Who here has ADHD?

Post Reply New Topic

I have a question for all of you with ADHD. There's a 4-year-old boy in my Montessori preschool who clearly has it - shows all the signs and symptoms, including hyperfocus on two specific activities. Unfortunately the parents are not on board with this conclusion - they think he's just "competitive" with his older sister and frustrated that the older kids don't want to play with him. I can see that the poor kid is really stressed all the time because he truly just can't control himself and he's being bullied (and punished a lot) as a result.

I would advise the parents to get him evaluated and possibly even put him on some medication if it would help him control himself and have a better time at school and in life, but I know they don't want to hear what I have to say because I'm not an expert. What I would like from you guys is some firsthand information that I can pass on to them. If anyone is willing to take a few minutes to answer these questions, I (and this very creative, good-hearted little boy) would be very grateful!

1. How did you act when you were a kid (around age 4 if you can remember, or report what your parents say)?
2. How did you FEEL at that age?
3. At what age were you diagnosed?
4. How did the diagnosis affect you?
5. What treatment were you given and how did it affect you - how did you feel about your treatment, did it help, did it make things worse...? Would you recommend the same treatment for this boy?

Thanks a lot guys!

I was diagnosed with it when I was in kindergarten along with dyslexia but the ADHD got changed to ADD when I got re-certified for dyslexia between 9th & 10 grade. I started seeing psychs a couple years after I graduated high-school because I had a mental breakdown & some thought it was ADHD & others thought it was ADD. One guy I saw didn't think I had either & thought the symtoms I had were related to a combination of my other things. I tried Strattera a while but it made it harder for me to focus/I was zoning out more, it also made me stutter more & increased my tremors & I had more ticks on it. I was on other meds at the time including an anti-psychotic that increased or caused those problems so maybe the combination made things worse. I tried one other ADHD med out very briefly but I cant remember which one it was or about my expediences with it. I say I have ADHD because I have a lot of the issues but I'm not entirely sure if I have it or not. I think there's a chance that guy was rite about those symptoms being caused by my other issues. Most everyone I saw didn't think I had Aspergers so they looked at other diagnoses to explain my issues. I think AS stimming behavior is often thought to be ADHD; I stim more when I'm relaxing & having fun or when I'm frustrated or angry. It's harder for me to focus on something when it's something I don't care about or have a hard time grasping because of my dyslexia. I could sometimes be distracted by things because of my sensitivity issues like hearing a noise. Also anxiety & OCD can cause me to be distracted & to have problems keeping still; I want to pace when I'm really anxious or I get jittery. I think having that mental-breakdown & taking psych meds for 5 years after screwed my mind up some because I'm not as hyper/I have less energy & feel drained some & it's harder for me to focus & pay attention. It's like I went from being ADHD to losing the Hyper & having a much stronger attention Deficit.

I have Autism and ADHd combined. As a child I was super hyperactive and my parents couldn't get me to sit still. I'm older now and take concerta for my ADHD which has even helped my Autism. I still get distracted a lot and there are times when I have a really short attention span as well.

But having ADHD does have it's benefits since I am able to stick to something I really love doing which is writing. It's a way for me to vent out frustrations i have and also express myself in a way that I never have before. Writing is another way that helps me with stimulation. :3

I was diagnosed with ADHD in second grade with a learning disability so I didn't get an autistic diagnosis until I was thirteen. I have been on meds after meds growing up for ADHD and finally settled with Concerta and not once has it given me any problems.

Only now, I think it's causing a reaction to my abilify because my concerta isn't working as well as it used to. My sensory issues are getting really bad.

I self diagnosed on both asperger's and ADD. It took me a couple of years to get to that conclusion, its so easy to just blame every thing on one or the other. It was a good thing i actually liked psychology stuff.

I even trace them to different branches of the family. I kind of localise them in the brain. The ADD is in the parietal lobe, its the area that decides whats important and should be forward to the frontal lobe. Aspergers, is in the lymbic system, somewhere. So yea, you can genuinely have both, but i think the rate of miss diagnosis is very high, ADD can resemble the prostractination related to OCD (common in autism).

Seriously guys, you should be thinking twice before medicating. I don't believe ADHD, and specifically ADD (that i have) are diseases. They give you straights, with the corresponding costs.

You are medicating these kind of stuff away http://www.addcoach4u.com/positivesofadd.html

I do. It can be a pain in the neck to focus a lot of times. Easily distracted too.

Well, i have to take medication or my sensory issues are really horrifying. It's something I've been experiencing lately ever since I started talking abilify. x_x Otherwise, I wouldn't mind not being medicated at all but I have severe ADHD so medication helps stimulate things I can't control. I'm a much better person when i can control it on medication.

I make do with caffeine, which seems to help very well with short term focusing (I have non-hyperactive ADD, not officially diagnosed though - I also have Aspergers and Epilepsy among other things). The only exception I guess would be if I get inspired or have a massive brain wave I have to stand up and walk around or I will start shaking like crazy. I do not know. But I am incredibly forgetful, easily distracted, scatterbrained, etc etc. If I say something I cannot remember a word I just said either - I know the general concept, but if asked to repeat it, I could not - which is annoying.

This has never been much of an issue until this last year where it became incredibly difficult to focus longer than 5 minutes on school work. I primarily attribute it to working on the computer which makes hyper-focus a lot harder since there are so many distractions, and if I spontaneously think of something interesting, I will wander off and spend the next few hours learning about random things.

