In the Driver’s Seat with Enzo!

Now that my ADHD teen has the keys to the car, he's borrowing the keys to my blog.

Life in the Fast Brain | by Donald Caven | posted by Kristen Caven

I’ve been driving in one way or another for about ten years now. When I was seven, I got my first Mario Kart game on my hand-me-down GameCube. I played that endlessly, not aware that there was anything more to cars and driving, until one day, at around age ten, I borrowed Need for Speed from my neighbor, and everything changed. I started with my first car, a bright red Mazda, and went nuts. I beat all the races, I bought all the cars, and my knowledge of automobiles grew.

When I drive by myself, there’s no self-esteem ding when I make a mistake. Which I do — I'm new at this.

Fast forward seven years to today, and I’m now in my second month as a licensed driver. Yes, a licensed driver on real roads, the kind that that require driving with an actual car. Actual roads are strikingly different from the world I speed around in on my Xbox. I can’t “press Y to rewind,” I can’t participate in underground street races down at the shipyards without my parents disowning me (or going to actual real-life jail), and I can’t win races or buy my dream Lamborghini. Driving in real life is slower and easier, and a lot more fun in some ways. But still, it’s got its share of new challenges.

In my eyes, driving in video games has a few key advantages over driving in real life. Fancy cars like Bentleys and Porsches and Ferraris are commonplace, and everyone is driving one. In real life, though, I’m constantly distracted by these luxury sports cars that appear every once in a while going the other way down the highway. Every time I see one of these, I point it out to share the marvels of automotive technology to my passengers, but...“ENZO! KEEP YOUR EYES ON THE ROAD!”

I admit I can be a distracted driver when I’m surrounded by exotic cars. But what is harder is when my parents criticize something about my driving, be it nit-picking or an actual, legitimate concern. Fortunately, one of the ways around both problems is to drive by myself. When I drive by myself not only is there no audience to excitedly point out cars for; there’s no self-esteem ding when I make a mistake. Which I do — I'm new at this.

Possibly the most stressful part of driving with ADD is having back seat (and front seat) drivers. My wonderful mother and father are great to drive with—one at a time. However, on occasions where the three of us are all in the car, things can get hectic. Sometimes one of them starts to give directions, and the other chimes in to correct them. Often, the opposing set of directions will result in us getting to the same place in the same amount of time, but no matter which set of directions I follow, I end up in the middle of the tension. Then I have to do my best to tune out the arguing and try to listen for directions from my choice of parents. It makes me miss driving in a virtual world, where the only people yelling in my ear are my friends, who I can more easily ignore than my parents.

Here are a few suggestions — okay, Mom, requests — for helping a young ADD driver:

• Be kind. We get it, even if we still seem a little bit distracted.

• If we mess up, we understand that we’re messing up. We have ADD and we’re rebellious teenagers and we're learning; we’re not doing it to bother you!

• One set of directions is enough. We finally made a rule in our family that only the person in the passenger seat is allowed to direct the driver. (Certain people — I’m not mentioning names here — sometimes have trouble following this rule...)

• Be a good role model. If we do something, and get snapped at for it, it’s hard to keep our eyes from rolling when we see you doing it when you’re driving!

Give a Kid a Little Extra Time…

A day at the beach, a great idea, and a kid who doesn’t want to transition.

In previous posts, I’ve mentioned Enzo’s remarkable childhood ability to sit in the sand and have fun with a bucket and a shovel for hours on end. In the days before he discovered race cars, it was all about the dump trucks and front-loaders. He didn’t have the patience to get properly dressed, stay sitting down while he ate his sandwich, or watch a movie past the first act, but mention that we were going to the beach and that kid would get organized! The best present I ever got for him was three miniature shovels. One would have made him happy, but three meant he got to direct a crew. Holes were dug. Castles were built. Friends were buried.

Where the Rubber Meets the Road

The last week of the marking period is always when we wish we had more traction to avoid an ADHD spinout.

This will sound like a familiar scene to those of you with teenagers. It's the last week in the marking period, and we check the online gradebook, and then our heads explode. Suddenly, the teachers who haven’t used the system for a month have gotten caught up, and lo and behold, there are some terrible surprises.

It's the last week in the marking period, and we check the online gradebook, and then our heads explode.

This is the week when I start kicking myself for having a life, a career of my own, distractions that keep me from hovering over the homework and pawing through the backpack on a regular basis. I should really mark these weeks on the calendar, cancel all my appointments, and just plan to be stressed.

The “Big Struggle,” as Hallowell puts it, is the family crisis that ADD brings forth. Ours goes like this: Enzo’s school troubles show up. Tension rises. Voices rise. His dad feels the need to jump in and take control. I feel the need to jump in and smooth things over with the optimism that ADD affords, but it just sounds like happymouth. Now I’m on the hot seat, too; after all, these inattentive traits are from my genes. When Dad leaves for work and there are only the two of us, Enzo and I try to re-balance and start moving forwardthrough the anxiety, guilt, and frustration. Hugs help. And then I say, “But seriously, this is the week when the rubber meets the road.”

Enzo is silent for a moment, his head hanging...and then he says, “Are you saying I'm a car? Well, that's good at least.” The mood lightens for a second while we consider whether that’s the right phrase or not... After all, hasn't the rubber been on the road this whole year? This past marking period, with the semi-consistent Bs and the few perfect scores, when it seemed Enzo was finally getting some traction? I guess he slipped off onto the shoulder without us noticing in the last few weeks, spinning his wheels in the dirt on the side with all those extracurricular obsessions, somehow not getting those TEN English assignments into the right basket... And now, just before the finish line, he's climbing back on the pavement again.

"I guess I'm a Ford MT now," he says with a sigh. "It's an awesome car, and super-reliable.” I raise an eyebrow at him, wondering where that came from. “Except—” he continues, raising a finger, “when it doesn't start.” 

Hah! He got me. I can't stay mad at him. This metaphor may be a non-starter, but somehow he’ll get through this.

Squeedle!!!

How I discovered my son’s distraction reflex is part of a hunter’s nature. Or a golden retriever’s.

A few summers ago we were on a road trip down south. The highway stretched out before us, cruise-control was on, and my husband and I were three-deep into our game of “top five Bruce Springsteen songs.” Suddenly there was a shout from the back seat, where we thought our tween son had dozed off with his nose in a Foxtrot collection.

Not Behind the Wheel…Yet!

You can’t get into the fast lane if you don’t have a license — and we're still waiting for our ADHD teen to show us he has the drive to get one.

Today my son Enzo turned sixteen. To a kid like him who can’t think of much else than cars, we figured this day would be a big one! Since he was ten, he's always dreamed of the scene from Transformers, where Sam Witwicki’s dad drives him to a used car shop and gives him a budget of double what he'd saved on his own.