An Ode to Percy Jackson

“Mommy! Guess what? Percy Jackson has ADHD, too!”

…and so began an epic family fandom of all things Rick Riordan

I read the first set of books with my then eight-year-old (she was a voracious reader and still is) and read them again in audiobook format when my younger daughter exhibited signs of dyslexia. My oldest daughter became a true fan. She read all the books, which have now branched into several different series.

For those not in the know – Rick Riordan started telling the story of Percy Jackson to his son (who is Dyslexic and has ADHD) at bedtime and eventually ended up writing the stories down, where they became bestselling novels for young readers. As a parent, I can’t tell you how much I love him for this.

One of the harder parts of raising kids with learning disabilities is how much shame kids feel with their initial diagnosis. It’s hard – as the adult – I knew that getting a diagnosis was a critical step in getting them the services and therapies they needed to eventually feel good about themselves and gain skills in areas where they struggle.

But that process is hard on kids. In my work with kids with dyslexia, several teens shared openly about their initial feelings of shame, some to the point where they openly talked of hurting themselves as third graders. (This process is even harder on kids who DON’T get the diagnosis. There is no explanation of why they are different, so they internalize it as being stupid/bad)

In that moment with your kids, you see them grapple with these really big feelings. On the one hand, you have the maturity to know that not being able to write legibly, read quickly, or sit still is not the end of the world at all. Still, you also know that for a kid in elementary school, that stuff is a currency for success, validation, and morality. 

Kids really do believe that doing good at school makes you a “good” person, and they internalize those feelings if they are “bad.” Getting the diagnosis and interventions are critical in helping them get to the other side of this, but this takes time.

And in comes Percy Jackson. He’s just a regular kid who struggles at school. Percy also has ADHD and dyslexia and feels like he can’t do good no matter what he does. In a whirlwind of events, he discovers that his absent father is the sea god, Poseidon and that he is part of an elite group of people called “demigods,” and he is sent to Camp Halfblood – a special place for fellow demigods to train for their futures as heroes. They all have ADHD and dyslexia. The reasoning for dyslexia is that it makes reading ancient Greek easier, as ancient Greek was often written right to left. The reasoning for ADHD is that demigods must always be ready for battle.

In the “real world,” these learning disabilities are seen as bad things – disruptive at school, “bad” kids – but at Camp Halfblood and in their future hero quests – these things are significant strengths. 

In just a few paragraphs, Rick Riordan takes a level 10 emergency for my kids and turns them into just another day slaying chimera.

He doesn’t overplay it either, these aren’t checkmarks he’s checking off for a DEI pass. It’s just a very small part of being a demigod and an incredibly small part of the books themselves. You hear about it in the intro of every book, and sometimes when a character struggles in the real world, but it is ALWAYS turned into a positive. And unlike some other kid fantasy books… Rick and the demigods of Camp Halfblood are incredibly inclusive and diverse.

They are also incredibly compelling page-turners. I definitely read them on my own!

My kids loved them and loved the concept. We stopped other families when a kid wore an orange “Camp Halfblood” T-shirt. We listened to the books on road trips. We watched both movies (super disappointing) and have at least one on DVD. When my youngest daughter went through a period where she lost interest in eating, I dyed her pancakes blue like Percy’s mom did, and I invented meals based on beloved characters. She ate it all. <3

So – when we heard that Disney was creating a TV show with Rick Riordan… we were excited. I’ve been getting links and trailers from my oldest for months now. We didn’t really celebrate Christmas too much this year, but wow, did we have our calendars blocked off for the first episode of Percy Jackson!!

And what a great last few weeks we’ve had! I’ll admit it’s been a while since we’ve read the books, but they did a great job with the transition to TV episodes! We have deeply enjoyed ourselves and are so excited about the next generation of kids who get to experience Percy Jackson on his quests. <3