Is ADHD just a label thats put on children.

Mountainsandh

SterlingArcher wrote: »

I won't go too deep into this as this is just for you personally to take away.

I realise it is just your wording. But if ever you are talking to your child about his mental health issue or just considering it yourself.

Instead of projecting or saying "what ever will keep them happy ,help them to be happy" ..

Try learn yourself to say "I just want them to have a healthy outlook on life ".

why is that ?
is it wrong to strive towards happiness ?

I am not talking to a depressed child or anyone else for that matter and telling them to be happy, I just wish happiness for the people in question.

_Dara_

eviltwin wrote: »

I have a child with ADHD and autism. He's not on medication and we don't receive any financial aid. He's not a "bold" child either, believe me if my son had a meltdown you would know he has a special need. We manage it with behaviour modifications and limiting his triggers, watching his diet, keeping him to a strict routine and making sure he gets enough sleep. He can't sit still for long periods at all without stimming like mad so needs regular movement breaks, once he gets those he is grand. I'm really fed up with being told I'm a **** parent who is too lazy to care for him so I need some fancy label to excuse his behaviour. You don't get a diagnosis that easily folks

Stop talking sense, woman, it make it so much harder to judge you and your child. No fair. :P

koumi

Deleted User wrote: »

Great enlightened days, God bless them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iQGczIx6Sg

the head of Varadkar in that vid.


I worked with children on both the autistic spectrum and with ADHD, there are some similarities but in my experience anyway there is no doubt in my mind that ADHD is very much a neurological condition. Yeah, the psychological factors can vary between kids but a lot of times there are other neurological comorbidities such as dyslexia and dyspraxia which are common in people with ADHD.

I worked in mainstream schools and special requirement educational faculties, and at that time there was very little understanding of either condition amongst the regular population and in mainstream education in particular. I think things have come a long way since then.

Dakota Dan

Brian? wrote: »

It was seen as the solution. But it solved nothing.

It was meant as a bit of sarcasm, lots of people use it as an excuse not denying those who suffer from it.

Cheerful Spring

I got tested many years ago when I was going to primary school in the late nineties. The head teacher felt I had learning difficulties, not sure exactly what I was send there for, I never really discussed with my mother then or since was only a kid and my mother was not a really open woman to discuss those topics with. I got tested but the specialist in this centre could not find anything wrong with me. I put in an effort to pass primary exams to go to secondary school. I passed those tests easily and got good marks.Secondary School I drifted and left school early I got bored. I have always felt I had a concentration problem I get bored easily with things and loved to be somewhere else than school. Even conversations can bore me if they are not relevant and stupid. Maybe the specialist missed something about me it was over 20 years ago?

My Daughter was diagnosed with a mild form of ADHD and mild form of Aspergers. My mother is also easily distracted not sure if this genetically handed down from parent to kid?

Wanderer78

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

I got tested many years ago when I was going to primary school in the late nineties. The head teacher felt I had learning difficulties, not sure exactly what I was send there for, I never really discussed with my mother then or since was only a kid and my mother was not a really open woman to discuss those topics with. I got tested but the specialist in this centre could not find anything wrong with me. I put in an effort to pass primary exams to go to secondary school. I passed those tests easily and got good marks.Secondary School I drifted and left school early I got bored. I have always felt I had a concentration problem I get bored easily with things and loved to be somewhere else than school. Even conversations can bore me if they are not relevant and stupid. Maybe the specialist missed something about me it was over 20 years ago?

My Daughter was diagnosed with a mild form of ADHD and mild form of Aspergers. My mother is also easily distracted not sure if this genetically handed down from parent to kid?

your conditions sound similar to mine, ive add, dreadful concentration at times. i suspect my father had mild aspergers, as i do, so yea, id say its genetic.

Cheerful Spring

Wanderer78 wrote: »

your conditions sound similar to mine, ive add, dreadful concentration at times. i suspect my father had mild aspergers, as i do, so yea, id say its genetic.

If it's topic I like I am obsessive, if it doesn't interest me I just can't concentrate and care about it. I felt that way in secondary school.

Since my daughter was diagnosed I think about it a lot more could I have had an underlining issue that the specialist failed to spot.My daughter is also attending a school for kids with learning difficulties. She perfectly healthy and if you met her she looks and acts normal like any kid you meet. She very bright I think she smart, but she bores easily. She has difficulty learning maths and Irish. English is very good and she likes history and science the physics stuff.

TomSweeney

No it's not just a label - it exists, my wife works in the area.

