ADHD TV Episode #3: Helping People to Understand ADD/ADHD
Episode #3 is finally here!
In this episode, I share how we need to help people to understand ADD and ADHD. There are people in this world who ‘get it’, and people who don’t. I hope you’re one of the people who gets it, and that you’ll join me in spreading the word out to those who don’t ‘get it’. We’re on a mission here to change the world for people with this complex, challenging and incredible ‘disorder’.
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Please help to pass this message along to other people who need to hear this message (either click on the ’share this’ link below, or just email them a link to this site!).
Also, please share your comments and thoughts below.
Best,
Dr. Kenny
p.s. To learn more about strategies that work for ADD/ADHD, please claim your free video here: ADHD Treatment That Works
Technorati Tags: ADD, ADHD, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Podcast, Video Podcast, Diagnosis of ADHD
- Comment (28)
I have become so dependent on my medication and am aware of such extreme fatigue if I don’t have it, that I worry about the long term effects on my brain… and what to tell others. Obviously Thos Edison didn’t have meds. Should I stop taking mine?
Hi Dr. Kenny,
First, I want to thank you for caring about the ADHD Community, and let you know that I do believe you care. Also let you know the following is not criticism at all. It’s feed back from someone who spent 32 yrs. in front of all age groups, trying to hold their attention.
My background is this:
I’m a retired High School Guidance Counselor & Educ. Psychologist with “ADHD”, who wants to “Give Back” since me and my children all were able to “succeed and survive” the traditional Education System to make it in our society.
I’ve been “Presenting For Years”. I’ve found from experience that if an “Audio CD” or a “DVD” is not “Very High In Bulleted Content”, it will not hold my audience’s attention. 20 minutes is the average time an “audio only” presentation will hold their attention. Then, we discuss that 20 minutes, then we play another 20 minutes, and then discuss that.
I’m looking for the best presentatioin I can find to “Mentor Parents” in being “The Coach” or “Advocate” for their own children, particularly through “The Education System” in this country. Then, I want to do the same thing for all of the “Un-diagnosed Adults” who are “Foundering in Life”.
Your “Interview Content” materials are informative, but will not “Hold My Audiences’ Attention long enough.”
YOU ARE ON THE RIGHT TRACK!!! KEEP GOING…..Just keep in mind how broad the need is, and that some of us ADHD people would like to do “Presentations” ourselves to larger groups to meet a need of “Public Educational Awareness” for the “Undiagnosed & Failing” children and adults “Who don’t know what they are dealing with”.
Thank You So Much! Please keep up the good work…………..
Carl Shelton
Ph: 210.568.3754
Email: cshelton1@satx.rr.com
“WOW”!
Dr. Kenny is dead bang on regarding “Getting It” or not. I count myself as very fortunate in the fact that “I DO” get it!….
As a 60 Y.O. adult who has experienced everything from being a “slow learner”, to a successful, out of the box thinker/business person, to now, a passionate ADD Advocate, I am ready to spread the same message as Dr. Kenny…and I am within a parallel developmental process.
Kudos, Dr. Kenny. Count me “IN” and Let’s go!
Hopefully, many of you will join in.
“Blessed are they who are flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape!”
I was diagnoised with ADHD when I was 50, I am now 58 and telling friends and family I have ADHD has been a nightmare. THEY DON’T GET IT! Not only do they not get it, one of my doctor’s told me, most of them don’t want to get it. Thank you for your support and sharing your knowledge. I was blessed with creativity and so many skills but I have a hard time working because I also have many co-morbids that come with ADHD. I can’t tell you how many at home type business I have tried to create on my own with no success. My family say I need to get an hourly job just for the income but they have no idea of the anxiety and stress we are under trying not to make mistakes. I find I spend more money than I make trying to keep myself mentally healthy to work a minimum wage job. I get so tired of hearing “we all do that”. Thank you for your continued support, we know that you get it.
