The Best Treatment for ADHD: Executive Function Coaching

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ADHD Is Not Just an Attention Disorder

It’s long been noted that “Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder” is a misleading name for this condition. Focus is complicated for people with ADHD; they may struggle to regulate their focus to stay on boring tasks, but they usually have strong abilities to focus when they are locked into a subject they care about. And for hyperactivity, many people with ADHD have no hyperactivity symptoms, such as excessive fidgeting, impulsivity, or overexcitability.

What Is ADHD?  

Russell Barkley, the world’s leading researcher on ADHD, has increasingly described ADHD as a disorder of Executive Function. As Barkley writes in an article on his website:

It is now obvious that the underlying psychological difficulties that are giving rise to these (ADHD) symptoms involve deficits in all of the major Executive Functions.

It Is Important for Children to Understand Their Executive Function Strengths and Weaknesses

At HabitCoach, when we see children with ADHD, they always have deficits in a range of Executive Functions, not just attention and hyperactivity, but also working memory, organization, procrastination, time management, emotional control, mental flexibility, or self-awareness. We help children understand their own Executive Function profile and how it impacts their behavior and school performance.

Unsure about your child’s Executive Function strengths and weaknesses? Have your child take our Free Executive Function Assessment.

Executive Function Coaching vs. Therapy vs. Medication

While there is hope for a wide range of treatments for ADHD, including exercise, diet, brain stimulation, etc., there are still really only three treatments for ADHD that are well supported by research and widely accepted:

1. Medication
2. Therapy
3. Executive Function Coaching

There are pros and cons to each of these treatments. However, if you are trying to support your child for their entire life, Executive Function Coaching will be the most effective treatment for long-term change. Here are some more details on each treatment:

Medication – According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), about half of children ages 5-17 with ADHD are on stimulant medication like Adderall, Vyvanse, or Concerta. These amphetamines can be very effective in the short run. Many people with ADHD, when they first take meds, report a newfound ability to focus on topics or tasks that they previously found boring. In the short term, stimulant medications can definitely improve school performance, effectiveness in life, and relationships at home.

However, there are some downsides to taking stimulant medications. First of all, they only work as long as you take them. Stimulant medications are not physically addictive in the ways that street drugs are, but if you rely on stimulant medications to get through life, you always have to take them. What children learn from behavioral coaching, on the other hand, lasts a lifetime. The most common side effect of stimulant medication is appetite suppression. For kids who are still growing, it’s important to make sure they continue to eat and gain weight appropriate for their age. Stimulant medication can interfere with sleep, particularly if you take it late in the day. Also, some people report they just don’t like the feeling of stimulant medication.

Mother Discusses Medication vs. Behavior Coaching for ADHD

Recent research reported in the NY Times indicates that stimulant medication may have no advantage over behavioral therapy and that it might impact a child’s growth.

That said, many families consider it crucial among the tools they use to support their children with ADHD. While medication won’t cure ADHD or fix Executive Function (EF) gaps, it can help a child focus well enough to work on their EF skills through therapy or coaching. It can also give families a break from the stress that comes with living with many ADHD symptoms. Whether or not to use medication is a personal decision that families should make only after doing research and discussing the pros and cons with their doctor.

Therapy – Behavioral therapy, delivered by licensed therapists trained at the Master’s level, can be incredibly helpful for people struggling with anxiety, depression, trauma, bipolar disorder, and other mental health challenges. Modern research-based treatments like Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) can provide great benefits, particularly to people struggling with emotional disorders. Kids benefit from therapy if there are challenges in their family, with friendships, or if they have experienced trauma.

Therapists are skilled in treating the mental health conditions like anxiety that accompany ADHD, but they are rarely trained to focus specifically on the underlying Executive Function challenges and strengths that people with ADHD show. The orientation and training of therapists is to focus on “disease states” or pathology, so for some therapists, it is hard for them to help their patients lean on their strengths as strategies to work around Executive Function deficits.

Executive Function Coaching – While therapy has been going on since the days of Freud, and stimulant medications have been used to treat ADHD for over 50 years, Executive Function Coaching has only come into practice since the early 2000s. Yet it shows many signs of being the most effective long-term treatment for ADHD.

At a well-respected Executive Function Coaching organization, like HabitCoach, coaches with master’s degrees and many years of experience working with kids have been trained to identify both children’s Executive Function strengths as well as their weaknesses. Helping a child with ADHD learn to recognize and play to their strengths may be the most important thing you can do for them.

