(8/8) ADHD: An up-to-date conception of it
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- čas přidán 6. 07. 2024
- In this series I talk about some of what's behind the controversies associated with attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); some reasons why the true nature and seriousness of the disorder is so deeply and widely misunderstood; some of the historiography and clinical descriptions of it; a wee bit about what it's like to live with it, and a brief description of the most comprehensive and up-to-date understanding of ADHD as an 'executive functioning deficit disorder' rather than an attentional one -- one which much more effectively explains and more fully accounts for the pervasive and disabling effects in multiple domains of life that this disorder causes IF it is untreated//unmanaged.
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For a very short screener for ADHD in adults, empirically proven to be more effective at sorting adults who have the disorder from those who do not vs. the DSM-V, scroll down below the subheading "Diagnosing ADHD in Adults: The DSM 5 Criteria" to the numbered items section of this doc: www.continuingedcourses.net/ac...
See also what the acronym in the title of the book by psychiatrists and clinical experts in ADHD, Drs Craig Surman and Tim Bilkey (with co-author Karen Weintraub) stands for: "F.A.S.T. M.I.N.D.S.: How To Thrive If You Have ADHD (Or Think You Might)".
Identification with what you find there in no way constitutes a good substitute for a proper medical diagnosis of ADHD (which should always involve an in-depth taking of patient history), but it could very well indicate that further assessment for the disorder is warranted, should you wish to seek it.
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Thanks! I had been thinking about this recently, great timing
The aspect that confuses me as an INFP is that Te (extraverted thinking) overlaps somewhat with 'executive functioning', so having inferior Te seems like it would manifest as ADHD-like behavior regardless of whether neurological differences are present. And also that Ne is random and distractible by nature, so there's overlap there as well. I did indeed skip to this video first though, haha, so I'll watch the rest and I'm sure you address topics relevant to this confusion.
Enid, Thank you so much for all of the info you presented. It WAS a lot to get through, mostly because you presented aspects not touched by the average medical professional; specifically your own thoughts and feelings interspersed in the mix; that for me, makes it totally worth watching, because most of the clinical professionals spout statistics and nothing else helpful or personal. I hear your frustration, and it is very understandable considering what you cite as your circumstances. Thank you for your willingness to be transparent in the face of opposition. That takes real courage.
I am going to access the online medical source you mentioned for the information I seek. Thank you for that. :)
( Some background: My daughter was diagnosed with ADHD by a school psychologist about a year ago. It was recommended we put her on meds. No other information was given in regards to helping my daughter obtain some help for her executive functioning states. I have refused to drug her without real informed consent. )
I sincerely hope you are able to conclude your studies and achieve your goal of psychological counsellor; I'm sure that there are many people that could benefit from your experience and expertise, particularly in this area of study.
If you do re-route this topic to another channel, will you announce it here?
Hi, Karen Traa.
I've been working my way back to answering this as it required a thoughtful answer. Still, I'm sorry it took so long!
Thanks a lot for the listening, the acceptance, your encouragements, and well-wishing. It's really nice to hear those things from you.
And I'm sorry it was hard on you to listen to all that was in this series, on the different levels -- especially knowing now what I do about your daughter.
I don't think I'll make a general announcement about the other channel here, as the two won't likely have much, if anything, to do with one another (the latest video series were a detour), but I'll let you and any other viewers who've expressed an interest know.
I've written many substantial comments to viewers with a vested interest in ADHD matters the past 10 days or so . . . Please forgive me if I'm about to repeat myself, but I would really like to make sure you know of these resources, especially since your kid has this too.
I cannot say enough about Russell A. Barkley's CADDAC lecture '30 Essential Ideas For Parents.' If I had to choose just one info resource to teach about ADHD, that would be the one, hands down. A *very* richly informative doc.
Another is the 13-min excerpt video (also available on CZcams) of the end of Barkley's 2012 keynote address to the psychiatry department of his alma mater in which he in riveting, whizzbang manner outlines all the key principles behind any effective treatment//management strategy for ADHD. The poster entitled it, 'This is How you Treat ADHD Based Off of Science." (And he's right.)
