ADHD Awareness

I didn’t face my own problems with ADD/ADHD until I had children of my own who were clearly ADHD. Medication was suggested for them, but I didn’t like that the Doctors were not treating the bowel troubles, hives, eczema, asthma, allergies,auditory processing disorder, etc. that went along with the hyperactivity and inattention. An allergist suggested in an offhand comment that I should try the Feingold program. It was a lifesaver. In addition to avoiding the artificial additives and natural salicylates, we have since found sensitivities to corn, dairy, gluten, and soy. By adjusting our diets, the problem has been nearly eradicated. I see symptoms of ADHD only after a dietary infraction.

My own ADHD and asthma have been “cured.” I think it’s important not to stick your head in the sand about the problem. Feingold is an especially smart way to go for someone who does not want meds. It takes a good solid year of effort to refine the diet for yourself (and feedback from your psych specialist or teachers or other outside sources is invaluable), but you may be able to control symptoms without medications. If you’re not ready for that effort, and the meds help… what are you waiting for. Get it done. Life is too short to always feel like a failure. Get going while you’re young. When you’re ready to have kids, you’ll be a better parent and a better person for it. PS neither meds or diet will take away the essense of who you are while both with eradicate the troubling symptoms.

I have the perspective of being newly diagnosed as an adult with a family but my diagnosis did not come as a result of my kids being diagnosed. It came with what I’m calling my mid-life crisis, and I’m in the middle of that. Hopefully coming out.

One of my strong ADD traits has been the ability to lock my concentration on topics that have been of interest to me so I did fairly well in school. I have also done fairly well with employment until a year ago. That’s when my untreated, and unknown ADD house of cards fell.

My experience with ADD has been a constant war with ideas and thoughts running through my head. If that is Gs experience I think he has ideas about what he wants out of life, his future lifestyle etc. I have come close to realizing my dreams without treatment, but my condition appears to not be as bad as his. And since my situation is unravelling at this point with nearly a year of unemployment I could very well see my dreams come to an end in the next six months. Fortunetly with treatment I can see various ways to recover.

G, get treatment. If the meds didn’t help clear your head then you need to have you doctor change your meds. Also be careful what you expect, I am mis-tating what happened for me when I say they cleared my head. It really didn’t do that, what it did was give me the ability to sort through the mess and decide what is important. The meds have given me the ability to be less distracted and has given me more control of my body and temperment. That may be why your teacher noticed an improvement in your behaviour and you were disapointed.

This also is where the med critics who haven’t taken the drugs fall down. These drugs leave us as the people we are, but they manage to increase our ability to control ourselves. We aren’t a group of people running around doped into submission. BTW - if you are taking meds and you feel dopy I was told by my doctor that that meant my dose was too high. Something isn’t right if you feel doped up.

Every person is different as well. Diet and exercise changes have made me feel better but didn’t deal with the problem. I also had to exert a great deal of self-control to maintain those. Interestingly enough once I started taking my meds my love of chocolate is almost gone and my diet is improving as well. I don’t have to force fruits and veggies down anymore. I actually enjoy some. One site that promotes a dietary solution believes that avoiding fruits and vegetables is a symptom of ADD. That certainly was my situation I’m surprised that the Adderall is helping me eat right.

G, it is very easy for a 39 year old to write this and for an 18 year old to discount an ‘old man’. At 17 you have a wealth of resources available to you, once you turn 18 or leave the school system most of those resources disappear. If you are having problems holding down jobs, and you have behaviour that is annoying to others you are going to have a tough time in life. You will have a 3 times higher chance of getting a divorce. You will likely never make it into the middle class, instead living in poverty. And in poverty you are more likely to get into drugs and since you may have ADD your drug of choice will probably end up being Meth. It’s not a pretty life snorting a drug made from Drano, don’t choose it.

You have a teacher who cares a lot about you, please work with that person to help you get some direction. And if you would like to know just what you can acheive read a biography about Thomas Edison. Based on symptoms that are described about him, he likely had ADD, and most of our modern technological world is built on his work. If you will accept the help around you and quit listening to the idiots who are making you feel bad. Who knows you may be the guy who develops the technology of the 22nd century! The beauty of this syndrome is that some of it is quite nasty but other parts have strong advantages.

With ADD your strengths are going to be best acheived as you follow your interests. Remember that there are some tough things we have to do in life to do what we want. Work with this special ed teacher to help you find something of interest in the work part of school. Find what you have a passion for and if society won’t pay you much for it, downgrade your dreams to that pay level. You will be happier for it through your life. With ADD forcing yourself to do something you hate is very difficult, if not impossible.

