“I’ll Do It in a Minute”: Why Your Child Can’t Get Started

What you’re seeing: The homework sits untouched. The “clean your room” request turns into an hour of wandering, stalling, and scrolling. Your child sits down to start, then gets up for water, a snack, a pencil, anything. When you push, they melt down or shut down. It looks like laziness. It feels like defiance. And you’re running out of ways to say “just start.”

Why it’s happening: Getting started relies on an executive function skill called task initiation. It’s the brain’s ability to move from “I need to do this” to actually doing it. For many outside-the-box kids, that bridge is shaky. They can want to start and know how, and still feel stuck at the starting line. When a task feels too big, too boring, too unclear, or too likely to go wrong, the brain hits pause, and the harder you push, the more stuck they get.

What helps: Task initiation can be supported, and it starts with making the first step smaller, clearer, and less overwhelming. In this session, Jill Gitten Aloia, PhD, ABPP-CN, shows you how.

What we’ll cover:

After Dr. Jill’s talk, she’ll be joined by Lily Baiser, MS, OTR/L, for a live parent community Q&A. Bring the tasks your child gets stuck on most, and Dr. Jill and Lily will help you figure out what’s getting in the way.