I really hope I will not offend you with what I'm about to go on about below. It's just that I really feel the need to leave this last bit on your doorstep to do with as you will, because I really think that it's so important that it's worth risking being a bit forward. (Uh, even for me! ;-))
For what it's worth, I think your not wanting to medicate your daughter without her informed consent is very cool. (Not that you asked!)
I do hope, however, that you are no more 'hands-off' about educating her and then strongly encouraging her to give medication for this a try than you would be about encouraging her to take Metformin if she were type 2 diabetic and the doctor said she should be on _that_. Because the stakes for her long-term health and welfare could be just as high in the former case, and, all kinds of pop culture-generated total-bullshit controversy about whether psychostimulants should be given to kids OR adults with ADHD, notwithstanding, the science about this is unequivocal:
Medication really does significantly help ~80% of people with ADHD who try it; these drugs really are safer than Aspirin if you're not at major risk of heart attack or seizures; they've been on the market for 80 years; we know all about them and what they do, and, if she doesn't like how they make her feel and no one who works with her at school and no one at home notices they help her with anything she's struggling with, then all traces of these can be out of her system in a matter of hours.
There honestly is no downside at all I can think of to trying them -- and many different doses of different agents from the two main classes of drugs indicated for this, as is best medical practice.
(Sometimes a small titration or a switch to another formulation of the same molecule makes a big difference in efficacy in a given person. Extended-release formulations "XL" tend to offer better symptom diminishment throughout the day, without a lot of 'peaks and valleys' of effect. It also makes compliance much easier and obviates any need for a kid to feel self-conscious about taking those meds as a dose in the morning before school could do you the whole day.)
I'm more aware than most about the dark side of pharma advertising, and I'm very far from enchanted with that industry, in general. But I _am_ telling you: I wish to *GOD* someone had given me these drugs as a kid. I would have felt very much better -- calmer -- and would probably have been able to be more than a high-average in my grades. I would have felt much better about myself for being able to attend to things longer and better and more easily, and to have been able to both start and finish more worthwhile activities and projects.
As is Barkley and Hallowell and Ratey and developmental specialist M.D. Patricia Quinn (please do sometime check out her 2011 lecture at Brown University about how ADHD is different for women and girls, and the fantastic pamphlet she edited, available for free download online, '100 Questions and Answers About ADHD in Women and Girls') and anyone with a great deal of medical and clinical expertise in this, those two ADHD clinical expert presenters for those workshops for mental health practitioners I attended, Drs Ari Tuckman and Martin Katzman, were unequivocal and hardcore about telling all of us, just as they do their patients and psychotherapy clients in clinical practice:
Do *NOT* soft-pedal to parents (utterly irrationally, if you look into the medical lit) reluctant to medicate their children with ADHD about what's very well demonstrated in longitudinal data to be at risk short-, medium-, and long-term for the welfare of those kids if they don't.
To whit, Tuckman -- who's a very affable and funny person, by nature (he probably could have done some stand-up, had that whole psychiatry doctorate and psychotherapy training not worked out :-)) -- reported that, when he's consulting with parents of a kid with ADHD and the parents say of the recommendation their child be medicated, "We just don't feel right about that," without missing a beat or altering his straight face and friendly voice, he sits back a bit, looks at them, and says, "OK. How do you feel about suffering?"
I don't think he's being harsh or inappropriate in the least for it. The room of therapists erupted in nervous tittering when he said that, but I wanted to stand up and applaud. :-)
P.S. Just found an interesting lit review study re: girls with ADHD by Dr. Patricia Quinn, which described much of what's in that excellent lecture of hers I was recommending: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4195638/ (N.B. Quinn herself has ADHD and, despite the fact she's a developmental pediatrician and previously knew her daughter had the disorder, she only discovered her own ADHD in middle age, which goes to show you JUST how under the radar women and girls with it are! Ha!)
Ah! There we go. There's the Quinn 'A Hidden Diagnosis: Women and Girls with ADHD' lecture: www.brown.edu/campus-life/support/accessibility-services/video/adhd-women-hidden-disorder-patricia-quinn-november-10-2011
I wasn't able to find a free download of the '100 Q&As' pamphlet quickly enough, but I did have one a few years ago . . .
Karen Traa, I'm sorry I didn't address this: "No other information was given in regards to helping my daughter obtain some help for her executive functioning states."
