Episode 74: The ADHD Pressure Cooker: Why Car Rides Explode (And 3 Steps to Fix It)
Host: Sharon Collon
We've all been there. You're driving back from a family holiday and your nervous system is shot. And you've just come back from a vacation that was actually just parenting in a different postcode, but without all your usual resources and buffers that you would normally have to keep things running smoothly. And everyone is kicking off in the car. If you've had a car ride like this, then this episode is for you. Let's do it. Before we dive into today's episode.
I wanted to let you know about something really exciting that I have coming up for you. I am running a four day free ADHD families coaching week. In this coaching week, we are going to create your own family's tailored plan. This is exactly the thing that I wish someone had given me at the start of our journey. Look, parenting a child with ADHD is about understanding the ADHD brain, but it's also about
putting the right systems in place at the right time. If you want support with that, join my free four day coaching week. We're going from the third to the sixth of March, and you're going to walk away with your own tailored plan specific for your family. I'll put a link in the show notes, but it's also at thefunctionalfamily.com backslash roadmap. I'll see you there. Yesterday we drove back from our annual family.
Now we go to the same caravan park every year with the same group of families. last, this year was our 17th year that we have done it. It's the most amazing caravan park and we've worked out that this holiday absolutely suits our family. And the reason that it does, before I get started on the car trip bit, which absolutely does not suit our family. I want to talk to you about what works for the holiday. It works because.
Everyone has their own cabin. So we basically book out every cabin in this caravan park with all the same families. And so it's like living on a street with all lovely friends, but you're not in their space. If we were to stay in a stays house or something where you're all together, that would be catastrophic for my family. There's no way that we could survive that and worrying about being too loud or someone banging their door or anything like that. It would just be doomsday for us, but we've worked out this caravan park phenomenon.
Of everyone having their own little space. So you can go in there and regulate if it gets too much, but also having a little common area out the front where you can talk and be social when you want to. And this caravan park also has lots of activities. So it's got surfing, it's got kayaking, it's got a pump track, it's got a jumping pillow, it's got all of these things and lots of shops and stuff nearby if you need anything. So we've worked out that this particular formula for holidays works really well for our family. And we really enjoy going with the other beautiful families that we go to, hence why we've gone 17 years in a row and we'll continue to do so. But the part that sucks for this holiday experience isn't the holiday. The holiday is actually delightful. And I've got it down to a fine art, ordering the groceries to do a click and collect when we arrive and all of that sort of stuff. It's a perfected art. had 17 years to get it perfected. But the part that really sucks and the one part that really needs a little bit of a refresh is the car trip down and back. My family does not car well. And yesterday we were driving and all three kids were absolutely kicking off. My husband was kicking off. Everyone was dysregulated. we were in the middle of the highway. I'm censoring avoidance. So there was just so much noise and demands and absolute lack of regulation, uh, and it was enough to make me want to open the door and just roll out into the breakdown lane. I was really thinking about it. I was like, could I make that? I think I could, I think I could roll out and I think I could survive it. It would be fine. But if you've ever felt that heat rising in your chest while your children are screaming because the brother is touching them, then this episode is going to be for you. today we're talking about how to support those big ADHD emotions in the car when we're in confined spaces. And a lot of our standard strategies do not work in the car because of the proximity. So people tend to lose their minds in the process, right? I am not too proud to say that I have actually pulled.
Mike done some serious damage to my left shoulder trying to break up my boys fighting in the car with my arm while driving. I have a lot of compassion for parents driving a car. Like, you know, when you think, like when you see a car that's just been abandoned, like it's parked, like no effort at all. Like they've just left it. They've abandoned it because I feel like that's, that's a mom who's just had it. They've been at her in the car and she's just walked away. I feel like that's where it's at. So.
if you have three kids, because I think that the gap is important when you don't have the gap and you can't put one in the front. I want to tell you that there's a special place in heaven for you. And, that if there is no gap in your car, like if you've got three in a row there, then you deserve a certificate. Please email it. Email us at hello at the functional family.com. I will make you a certificate and send one to you because I know these pains so well. Now on the way down to the holiday.
