My 11yr old son that is ADHD/LD with social behavioral problems

My 11 year old son has major behavioral problems at school and at home, he doesn't thing he has any problems, we have gone to neurologist, therapist, psychistics and his ped. What else can we do to help him before it's to late?  Nothing is working..

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

Dear Ms. Clarke,

There need to be two avenues in the treatment: one is the direct, face-to-face work that is done with your son; the other is the parent collaboration/guidance that goes alongside the individual therapy, education, medication, etc.

So it's important to find a person, or team, of mental health or behavioral health professionals who will adopt the general approach to the work I mentioned above. That is, you'll want to locate professionals who believe it is important to work with a child directly, and that it is equally important to work with parents and educators in a collaborative fashion to help the child. Individual treatment alone will not be effective.

[Scooter's Mom]

Hello Sue,

Invested efforts such as those you mentioned may seem like they aren't paying off.  It may seem quite frustrating.  As the doctor mentioned, though, face to face is extremely important.  I was lucky.  A parent training program in my area teaches parents the "back door approach" to reaching this type of behavior.

The primary concepts are to build your relationship with your child by offering him plenty of hourly praise, an incentive program for good behaviors, and absolute consistent consequences.

In other words, parents must provide more than love and help.  They must also work at sustaining an objective 'in control attitude' with kids who believe that they are dictators.  

Think positive with love/stay in control.