If I'm going to go on and on as I did, the least I could do is speak also about the _voiced_ potential concern in your OP!
It's a real shame you and your spouse were given no info as to how you could help your daughter _other_ than to provide her with medication! (Though I have the distinct impression such inadequate informing of the parents is the norm. :-(( )
Especially considering that, explicitly according to Hallowell and Ratey (and what has been well demonstrated to be true all over the damn place), medication could only ever, *at best*, be expected to comprise about 20% of any successful ADHD treatment//daily-management (=same things.) The rest is all about heavy and frequent use of tools and gadgets and techniques (e.g., timers; calendars; Post-it reminders; lists; progress charts; frequent breaks when doing tasks that tax the executive functioning system; motivational messages in our ears and field of vision; regular practice throughout the day of 'mindfulness moments'; all manner of organizational systems that make it as easy as is humanly possible for us to keep track of; replace//find our mittens, so to speak ;-)) ** and various other devices -- material and mental -- proven to work for the individual to help him or her keep on-track and to continually redirect focused attention (as we will always have to do for *everything*, all the time) to what s/he should be attending to according to pertinence and importance, as opposed to whatever shiny thing has captured our wayward interest for the moment.
As Barkley so eloquently put it [I paraphrase], children AND adults with ADHD need to be reminded to remember ourselves in the mid- and long-term future. Along similar lines but on the 'micro' scale is a meta-cognitive thing about myself I've observed: For there to be a hope in hell of me arriving somewhere on time (ANYWHERE! it matters not whether the displacement is three blocks away by foot, or clear across town via multiple modes of transport) -- I need to:
(a) *remember that I'm not normal* -- that accomplishment of lots of tasks of everyday life are going to be more complicated for me and will require some special techniques and efforts
Hello! So sorry it has taken me this long to get through these videos!
My mother is also an ENFP and she has ADHD! What are the odds?!
I have never heard of people not believing in ADHD before but I really haven't researched this at all. But I'm so sorry that you have experienced so much misunderstanding and unbelief. Also, I really appreciate your raw and fierce authenticity! You don't let it stop you and you continue to put out genuine and authentic content to the world! I appreciate the message that you bear and the way with which you bear it! Thank you!
Aw, Caleb, you're too good! (I won't say, to be true, but . . . _point final_. ;-) haha.
Thank you very much for watching (this series doesn't even have anything to do with our mutual _chou-chou_) and for those very kind words.
I feel a bit ambivalent about this series remaining up as I don't think my mega-intense, aggrieved tone throughout necessarily helps my message get across, as it's hard to hang in for all that time with someone at that level of 'had it,' and the overt, spoken messages should be the ones of any importance.
On the other hand, that's really very how it is, so . . . :-S
You've never heard of people not believing in ADHD . . . Wow.
Honestly, other than the neuropsych team who officially assessed me and led my subject cohort through a clinical trial, I have encountered only one other person (two psychiatrists, and four assorted other helping pros included) out of about 80 I've disclosed to who didn't either meet what I had to tell them about it with major misinformation or skepticism, if not outright disbelief.
Perhaps this is a regional or a generational difference?
If you wouldn't mind saying, I'd love to know how your mum found out about hers, at what point in life, and how she felt about it, or any piece of those.
(If you do happen to feel like saying but not here -- please, feel free to PM through my channel's homepage.)
Oh yes -- and I should underline to someone with lots of Fe going on: If for any reason it's not good for you to say anything in response to that, please don't think I'd think anything of your not saying anything at all. (Those are personal questions I posed; about a third party; I don't know you; your mum doesn't know me, etc.)
Maybe it is a regional or generational difference and maybe I have encountered someone who disbelieved in it but I probably just disregarded it because to me to seems ridiculous to not believe in it.
And because I don't know you and my mom doesn't know you then my Fe will allow me to talk about it more freely haha however, I'm sorry to say I don't know much about it or about her experience with it. She is 54 years old and she has only been diagnosed and started taking medication about three years ago. She has a tendency to switch topics very rapidly and focusing on one thing is hard for her at times. She still is able to do very well with her job and is generally good about keeping appointments and so forth. She has said many times that during school she would have to read things many times before actually understanding something. She is a very lively person and gets very excited very easily. Looking back on my childhood she was not very consistent with her parenting but also I admire her spontaneity and passion. We are very different people but I appreciate her more and more the older I get.