we were actually quite fine because our eldest came a bit later because he's recently got his apprenticeship. I pulled him out of school, super excited about that. and so he was working, so he came late. so the way down almost no, no chaos, right? There was just, it was quite calm. We stopped and let them stretch their legs, have a little snack. It was all fine. a pretty good road trip all round for the Colin family. Now, bear in mind that this is our weakest point as a family. Like we have lots of things systemised and worked out strategies along the way to support us, but the car is our weak point. And it doesn't seem to matter how big a car we get. So we've got the car now that has so much room in the backseat. It doesn't matter. We've also experimented with having
seven seat us so you could put one in the back row, but all my kids get car sick. And so whoever you put in that back row used to get car sick and also annoy their brother from the end row by touching their heads and things. so that didn't work out so well. And I often find myself wondering like, why hasn't someone invented this? Is it like, why hasn't someone, and maybe I'll leave my job and just focus on this full time, but like, why hasn't someone invented plastic?
Little inserts, like, know, in a limo when they hit the button and the little divide comes up, I want those between the kids seats. I want a little divide to come up and for them not to be able to touch each other. So maybe I'll, maybe I'll focus on that for the future, but why hasn't someone done that also? Like, please someone, someone invent that really good idea. So cars are a pressure cooker and they have.
Lots of components to it. So there's often sensory overload from the noise. have physical confinement. this is for the adults too. Like I watched my husband in a car and when he, and even on an airplane, when he can't move because of his hyperactive profile, he likes to move. He's almost a little bit like a caged animal. There's often not enough transition times or we're making it a transition injury because we're taking them to something that they don't want to go to. and so it can add the fuel to the car fire. And then.
When those moments hit where there's conflict, your child's brain essentially goes offline. So they go back into that monkey brain of like not their part that is responsible for logic and reasoning. That bit's left the building. They're now just in their monkey brain. And so they're operating entirely on survival mode. So what's more is they are likely that your brain is likely to go into survival mode too. Because if.
feels intense when you can't put space between you and that dysregulation. So one of my strategies as a sensory avoider is to actually move. Like I move, when things are dysregulated, I actually move outside. I go and put my feet on the grass so they can still be fighting, but I just kind of change our environment setting. Like I'll just move everyone outside. So I'll walk and they'll usually follow me fighting, but I get them on the grass.
And that strategy or even changing rooms, if you can't get them onto the grass, that strategy often works really well to deescalate things, but you can't do that in the car. This is why it's a weak spot. It's a, it's a really weak spot. so when we, our brains gone offline, we're all in survival mode and we try and use logic here. We say things like, come on guys, we're nearly home. Stop yelling or no iPad. We're taking it away. Like we start getting desperate with the, with the threats of taking things away.
And really in those moments when the brain is offline, we're just adding noise to a car that's already on fire. So you cannot teach a drowning person to swim in that moment. All you have to do is to get them to shore. So it's that beautiful saying of dysregulated moments and not teachable moments. Now this is what I would call a predictable problem because if we know that car trips are where our family kicks off, then
We need some strategies around it. And so this yesterday's delightful experience or traumatic experience was a good reminder that I've let some of these things slip, right? And so I kind of see strategies, ADHD strategies, like a pen. You drop it and then you just pick it back up. Right? Like it's not, no, that strategy didn't work for me. Like I tried that once six years ago and it didn't work. Like, and then I forgot about it. So doesn't work. I've got to look for something completely new.
No, no, no, no, it's just a pen. just pick it back up. We just give it a go. We might re-sparkle it a little bit. We might add a little bit of nuance or something new to it to make it exciting again, but we can just pick that pen back up. So for our three practical strategies at first, I want you to acknowledge the storm. So you do not have to agree with the emotions that are going on in your car, but you do need to name it. So I think one of the easiest things you can do is just go.
