Whispers
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A practical guide for parenting and teaching ADHD kids

Excerpt from Chapter 1

ADHD: That Child Ain't Right

    If there was ever a condition that has been misunderstood, ADHD is one of them. It's been called Minimal Brain Dysfunction, Hyperkinetic Syndrome, ADD, and ADHD, to name a few of the more recent labels. I'm sure there will be other names in the future which sound more pleasing to the ear, like Really Creative But Doesn't Like Structure Disorder or Really Nice Kid But a Pain to Live With Disorder, but for the moment, we're stuck with ADHD.

    Deciding exactly what ADHD is and what it isn't has been one of the ongoing debates in the psychology world, causing heated arguments not only in academia but also in the media. Rush Limbaugh even jumped into the fray several years ago claiming there's no such thing as ADHD, fueling the flames of controversy even further.

    But let's assume Mr. Limbaugh was a little too hasty in his proclamation, and examine the subject for ourselves, beginning with the fact that we live in an ADHD-like culture, an observation wonderfully exemplified several years ago by a cable TV show on Comedy Central called "Short Attention Span Theater." Instead of having to sit through a whole thirty minutes of a comedy show, we were exposed to only one scene from a show, rapidly followed by scenes from other comedy shows.

    We also live in a fast-paced, hyper type of society--Have a headache? Take Excedrin. Learn guitar in two days! Overweight? Lose three hundred pounds overnight by taking New Improved Fataway Tablets! Feel nervous? Pop a Xanex! Got ADHD? Here, have a Ritalin or try these new exciting Blue-Green Algae pills which are currently being touted as a treatment for ADHD. Where do you get this stuff anyway--scrape the inside of your kid's fish tank?

    We now speak in sound bytes instead of sentences. TV commercials cram so many visual and auditory stimuli into a thirty-second time slot you can develop instant ADHD. And don't get me started on dizzying TV commercials by used car dealers or mad carpet salesmen, you know, those guys in loud, plaid blazers with buzz-cuts or slicked-down hair who scream at you on Friday evening, the cameras zooming in and out while they yell, "Boy, do I have a deal for you down at Billy Bob's Used Car Lot and Rugs!"

    You get the idea. As you can see, we live in an attention-grabbing, impulse-spending culture, the results of which can be high distractibility, short attention span, restlessness, and jitteriness. Funnily enough, these are also major symptoms of ADHD.

    So are we dealing with the side effects of our loony culture or are we dealing with a true neurological condition? In other words, we need to define exactly what we mean by ADHD, the Disorder Formerly Known as ADD.

    First of all, we have to be careful we don't pathologize normal child and adolescent behavior. Our society is very good at labeling and making syndromes out of any number of human behaviors, and ADHD is no exception.

    As a clinician, I spend some of my time un-diganosing ADHD kids who were incorrectly labeled and categorized after a ten-minute evaluation by some quack.     They've been medicated ever since just because they were a little rambunctious or fidgety!

    So what is the difference between ADHD behavior and typical child and adolescent behavior? Many kids are distractible, rowdy, and don't like doing homework, but this doesn't mean they have ADHD. But a child who has all these symptoms over an extended time period in a way that interferes with their lives, well, that's probably more than just typical kid stuff, possibly ADHD. So let's take a look at the official signs and symptoms to find out what we're dealing with...

1. Hyperactive-Impulsive Type (HIT)

    This is the type most people are familiar with, the hyper kid who drives everyone crazy, the one who doesn't know how to shut his big mouth, who ties up his sister and locks her in the hope chest, who is easily excited, and generally creates chaos wherever and whenever the mood strikes him. I use the pronoun "he" because boys are better than girls. Oops! Sorry, no they're not, the reason is because we see this type more in boys. Really. It's true.

    Not only does he receive negative attention from parents, teachers, and even other kids, but in some cases, he actually seems to thrive on it. He becomes bored so easily that while picking a fight with Mom or Dad might result in grounding or creates some other consequence, it can also be exciting and even energizing. The conflict creates an adrenaline rush, which in a bizarre fashion, appears to focus his wandering attention and well, to him, it just seems like a good idea at the time. And you may also notice that when you tell him he's grounded, not only does he not seem to care, he really doesn't!