All right, great. Let's talk all about your mom. :-)
What makes you like her more now than way back when?
Is it because she can't mess up all your plans the way she used to do when you were eight? ;-)
I know all about what it's like to have a mother who gets much more wound-up than the kids do, if you can believe it. (And we wonder how my nerves got fried in the first place, sheesh.)
Per the once in a while charms of ADHD-rocket-boosted ENFP high-spiritedness: A fairly new INFJ in my life I met via homesharing (I meet a ridiculous number of you people that way -- just another one new to me left this afternoon) who cannot drink or enjoy any fun substances but the odd cigarette after a particularly good meal on account of too much psychic permeability, said the nicest thing after I'd disclosed to her my ADHD -- that, though I felt bad about it, obviously, she didn't think I should. Partly because she didn't seem to know how serious and what a far-reaching drag and disability it can be, but also, she said she enjoys my disorder because my rather chaotic energy that she feels when she's near me in her heightened spooky INFJish way gives her a buzz. :-)
Maybe that's part of it haha also I moved out of the house to go to college and you gain a different perspective when you leave home. Also as I have learned more, I have learned more about myself and about her and about life in general and instead of focusing on the sometimes negative aspects of differences I focus on the positive aspects of individuality and diversity.
And yes I agree with that fellow INFJ! I feed off of the emotions and vibes of other people and it is a special treat when that person is fun, energetic, while also kind, intelligent, genuine, and authentic, such as yourself.
Hi Enid, this is really interesting, I think I just had an A-HA moment. I was diagnosed with ADD in middle school but it kind of got lost with all the depression, anxiety and insomnia I've had in addition...what exactly is the difference between ADHD and ADD? I'm someone who's on a spiritual path and have used yoga, exercise, diet and meditation to help me with various issues, but I'm just realizing that the attention problems I have are probably a bit more severe than I've acknowledged. This is a new way for me to see my issues as I always just assumed it had more to do with my anxiety/depression/personality. I've always had a very hard time focusing, usually I need someone else there with me to accomplish things and I've been trying to be a self-starter - and failing miserably so far. Like you said I have no sense of time...I was just reflecting on that today, I have no idea where the past 2 years have gone as I've accomplished extremely little. Everyday I might as well be in a fog/cloud, time just goes by and I feel no connection to it. Sometimes I can over focus on small things like food, self-care and getting mundane tasks done, but I never get to my creative/important work. People keep telling me maybe I'm not doing my work because I don't "want to" but it's not that, I just can't focus at all or manage my time effectively, no matter how many strategies I read about/learn I cannot seem to implement them, ever. It's like time does not exist. So I have no idea how I'm supposed to stick to a schedule I make when it feels so foreign to me. I'm also almost always late, skipped a lot of classes whenever I was in school. By some miracle, when I've had a job, I managed to get there just on time, with a lot of stress. Hmmm this is very interesting, I will look into it more. I do believe in the power of meditation and other mind-body healing modalities, but that's yet another struggle on its own (to practice daily...etc). lol Do you know any other natural methods for dealing with ADD/ADHD, as I am hypersensitive to medications and don't want to take anything? Thanks! I'm an INFP by the way.
Hi, aquarius1986.
I relate to everything you wrote, and know most other adults with real-deal ADHD would too.
I could so easily go down a rabbit hole of answering your comment in 10,000 words when I really should be doing five other more urgent _and_ important things (know how that is? ;-)), but will try to set a good example and rein myself in a bit.
Most people with it find that yoga, regular aerobic exercise, a healthy diet, and mindfulness meditation are all great for helping manage ADHD symptoms. A rule of thumb is, that anything that improves _anyone's_ health and quality of life is what a life of **any** quality for an ADHD-er _depends_ upon. That goes too for sleep hygiene; picking the right career and spouse; getting therapy as accessible and as needed -- perhaps of several modalities.