I can see that you're really frustrated that you're in the middle seat. Like, I mean, these are very specific examples, aren't they? You can see that this is fresh in my mind. I can see that you're really frustrated that you're in the middle seat. That really sucks. Like you can just acknowledge that it is a sucky time. So we don't need to fix it. We're just witnessing. And for a lot of parents, we skip that bit and we just go straight to problem solving because in
Families with ADHD, the conflict comes so thick and fast that we feel like we're wasting time doing the acknowledging bit. So we don't acknowledge the storm, we go straight to the problem solving mode, but witnessing really comes first. So step two, you know, I'm big on environmental changes. So I think one of the easiest low-hanging fruit things to do is to change your environment. So if you've got a predictable problem, something like the car, what can we do with that environment other than my plastic little things that come up between the seats that haven't really been invented yet. What can we do to reduce some of the pressure out of that environment? So let's look at the crunch factor. Let's pack some snacks that require a bit of effort. So think about carrot sticks, apples, pretzels. Now this has got proprioceptive input through the jaw, which is incredibly grounding for a dysregulated kids. Anything crunchy that they will eat better yet if you can dip it in something that requires two hands, low key my back of the car seat would be disgusting, but whatever, whatever works in this situation for these car rides. If you know, it's a predictable problem. So let's pack some snacks. Let's get their mouths busy and use that input for regulation. Next, let's use a device pass. So forget the screen time guilt in the car where safety is involved. You can use devices as a regulation tool.
Full permission. will do another certificate if I have to, if it's going to help you drive safer and not abandon your car or roll into that side thing, like I was thinking of yesterday, you can use devices. If it's going to keep kids quiet, use it. So it provides a little bit of dopamine and distractions. So while they're sitting in traffic and they're bored. Next, let's look at audio anchors. So audio books or podcasts give their racing mind a track to run.
So it doesn't run into their brother. So you can, you can look, get them a podcast each or an audio book each, because they're probably never going to agree on what one it is. And they'll probably fight about which audio book to listen to. And that will take the whole car trip. So you're better off just having three different devices with the audio book on there, whichever one they choose. And that can be a really nice distraction. And it's also a little bit of separation. So that's quite a nice strategy too.
Next, we're going to look at the parent pivot. So there was a point yesterday where I was thinking about jumping out of the car that I was like, okay, I am actually really dysregulated. And so is Anthony. Like we were both not okay. We're both showing it in different ways. His comes out explosively. Mine comes out in shutdown, dreaming of a new life. Right. So you can't co-regulate if you're dysregulated. So when my three and dad were all screaming, I didn't yell back, I did my secret three. These are three little things that I do when I'm dysregulated because I'm prone, a bit more prone for a shutdown. So I had to do my little three things to get my brain back online. So firstly, I had a sip of my cold water. I am a big fan of having frozen water bottles because that mouth feel is so regulating when you're dysregulated. So before I responded, the big sip of ice cold water.
Then I did my next little thing that I do when I'm dysregulated is I crunch my toes really hard inside my shoes. This is, sounds weird, but trust me, it works. So I crunch my toes all up together. I hold them as tight as I can. And then I release them inside my shoes. Now I do this a lot in the day. So whenever things are getting a bit tough for me, I scrunch my toes and then I release them. And I usually release them with a really long exhale.
And I actually say, good, very good for regulation, quite good for the vagus nerve as well. know humming is great for the vagus nerve, but that's scrunching. And then that release actually helps me stay regulated. And, and it also buys me a little bit of time. So, cause if I jump straight, if I shoot from the hip with the strategy, it usually isn't the right one. So I have to do that toe scrunching, have a little bit of water, have a little exhale, and then I can.
deploy a strategy. So those three little things in the moment really helped me to bring myself down a couple of notches. So I can then help with what is going on in the back there and help diffuse the situation. But if I just jump in and just go straight into problem solving mode, it just adds more noise and more dysregulation to the whole thing. I also want to say that sometimes the best strategy is just to wait out the storm. So sometimes that will be, we're just pulling over. I'm just going to, we're all just going to have a break in this roadside parking area. You know, those rest areas, which always make me think of serial killers, but you know, pulling over at one of those and just having a couple of, having a little bit of a breather, having, going to the bathroom, getting a drink, whatever it is. So sometimes the strategy is just separating and waiting out the storm.
