Does your child quickly jump to:
“I’m bad.”
“I never do anything right.”
“Everything always goes wrong.”
That kind of negative thinking can be exhausting for kids and heartbreaking for parents to watch.
In this episode, I’m breaking down what’s often really happening underneath these thought patterns in kids with ADHD, anxiety, sensory needs, and other uniquely wired challenges.
I’m also sharing a simple shift you can start using today to help your child move out of all-or-nothing thinking, build confidence, and feel more emotionally steady.
If your child is hard on themselves, melts down after mistakes, or always expects the worst, this episode will help you see them differently and know where to start next.
Key Timestamps
02:18 What’s really happening under “I’m bad” thoughts
05:12 The hidden link between ADHD, anxiety, and self-talk
09:45 Why logic doesn’t work in the moment
13:08 The first thing to do before teaching confidence
16:42 A simple script to shift black-and-white thinking
22:05 How to build self-esteem in everyday moments
Read the Transcript
Welcome to the Connected and Capable podcast. You’re here with Alisha Grogan and I am an occupational therapist. I am also a mom to three kids. One of my kiddos has ADHD. We’ve also had struggles with some of my other kids with significant anxiety. And all kinds of different motor challenges and stuff too.
So as a parent, I’ve really seen a wide spectrum of what it’s like to live this in real life. So my hope is that when you are here, that you’re getting my OT expertise, but the real life, what you can do, how to, why it’s important to understand your kid and what is practical in in everyday life.
Because I know, that there is definitely a difference when I had to do this as a mom, as, uh, and what that really looked like for me to use the strategies to feel dysregulated myself in the moments I was often trying to help my kids or feeling frustrated or too busy. And so I really love answering, questions from you. All this, this question is. What we’re gonna be talking about on this episode, and it is from one of our newsletter subscribers, she wrote in and asked, I would love to get your take on negative self-talk, or the black and white thinking of I did something poorly, therefore I’m bad on the whole.
That’s one thing our ADHD kiddo struggles with, and we are in desperate need for resources to handle that in an impactful way. This is such a good and thoughtful question, and I just wanna give you, props for just naming the challenges. So, well, I think sometimes when our kids are struggling with these kind of challenges, like stuff like this is coming up on a regular basis. Like every day this negative self-talk, black and white thinking, you know, and it, it really can feel like a grind when we’re dealing it with it every day.
And it can even be kind of hard to name and not just be like, oh, you frustrate me so much, or You’re so negative. And so really, really good job in just naming what is going on here. Uh, there are a couple of different things that I wanna make sure that we hit on today as we answer this question. First, I wanna talk about how negative thinking, uh, black and white thinking and this kind of notion that there’s like, I did something wrong, something’s wrong with me.
How these things are all related actually, and what they are related to. And then I wanna talk through a couple of strategies. To help get you started as a pathway forward for your kiddo that is struggling with this. And again, I know you’re not alone, which is why we’re talking about today. It’s such a good question. So let’s first talk about what do these things have in common?
Well, they are all rooted in anxiety. Okay. So. It’s or worry, you know, and please hear me. I’m not saying that your child has an anxiety diagnosis, but even just worry. Okay. Like we can even just name it that way. And this really can stem from a couple of different places. First of all, kids with ADHD in general tend to have challenges with emotional regulation.
That is not always the case for sure. Emotional regulation is one of many executive functioning skills. Also, you know, attention and following directions and doing hard things. Those are executive functioning skills. That emotional regulation piece is one of them. So we do commonly see that kids struggle to regulate their emotions. What happens when our emotions, like our frustration, our worry, and sometimes even anger, get really, uh, high, very dysregulated, and they start to feel out of control.