Smart kids who struggle to execute because of Executive Function deficits spend a lot of their childhood receiving negative feedback. Realizing they have incredible strengths—and learning how to exercise those strengths—leads to improved self-esteem and a clear path to success in life.

Well-trained Executive Function Coaches, like the coaches at HabitCoach, help kids both improve and find workarounds for their Executive Function weaknesses. For example, for kids who have trouble getting started on tasks, HabitCoach coaches will teach kids techniques like accountability partners, visioning, the Pomodoro technique, and “work for five minutes, then see if you can keep going.”  For kids with emotional control or impulsivity issues, HabitCoach coaches teach them strategies like cognitive reappraisal, breathing, and mindfulness.

Smart families are getting Executive Function Coaches to help their kids succeed.

Interested in learning more?  Book a Free Consultation with HabitCoach today.

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How Does HabitCoach Help My Children Perform at School and Behave at Home?

HabitCoach is the leading Executive Function training program for children with ADHD.

Coaches

Our master’s-trained, highly experienced coaches know how to get kids to open up and take ownership of their behavior. Very often, a child will be more willing to change their behavior for a coach than for a parent. Our coaches are kind, but also know how to motivate kids to make positive changes.

Behavioral Curriculum

Our coaches work with your children on skills that impact behavior such as:

• How to Complete Chores Without Having to be Reminded
• Getting Up on Time
• Getting Through their Morning Routine
• Organizing Their Schoolwork
• Being Mindful When Faced With Stress
• Being an Active Listener
• Keeping Your Room and Workspace Tidy
• Building Habits That Improve Focus, Time Management, and Self-Control in the Classroom
• Foster a Growth Mindset and Boost Their Academic Confidence, Making School Feel Less Overwhelming
• Shifting Attention When Parents are Speaking
• Having Better Two-Way Conversations
• Thinking Before Speaking
• Refraining from Impulsive Behavior
• Understanding Different Points of View

…and many more

HabitCard and Check-Ins

When a kid sets a goal with one of our coaches, the coach sets up a “HabitCard,” which helps them track their own behavior change. Our assistant coaches do mid-week check-ins with them to ensure that the child is staying on track with their goals.

How Does HabitCoach Help Me Be a More Effective Parent?

Coach Your Own Child is a revolutionary program for parents who are self-starters and have a DIY approach to parenting. Here, we have provided parents with easy-to-follow training designed for parents with busy lives.

Mother Discusses How HabitCoach Guided Her in Telling Her Son About His ADHD Diagnosis

For 75 High-Demand Parenting Issues designed to help your child excel academically, Coach Your Own Child offers the following:

• Self-Evaluation – Together, parent and child complete an in-depth questionnaire that identifies the child’s Executive Functioning strengths and weaknesses. This serves as a blueprint for identifying challenges to work on and highlighting the strengths your child can rely on.
• Mini-Lessons – Each lesson takes 30 minutes or less. Lessons introduce the topic, provide discussion questions, and share multiple winning strategies your child can try.
• “Before and After” Videos – For every topic, we provide a video that shows “What We Sometimes Say” examples of ineffective parenting, followed by a “Here’s A Better Way” example to give parents language and techniques to engage with their child.
• Cheat Sheets – When you’re faced with a stressful situation with your child, these quick-reference guides offer a concise summary of strategies and words you can use in the moment.

Why Choose HabitCoach for Executive Function Coaching?

• Experience – TestingMom and HabitCoach have been working with kids and improving their performance for over a decade. Our Program Director is a veteran of ADHD practices, having trained with Dr. Edward Hallowell and Dr. Alan Graham. All our coaches have over 10 years of experience working with kids with ADHD as special education teachers, tutors, or therapists.
• Curriculum – HabitCoach has developed an extensive set of lessons across multiple domains: Home, School, Social, and Emotional Learning.  These lessons help kids understand the underlying Executive Functions behind all of these life situations and help them identify strategies that will work for them.
• Coaches – Our coaches are not only well-trained but are empathetic and helpful. Our kids love coming to their HabitCoach sessions because they feel seen and heard. All of our coaches have master’s degrees and many years of experience working with kids with ADHD.
• Range of services at different prices – HabitCoach offers a wide range of services starting with Coach Your Own Child for the hands-on parent which gives them the tools and lessons to guide their kids themselves (starting at under $5/week) all the way to our Advanced Coaching Program which offers one 50-minute coaching session and two 15 minute check-in sessions each week as well as frequent meetings with parents (under $70/week).

If your child has ADHD, don’t wait. The younger you get your child started on Executive Function coaching, the better their outcomes will be. Reach out to HabitCoach today!