Get highly informed about your own disorder -- big caveat: from scientifically valid sources -- as you cannot expect any old practitioners of any kind to know what they're talking about. E.g., If you're like the vast majority of adults with ADHD (and this is of the merely 10% of those with it who *know* they [still] have it!!!), all the doctors, therapists, teachers, etc., you've encountered have been well-intentioned but have come at your problems of depression, anxiety, and insomnia (look up 'sleep phase disorder,' which afflicts a great many of us, life-long) arse-backwards, thinking,
(a) those other disorders are far more damaging and important than your ADHD, which is a trifling matter, comparatively.
I could (already have!) go on and on about this stuff, but if you're interested, I suggest reading the novella-length comments I've left for other commentators about these matters, and following up on links I've provided in the video description boxes and in those responses to viewer comments.
Good key principles to understand are that your quality of life and ever getting any important but less-than-100% scintillating and//or taxing of the executive-functioning system of your brain crap done is that you need to build your important, habitual life activities around your disorder the same way someone in a wheelchair needs special mods like ramps all over the place (am borrowing from Barkley here) in the material environment to succeed at doing what s/he wants to do in life.
The consequences of enacting and getting and employing and being accountable to others via these 'environmental prosthetics' for what your brain can't do consistently well unassisted (i.e., manage yourself to fully adult level in every domain of life functioning) are similarly stark and straightforward: If you don't have and use the prosthetics every hour of every day you mean to be productive, you're f*cked. If you have them and you do, you can do most things neurotypical people with the same kind of other resources inside and out as you can.
A big one is 'tethering' the important but draining or frustrating or boring activities you struggle to attend to properly to the activities of others whose prefrontal cortexes are working well. That 'body double' thing you describe in which you notice it's much easier to get to and stick with troublesome activities when there's someone else around is a HUGELY helpful insight you've had about yourself, and is entirely typical of someone with ADHD. Perhaps you could join an 'accountability support group' for other adults with it. (See a link I'll recommend below for more on that.) I find I get a lot more horrible paperwork done during my 'working socials' with friends in which we do quiet, separate work together with nice, timed, social breaks in between as rewards than I would ever get around to all on my own.
Re: Your friends who think you "just don't want to do" these things you're behind on are well-meaning, but dreadfully uninformed. Have been there too. (See my other videos for more on that.) You have a performance disorder. You may well have nerves and terrible self-esteem and be lazy and of poor character, too, but your mostly un- or not nearly aggressively enough-treated ADHD would still definitely be a major neurological stumbling block to putting the fullness of your intentions into robust, long-term, continuous, age-appropriate, predictable, sustained action even were those not the case.
I'd better get going, jeez!, but here are four 'lifesaver' resources:
czcams.com/video/_tpB-B8BXk0/video.html
(Anything and everything by Barkley, really, but this 13 mins is the most critically useful, I think. A great antidote to all the rampant misapprehension and malpractice going on out there as regards this disorder.)
Here's a much softer and warmer Barkley in a recent interview with a cutie of one of our people ;-) (a social worker and therapist with ADHD who runs a very successful ADHD accountability group with and for adults with it, talking about some little-known but very important emotional and relational aspects of the disorder; is uplifting as well as informative, I found): czcams.com/video/hZBDAEyk0N4/video.html
The funny and really encouraging and useful podcasts by doctor of psychiatry and therapist specialized in working with people -- adults and children -- with ADHD, Ari Tuckman. It's full of all kinds of good ideas and tips for managing better: adultadhdbook.com/
Last but not least, the site and attendant CZcams channel of same name, 'Totally ADD' founded and run by comedian, writer, and long-time TV producer Rick Green (who has it too) is a wonderful, fun, funny, useful, and scientifically-sound resource for people with our difficulties and funny little ways, warm hearts, short tempers, and talents. ;-)
Two awesome things from that channel that make me laugh and laugh in recognition:
Sh*t No ADD-ers Ever Say:
czcams.com/video/AeC040DqzFk/video.html
The 'Unofficial' Test for ADHD in Adults:
czcams.com/video/iozAFIr3BEw/video.html
A hearty good luck to you finding and putting into place in your life more of what you need to thrive, aquarius1986. Thanks for watching and for sharing your experience. It's a very common bunch of ones, I assure you -- and ones much can be done about with the right kinds of help.
P.S. Several thousand words and a day later and I still haven't answered one of your questions. Typical! ;-)
Sorry about that!