Sally
Dr. Kenny, Thanks again for your continued support in the adult add arena. Throughout my life the ups and downs of having ADD, and the need to explain my condition to others has been a constant source of mental anguish for me. With your help and guidance I am beginning to understand the importance of sharing my story with others. Sincerely, Bruce
Thank you so much for your willingess to “spread the word.” I’m the parent of an adult ADD person who wasn’t diagnosed until age 25. Life in our family was a living hell until we found out what the problem was. Now trying to make people “get it” is still dificult because my son is extremely bright - a genius, academically, but his trouble with relationships and surviving in a “they don’t get it world” is so frustrating. He hasn’t evenbeen able to find a counselor who “gets it.” Please do whatever you can to get your mission out to professionals so that everyone who “thinks” they get it won’t be doing more harm than good like those we have run into! Thanks again!
Thank you so much for message that you are sending out about just not getting it…This has really made me understand that what I have been thinking about doing for my child that is 8 years old that has ADHD may be the right thing to do…Home Schooling…I have been having a lot of trouble with her teacher not understanding what ADHD is all about!
I have tried to talk to her about this and she tells me that she thinks that Kenzie is not wanting to do her work and when she gets on to her about not doing her work my daughter will yell out and sometimes even scream at her telling her teacher she is wanting to do her work but it is really hard and toi much. She tells her she can not understand what to do…Kenzie gets really upset and she will scream out in a way that makes the teacher believe she is just being a brat…I have gone to this teacher and still she tells me she understands but from what Kenzie the teacher is getting in her face and screaming at my daughter when ask the teacher she says that it is not true…I don’t know anything else to do but home school my daughter now…Do you think that I am doing the right thing by taking her out of the school? I have also gone to the school about this but seems no one wants to talk about it!
Thank you again for your mesage about just not getting it
Patty
I am the mother of fraternal twin girls that are almost 13 with ADD. I really did not understand ADD until about a year ago. I’ve really been researching about ADD & meds. over the past month and I will tell you the truth I am more confused than ever. Both of my girls have started their periods now and the mood swings and tiredness and fighting has become worse. They are both on strattera 40 mg and will be going for a EKG next month to see about increasing their dosage. They are very pretty and athletic girls, they play school basketball and school softball and I think that is a great way of using up all of that energy. Their grades are alright, they are in resource for a reading comprehension disability which they are very comfortable with being in resource. My question is how do I get them to help at home with the cleaning of their rooms, and I would like to teach them to cook and to take care of their home? They come home and crash and basically don’t want to help. Do you have any info. on how to help with two ADD kids?
Thank You! Tammy
My comment is identical to Sally’s above with this exception - after being fired from my last job and leaving 3 others precipitously, I’ve been unemployed and indigent for 3 years. I’ve tried to think of a home business but haven’t come up with anything. The result of losing that job was to be wiped out, home, savings, car, pets… and i now sleep in a guest room at one son’s or the other. I had the “benefit” of having back problems that re-emerged shortly before the adhd diagnosis and to tell the truth - I am grateful that it gives me a so-called “legitimate” reason with which I could file for Social Security Disability because if I have to live on the street - I would not go back to work again. I was nauseous every day going to work and spent half my time covering my mistakes or trying not to look stupid. (And I found out in the testing that I have a high IQ with most of my scores in the 94th to 99th percentile), but the co-morbid feature makes it impossible to function. The anxiety is so pronounced that my brain just stops thinking - is all I can explain. I sit in a black hole - or like a deer caught in the headlights - trapped in the anxiety of my own making… and no idea how to fix it. None of my family got it - until my son Mike went to a doctor and asked for help - and was diagnosed with ADHD and put on medication. Because I am indigent, I cannot get the medication I need so badly to function, no social service providers will prescribe because of the drug crackdown on doctors by the DEA and no private doctor will see me because I can’t pay… so I sit trapped. Thanks for letting me share and thank you for helping to educate people toward understanding what ADHD is like for those that deal with it every day.
My beautiful, loving, caring, daughter has been living with ADHD since diagnosed in 4th grade. She is now a freshman in high school and has been having significant issues with her ADHD. We had her reevaluated and changed her medication since, (1) It wasn’t lasting long enough, and (2) she was having a lot of trouble sleeping. (She was on an extremly high dose of Concerta)When we switched to Vyvanse, it worked for a short time and then just stopped. While on the Vyvanse she had significant mood swings and just seemed angry all the time. When her grades crashed while on the Vyvanse, we had her return to the Concerta and other that some sleeping issues her grades have improved.
