Podcast Title: School Camp and ADHD: What to Do Before, During and After
Podcast Host: Sharon Collon
The note comes home in the school bag. School camp. Three nights away. Does your stomach drop or are you excited by that? Because everyone else's parents probably just sign the form and you're standing in the kitchen running a whole scale military diploma of how your kids are going to cope and what they're going to need and like the whole thing, right?
It's a whole thing in your head. There's new place, new routine, the sleep, the medication. The social side of it, three days from morning till night, with no break and nowhere to hide. And underneath it all, the real question: will they cope? And can I actually send them?
If that's you, then you're in exactly the right place. Because here is what I know after years and years of this and sending my own three boys off to camp, I was terrified about. Camp is hard. It can be really hard for the ADHD brain for the reasons that I'm sure you can predict. And anything that you can predict, well, this is where I come in. We can prepare for. So today is a
Properly practical ADHD families podcast episode, we're gonna walk through the whole arc of school camp, what to do before they go, what to set up so that they're supported while they're there. And then the bit that almost no one talks about is actually the come down when they come home. We're gonna make all three really doable.
I'm Sharon Collon. I'm a PCC credentialed ADHD coach and parenting expert and mom of three beautiful humans with ADHD. And I've worked with over 40,000 families. And let me tell you, I get a lot of messages about Camp, right? People have got really big questions about CAMP. My inbox is constantly filled with lots of exclamation marks when we're chatting about Camp. So I thought I'd better do this practical episode.
And you know, I'm not immune to this. Like I get the camp note and I'm like really excited for my kids. And I'm also a little bit nervous about how it's gonna go. And it's kind of both emotions at the same time. And I want to make sure that we just break this down so we don't catastrophize how camp's gonna go. Cause in a lot of my experience, it's actually been really positive. but we also do the prep work to ensure that it's as possible as positive as possible.
possible for our gorgeous kids. So let's do a big exhale together and let's get practical and brainstorm camp.
But before we get started in today's episode, can you please go and leave the ADHD Families Podcast a review on iTunes? Go down to the bottom of the podcast page or on Google Review, Facebook, Spotify. I'm not fussy, just review us somewhere because it really helps us keep on delivering you this beautiful free podcast resource and helps other families discover us. And I will do a happy dance in your honor, I promise.
So before we get practical, let's quickly name why CAMP is so much for an ADHD brain. Because once you see it, the whole prep list makes sense. So Camp removes every single support your child leans on without anyone realizing that they lean on it. So the familiar family environment, it's gone. the familiar school environment, it's gone. The daily routine that does the thinking for them, well, it's gone. Their own bed, their comfort, their decompression corner.
their sleep is shorter and a lot worse, judging by my son's school camp, right when they need it the most. The social demand is a lot all day and all night, and no downtime built in. And the safest person in their whole world, which is you, well, you're not there.
So that's a lot of scaffolding to pull away at once. So of course it's going to be a little bit tricky to navigate. And it would be hard for a lot of us parents to go on a school camp. And actually, thinking about it, it's kind of my worst fear along with cruise ships. I would hate it.
so we're not going to pretend that it's going to be easy. The goal is to put some scaffolding back and deliberately in a form that travels with them. So let's start before camp. What to do before camp? Because this is where most of your work as a parent actually happens.
The power is in the prep. The power is in the prep. The first thing is the decision itself. And I want to give you permission here. Going to camp is not an all-or-nothing. For some children, three nights is right. For others, the first camp might be one night or a day visit. Or it might mean being picked up after the first evening activity and sleeping at home. So talk to your school, depending on where your child is at developmentally at this stage. A partial camp is still a camp. It still counts.
A good first experience is actually more important than them doing the whole experience. You're building a track record of I can and not throwing them in at the deep end.
But also bear in mind that camp has novelty. They're doing a lot of exciting new things. So it actually might be a lot better than as parents we are thinking it's gonna go.
But I'm going to leave that decision as to how long your child stays at camp, whether they up to you. You know your child best. As a parent, you always know your child best. And only you and your child will be able to come up to that decision. There's no decision that I can give you to make your mind up on that one. The second thing is to talk about camp early.
Do not assume that the classroom teacher has passed anything on and do not assume that your child has listened to the classroom teacher when they've been talking about camp stuff.
So we want to find out as much information as we can about the camp. I would be showing, I'm showing my kids the website, showing them where they're gonna sleep, where they're going, if they're going to QuestaCon or whatever, what activities they're doing, just showing it a really nice, like, you know, neutral conversation, just to getting them excited about camp. And I'm doing that as soon as I find out about camp because I often feel like the excitement turns to anxiety the closer it gets to the event.