Those of us on this board will be happy to help you find ways of finding interest in the work part of life as well. Afterall, ideas are one of the strengths of ADD! You will also find many organizations that will be happy to help you. Hopefully CHADD has a local chapter you can attend meetings at. If you have an interest in military service they may also be able to help you. If you have a religious interest see if there are groups meeting in your area of people your age. And especially meetings of young people with ADD.

This has gotten way too long. I’ll stop now and pick it up later.

~Mark

Thank you Mark, I will show this to my student tomorrow. You pretty much described everything I have told G in the past and it helps to hear from others. Thank you for the time you have taken to respond. It is greatly appreciated.
Mrs. Davis

New ADHD resource:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ADHD_Bulletin_Board/

Have met several people with ADHD who said that the only thing which helped them at all were the ADHD medicines (stimulants/alerting agents); they tried the controversial alternative approach you describe which they said completely wasted their time, wasted their money, produced no results at all, and put false ideas into their heads about what neurological challenges like ADHD, epilepsy, and dyslexia really are. They said they could not believe or trust any of the incorrect information coming from that controversial cult approach at all which essentially and falsely denies the existence of neurological conditions implying that the cause of all neurological challenges is diet only. They said the controversial approach you mention is a synonym for big fib and great dishonesty.

Heard the same comments from others with real ADHD. They made changes to their diets and exercise programs with zero results; the diets and exercise programs completely failed. It wasn’t until they found the right ADHD medicine (a stimulant/alerting agent) that the ADHD for them temporarily was reduced/the symptoms were temporarily relieved.

ADHD shows up on some objective SPECT scans which means ADHD is quite real vs falsely due to something as simple as an allergy or food. Those concerned about classic lifelong ADHD should look to known medical sources for what classic ADHD actually is vs falsely mistate that all of ADHD (like all of polio or Tourette’s or epilepsy) is due to an allergy or food which they are not.

People must be protected from false and incorrect information about ADHD, that is, that all of ADHD is falsely due to food additives/end of story. That’s a huge fib - dishonesty and does not belong in the world of good scientific medicine.

That’s my view.

http://jol.rsna.org/pr/target.cfm?ID=28

http://www.brainplace.com/bp/atlas/ch12.asp

I was tested then labeled as ADD when I was in the 2nd grade. I started taking Ritalin and for the most part it was good. I would take it in the morning then at Lunch. The hard part was walking out of the lunch line and heading down to the nurses office every day. At least twice people would ask and shout “Why is she going to the nurses office, are you okay, are you sick?” I was just a 2nd grader and I didn’t know what to say. I was not sure if I was sick or not. My parents were and still are wonderful, they helped explain things to me. So note, parents to hide from your child that they are ADD, or ADHD, (the new label) let your children know and explain to them they are different but wonderful, otherwise they will just think they are different and bad.

So that entire process of going down to the nurse lasted until junior high. I went to a small school and the only nurse was in the elementary only. Now the office would have the medication. I just avoided going there all together. It was very un pleasent because other “bad” kids were in the office. That made me a “bad” kid because I had to go to the office. Finally thank goodness time realsed Ritalin came around. I started taking that in the 8th grade and I could hide my ADD under a mat.

I was an interesting combination. I am also LD, but I would go to advanced English and Math courses then Special Education Pull Out for History. I had a few teachers that would not follow my IEP because they thought that my grades were good in other classes and I didn’t need it. After my sophomore year of high school I was competely pulled out of Special education classes. I was in all gen ed reagular kid classes, and all my friends were in the advanced college bound classes. It really did not bother me all that much.

I was active in high school. I was a three year Varsity Cheerleader, a four year show choir member, a student council member, I was in National Honor Society, I was in Student Council and a class officer, and I graduated 10th in my class. Of course I felt as though that was an honor I did not need to get because others had a lower GPA because they had choosen to take harder college classes, when I had not been advised to take those courses. I did not take Spanish or French in high school. Because of my disability they waved it. So I had extra time to take some easy computer courses, I am very good at computer skills now, which serves me a little better then two years of forgotten French!

I also worked at the elementary school in an LD, EH, and MoMH class. I was interested to see how the students were being treated then. I wanted to know if any one else had to still walk to the far corner of the school then down to the basement to get “extra help”. I feel in love with the Special Education class. During High School I spent three years working with the students. I graduated in 2000.