The amount of kids that are told they are stupid in school but just have an attention disorder that is easily treatable - it's such a shame, cos it affects them for life.

Wanderer78

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

If it's topic I like I am obsessive, if it doesn't interest me I just can't concentrate and care about it. I felt that way in secondary school.

Since my daughter was diagnosed I think about it a lot more could I have had an underlining issue that the specialist failed to spot.My daughter is also attending a school for kids with learning difficulties. She perfectly healthy and if you met her she looks and acts normal like any kid you meet. She very bright I think she smart, but she bores easily. She has difficulty learning maths and Irish. English is very good and she likes history and science the physics stuff.

very similar to myself, ive been obsessive most of my life, still am, possible more so now.

i do suspect research into these matters has intensified over the last couple of decades. i was diagnosed with dyslexia only a couple of years ago, obviously also missed during my time in education. autism diagnoses only happened last year. languages would have been my weakness in school, for obvious reasons, was pretty good at technical subjects such as maths, physics, engineering etc.

koumi

my tribe

Noodleworm

Really depressing to read the comments where everyone seems to think ADHD is just a label for badly behaved children.

I was diagnosed with ADHD at 14, and I've was always a shy, incredibly well behaved child.
As a kid I was diagnosed because of the discrepancy between the effort I was putting into my school work, and the results I was getting. I spent longer on homework than any other kid, yet by once I was approaching the junior cert mocks I was failing. So a learning disability was suspected.

ADHD is about your brain struggling to focus, far worse than normal people.
It's particularly noticeable with 'dull' tasks that are less mentally stimulating. Your brain goes crazy looking for anything more stimulating. Thats why the medication helps. Your brain gets dopamine as a reward when doing something stimulating. Medications like Ritalin and Concerta are dopamine reuptake inhibitors. Meaning the dopamine sticks around in your brain for longer even when doing "dull" tasks". Bringing you up to normal speed. I find it feels like having a really good cup of coffee first thing in the morning, it lifts the fog.

With ADHD you feel like your attention span is both not focused enough, and not strong enough.
I find it incredibly difficult to narrow by attention span at times. My friends how I can pick out details they can't. My attention can't screen out background noise. I'm often able to hear other peoples phones ring, even on vibrate before they can. I hear every conversation around me. I love reading but find it very difficult to read on the bus, because I can't tune out other peoples conversations.

As an adult I still have it and still take medication.
Its not as bad, but thats largely because I have more freedom in how and when I work. My job allows me to do my work in my own time, and do tasks in my own order. But when I attend conferences or long meetings that aren't particularly relevant to me I still feel like my whole body is itchy, and taking in what I'm listening to is more and more difficult as time goes on. I've never been a person who can work late because as my medication wears off I become less and less productive.

Evidence has shown that 2/3 children diagnosed with ADHD will continue having symptoms into adulthood.
ADHD has a massive correlation with poor life outcomes without any intervention. If you can't stick with school and get a good education, so many opportunities are cut off for you. The inability to focus leaves you feeling stupid and useless and low self esteem can really mess a kid up.

zcorpian88

Some kids genuinely have it but I think it's overly diagnosed in this country, any kids that's unruly in class or at home is immediately diagnosed with it, and these are the same parents that don't go out of their way to discipline their children.

I remember many times a few years ago I was working in Dunnes and kids would pull hissyfits over not getting something in the shop and they'd start wrecking the place, breaking jars and bottles of stuff and I the poor sap on hygiene having to clean it all up. And the yuppie mother just standing there saying "Oisin, Oisin....stop that now"...wouldn't even raise her voice or grab the little f**ker.

Suppose they just tagged him with the ADHD label then.

I remember this very elderly shopkeeper too we had near us years ago, she was working until she was nearly 100.... and there was this discussion about ADHD going on in the shop. And she just says "Fancy name for bouldness, nothing a kick up the hole wouldn't sort"

Ipso

zcorpian88 wrote: »

Some kids genuinely have it but I think it's overly diagnosed in this country, any kids that's unruly in class or at home is immediately diagnosed with it, and these are the same parents that don't go out of their way to discipline their children.

I remember many times a few years ago I was working in Dunnes and kids would pull hissyfits over not getting something in the shop and they'd start wrecking the place, breaking jars and bottles of stuff and I the poor sap on hygiene having to clean it all up. And the yuppie mother just standing there saying "Oisin, Oisin....stop that now"...wouldn't even raise her voice or grab the little f**ker.

Suppose they just tagged him with the ADHD label then.

