Beyond Labels: A Parent's Journal

They say some children come into the world with their maps already drawn. Mine came as a compass that spins in every direction, in love with North, with South and with everything in between. What is it like to raise a child who feels everything more strongly? It’s like learning to hug a lightning bolt.

It means being the shelter of a living spark that pulses, wired straight into the vibrant pulse of the world, and stubbornly refuses to turn to ash. Day by day you learn that your job is not to put out his light so that others can understand him more easily, but to be his anchor when his own intensity overwhelms him. To turn the world’s screen down to a lower volume while his heart beats at full.

In September, my son, Alex, started school. Like every parent, I had pictured that first day for years: the new backpack, the excited smile, the stories at dinner. My wife and I thought he was just very spoiled and hadn’t spent enough time around other children, like many six-year-olds starting the preparatory year of school.

But within just a few days we were given two labels that changed how I see my child, and myself as a parent: ADHD and an IQ above 120 (on the Raven test).

Together, the two are confusing, even for people who should know better. A bright, curious child who can talk for an hour about what he loves but can’t sit still forgets his homework and ends up labelled in class as “the difficult one”, with behaviour his teacher called “abnormal”.

Some days fill me with pride to the point of tears. On others I run out of strength, get angry, or simply don’t know which way to turn.

And sometimes the hardest part isn’t my child’s behaviour at all. It’s the looks, the comments, the quiet decisions made by adults who don’t understand, and the feeling that we’re treated differently because of how a brain works.

What this blog is

This is where I’ll write it all down: the struggles, the small victories, the things school gets wrong, and the moments that remind me why it’s all worth it.

I’m writing for two reasons. The first is selfish: I need somewhere to put these thoughts. Writing helps me make sense of them, a kind of therapy on a blank page.

The second is you. If you’re a parent who just heard the word “ADHD” for the first time, or whose child is both “too smart” and “too much”, or who is fighting a school that won’t listen, I want you to know there are others in the same situation.

What this blog is not

You won’t find my son’s real name here, or his school, photos, or anything else that could identify him. Here we’ll call him Alex. This is his childhood, a story he will tell himself when the time is right, not me. What I share are my own thoughts and experiences as a parent.

I’m not a doctor or a psychologist. Nothing I write here is medical advice, just one family’s honest experience.

If you’re here too

If any of this sounds familiar, write to me or stay a while and keep reading. Maybe together we can untangle some of it.

Thank you for being here.