Writer's Block: Life With ADHD
My son has it. So does my brother. So does one of my nieces (my sister's child, though, so it wasn't passed down directly.)
My brother grew up before they had a name and a fancy pill for it -- we just thought he was a space cadet. Made it through college eventually, had the brains to develop coping mechanisms, but never felt like he was where he ought to be -- it was a struggle just to keep up to normal tasks. He finally went to the doctor and asked to try Ritain as an adult, and for him, it works! He says it's amazing, he can do something like a jigsaw puzzle for the first time in his life. He can focus when he needs to, without fighting to keep his mind on the task.
My niece went on Ritalin about fourth grade, and says the same thing -- it lets her stay on track long enough to hear everything the teacher is saying, not just the first two sentences. She's in college now, and the doctors leave the choice to her as to when and how she takes it, but she says she can track the differences in how she feels and functions when she does and doesn't have it.
My son -- we struggled through preschool thinking he was just young. We struggled through kindergarten and first grade thinking he was just restless and gifted. We got the IQ tests to confirm that suspicion -- he can grasp what the teacher is saying before most of the rest of the kids in the classroom, then he gets bored. We struggled through second grade hoping that something resembling maturity would kick in soon and he'd learn to stop picking his nose and kicking his chair legs and generally acting out. I resisted the ADHD diagnosis and the dreaded Ritalin solution because he really didn't seem like he had ADD to me -- he can concentrate! Give him a new video game or computer game that interests him, he can hyperfocus for two and three hours at a time, and could do so from the time he was four. That sure didn't sound like a short attention span, though I was starting to wonder if he was obsessive-compulsive or even bipolar.
Finally at the end of second grade, my sweet, loving, wants-to-please child was coming home and telling me he was a loser. My eight-year-old was saying he wished he was dead. He couldn't control himself, he couldn't control the symptoms, he couldn't help looking at whatever was going on around him or being distracted by the noises. We tried caffeine, we tried omega-3/DHA/fish oil pills. Gave up, took him in, got the prescription. Gave him one week in third grade without the Ritalin so the new teachers could see what he was like without it. Put him on it, hating every minute.
Night and day difference.
The first week, his teacher told me she could tell.
For him, it works. We had to adjust the dosage towards the end of the year, but it works.
Don't kid yourself, this condition is real.
I don't know if it's ADD or ADHD, but for this particular kid, Ritalin works. I still think it's been overdiagnosed in some cases, and I've seen the studies showing that some kids appear to grow out of it -- their brains eventually get all the necessary wiring in place to correct the problem. To some extent, I think we push some kids to settle into a classroom routine before their particular brains are ready for it. But for my kid, it's been a lifesaver.
He still has an IQ of 145+ and the attention span of a gnat, when he's not on the magic pill. Even with it, he still gets bored in class sometimes. But he can function now, and it's given him back some self-respect. I still hope he's one of the lucky ones who grows out of it, but I'm glad the tool is there.
My brother grew up before they had a name and a fancy pill for it -- we just thought he was a space cadet. Made it through college eventually, had the brains to develop coping mechanisms, but never felt like he was where he ought to be -- it was a struggle just to keep up to normal tasks. He finally went to the doctor and asked to try Ritain as an adult, and for him, it works! He says it's amazing, he can do something like a jigsaw puzzle for the first time in his life. He can focus when he needs to, without fighting to keep his mind on the task.
My niece went on Ritalin about fourth grade, and says the same thing -- it lets her stay on track long enough to hear everything the teacher is saying, not just the first two sentences. She's in college now, and the doctors leave the choice to her as to when and how she takes it, but she says she can track the differences in how she feels and functions when she does and doesn't have it.
My son -- we struggled through preschool thinking he was just young. We struggled through kindergarten and first grade thinking he was just restless and gifted. We got the IQ tests to confirm that suspicion -- he can grasp what the teacher is saying before most of the rest of the kids in the classroom, then he gets bored. We struggled through second grade hoping that something resembling maturity would kick in soon and he'd learn to stop picking his nose and kicking his chair legs and generally acting out. I resisted the ADHD diagnosis and the dreaded Ritalin solution because he really didn't seem like he had ADD to me -- he can concentrate! Give him a new video game or computer game that interests him, he can hyperfocus for two and three hours at a time, and could do so from the time he was four. That sure didn't sound like a short attention span, though I was starting to wonder if he was obsessive-compulsive or even bipolar.
Finally at the end of second grade, my sweet, loving, wants-to-please child was coming home and telling me he was a loser. My eight-year-old was saying he wished he was dead. He couldn't control himself, he couldn't control the symptoms, he couldn't help looking at whatever was going on around him or being distracted by the noises. We tried caffeine, we tried omega-3/DHA/fish oil pills. Gave up, took him in, got the prescription. Gave him one week in third grade without the Ritalin so the new teachers could see what he was like without it. Put him on it, hating every minute.
Night and day difference.
The first week, his teacher told me she could tell.
For him, it works. We had to adjust the dosage towards the end of the year, but it works.
Don't kid yourself, this condition is real.
I don't know if it's ADD or ADHD, but for this particular kid, Ritalin works. I still think it's been overdiagnosed in some cases, and I've seen the studies showing that some kids appear to grow out of it -- their brains eventually get all the necessary wiring in place to correct the problem. To some extent, I think we push some kids to settle into a classroom routine before their particular brains are ready for it. But for my kid, it's been a lifesaver.
He still has an IQ of 145+ and the attention span of a gnat, when he's not on the magic pill. Even with it, he still gets bored in class sometimes. But he can function now, and it's given him back some self-respect. I still hope he's one of the lucky ones who grows out of it, but I'm glad the tool is there.