You may also need to let the teaching staff that are going along to the camp know that your child might potentially struggle with X, Y, Z. And you need to help support that teacher to be able to know what to do, words that work, what decompression activities that they could try. so you're handing the staff.
A manual, a bit of a manual that they and then not learning your child from scratch in an unfamiliar cabin, unfamiliar environment.
And the third thing is medication. If your child takes medication for ADHD, who's in charge of holding it? Who's in charge of administering it? and there's a genuine logistics question that you want to sort out in writing, not on the morning of camp, because it can draw attention to your child and they might not feel comfortable with it. Just get all of that sorted before.
Now, this one, this fourth thing is really important. It's sleep because sleep is usually the first domino that falls at camp. I think my son told me that they were going to bed at 10:30 every night, and I'm sure he rounded that earlier than what he actually was. And then they were waking up at 6 a.m. every morning. That is a much later night than we have at home.
So we really want to treat sleep like it is gold. So if you can, you might want to do a practice run about sleeping in a sleeping bag. You know, if they're sleeping in a sleeping bag, like what what bedding are they using? perhaps they might want to sleep with a torch next to them. Perhaps there's earplugs that they might need to get used to with a cabin full of kids. So familiar beats new every time for an ADHD brain under stress.
And the fifth thing is packing. And this is where your systems brain comes in. And this is the very thing that I stuffed up for my son at Camp. So I was trying to pack with him, you know, in the weeks prior. I knew that packing was going to be stressful and it
was going to kind of stoke his anxiety about going to camp, right? So even though he was excited about camp, remember you can be excited and be anxious at the same time, right? So he was excited about going, but when we were packing, it was becoming really, really heated because he was also just a bit nervous about how it was all going to play out. He'd never been to a camp before, right? And so what I did is I stalled. I every time I tried to pack.
with him, he would do avoidant behaviors or it would end up in a big fight. And so we ended up packing the night before and it made everything so much worse. So much worse. because it placed all that anxiety and all that fight that we had right before he was supposed to go. So I do not recommend doing that. I recommend getting a list and actually starting to even if they don't want to do it with you, just
Building a bit of a packing system. So I like those packing cubes. So you just go everything they need for day one, everything they need for day two, everything they need for day three. It's labeled day one, day two, day three. So not all t-shirts together and all pants together and all that. Like actually planning it out in the way of the days can be really helpful. so labeling everything with your child's name because you know they're gonna leave some stuff there, and packing in outfits or days.
Not in piles. So there's no decision to be made every morning. So Ziploc bags work really well for this too.
Remember, we want to make this easy, knowing that this is going to be a little bit of a sticking point because it can bring up all the anxiety that they're feeling about camp. So we want to make sure that we're doing this well ahead of time because we can remove some of that discomfort, have their bag completely packed before it's time to go. Cause if you add rushing energy, like, come on, we're gonna get out the door. Why are you still touching that? Like we've got to get get everything right, where's these socks? It's going to make that transition really, really tricky.
Actually, I've got to tell you a funny story. When I dropped my son to his high school camp, a kid got out and he had no, he only had a backpack that was empty. He didn't take any clothes. He just had the one outfit, no toothbrush, no nothing. It was just an empty backpack. and he survived perfectly well at camp. So it's not he he survived. He just borrowed things, right? And I could, just see that this kid had packed for himself.
And the sixth thing that we want to do before they go is connection. So pack something that smells like home or feels like you or a special note tucked away or some sort of small familiar comfort item that's not that they're not too old for, that's not going to draw attention. So tucked away somewhere and agree on it beforehand so they're not embarrassed. these little anchors are what they reach for in the wobbly moments, and the wobbly moments are usually bedtime when they're alone.
usually bedtime when it's quiet. So so that's before. Now let's talk about during camp because that can shape this even though you're not there.
Now, the single most useful thing to set up is a person. So one adult at camp that knows that your child knows and that they can go to. So not the teachers. Give them an actual name, introduce them to the teacher beforehand, make sure your child actually likes them and that they have the perception that the teacher likes your child. because we need to have that person, that beautiful anchor person that your child can go to.
So a child with ADHD who's overwhelmed cannot scan a room and work out who's safe. They need to have it pre-decided. So decide it and tell the point person and tell that, tell that teacher too, so that they're expecting it. The second is a regulation plan for that they can actually use without you. So talk through before camp.
This is where that stories come in, that social stories, like be showing them where they're going, where they're sleeping, what they're going to be eating. All of these things can help reduce anxiety and just help them know the lay of the lay of the land. And it's asking your child with ADHD to do the movie of the mind strategy and actually forward project to what it's going to actually be like when they get to camp, which is important because a lot of our kids, they're excited about the thing, right?
But they don't run movie of the mind, which means that they get themselves into situations and then they're a bit overwhelmed when they get there because they haven't actually sequenced what it's going to feel like when they get in the moment. So doing the, you know, showing those pictures and those sorts of things on the website can be really helpful.