'ADD' and 'ADHD' are pretty interchangeable terms and both have at least the grudging respect of all and sundry. They refer to the exact same disorder as does the potentially confusing term 'adult ADHD." Aaaaaall of them are to be understood as ADHD, proper. Some people may prefer to use the somewhat outmoded but still respectable enough term 'ADD' to refer to the disorder in the many introverts with it and the few extroverts with it in whom the hyperactivity component is no longer or never was present kinetically. Most people with ADHD, however, feel the 'raciness' inside themselves ("mental blizzards," I call this excitability; nervous 'all-over-the-place' energy inside my own flitting, sometimes overactive mind) whether or not this chronic restlessness of mind is expressed outwardly or not.
As you probably know, giftedness can be confused with ADD/ADHD and it also occur with it. I can identify with your attention problems and have been screened for ADD by a psychiatrist. I didn't qualify for the diagnosis and possibly my attention problems are just due to my being diagnosed with Dysthymia. I had been labeled as "gifted" when young and when I am researching my specific interests I find that I have less problems with motivation/focus. Perhaps this is part of your problem?
I am specifically interested in alternative treatments for mood disorders(sleep augmentation/ diet/exercise) and came close to doing research in that area however I did poorly on the GRE and in classes that required too much regurgitation and not much creativity.(Biochemistry/ Psychology major) I find that I can anticipate major scientific advancements such as conceiving of the gut-brain relationship via the vagus nerve but am annoyed at learning material that is not relevant to my specific interest and or requires too much "boring" detail. sengifted.org/when-diagnosing-adhd/
Hi, Mood Sprectrum Indigo. Thanks for that (it's a good article), and for watching and commenting.
Here's what I also know, though: The DSM has a pretty poor track record vs. many other assessment tools for diagnosing ADHD -- especially in adults (ratings scales are better, and in-depth taking of patient history, even better -- for, for example, discerning underachievement *relative to potential* ); psychiatrists tend to be the least-informed practitioners _as a group_ when it comes to ADHD; gifted people (I'm definitely not one of them -- standardized tests indicate superior intelligence, but not that high) with ADHD are more likely than those of lower intelligence to be missed, even when assessed 'by the book.'
Two dear friends of mine are in the gifted range; are high-achieving vs. vast majority of ADHD adult population; had much and various contact with mental health services over the years, and no one fracking perceived their ADHD until middle-age. Sadly, their stories are the norm. And are why I am so impassioned and frustrated about all the willful ignorance about and legion obstructions to understanding this disorder.
I don't know if this would be of any interest to you, but just in case, I'll post it. (Was relevant to those friends I was just speaking of.)
www.addvance.com/help/parents/gifted_child.html
P.S. I just learned at that workshop with clinicians expert in ADHD that so many people with chronic dysthymia also have undiagnosed ADHD that the room full of psychotherapists was strongly urged to screen all their dythymic clients for ADHD -- especially those who have been non-responders to several SSRI meds. (An ADHD brain will not usually respond to them.)
Even more strongly correlated as comorbidities are ADHD and _social_ anxiety disorder, in particular. A whopping 38% of those with a mood disorder, if considered as a group, also have ADHD. The vast majority of them have not been diagnosed or treated whatsoever for their ADHD, and it is complicating and worsening the adverse effects of their mood disorder.
The misunderstanding and misperception of ADHD constitutes a huge fucking fiasco in the fields of mental health, education, and occupational functioning. We are very much in the Dark Ages right now as concerns the scope and the impact of this (in adults and in girls) mostly unrecognized and untreated disorder.
Interesting info since my depression had little to no response to numerous SSRIs. I was however prescribed an ADHD stimulant drug for severe fatigue. If I recall correctly, it helped with alertness/energy but not dramatically with my ability to focus.
I wonder though how one can accurately test the IQ/"giftedness" of someone with ADD/ADHD given the inability to focus to varying degrees.