I remember this very elderly shopkeeper too we had near us years ago, she was working until she was nearly 100.... and there was this discussion about ADHD going on in the shop. And she just says "Fancy name for bouldness, nothing a kick up the hole wouldn't sort"

That generation really are people to be looked up to when discussing the welfare of children.

RDM_83 again

I see Laptops have been mentioned a few times, whats the reason for this being beneficial? an obvious reason doesn't leap out at me unlike dyslexia, also it seems like a weird thing to make a big deal about demanding for free considering a 2nd hand Chromebook or low-end Linux system that would be perfectly functional for wordprocessing can be sourced for the price of a new pair of Converse runners, or is there particular software involved.

Samuel T. Cogley

TomSweeney wrote: »

No it's not just a label - it exists, my wife works in the area.

The amount of kids that are told they are stupid in school but just have an attention disorder that is easily treatable - it's such a shame, cos it affects them for life.

As a newly diagnosed adult, in the incredibly lucky position of having a few quid to get diagnosed outside of the horrendous waiting times in ROI, the above can't be overstated.

I'm not going into the effects undiagnosed ADHD has had on my life in AH but they have been chronic and extremely damaging.

The drugs used are safe, have been used in the long term and extremely difficult to get put on and require frequent visits to a doctor. The effects of a misdiagnosis of ADHD are slightly better attention at extremely low doses - higher doses would make the situation worse. The effects of a misdiagnoses the other way can be a lifetime of misery and underachievement.

People forget these drugs are a stimulant - they affect ADHD suffers differently to the rest of the population, they have the effect of slowing the thought processes down in ADHD suffers and allowing concentration.

Samuel T. Cogley

Just also to point out the same stupid ill-informed nonsense has been levelled at; dyslexia, autism, and being left handed.

nice_guy80

corner of hells wrote: »

nice_guy80 wrote: »

its usually the parents who push for a diagnosis

it absolves them of any blame.
they can go on not parenting or putting manners on their child

Load of bollox.

ok

teaching 10+ years and I've seen the label being used to justify all sorts of things

nice_guy80

TomSweeney wrote: »

No it's not just a label - it exists, my wife works in the area.

The amount of kids that are told they are stupid in school but just have an attention disorder that is easily treatable - it's such a shame, cos it affects them for life.

really?

what school or teacher calls children stupid nowadays?
they'd get the sack

Ray Palmer

The bit I don't understand is what happened to children of the past who had it and got no special treatment?

I believe it exists but it may get over used and there is always a spectrum.

byhookorbycrook

Mountainsandh wrote: »

On the topic of having to slap a label on children to get them help, well, you still kind of do byhookorbycrook, I'm afraid.

My son needs a laptop in school, as recommended by HSE OT. But we have just been informed that he won't be getting it, because he has no diagnosis. He was assessed for dyspraxia, but OT decided it wasn't it really, and I agreed with her it isn't it, but there's something else and he is due to be assessed by ASD team. Parallel to that the educational psychologist also recommended help (and ASD assessment).

We are waiting more than a year now for that final assessment, his work in school is suffering and he is anxious as a result, but hey, no diagnosis, no laptop.

.

Why was he recommended for a laptop? Sadly, the SENO takes a very narrow view of who will benefit from assistive technology, so it's not the fault of the school.

Many professionals make recommendations, but don't realise that what they recommend is not actually allowed/available. I once had a child suggested to attend a school in Belfast - the child lived in Tipperary!!!

mariaalice

byhookorbycrook wrote: »

Why was he recommended for a laptop? Sadly, the SENO takes a very narrow view of who will benefit from assistive technology, so it's not the fault of the school.

Many professionals make recommendations, but don't realise that what they recommend is not actually allowed/available. I once had a child suggested to attend a school in Belfast - the child lived in Tipperary!!!

So do you think the distance to services or availability of resources should be mentioned in any assessment as just stating the child has been assessed as needing xy or z, knowing there is no or very little possibility that the resources would be available in the way stated in the assessment is a bit disingenuous and maybe a moral issue.

fly_agaric

Ray Palmer wrote: »

The bit I don't understand is what happened to children of the past who had it and got no special treatment?

I believe it exists but it may get over used and there is always a spectrum.

Speculating here, but with autism (don't know about ADHD, but autism seems be being dragged into things in the thread also), if they could not learn to communicate they probably would have been put into a mental institution of some sort.

If they were communicating but having violent meltdowns etc + generally could not cope with life would have to think they would ended up in prison or an institution too.

The kind of "mild" autism that people seem to (now) think some geniuses etc of the past had, imagine they lived pretty normal lives. Perhaps people around them just thought they were a bit of an "odd duck" without having a specific label for it...