    This is the kid who constantly finds himself in all sorts of trouble without even realizing what he's done half the time. How often have you confronted your kid for doing something wrong and he swears he has no idea what you're talking about, like an alien took over his mind an body. At the time, it really did seem like a fine idea, but with no thought, none, into any future consequences, and then, POW! he's nailed.

Does this type of scenario sound familiar--?

You: "Did you chop the heads off all the daffodils in the front yard?"
Him: "I don't know what you're talking about."
You: "Oh, sure! You're grounded!"
Him: "But I didn't do anything!"
You: "Grounded for one week."
Him: "I don't care!"
You: "Fine! Two weeks."
Him: "Why don't you make it three!"

    And all the while you and he are arguing, he's playing with a Bic cigarette lighter, rubber ball, picking lint off his pants, staring out the window, walking around in circles and muttering under his breath about what a jerk you are.

    See why we call this Hyperactive-Impulsive?

    But can you both let it go at this? Oh, no, we have to keep going!

You: "What were you thinking?"
Him: "Huh? I dunno."
(And you want to scream because if he's a teenager, that's the only answer you ever get to a direct question.)
You: "What do you mean, you don't know?"
Him: Shoulder shrug, followed by indiscernible mumbling.
You: "How can you not know, for crying out loud? They didn't chop off their own heads!"

    On and on into that deep dark night...But you know, he might be telling you the truth; he wasn't thinking. He just had this wild idea about beheading flowers and ran with it, carried away in the heat of the moment. So where did this beheading idea come from, anyway? It turns out that he'd been half-listening to a TV documentary on PBS about The Mikado, a Victorian operetta by Gilbert and Sullivan, and the part about Ko-Ko, the Lord High Executioner, caught his attention for a few moments, then he went outside to play in the yard. He saw the daffodils and all their little yellow heads just pleading to be lopped off as if he were the Lord High Executioner, which when he thought about it, sounded like a really cool job, and then...

    Now, a word of caution, this is an explanation for why he chopped off the daffodil heads, not an excuse for his behavior. ADHD should never be used as an excuse otherwise there is no accountability or responsibility, two important traits you've probably been trying to get through his head for the last ten years.

    You see why you feel like tearing your hair out in frustration?

    Think of this exchange as a kind of dance. You both know the steps, the familiar music starts playing, and you both waltz into the foray, the conflict escalating, accompanied by yelling and tears with neither of you getting anywhere.

    Are there any alternatives?

    Sure there are, but they aren't easy or quick. Learning new ways of parenting an ADHD kid required bucketloads of patience and persistence on your part. Clear thinking is vital. When conflict arises, try to step back and think it through before taking any action.

Solutions for Clear Thinking

1. What's the situation?

Junior did something impulsive/thoughtless, unheeding of the consequences.

2. What does he need?

The instinctive answer is a kick in the rear, but it's the wrong answer. He needs to learn how to interrupt is own impulsive train of thought and to understand potential consequences before taking any action.

3. What do you need?

Valium. Lots of it. And a way to get through to Mr. Blockhead standing here. And honesty, you need him to be honest because the odds are high he's pretty quick to tell lies.

4. Options: Yelling, screaming, berating, shaming, beating?

Nope, because they don't work, not in the long term. If you do yell, he'll simply tune you out but pretend he's listening. He learned that one by about age five.

    Educate him? Absolutely! If the bottom line is you want to each him not to do mindless things, you have to educate him. How? Repetition, repetition, repetition, over and over. And over. Education along with consequences? Most definitely. This is one of the hardest concepts to get across to an ADHD kid, that there really is such a thing as cause and effect.

    But with consistency and persistence, you can avoid escalating the conflict and even start getting through to him that cause and effect is a reality.

    However, if you're not consistent, forget it. Being inconsistent tells him you're not taking the situation seriously, so why should he?

    By the way, grounding him for twenty years probably won't cut it, either. Try a day or so. Even better, send him to visit Great Aunt Ethel for a couple of days, your mother's sister who lives three states away.