I have been in contact with the school and some of her teachers have been cooperative, but the majority of them just ignore or don’t respond at all. The most difficult thing of all had been the “input” from both her friends and mine as to her schoolwork. They have repeatedly told her that she just doesn’t want to do the work, that all she does is play, they have even taken to monitering her extracurricular activities and reporting back to her and myself that she is not doing her work and that is why she fails. They also constatly give suggestions as to how they would do it , that they could fix it. I have tried to explain that she is impusive and has attention issues and that while she doesn’t always “appear” to care about school, the reality is she does very much. She just has trouble attending to the task at hand, compound that with her school uses laptops at all times and you can’t turn the Instant message and Social Networks sites off.
I am tired of the fact that others don’t understand and don’t choose to.
They have written her off as someone who doesn’t care, when in fact she does care and really tries very hard. She just has to be reminded and/or redirected every so often to stay on task. There has to be a way to get it across to these people that this is as REAL as any other medical concern. Would someone say the child that needs glasses or hearing aids to see or hear could do just as well without them ? Why are concerns that can be seen accepted and those that are not seen by the naked eye ridiculed and ignored ? This is a REAL concern, and I never realized there would be this much negativity toward Medical Concern. We will keep on trying and she and we will be stronger for it. She is an absolutley incredible, wonderful, loving young lady and her family knows it !!!
I loved your way Dr. Handelman. I would like to think that my daughter has something special, the problem is i don’t . She is untidy, lazy, always screeming, and lately she has been kicked out of school for being extreemly careless; she answered her exam writing horizantaly instead of vertically, she is 12 on Concerta 36mg along with Cipralex. I would like to find a way to accept and appreciate her i am always forcing myself to seek for that yet it is useless.
I am sorry if i sounded giving up but i think helping the parents to see positive things about thier child when all things about him/her seems negative is extremly important. I wish you can give more time for this.
Thanks you fro all the efforts you are putting in this
how many symptoms of adhd partial remission
some times I do good without my concerta do I need a low dose because I take 72mg in concerta
is vyvanse like adderall or concerta
what is adhd not otherwise specified and can it be treated with medication
I am so happy to see this discussion as it is very timely. After years of describing myself as an eccentric character, I always knew that I marched to the beat of a different drum, my teenage son was diagnosed with ADHD. I began researching it and lo and behold I saw myself there as well as my father, the black sheep in his family, and my mothers sister, the black sheep in her family. Good thing I like black just fine. I am in partnership with one daughter and the other daughter has made me a grandmother. While we have always been close and they have been very attached they are at that point in their young adult life where they compare and contrast their choices with mine at the same age. I have enjoyed many outstanding accomplishments in my life but no one has understood why someone who has demonstrated exceptional reasoning abilities can also be quite boneheaded. I myself have often marveled at a seeming life mystery of how moments of sheer brilliance(I’m not saying they are frequent but I have had some very satisfying ones) can reside quite cheerily alongside moments of complete mindlessness in the same few cubic centimeters. I now understand. What causes me no end of pain is that my children dismiss ADHD as a real condition and choose to view any negative aspects as my character flaws. I have plenty of flaws and know all too well their impacts. They simply cannot realize that I am wired differently when it comes to some things and not all of my choices in life can be understood without some contextual accounting for my ADHD symptoms. Just an aside here, I was a child with asthma at a time when the medical community attributed it to emotional root causes. This led my parents to disregard my asthma attacks as faking distress. You can imagine the implications of that lag in medicine.