So in this regulation plan, we want to talk about what they can do if it all gets a bit too much. What can they do if you, if you're tired and everyone else is staying up, where can they go? What can they do with their body? Normalize stepping out, going to the bathroom, going and getting cold drink of water. It's completely okay to take yourself somewhere quiet if they need to. We need to have this, we need to be workshopping this with our child so that they've got options.
And make sure they know if they do need to have some quiet time, that they're not not somehow failing at camp, that our kids will immediately run that. it's that they're being smart. They're actually supporting themselves and giving their body what they needed.
You're giving them the co-regulation script to run on themselves since your calm won't be in the room. Now, the third is to lower the social bar out loud before they go. A lot of camp meltdowns are social exhaustion. So tell the truth in advance. You can talk about how you don't have to be on the whole time, you don't have to have a best friend by day two.
It's fine to be quiet. It's fine to need a break more than the other kids, giving them permission ahead of time to take the pressure off a system that's already stretched. That's already stretched. And the fourth thing during camp is managing you. No news is good news at camp. I had a space talk watch for my son and he never texted me back, right? Like I was like ready, I was tracking him, ready to communicate and nah.
Never text me back, right? He was just busy living his life. Most schools only call if there's a real problem. So silence is your child coping, not your child in crisis. And I know not knowing is hard. It feels really hard. But your job, while there are ways, is to trust the scaffolding that you've built and then let them use it.
Now, here's the part that people don't talk about when it comes to camp. It's the come down. So your child holds it together at camp with everything they've got,
And you know that that's got to go somewhere, right? They get in the car or they walk through the front door and they fall apart. They might be sobbing, they might be raging, they might be completely shut down, they might not be able to talk, they might be absolutely exhausted. And you think, I thought camp went well. and it probably did. This is the restraint collapse, the camp edition. It's on and it's on a three day scale instead of a school day scale.
They've been on away from the safe person with bad sleep. They're probably exhausted.
Which means that the moment they're back with you, one of those things could happen. I was just shocked that my son I asked my son, like, you know, how did it go? What fun things did you do? And he's like, nothing. And then I saw all these fun photos. And as the weeks went on, it actually he was able to recall and tell me the stories, but he just wasn't able to tell me till about three days after camp. He was just needed to rebuild his little stores there
and get some good sleeps until he was able to remember any of the stories.
So here's how you handle the pickup practically. Do not debrief in the car. Do not ask 20 questions like I did. Do not don't say who did you sleep near? What did you eat? Was so and so nice? Did you have fun? I know how desperate you are to know, but say that a brain that's running on empty after three nights of bad sleep cannot narrate its camp experience on the drive home. The story will come out later in dribs and drabs, usually sideways when you least expect it.
Instead, plan for recovery like you'd plan for any predictable friction point. Clear the calendar for the day after camp if you possibly can. Lower expect lower capacity, short a shorter fused child for a couple of days, and drop the demands to match. Extra sleep, familiar food, low stimulation, their own bed, their own quiet corner, their own everything. Just
Just keep everything how they like it. Keep everything nice and familiar. You're refilling the tank that's completely dry. It duh it does take a few days. Don't schedule anything big into it. Do not cut and this should come with a warning. Do not plan family photos for straight after camp.
So let's zoom out because here's what I want you to take from all of this.
Camp often feels really big for us parents. And it's been my experience that a lot of our kids actually cope a lot better than we think that they're going to at camp. And it is often a positive experience. And for the friction points that we're expecting, we can make a bit of a plan for to ensure that it's the best experience that we can for our kids. Remember, pull all that planning way before the night before you have to go.
because we want to make sure that they've kind of got time to process it away from the deadline, which I think can add extra pressure and anxiety.
And I also want to encourage you to stop bracing against the hard moments and we start mapping them so that we can build a plan into each one of them before it arrives. Our kids have shown us time and time again that they can do hard things and they can grow and they can develop and change and and be their beautiful selves in different environments that are challenging. So we've got to.
Sometimes to support them to take that first step. Now, if you need some help mapping. And before we go, if you would like some support for your family with ADHD, I am running a free session called the ADHD Family Systems. We are going to map your family's friction points together.
And we're going to build a system version for the ones that are costing you the most. So if you'd like to attend, we have three dates available. They're in the first week of September.
Head on over to the functionalfamily.com forward slash system and we can spend some time together creating ADHD friendly systems for your beautiful family as we map our friction points and plan what we are going to do to support the whole family to navigate through them. Now remember, camp isn't a test of whether your child can cope without support. It's a chance to show them that they can cope with the right support traveling with them.
Build the scaffolding and then we just stand back and trust it. I'll see you in the next episode.
