help him do as well as he can in school. His father and I have been divorced since he was 1. Our son goes to his father's house after school. Homework is done in the afternoons as he has martial arts four nights per week from 6:30-9.
He consistently tells us he does not want our help, and that it makes him angry when we bring up the subject of school performance. This seems manipulative to me and I am wondering how hard should we push? In the past, he has "shut down" if we push too hard, but fails to complete his assignments or does poorly in school if we back off too far. If left to his own devices it does not seem that he will succeed.
Please let me know what other information would be helpful in understanding our issue and any feedback that you might have.
Thank you

Answer
hi

thanks for posting

to be honest i am based in the UK so things are really different to where you are in the USA

however obviously things on the personal side of things are similar

i would actually suggest that you check out my main site at www.adders.org where there is a lot of information and advice and support as i am sure that on there you will find a lot of information that would help you

we also have a forum board where we have a lot of parents talking to each other a lot of the time with many of the similar problems which i think you could get a lot of help and support from

hope this helps