My 12 year old niece has been diagnosed by two doctors that she has ADD. Based on my working with her on math, I am also convinced she has dyscalculia.
I am trying to find a way to ensure all these disgnoses are correct and to develop a plan to address these issues, whatever the findings may be.
I get the feeling that ADD is over diagnosed; that the doctors are financially motivated to test, write a prescription, and move on to the next patient.
The internet likewise seems to have filled with sites that will test for LD, then offer programs that will “train the brain”.
On the flip side, I get the feeling that schools UNDER diagnose LD so that they don’t have to make accomodations as required under the Americans With Disabilities Act.
The bottom line is I need to know whom I can trust in this important matter, what is fact, what is fiction.
Thanks
Getting a proper ADD and LD assessment
You can not trust anyone. Because they all lie for financial benefit. Even important groups that once upon a time were really good have gone bad like Chad. Everyone is on the drug corporation dole. Including the schools. Please check out groups like Able Child and look into The Wildest Colts. It is eye opening and jaw dropping the type of true satatnism is mixed up in ADD and ADHD diagnosies. I can’t speak for dyscalula I don’t know a thing about it. But i know i have seen upwards of 50 so called experts and some have declared me bi polar one of the current fads that pays them alot due to prescriptions and drug corporations. Many of them claim i am ADHD/ADD even though i don’t exhibit the symptoms, which cracks me up because the display of the symptoms is really the only criteria by which one can be diagnosed so if there is no credible scientific test and it is based solely on a subjective observbation of one’s behavior and you don’t exhibit the symptoms according the doctor observing and yet you are diagnosed as ADHD anyway and drugged…. You do the math. Some claim i am normal as anything aside from the dyslexia. I have never had a manic spell or phase in my life or been euphoric like is necesary to be *bi* polar. Today any form of depression seems to fall under *bi* polar even if youa re not exhibiting the manic highs associated ever in the course of your life time if you are ever low you are bi polar. It is ridiculous!
I need to go have dinner but i will give you some stuff from an email i received as part of a mailing list, the implications of it are frightening as it relates to ADD/ADHD in particyular. This email does not adress schools, but schools are a leading part of the problem and are having people diagnosed many times for no reason at all just because in many not all school districts the school receives a drug company kick back for every child medicated in zombification.
Getting a proper ADD and LD assessment
I think the best assessment for LDs and other brain disorders is to get a variety of testing done. When my daughter was 9 she really struggled with school and was already being treated for Bipolar, which she definitely has. The problem was that some of the symptoms looked like ADHD, too, and she was having difficulty in a lot of academic areas. I requested an Independent Educational Evaluation through the school so that we could get a better idea of what was going on. She had testing with a Neuropsychologist (confirmed Bipolar, questioned ADHD because of so many other issues with overlapping symptoms and added Dyslexia, Dyscalculia, Dysgraphia, and visual processing issues), a Speech/Language Pathologist (added receptive/expressive language problems but also noticed that vocab was WAY higher), Audiologist (Auditory Processing Disorder), OT/PT (sensory issues and low upper body muscle tone) and Educational Optometrist (double vision up to 3 feet from her face). With all this information we were able to do a lot of things that have helped my daughter. She’s about to finish her Junior year in HS and has been successful in some areas. Her reading is at grade level and she took a Geometry class.
It’s often hard to unravel the puzzle but it can be so worth the effort when you see thngs working and the child being successful.
As promised some interesting statistics and stuff from an email i received as part of a group that objects to the over use of medication. I am not against it in all cases but i do feel the way it is used now is an abuse not a fair use. The UN would actually agree with me and has infact issued statements against the US’s drugging of children. We use over 90% of the world’s ritalin supply each year. What does the rest of the world do with that less than 10% that we leave for them to use? Yet somehow our kids are coming out less and less educated for example it is extrmely rare to find kids on medications in Finland yet their students rank as the best educated in the world. Their school system functions on less than ours and though the population of school age children is different as Finland’s population is far smaller, it is still a shocking blow to us. The USA doesn’t even rank in the top 25 for either the most educated children and it is at the bottom of the list for the most happy children. Finland is in the top 5 there but Holland actually has the happiest children int he western world. There is something really really wrong with all this so here are some stats some apply to LD such as ADHD some do not but all in all it is quite frightening what it is telling us.
