Five Benefits of ADHD Coaching For College Students
Many ADHD children and teens are 3-5 years more emotionally immature than their neurotypical peers. Because of this, they may struggle with emotional regulation and other executive function skills. An ADHD life coach can assist with accountability, timelines of assignments, clarity with directions, helping with procrastination and so much more. Many students like working with ADHD coaches because they find out it is, “their team” and the coach is there in a non-judgmental and safe space. When working with an ADHD coach who also has ADHD, they feel a connection, someone like-minded as them, they feel seen and heard and appreciate the openness the ADHD coach offers. Coaches also help provide ADHD education, which helps validate them and put their own puzzle pieces together. Education regarding ADHD and tying how their own brain is wired, create self-awareness, healing, and understanding, their self-esteem and confidence grow. As they learn more about themselves and their ADHD they become more empowered, and confident, versus, feeling broken or different.
1. Guidance on Getting Organized
ADHD people do very well with a routine and habits. Coaches help build a daily and weekend routine for your young adult. A schedule for bed and sleep is a must, as well as eating healthy, and trying to incorporate exercise into their routine. These are all holistic strategies that help manage ADHD in children, teens, and adults. Using timers and alarm clocks can be extremely helpful to help remind one of their daily tasks. Using a paper calendar for the family, to plot out the plan visually is also helpful. Getting a child to use their phone calendar and use their alarms as a reminder is extremely beneficial. Coaches help them become more self-aware, and know when to listen to their bodies' physical cues, when stress, anxiety, or overwhelm come knocking at their door. They learn to pause and assess situations prior to stress taking over or acting impulsively and saying something they may regret later.
2. Learn Test Taking Skills
Practicing speeches and presentations beforehand can help everyone, but especially someone with ADHD. Many children and adults with ADHD process differently and some will process better if they discover which works best for them. Some are verbal, kinetic, visual, or audio processors, so it is important to try to learn which one your child finds more beneficial. Maybe they need to write things down, maybe they need to doodle while listening, or maybe they need to move around while learning. Whichever way is useful, try to incorporate this for your child to process the best way they can. Test-taking can be a challenge, many ADHD takes their time to analyze, then overanalyze, and then become overwhelmed. Making the test-taking a lot more challenging. Learning ways around this can help, as well as, asking for accommodations with their school.
3. Improve Time Management
To help with time management, planners, calendars, clocks, times, and alarms can be beneficial. It's important to try to teach them these skills versus doing it for them. They can then become reliant on their parents to do this for them. It is much better to try to teach them how to set up their own calendars on their own phones and set alarms for their tasks and appointments. These skills will need to be learned and worked on often before they leave the nest and are on their own. If time management and awareness improve, their stress will go down. Making it easier to balance day-to-day and create more joy.
4. Work on Goal Setting
Sometimes having fun activities planned out beforehand can help someone with ADHD. They can handle boredom better. They have interest-driven brains, so try to incorporate some things to do so they can look forward to it. Help them break down their tasks or studies by having a fun goal or activity planned that week. If there is a task that needs to get done, maybe giving them a timeline to do it within a certain time frame can help parents and children, versus asking them to do something at the moment. For example, If it's Friday night, maybe tell them to clean their room by Sunday at 5 pm. That way they can plan and work it out on their own time schedule. Having rewards can also help with goal setting, Maybe an allowance, maybe 30 extra minutes on their tablet, making going out to dinner the following Saturday and having it be their choice. What does your child like to do? Make a game and a reward system out of it.
5. Build Communication Skills
Communication is a skill that continues to be needed especially when a student is in college and doesn't necessarily have their parents there to explain to them or tell them how to do something. If the average ADHD student is a few years behind emotionally, they may struggle with open and honest communication. They may also struggle with follow-up. These are skills that can be learned and taught. A life coach can help the student navigate this and help them learn that having consistent, clear, and effective communication with others is the way to go. All these skills will aid them while they are in school and will also keep the stress and overwhelm to a minimum. It will also make their college journey much more successful and fulfilling. Please reach out to me directlyy, if you would like to know more about ADHD Life Coaching for a College student.
