ADHD and Lack of Empathy? Are They Related?

ADHD and lack of empathy ? Are they related somehow ?

Empathy refers to the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Its a key part of social interactions and helps us to build relationships with others. When someone is lacking in empathy, they may have difficulty understanding how others are feeling or why they feel that way. They may also seem insensitive or uncaring towards others. Children with ADHD can sometimes be seen as unempathetic because they may have trouble reading social cues, act impulsively, and can be hyperactive and distractible. Do children who have ADHD have a lack of empathy? Is ADHD and lack of empathy related?

Empathy VS Sympathy

These two terms are closely related but are not synonyms. Sympathy involves feelings of compassion, sorrow, sadness, or pity for another person or other people who are facing difficult circumstances. It is an emotion experienced in reaction to something that happens to other people. When you feel sorry for someone, you have sympathy for that person.

Empathy is stronger than sympathy. It goes beyond feeling compassion for their loss. It is the ability to put yourself in the place of another and understand someone else’s feelings by identifying with them. With empathy, you put yourself in another’s shoes and view the situation through their eyes to get a real sense of what their experience is like

Compassion

The meaning of compassion is to recognize the suffering of others and then take action to help. Compassion embodies a tangible expression of love for those who are suffering.

Back Story

A quick back story. My son is 10 years old and has ADHD. He was diagnosed at age 5 and has been on medication since then. Medication is not a fix all but it definitely helps. He struggles with impulsivity and focusing the most.

Last weekend episode

The weekend of 9/30 my kids had a friend’s birthday party at the community pool in our development. My kids were having a blast swimming, playing with their friends and playing with the water squirters. At one point I was watching and Michael and a friend were running around the pool playing and Michael pushed his friend into the pool. The kid came out of the pool upset and said that Michael had pushed him in. He had a huge scrape on his foot. The party hosts came over and put a bandaid on. I spoke with Michael about not pushing other kids in the pool because we don’t want anyone to get hurt.

About an hour later, my daughter starts squirting me and I asked her to stop a few times. She did not stop and kept getting me wet. I ran after her and picked her up and threw her in the pool. We were laughing and playing around. She got out of the pool and start squirting me again. I grabbed one of the squirters and was standing next to the pool. Michael came over and pushed me. When he pushed me my foot went into the pool grate and my other leg scraped the pool. He looked at me and said “you get what you get”.

Injury

I believe he was trying to push me into the pool. But he wasn’t anticipating my foot going into the grate. My left knee hit the concrete and the grate, I have a huge abrasion on it. My right knee I believe hit the ground. I have a huge black and blue right by my knee and a few more going down my calf. He had no remorse at all. He said he pushed me because I threw my daughter into the pool and said I got what I got.

I had to ice it for days. It has been over a week and it still hurts sometimes. I did speak with his counselor about it and she did speak with Michael about it. She was concerned because he showed no empathy. She stated that sometimes children with ADHD struggle with empathy and that she would talk with him about it.

Empathy in ADHD kids

Certain habits, behaviors, or personality traits could make it seem as if you or your child have less empathy — regardless of how much empathy you actually have. Kids with ADHD tend to be impulsive, restless and have difficulty paying attention. Kids with ADHD might react to other people or situations before they take time to consider their response, which can lead to words or actions that come across as less empathetic.

Having less empathy can be viewed as:

• criticizing others
• considering other people too sensitive
• finding it difficult to understand how others feel
• having a hard time forgiving others
• blurting out things without thinking how your words can affect others
• having little or no interest in other people’s opinions
• feeling frustrated or confused by other people’s emotional reactions

Research suggest that kids with ADHD have lower empathy scores which may relate to inattention, impulsivity, and difficulty with tasks such as planning, organization and time management.

Can counseling help?

My son has been going to counseling for the past few months and we have seen a dramatic change. He is doing better and working really hard in school. His actions toward me the other day was concerning. He showed no empathy or all. After I had fallen and was visibly hurt his response was “you get what you get”. The look on his face showed no remorse and that I deserved it.

Empathy skills can be learned and cultivated, and you can help your child with ADHD show empathy. His counselor said that is going to work on empathy skills with him over the next few weeks.

Here is a good article I read regarding ADHD and empathy.

Do you have a child with ADHD? Do they lack empathy?

Does counseling work for ADHD?