ADHD kids - a reaction I just don't get

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Why is it that when a situation is obviously serious and for example someone is upset because they got hurt (physically or emotionally) or an adult wants to have some serious talk with the ADHD child (because for example it hit someone else out of "fun" and it was too hard and the other child is now crying or something similar), that no matter what one says all the reaction one gets is laughter and giggles? Is that out of provocation or embarassment or lack of empathy or do they just really find it so funny? And how is one supposed to react to this in return?
I'm absolutely not sure it's with all hyperactive children this way, because I only know two, but that's a trait they both clearly share.

I have notice in myself If I injury myself I sometimes laugh as my first response to the pain. Not sure why or if this is even related to your question. Oh I have the inattentive non-hypertype ADHD.

I think i do that O.O i mean, if i do something wrong and someone will talkt to me like "you shouldn't put your pen into this child's hand, it's rude" i will laugh and giggle... i don't know why, either i find it funny or it's stress reaction. (oh, i don't get it now, i used to as a child. if i do something wrong i'm informed in more subtle way, nobody treats my that childish now) Is that what you mean???
I have no idea how should you act. Ask my mother ;)

Last edited by Likho on 07 May 2007, 6:40 am, edited 2 times in total.

I do they SAME thing sometimes! Sometimes I laugh when I get hurt or am under too much stress. Don't ask me why...

Steve

I do the same i can do it while upset as well.

when a kid, i would laugh when when something was being explained to me. i used to think when i learned something new it made me giggle.

Yeah and they thought i was takeing the p*** damm teachers

I have a tendency to laugh (sometimes really uncontrollably) when someone is yelling at me and it has made the other person react even more angrily. I also laugh when I get upset or nervous.

I don't particularly find it funny if somebody is injured as a part of a game or a joke. But once I had to have my blood tested... and the problem was that they couldn't find my vein... and I laughed despite being in a lot of pain. I couldn't stop laughing.

My son is like that, but he has a lot of other things he does as well. We thought that he was ADHD for a long time because of this, but we started to notice, it really doesn't matter the punishment, facial expression, tone of voice, he just doesn't get that he did something wrong because he doesn't understand why it was wrong.

I had a friend that was 13-14 a few years ago, and he was ADHD. He didn't laugh or anything when he was in trouble, he'd go upstairs and become destructive because he was flat out bored in his room. I think in the time I knew him, he set portions of his room on fire, he'd punch holes in his walls, break his window, etc. I don't know what he was like when he was younger, but he knew why he was getting in trouble and fully understood, at least it seemed like it...

well, ADHD kids are known to get excitable and not have the forsight to control that very well.

at a guess i'd say that the giggling bit was due to anger, frustration and the embarassment at being told off. i am sure that you are familiar with the 'rule' of telling children off straight away or not at all so that they can relate being in trouble with the previous incident and actually learn from it. lots of kids of my generation were told 'wait til your father gets home'. by the time father got home and administered punishment, the average child would have forgotten what the original misdemenour was anyway. i just think that this is so exagerated in an ADHD child that they end up in this awful flux of feeling that they are constantly being told off for something they do not understand.

as for the 'lack of empathy' bit. 'specialists' like to bandy that phrase around a fair bit, but if you break it down it doesn't really mean an awful lot on it's own. i mean there are a lot of times when people lack empathy and one of those would be when feeling other more driving emotions and not being able to emotionally 'multi task' as it were. also a lot of other issues can prevent us from knowing how to act out upon the empathy that we feel towards others.

All kids - boys especially - love to test and explore their limits. Some climb trees, some find the toughest other boys to fight with. If you are different and unusual, then that's your speciality. You want to get good at it. Remembering back, it was an enormous high to realise I could go farther into madness than any of my fellow kids, or teachers. Seeing their shocked, incomprehending faces just made me want to laugh. You can't come into this world, but I can!

The people who tormented me were getting their lives made miserable - and I hardly needed to expend any effort at all! A simple piece of string connecting doorhandle to table full of china - the door opens and my, the screeching and howling as the crockery hits the floor! Lovely!

The power - the sheer power! - when a big, tall, strong adult just gazes into your eyes in mute horror and disbelief. Cocaine doesn't even come close.

And you can bet, every time, I fell about laughing.