Dear Citizen, December 2006
$162,155 was issued to the Alleghany County Public Schools in Covington,Virginia to provide mental health counseling services for students. Totalitarian psychiatry has arrived, the Hippocratic Oath has been annihilated, and millions of Americans will be again reduced to fodder by the abusive legal system and by the PAC’s , regulatory agencies, and others who are willing to utilize it.
Written are few facts.
1. 400,000 pre-schoolers are now on ADHD medication. 40% have reported
side effects.
2. Originally Ritalin was supposed to be temporarily prescribed
only in the most extreme cases. In 1985 there were 500,000 cases of
ADD/ADHD. In 1999, there were 7 million.
3. Since ADD was invented in 1980, hospitalizations for adolescents nearly tripled in just six years.
4. Last year, 1.6 million children and teenagers were given at least two psychotropic drugs in combination, and 500,000 were given at least three.
5. Over 8 million children in the U.S. are taking psychotropic medications.
6. Individuals 20 and younger that included prescriptions for antipsychotic drugs grew from 201,000 in 1993 to 1.2 million in 2002. About 18 percent of visits resulted in prescriptions for antipsychotic drugs.
7. New York University’s Child Study Center speculates that 1 in 40 infants “or so” is “depressed.” Psychiatrists are now saying toddlers who cry a lot may need Prozac.
8. There are now 370 mental health “disorders”.
9. The number of educational psychologists increased from 455 in 1969 to 16,146 in 1992. Child psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors and special educators now out-number teachers.
This is all criminal fraud. No one has a brain scan, blood test or X-Ray to verify they are “ill” or “diseased.” Yet many psychiatrists mislead the public into believing these so-called “disorders” are biochemical or neurological conditions. That is false. These are just behaviors voted into existence and inserted into their billing bible, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
In 1999, Mother Jones magazine reported that 18 drug firms gave National Alliance On Mental Illness $11.72 million between 1996 and 1999. It is a leading PAC for the psychiatry and pharmaceutical industry.. Its former executive director was Laurie Flynn. She now headsTeenscreen that is descending on school systems nationwide.
Teenscreen will compel students to answer highly invasive and private questions. This program has to be protested against by parents and community members at school and local board meetings. Exposure of the fact that parents, schools, and child welfare agencies receive taxpayers’ money for every ADHD student must be provided.
Mild medication, in small dosages, and on a
temporary basis, can improve the productivity of an individual by helping to
relieve some of the symptoms of compounded stress and anxiety. They are to have the same effect and purpose as antibiotics and headache medication. If an individual experiences adverse side effects, seeing another doctor should be strongly considered. No ethical doctor makes a significant departure from the initial prescription. Otherwise it will appear medication was not prescribed with credibility, competentence, or seriousness.
Many psychotherapists have unfortunately partnered with the legal
profession as psychotherapists play a major part in the judicial and the social
agency process. So often judges order people to undergo forced counseling, which is clearly wrong. For therapy to work, an individual has to voluntarily decide to see a doctor for any assistance in the strictest of privacy. Worst yet, judges are ordering forced drugging, hospitalization, and even ECT treatments. This is evidenced by the fact that many youth in foster care are medicated to the extent of suffering lactation. The primary question is “How humane and fair can a nation be if its most vulnerable and helpless are exploited like this?”
If parent(s) object to the school mandated drugging, they could lose their child to government agencies. So many “youngsters” will be turned into “guinea pigs” and consequently poisoned & labeled. Yet the money continues to roll in. Pharmaceutical company gifts to the Texas Department of State Health Services alone totaled $1.3 million from 1997 to 2004.
There simply is no chemical solution to emotional pain, bizarre behavior, anger and bad temperament, character flaws, psychological inhibitions, personality defects,personal traits and other temporary issues. What really is needed is guidance, discipline, and evaluation based on objective merits .
In any country with an oppressive legal system, it is convenient to “brand”. The Soviet Union had their “mental health facilities” to help those to “see the light”. Bar associations’ control of the three branches are doing the same here. The only way to stop this dangerous government intrusion is to ban lawyers
or any other group from belonging to two or more branches. The time for the revolving door to close is now overdue.