What happens now (even if there may be some overuse of labels and diagnoses etc [don't know if there is?]) is definitely better imo.

222233

I think that because we can't possibly define "normal", most people would appear somewhere on a spectrum, after all a diagnosis is just ticking off boxes really and finding people who don't fit the "normal criteria".

If you look hard enough at any person you could find somewhere to place them on some scale whether its psychiatric, developmental, intellectual etc.. There are definitely people who suffer more profusely from attention deficits and it's important that they can access diagnosis to get the correct interventions but without looking at environmental factors diagnosis on symptoms alone is counter productive, as it doesn't address the behaviour that has led to a child presenting with "ADHD" symptoms if in fact that behaviour causing said symptoms is poor parenting or circumstances in the environment.

It's also interesting though that many symptoms of *ADHD are similarly seen with bi-polar disorder, people don't really question if BPD is a real thing but then again it's not as widely diagnosed I guess.

Mountainsandh

RDM_83 again wrote: »

I see Laptops have been mentioned a few times, whats the reason for this being beneficial? an obvious reason doesn't leap out at me unlike dyslexia, also it seems like a weird thing to make a big deal about demanding for free considering a 2nd hand Chromebook or low-end Linux system that would be perfectly functional for wordprocessing can be sourced for the price of a new pair of Converse runners, or is there particular software involved.

Good for you you can afford a new pair of Converse runners just like that, please do not assume other people's budgets, plus not everyone has your knowledge of what is a passable laptop for a small budget.
I have thought of getting him one myself, if I could identify and find something cheap, but I'm not sure he would be let bring it in school if it is not property of the school (theft, damage, etc...).

byhookorbycrook wrote: »

Why was he recommended for a laptop? Sadly, the SENO takes a very narrow view of who will benefit from assistive technology, so it's not the fault of the school.

Many professionals make recommendations, but don't realise that what they recommend is not actually allowed/available. I once had a child suggested to attend a school in Belfast - the child lived in Tipperary!!!

He was initially assessed for dyspraxia, as he showed a lot of the signs, however after assessment the OT said that he motor skills were not "bad enough" for dyspraxia, although she could clearly see the difficulties. In other words it seems to be more cognitive than motor/spatial.
His writing is slow, hardly legible, and laboured in spite of many interventions to try and improve it, all sorts of special pens, slanted panels, etc... and a special intervention sort of "handwriting camp" (for a group of kids) at the OT for a few weeks. He can type 5 sentences in the time it takes him to write 1 or 2 legible ones.

The OT recommended the assessment for ASD, and in the meantime the use of a laptop, so he doesn't get behind in school.
I know that ASD and sensory issues can sometimes have an effect on children's mobility so I'm guessing that's more in that line. It really shouldn't be on me to try and analyze what's going on here, but the issue is obvious enough for the principal/his teacher to push for the laptop.

Can I just say as a parent of a child undergoing assessments that it is a right dose, and I'd much much rather not have to worry about all that, laptop or no laptop, assessment waiting lists, forms to fill...

The school rang alarm bells when he was 7 and I got cross with the teacher in question, I was in complete denial for a year.
I had to just accept that maybe they were right finally, and start the whole rigmarolle of S&L, OT, and other visits, school meetings, pediatricians, assessments ...

It's a dose, and in my case my child is not bold, not disruptive, school psychologist assessed him as "exceptional ability" so really, it's just a case of making sure that he is well in school, not miserable, that he doesn't become disruptive because of disengagement or mental health issues, and that he achieves reasonably well instead of being a brainy child who "could have done well" in other circumstances.

They have to do longer assignments and projects now and guess what, he's starting to keep quiet about parts of the homework because he knows they're going to take him hours to complete, not because he has no idea, is not able, or is lazy, but because of the handwriting.

Cheerful Spring

SEPT 23 1989 wrote: »

Just remember without these "abnormal" kids we would have no internet no art no engineering no science

A very grey world without them

It not conclusive as they lived a long time ago and different people will argue against it today. According to autism expert, Simon Baron-Cohen Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton may have had Asperger syndrome.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn3676-einstein-and-newton-showed-signs-of-autism/

http://www.autism-help.org/points-%20aspergers-einstein-newton.htm

kylith

Maddox Huge Dreamer wrote: »

Too much sugar and E numbers, whatever you do don't give them Lucozade or RedBull unless they've actually got proper dengue fever.

Nah, my nephew could be described as adhd and he gets none of that. What he actually has is a dire need to be brought to a big field and let run around the place to burn off some of the energy.