I don't know, re: determining someone's I.Q. with precise accuracy when that person has attentional problems. Just my opinion, but I don't think it really matters. If someone's smart, they're smart. If they have ADHD (or another serious condition that alters consciousness -- I would consider very high intelligence to be one of those ;-)), what their abilities would be were that person able to get beyond whatever is holding them back -- be it boredom, or inability to focus at will, or inability to get access to real-world activities that are interesting enough because they can't find their way to the front door with all the stuff they need in hand, and at the right time (will be talking about what _that_ is like in an upcoming video :-) :-/ ) -- should be the secondary concern. The first concern for educators and clinicians -- the cart that should get behind the horse -- is dealing with the obstacles to even really finding out what that potential is.
It's been demonstrated that high I.Q. confers no significant benefit to any adult with ADHD, as concerns that adult's ADHD-related difficulties of executive functioning. It's all very well to easily understand quantum physics, but your life is still definitely going to suck aquarium rocks if you can't find the damn keys to your car 10 times per week.
So, per gifted children or adults with ADHD: Those who would like to help them express to the fullest in the world what they have to offer would do well to stop wringing their hands about just how many I.Q. points that person is ahead of the curve and start helping that person with their executive functioning, i.e., where things are going chronically and terribly, and frustratingly, and discouragingly wrong for that person.
And, (as that CHADD article makes implicitly clear), if psychiatrists evaluating intellectually gifted people for ADHD were to probe for detailed info from the patient and from those who live with the patient and see the nitty-gritty on a regular basis about what would be evidence of losses and suffering and missed opportunities and assorted awfulness (No.1) related to _poor executive functioning_ (No.2), vs. much less relevant (in the case of a gifted person) symptoms of inattention (which are what the DSM criteria would tend to lead a clinician to focus on), then way fewer people with ADHD would be overlooked, misperceived, and left untreated for that condition and, consequently, possibly *doubly* at a terrible loss in life for that (unintentional) negligence.
OH gosh.... Not-normal Mama Bear, guilty as charged!
Aw! Thanks for coming out, Amanda Gauthier-Parker. ;-) I'm sure that's a good thing for your baby(ies) to hear sometimes.
They diagnosed me with ADD and I can agree that I have the symptoms but I don't accept the label. To me it's a neurological issue where our neurotransmitters are not firing off correctly so we have "gaps" if you will. This comes from our adrenal glands since they produce neurotransmitters. Sorry I am a regenerative detoxification specialist so I was trained that all of these labels the medical community give us are just symptomology given a name then people start wearing it as a badge. I used to do that and then ADD started becoming part of who I was and I had to unlearn that that wasn't the case. The prescribed me Adderall, told me my working memory was in the 9th percentile. The Adderall made my adrenals worse so in turn I have a lot more work to do in regards to regenerating my adrenal glands.
But with that being said, I can definitely agree and see where you are coming from here in this video! I do deal with scatter brain. My emotional swings I think are due to my passion and the fact that I can easily become overly stimulated easily. lol
I'm glad you found ways of dealing with those things that work for you, Codi Smith. And sorry that you had some kind of adrenal exhaustion! (A friend had to be off work and everything else for months because his adrenal glands got 'wrung out' at some point due in his case to chronic externally-generated stress.)
I hope you won't mind my asking. I'm curious, though. Do you think your understanding of your symptoms being a result of "a neurological issue where our neurotransmitters are not firing off correctly so we have 'gaps' if you will" differs from what is presumed to be going on in ADHD?
(If your doctor[s] had never told you -- or even did not know, themselves -- that's what causes ADHD symptoms, I wouldn't be at all surprised . . . )
Enid F. Patternson Yes I do believe so dear. :) I just think that the medical system has created labels (ADD) to categorize us and sell us to big Pharma. So answer your question, yes I believe that without a doubt in my mind and I know that detoxing the body as well as regenerating tissues can completely reverse those symptoms. :)
OK. (Sorry if I'm being slow!) So you're aware that the neurotransmitter deficiency to which you ascribe the symptoms is the same one presumed to cause ADHD, but where you part ways is in your treatment methods and in refusing that label (any label) for the same neurological deficits and causality according to contemporary establishment-medical understanding?
Enid F. Patternson I'm not sure I understand your question.
Enid F. Patternson yes it's the same, except they do not correlate the adrenal glands with it....they just say it's mental...when really there is more too it and their medications they use to treat it exasperate the problem because they overwork the adrenal glands by stimulating them. :)