I am so grateful that you have the passion and desire to reach out to our community with your knowledge of ADD & ADHD. There are so many people who “Don’t Get It”; it is frustration to me because I myself, “Get It”; but knew very little about ADD/ADHD, until I was diagnosed with ADHD approx 4 months ago. Since then, my world has changed drastically. I know longer feel like I am crazy. Those that are close to me, Husband, Daughter, Son, Mom, and Sister would make me out to be crazy. I cannot believe I was misdiagnosed all of these years. I am now 43 years old. I was depressed all of the time. I wanted everything perfect and when it I wasn’t able to make them perfect then I would go to the opposite extreme and give up all together for a period of time. I was a compulsive shopper, and tended to get compulsive in whatever it was I was doing. I since have learned to set time limits for my projects and not feel I have to be a perfectionist. I schedule time for things that I enjoy instead of working all the time. I make “Me” time everyday. Last June 22, 2009; I was at my heaviest 239 lbs. Since then I have lost 25 lbs, as of today, August, 31, 2009. I work for a mortgage company in Fort Worth, Tx and go to the gym 4-6 times a week. I started to live life for me. It was hard for me to do, because I raised my 2 children and I have been married now for 22 years. Both of my children are wonderful. My daughter is going to UTSA (San Antonio, TX) to have a teaching degree-now starting her 4th year and my Son, is in the Unites States Air Force - Going to the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California to become a Linquist - Studying Arabic. It is a happy sad; but ultimately left me a empty nester and realized that I wasn’t just depressed; but there was more going on and I didn’t give up. I found a new pychiatrist and he diagnosed me with ADHD. I have been on Concerta 54 mg day. I have PTSD, Depression (Not depressed at this time), Anxiety (Major), I take .25 Xanax two times a day as needed, 80 mg of Celexa at night. I am also a diabetic (controlled-pills/diet), Hypothyroid (Synthroid), and Sleep Apnea (Sleep with a C-Pap machine). I want to share that we can lead productive lifes and I wish I found out/diagonsed a long time ago—but it is never too late! I thank God everyday that there are individuals like yourseld who are committed to service our world by providing your knowledge and expertise through many avenues. I get alot of tips and education on ADHD and how it applies to my daily life. I am truly a whole new person. Thank you again! Love, Sandra Ruiz-E
I am an adult with ADHD, and your absolutely right. I struggled though grade school, it seems like I was in the special ed room constantly pretty much until I was in high school. My freshman year of HS was hell, I didnt think there was a way for me to make it though HS. But then its like it all started to make sense, and the second semester, I went from making one B and Cs and Fs, to making all A’s and one B. The one thing that helped me was I could find interest in my school work. I was able to successfully finish HS and I made the honor roll after that every semester until I graduated. I went to college and while I did struggle in subjects which I did not find interest, I managed to graduate in 4.5 years with a BS in biochemistry and a minor in chemistry. I wasn’t taking any medication or getting any help in college, and looking back now I wish I would have. People who made A’s would always come to me and ask me questions, but I would always make B’s or C’s. This was very humiliating. I did actually take meds when I was in grade school (but not HS) and they never did any good. Plus I found it incredibly humiliating when my mom (or anyone else) got onto me and asked me if I had taken my meds. But after I graduated I hit the real world, I started a real job and I ended up almost getting fired just because I couldnt focus. It was then that I decided it was time to get help, and I did. Needless to say, my life is 100X better than it was before. Mental health is one of the biggest things that people not only understand, but disrespect. As a former child (now and adult) with ADHD, I can tell you just giving your kid a pill may calm them down, but it probably wont help them in the long run. I took medication when I was struggling in school, it never did me any good. Medication may benefit the parents, the teachers, or whoever else is around the kid, but medication and psychotherapy (or even counseling or coaching) are the real way to go (see the multimodal study). It requires a lifestyle change. I think what helped me get though school was finding something to get interested in, for me it just happened to be chemistry and biology. Thank you Dr Kenny for publishing this, we all need to fight ignorance.
