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[quote=Anonymous]I just can't, at this moment, see this child growing up to be a happy, productive member of society. I hope I am catastrophizing, but I feel so down because nothing ever seems to improve with him. He's a boy and he's got ADHD (treated), both of which can lead to a later maturity, so we'll see. I also think there may be some depression at play, so we're working on that as well.

The thing that makes me worry about him is that he does not put effort into anything. He half asses everything and then lies about it. You have to tell him each step every single day and then you have to follow behind him to make sure he's done it, then tell him to do it again when he clearly didn't do it, then watch or the cycle will repeat itself. I'm not even trying to catch him lying and I can't help but see so many, so I can only wonder about the stuff he does/doesn't do that we don't notice. Homework, hygiene, picking up after himself, eating snack after snack. Although it's constant, it's all little stuff but I feel pretty sure that's because he's too young to get into big stuff.

I don't want every interaction to be a negative one, so often I'll try to ignore the first several times something simple didn't happen but then he will just argue and argue. Here's a small example (it's just [u]one small example[/u] but so many things are just like this.).

As we're getting ready to leave, I call to him, "Are you ready to go? Did you brush your teeth yet?" 
Answer, "Yep!"

As I walk past the bathroom I see his toothbrush in the container (he never puts it in the container) and his brother's toothbrush on the sink, about to roll off. As I go by, I put brother's toothbrush into its container and see that DS12 toothbrush is completely dry. I know I didn't see him brush his teeth last night so I'm thinking this is a long time without brushing and, rather than accuse him of lying, I go to him and say, "I don't think you brushed your teeth well enough, please do it again."

He says, "I did! I spent extra time! 
I say "Your toothbrush is dry, so please do it again." 
Him: "No, it's not, mom; it's wet. You didn't see it. I used a new toothbrush."
Stupid me, I believe him, "You did? Oh, ok. I didn't  realize that; I thought we were out of new toothbrushes. Where did you find it?"
Him: Silence
Me (to self: Oh, right. Of course he'd rather spend 5 minutes lying about a new toothbrush then simply brushing his teeth!)
Me: Go brush your teeth.
Him (in a very aggrieved tone): You never believe me!
So he stomps off, runs the water for 30 seconds, comes back and says "Done." I doubt he brushed his teeth so that leaves me with insisting he go back while I watch him or just let it go. Multiply that by everything.

Everything is like this. Showering, getting dressed with clean underpants, doing homework, picking up after himself, everything he is supposed to do. I just don't see any improvement. He gives up on even enjoyable activities if they get hard. He's adopted this kind of snarkiness that I think he thinks makes him seem more grown up or something but I think it's probably off-putting to peers.  He's got some LD's as well. He does ok in school because we make him do his homework and check behind him but that will only work for so long.

He's a sweet kid; he cares about animals and anyone smaller than him. He likes to seem intelligent by spouting obscure facts. He likes being funny. He likes to listen to audiobooks; he's got a creative way of looking at the world. He's smart.

Sometimes I'm amazed by how well he can think through an argument, for example, the other day our driveway was blocked, so we had to park on the street. He said we should sue the people who blocked us and I told him I didn't think we'd win money just because we had to walk a little extra. He said, "What if someone hits our car because it was on the street, then they would owe us the money for the car because it was their fault we were there." After we noticed the people blocking our driveway were workers we'd hired he said, "Oh, no, they'll probably say we gave them permission to block our driveway because we hired them, so it's not their fault after all." Again, it's a small example, but I thought that was a pretty good legal point and counterpoint from a 12 year old.

Why am I writing this? Looking for reassurance I guess that someday he'll follow through on enough things that he'll be able to hold a job. He's only 13. I just wish I could see some improvement with any of these bad habits because I think he's a great kid but lacks all effort.

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