How do you talk to your child about their upcoming evaluation?

[Anonymous]

My son has his evaluation for suspected ADHD in a few weeks, and I'm not sure how to address it with him. He's six, very sensitive and gets down on himself easily. I need to give him some sort of explanation about why he's meeting with a special doctor and what they're going to discuss. However, I'm at a loss of how to address it. Anyone BTDT and want to share?

[Anonymous]

My DS was 12 and incredibly self-conscious about the testing and we explained that we all needed to better understand how he learns, how he processes information. We reminded him that he is a smart awesome kid that learns differently than some of his friends and that we just wanted some help understanding it. At 12 he is self aware enough to get some of this.

[Anonymous]

Don't forget that your son is used to going to the octor merely because you say so: that's what he's doing every time he has a well child visit. We took our child (5 at the time) to two dev peds. The first time I probably over-explained and said that just like she goes to the docotr to get her body checked out every year, at age 5, she has to get her brain checked out. For the second, I just said that [name of doctor] was going to play with her for a bit, and she never asked why. I called that doctor Ms. [name] rahter than doctor, because she didnt look like a doctor (no white coat, etc.), so there no reason to introduce that.

As far as your son knows, everyone does this. He doesnt have your adult concerns.

[Anonymous]

For this kind of testing we often let them know that we are going to meet with Dr. First name and play some games, that it will take a couple of hours, and that we're going for ice cream afterwards. (From the kid's perspective, it is more like playing games than being "tested.")

Often our kid doesn't ask why are doing this and we don't give this explanation up front.

[Anonymous]

DC didn't ask, and it seemed like fun to him, not like a doctors appointment. He was 5. Dr. Dan Shapiro has an easy going manner. For older children, I'd mention it briefly and move on unless they have questions. Give info to the level of the question.

[Anonymous]

When we had my son tested at age seven, he was well aware that he was different than other kids and that there were things that were difficult in a way that other kids didn't experience. I talked to him about these differences and told him that we need to understand how his brain worked so we could figure out whether there were other things we could so to make school more successful for him, and so he was going to be evaluated. His only two questions were whether he would get a shot and whether it would be painful at all. I actually think it was an ice breaker of sorts to be able to openly talk about things with my son.

[Anonymous]

How old is the child? Makes a big difference in how to approach it.

[Anonymous]

My son was six as well. Is yours having a neuropsych exam? When we had done OT we talked about playing games but I didn't feel like the neuropsych exam would be game-like/fun enough to say that. We just told my son that we were going to meet with some doctors who were going to study how his brain works. We talked about how exciting it would be to understand more about it and also how it would help us figure out how to find the best school for him (we were switching schools anyway). That was really it. He got to miss some school for the tests and he knew he would be getting lots of breaks and snacks at every break. My child is extremely sensitive, too, and he was fine with the whole experience.

[Anonymous]

OP here. I really appreciate the feedback. I realize that a lot of this is my anxiety about the process and that I need to keep that to myself and not telegraph it to my son. I'm going to do my best not to make a big deal about this unless he asks a lot of questions. If he pushes for more information (which he tends to do), I'll explain that the doctor just wants to see how his brain works and what we can do to help him to his best in school. Again, thanks for the information.

[Anonymous]

I was very honest with my son about why he was being tested, in an age appropriate way. (He was in second grade). He was struggling so we told him we were having him evaluated so we could figure out how his brain worked, and that way we could make sure he got the help he needed and also knew what his strengths were. He burst into sobs when we told him what we were doing. At first I thought he was upset or nervous, but once he caught his breath he told us he was crying because he was "relieved." That was almost three years ago and it still makes me well up a little to remember it.