Thanks for sharing all your knowledge of something that is still a sort of controverse for most people. Even for parents asking ourselves: Are we doing the right thing?” After several meetings with our 10 years old son and his teacher last year trying to understand how our son was doing (or not doing) in class we decided to consult first our pedriatician then a psychologist and finally back to our pedriatician to try medication. Seams to go well in school when we see his results in tests every weeks. Now that he is in 5th grade and he takes his Biphentin 15mg every day since beginning of school, that he loves his new teacher…I am a bit afraid to meet his teacher and tell her that he is on medication. I am just scared that she changes her perception of him. Even though she told me a few days ago that she has to explain frequently back to him personnally what she just explained in front of the class. And when he understands it goes very well. I find also that since he takes the medication he has a very hard time to go to sleep every night. He used to go to bed at 8:30 every night and now at 11:00 he still has a hard time to close his eyes…
That may explain his trouble to be attentive in class. The image I have is like a “dog running after his tail”.
Sandra,
Thank you for sharing your inspirational story. I am very happy for you that you are getting things on track. Keep up the great work!
Dr. Kenny
i am so thankful that finally i have found something positive about ADHD, for so many years my younger brother (had ADHD) myself and my family have struggled with peoples narrow mindiness and lack of awareness about ADHD. If only you could add facebook to you share this link please and i will share you knowledge with everyone! its about time people wake up and acknowledge ADHD. IT IS REAL AND IT IS AN ILLNESS. NOT AN EXCUSE FOR BEHAVIOUR!
Hello,
My comment is kind of funny, however I found it extremely difficult to focus on what you were saying because the pen in your shirt pocket looked like it was flashing different colors. If you could, note not to leave that pen in your pocket when you make other videos.
I’m Julia, and I have ADD.
Thanks!
Julia
Thanks for the suggestion, Julia!
Dr. Kenny,
I am a principal and a mother of a 14 yo daughter with ADHD (comorbid of TS.) I love your attitude. I look forward to learning from you and sharing your podcast and knowledge with my family an staff.
My daughter’s own school psychologist doesn’t get it; insisting (during an IST) that the teachers don’t have to prompt my daughter to remind her (if she forgets) to have her planner checked! By the way, the IEP says “Check Daily Planner”. She says she has to learn independence; like she’s punishing her. Needless to say, she is no longer invited to and IST or a CSE!
S0, Parents, Dr. Kenny is right. Don’t rely on the professionals! (Said to say considering I’m in this field.) WE are the best advocates; the ones who get it!!
Thank you, Dr. Kenny. I feel your passion for our ADHD/ADD brothers and sisters when you speak. Please continue to spread the message. We are truly grateful.
Dr. Kenny, I am curious your thoughts on infections causing ADHD/ADD and if you have found this in any of your patients? I am a 5 year sufferer of Lyme Disease with treatment failure. I found out recently that I have two other tick borne infections (babesia and bartonella) that were negative antibody tests back when I had my lyme test done but have come to light through direct culture (PCR). I was always healthy prior to to my infections and have many different and strange symptoms, good and bad days and flares with neurological involvement. I used to be very organized and detail oriented and outgoing but have found this to gone awry. I am still managing to work at my technical job but am not working at the same capacity as the old days. I have a hard time focusing sometimes when people are talking, noises are more bothersome at times and I avoid social situations as the thought exhausts me. My husband was diagnosed a couple years ago with adult ADD and is on Concerta which helps some things and I have 3 young children I am keeping my eye on for signs but after struggling a long time to find answers to my deteriorating health and lyme treatment failure, I have done alot of researcah and it seems that many Tick Borne infections can cause ADD-like symptoms. Just wanted to get your thoughts? thanks !
Thank you, Dr. Handleman. Only hearing your description about ADHD and creativity makes my eyes tear up.
Ive heard it all through my life: lazy, arrogant, spoiled, stupid, spiteful, you name it. My creative side was always in the shadow of my unfulfilled potential in various areas, and still is. Now, however, it is all starting to come together! I just found your podcasts, and I will definitely subscribe!
Thank you from Sweden!
Lynn,
Thanks for your comment. I have to say that I haven’t read any research on tick borne illnesses causing ADD/ADHD. I can’t contribute anything useful to your situation.
Hi,
Thank you, Star, for sharing your comment. I really appreciate hearing about a principal who is so on the ball.
As you can see on my main blog - one parent had a terrible experience with a school principal recently: http://www.addadhdblog.com/discrimination-in-school/#comment-195319
Best,
Dr. Kenny