It's not about calm and it's not about perfection in those moments. Sometimes we just need a little bit of a circuit breaker to lessen the intensity of the situation. So if you're listening to this and you're listening to those strategies, like let's do a little bit of a recap here. We've got to acknowledge the storm. So call it for what it is.
We've got to look at the environmental changes that you now control easily. So the crunch factor, the device pass, the audio anchors, then look at the parent pivot. What can we do as parents? And then we've all got to get together and lobby for those little devices that come up in between the seats. Cause that's a great business idea. Someone please invent that. But if you're listening to this and thinking, Sharon, my car is still a battlefield every day. Like I only drive 10 minutes to school. Why is it so bad in 10 minutes?
I want to say, hear you and you are not doing anything wrong. It is actually a really tricky time for families to manage. There's no magical like sprinkle of glitter that I can put over your family in the car because it just is an environment that isn't set up for a lot of kids, especially if you have three across the back. If you have two or even take one child out, it changes the dynamic. Have you ever noticed that if you've got, if you've got a whole day with the kids and just one.
ones that are play date or something, the whole dynamic shifts and they can get along a bit better. But when you have all of your kids there across that back seat, you're likely to have this really stressful time. If they don't have the crunch factor going on, don't have a device, they don't have the audio anchors there employed. So just want to acknowledge that it is a bit of a tricky time. So if you're thinking, but it's not just my car, Sharon, my whole home is a battlefield every day. I want to say, hear you and you are not.
doing anything wrong, you're not stuffing this up. It is really tricky. Navigating ADHD and family life when you have multiple kids is a lot, right? And you might just be missing some specific systems that work for your family's unique brain wiring. That is why I'm running my free coaching week. It's called Your Family's Tailored ADHD Roadmap. We are starting on the 2nd of March. It is a free coaching week for families.
It's just going to be the best thing ever. think we've got 580 people registered already. And, it is going to be four days with me live coaching and every single family is going to get their own tailored plan. Like not a generic plan. They're created for their family, like a unique plan for their family.
And it's going to take away a lot of the confusion. It's the very thing that I wish someone had given me at the start of our family's ADHD journey, because gosh, would have saved us a lot of time and money and really helped us to know what to focus on. So we're to be spending those four days together. We're going to do a welcome call on the 2nd of March. And then the 3rd to the 6th of March is where we are going to be doing our live coaching sessions. It's going to be awesome.
And we're going to be stripping away the noise and actually building a roadmap for your family. So just the systems I use with my own three boys and my formal training as an, credentialed ADHD coach to move from chaos to one that actually functions. I don't even care about calm. We're not shooting for calm here. We're shooting for functional. We want our family to actually, actually function a bit better so that we can take some of the pressure off ourselves and actually enjoy family life again.
That is what we are going for in this one. And that is what we will get. So I want to say thank you for showing up for your kids, even when it's hard, even in the car. but, but you do not have to carry the mental load alone. head on to our website at thefunctionalfamily.com backslash roadmap, go and save your spot before we close this off and let's get your family their tailored roadmap.
I am Sharon Collin, this is the ADHD Families podcast and I'll see you over in our coaching week and let's get you your roadmap. Thanks for listening to the ADHD Families podcast. My mission is to help you build a family life that isn't just managed, but truly joyful. If you're with me on that mission, please share this episode to help us reach more parents. Don't forget to subscribe and leave a review. It's a small act that makes a massive impact.
And it also makes me do a little happy dance. For more support and strategies, find us over at thefunctionalfamily.com. I am in your corner. See you next time.