I have ADHD but I need to get diagnosed with it though to get some ritalin first.

My mom, grandma, dad and brother have ADHD and I also seem to have it so I can't wait to get diagnosed and get some medicin to hold my head clear and stop making it run at 100% all the time.

I am in mid-life, diagnosed within the past year for inattentive ADD and SPD. In spite of a number of regrets for being diagnosed so late, I am very proud of what I have achieved. It turns out most of my coping / compensation mechanisms have gotten me far enough with two years of technical training in a good (but very stressful and anxiety inducing) career. I have had a successful long-term relationship although there were a great deal of problems most of the relationship due to non-diagnosis, non awareness of my having ADD. I am on a non-stimulant medication and am seeking a practitioner skilled to help create a management program for me. My diagnosing practioner feels confident in my compensations, but admits recommends pursuit of medical diagnosis for auditory processing disorder and a more skilled practitioner for coaching or cognitive behavioral therapy for the ADD.

I wish i was never put on pills everyone noticed how detached and quiet i became and said how sad it is to ruin the one that makes eveyone laugh all the time

I am ADHD, to the VERYYYY core. I don't take pills though, they're not much help. No pill can help calm down this girl. Yeeee.
Being addicted to sugar and caffeine doesn't exactly help my situation, either... God, I really need a Pepsi.

Diagnosed with it as a kid - now questioning that diagnosis and believe my symptoms more closely fit Aspergers. In general folks with genuine ADHD don't have nearly as much trouble with social interaction and have a much more difficult time in school and keeping a job.

this

I may have. I am ridiculously hyperactive and, despite my remarkable ability to learn/memorize things, sometimes I find it very difficult to focus on things (the opposite is also true: sometimes it is very hard for me to change my focus to something else). unfortunately, I cannot really afford a diagnosis right now, but I intend to confirm my suspicions (about ADHD and Asperger) as soon as I get a job.

I have some ADHD traits, espessially hyperactivity, but not strong enough for an ADHD diagnoses.

If you have ADHD/ADD that is severe enough to constitute an official diagnosis, then yes, it is a problem and should be medicated. That is the whole point of the psychiatry system. As someone who does have ADD/ADHD, properly diagnosed (I don't intend offense here, but if you are self diagnosed but don't see it as a problem in your daily life then you don't have it. You could say you have "traits" of it, or you are "on the spectrum". A disorder can only be professionally diagnosed if it causes clinically significant distress or dysfunction in that person's daily life - that's what constitutes a disorder. That's how one draws the line between what's a disorder and what are personality traits).

In response to the woman who wanted advice with the 4yo who clearly has it, I wasn't diagnosed until I was 16 but I think a lot of things that caused much grief in my life could have been avoided with an earlier diagnosis and proper intervention. I was borderline failing subjects by the end of grade 10 when I was diagnosed, but once I was diagnosed and put on ritalin I went from D grades to A grades in many subjects and ended up graduating with 6 A's and one B, in the top 2% of students. This is the difference medication made for me. Prior to intervention my parents were seriously concerned I wouldn't make it through grade 11 and 12. When I graduated school I had been on ritalin 3 years and had improved substantially so I decided to try uni going off it. I got by for 3 years, but really struggled to do so. It wasn't marks I struggled with - I got consistently high marks, it was being able to sit and work for extended periods of time, and focus on what I was doing. It took me many times longer than everyone else to complete things and every essay I wrote felt like an uphill battle despite the fact that I love academic and actually WANTED to be writing essays (it certainly wasn't lack of motivation that was the problem). After 3 years I had a massive crash, got diagnosed with bipolar (although this is another story), but now I'm back on ritalin again. I've come to the realization that I need it to cope day to day and I can't really effectively stuggle on without it any more, especially since I now have to deal with bipolar mood swings on top of that.


Anyway, I was more of an ADD presentation as a child. How it affected me:

- I was so constantly and completely zoned out that kids would wave their hands in front of my face and ask if there was anybody in there.
- I was constantly getting locked in classrooms, left behind, going to the wrong rooms and missing classes, etc. because my sense of time was so warped and my attention was so terrible. This caused me a lot of grief and often anxiety or panic.
- I made all kinds of stupid mistakes on assessment and lost massive marks because of not fully hearing instructions or misreading questions (I would often not read questions fully due to the way my attention kept jumping). Despite not being diagnosed, a lot of this was mistakenly attributed to my aspergers diagnosis and my teachers were instructed to always double check that I fully understood the question and to always repeat verbal instructions to me. This actually helped a great deal.
- I constantly lost or broke things to the damage of thousands and thousands (literally, I am not making this up here, I once misplaced $6000 cash in one go) of dollars due to inattention and forgetfulness. I had to buy a new sports uniform almost every 2 weeks as I kept leaving them on the bus. And the worst part of it was I kept making the same mistakes over and over. It was like I was unable to learn from them, or was too lazy (as my parents often accused me when they didn't know better) to bother. Losing the same thing in the same place, forgetting to close the front door, absentmindedly scraping the school bag against the hallway and knocking over expensive vases. I was damn fortunate my parents were wealthy and able to afford to pay for the sort of costs and damages I inflicted on them.

Basically, without going on and on about it further, I think intervention is vital - the earlier the better. Whether or not medication is deemed necessary, there are all sorts of helpful things that can be done to help that kid both practically and also psychologically (I had poor self esteem for a long time due to not understanding why I was the way I was with the ADD related problems, not just due to aspergers and bullying).