Now I am a Junior at ISU. I still am on medication. I take Conerta. I switched over second semester of my sopohomore year and experieced a few months of depression while making the switch. It was a very hard time for me and it was too bad those side effects happened to me. However, it passed and now the concerta is better then ever, I don’t lose sleep, I can eat more, and I have a better focus.
Sometimes I feel as though I should not be taking any medication. I feel like it is a weakness, that I am not really fighting my disability. But that is not true. Concerta is not a cure for ADD. I still have it and I still have to help my self combat it. Concerta also is not a cure for the learning disabilites I have. I still have to study longer and take notes in special ways. So yes it is hard. And I take concerta because it makes sense too. If I, like my mother, had problems with my heart, I would want to take heart medication. No one would be against me taking heart medication. I think that taking medicine and accepting a label is all about how the person feels.

It was hard for me to live with a label even though I had very supportive parents. Some teachers pushed me to excell. Others didn’t think I had the right to be as sucessful as I was. When I graduated from High School my class gave me the (Friendly Senior) award. I think that reflects upon my postive attitude about life and the entire issue of being different. I like to think outside the box. Because early on people told me I would never make it and I would never be smart, I would always be below average, I pushed myself to prove to myself it was not true.

Yes at times I still feel as though school is too much. I will start student teaching in the Fall of Next year but I have made it this far. ISU offers help to those who have disabilites. I chose to rid my self of the label and not accept the extra help. Even with out it I have maintained a 3.6 GPA (out of 4.0) in my major.

What can I say. It is possible to do well in school. I am living proof to the fact that an ADHD girl can make it in High School and have friends and be well liked and get good grades. Now I don’t mean to toot my own horn, and believe me the first thing I tell some one is not that I am ADHD and I am doing well!
It is important to remember that life is not all school work, and I understand that. I have not just studied at college. I went through recruitment and pledged Chi Omega. They have helped me to reach goals in life I did not think I could acheive. I have a leadership position and can use art to my full extent. Also our chapter has the highest GPA on our campus. It makes me feel so proud that our chapter full of the “smart girls” has a few learning disabled and ADHD women. Well I don’t mean to write in and say I am so wonderful! I actually got on line because I am working in a class now and I wanted to find some learning interventions to teach a student. I just want you to know that it is possible. ADHD and LD does not have to be a barrier. I did it and I am no extra special person. I have an average if not a little low IQ, I am not from a weatlhy home where I had extra help and tutors. Both of my parents worked. I have one older sister. She helped me too. My family feels like I was their group project! Everyone pitched in and look how it turned out. My goals in life now are to inform and help people deal and overcome disabilites. I appreaciated my families help, it changed my life, but I also know that my family could not make that walk down to the special education classroom for me. I had to do it alone. I also had to pull myself up and make a choice about how well I really wanted to do. No one expected me to do anything great or be anything special. It was my choice. Now I will teach special education. I am just hoping to influence those students I will meet to reach far past the stars. So what I mean to tell the student who might still be reading this, it was very long, is that you should take the chance and fight for your self. Don’t let ADHD or LD stand in your way. Taking medicine and/or learning interventions and being organized is like training for a fight, if you don’t you are going to go down with the first hit. So, here is the good news, you can do it, you can make it in any way you want, here is the bad news, it is a lot of hard work to get here. Good luck!

Hi!
I have ADHD and take meds. I do feel like changing my diet makes me feel better. However, eating heatlhy and good can make anyone feel better. I think that their is a realtion between chaning your diet to heatlhy food and feeling better but no realtion between chaning your diet and controlling ADHD. That is the medical side. On the personal side, it is easier for me to control my ADD when I am feeling good and have eaten well. If I have had too much junk food I feel all over the place and do not do as well. So thats my experience. Anyway, it can’t Hurt any of us to try and eat a little better and work out a few times a week! haa!

Hi!
I have ADHD and take meds. I do feel like changing my diet makes me feel better. However, eating heatlhy and good can make anyone feel better. I think that their is a realtion between chaning your diet to heatlhy food and feeling better but no realtion between chaning your diet and controlling ADHD. That is the medical side. On the personal side, it is easier for me to control my ADD when I am feeling good and have eaten well. If I have had too much junk food I feel all over the place and do not do as well. So thats my experience. Anyway, it can’t Hurt any of us to try and eat a little better and work out a few times a week! haa!