Just stop it

I received an email this week, a piece of crap illustrating several "scenarios" and the 1957 reaction and 2009 reaction - supposedly showing how overbearing and stupid we've become. Many of the examples are ridiculous and unnecessarily inflammatory.

Included was this little gem:
Scenario 3:

Jeffrey will not be still in class, he disrupts other students.

1957 - Jeffrey sent to the Principal's office and given a good paddling by the Principal. He then returns to class, sits still and does not disrupt class again.

2009 - Jeffrey is given huge doses of Ritalin. He becomes a zombie. He is then tested for ADD. The school gets extra money from the state because Jeffrey has a disability.



This little missive caught me in the wrong week. This was from a friend and a teacher and I did not feel I could let this go. My response:

I am the wife, daughter, sister, friend, and mother of people with ADD. It is real. Paddling does not relieve the symptoms. I've sure been tempted with Caragh, but it had so little effect on my brother.

The statement made about medication was factually incorrect, as you cannot medicate a child until there is a diagnosis of ADD/ADHD. The diagnosis is made with a behavioral evaluation completed by the parents and the child's teacher and a discussion with the physician. Drug choices are made after a complete history is taken, including conditions surrounding pregnancy and birth of the child. A prescription is written for 30 days and we are required to return to the doctor for each new prescription so the doctor can review several physical factors and behavioral markers before giving us another 30 days of pills (ours last longer because we don't medicate her on the weekends). Because the drugs are stimulants and highly regulated, we will have to physically pick up a prescription and drive it over to the pharmacy for the foreseeable future.

And while it may be true that schools receive extra money because of a child with ADD (I don't really know), I doubt it would be simply from a diagnosis of ADD/ADHD. I believe parents would need to file an IEP with the school for accommodations before the school would be eligible for additional funds. They wouldn't really know about the diagnosis otherwise.

Additional funding, if it is received as the result of an IEP, may be due to the accommodations used to assist the child's attention and reduce the need for medication or the dosage needed. My daughter has a cushion on her chair that allows her to wiggle her butt around a bit and get some energy out, rather than constantly chewing on her clothing as she used to do. We will also be working on an IEP that allows her to have a weighted lap blanket in class with fidget items buried inside it. It will keep her hands busy and her brain stimulated without her being able to see it, which is a huge distraction for her. Studies have shown that weighted blankets, vests, or neck rolls can help children with attention problems or sensory issues, although I'm not really clear why. These things are provided by the school to improve the success of the student, but therapy items are often not cheap (I've researched them). Our school is also working to install microphone and speaker systems in every classroom because they have been shown to assist in learning for all students. The district is funding this for all schools and all classrooms over the next several years, but our school is starting the installation in classrooms where the need is greatest. I certainly hope they are using some of the special education funding, including funding for IEP plans, to help with the cost.

I am so grateful for the options my daughter has today to help her overcome her ADD in the classroom, where it is most debilitating. My brother was labeled as a trouble-maker early on, although we started to discover he was a classic case of ADD just before he died. He was very smart, probably smarter than me in a lot of ways, but he was disruptive in class, had difficulty finishing his work or focusing on tasks, and had trouble with spelling and handwriting. Some of these made it look like he was stupid and I think he certainly felt that way. He certainly felt "different," as he once told me he smoked pot because it slowed his brain down and made him feel like he thought other people must feel. I can't even imagine what he might have achieved if he was evaluated for ADD and given appropriate accommodations.

And this is the difference between now and 1957. I can't imagine what kids in 1957 with ADD went through when they literally COULD NOT pay attention. Apparently they were beaten for it. As late as the 80s, Eric was shamed and dismissed because of ADD. He absolutely hated school and dropped out in the 10th grade. Fast forward to 2011 and Caragh, his neice, is diagnosed in kindergarten, medicated early so we can work on her dosage before school gets more intense, and her love of school and herself is still intact. She truly loves learning and feels good about herself and now that I understand the challenges we face, I will not allow that to be beaten out of her. But I will have to advocate for her at every turn until she learns to advocate for herself because of the opinions out there about the way her brain works and taking medication for it.

There is still a huge stigma attached to ADD/ADHD and an even bigger one for treating it with medication. Emails like this are one of the reasons my daughter will continue to face judgements from her peers, teachers, and other parents for taking medication. Judgements like this are one of the things that made it so difficult for us to even put her on medication, which she absolutely needs. Many people think it should be manageable through natural remedies and that taking drugs is just the easy way out - I certainly felt that way because. While dietary changes and natural remedies certainly can help and are worth a try, they don't help every kid enough to go without medication.

I refuse to call ADD/ADHD a disorder. It's not as if the brain doesn't work, it just works differently than the majority of the population and schools and teaching methods were built by the majority for the majority. There is some excellent research about the evolution of the ADD/ADHD brain and why it exists, if you're interested. There is also quite a bit of research showing that a very large percentage of CEOs have ADD/ADHD. New studies show that people with ADD/ADHD are both highly intelligent and also often very socially intuitive - they have an ability to read people in a way others can't. If they are properly supported, they often achieve great things. Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein most likely had ADD/ADHD - neither finished school. My grandfather Charlie Schnetzler, who attended MIT and Oxford and worked for NASA for 40 years, also suspected he had ADD (and I'm quite sure Rob has it). His eulogies, delivered both by family and by colleagues from Goddard Space Center, centered not on his intelligence (which was a given) but on his ability to put people at ease, build consensus, and talk to anyone young or old as if they were the only person in the room that mattered.

Please think before reinforcing this kind of stereotype regarding ADD. Many of the people I love have a brain that works this way and it's been a privilege and an education to know them. Flippant statements like the one below only make their lives and mine harder and move us farther away from understanding rather than closer together.

Odds and Ends

Along with everyone else, we have also been ill the past week. Stomach ill. I'm hoping this means a sick-free holiday, but I'm not sure I can be that lucky.

We have discovered that we have mice. A few other things we've discovered:

• Those stupid sound-emitter things that supposedly will drive rodents out of the house DO NOT WORK.
• Traps built to hide the mouse body after it dies DO NOT WORK.
• Mice never travel alone.
  

Three days ago, Pants purchased a pack of "old trusty" mousetraps and a pack of glue strips. He also gave me crap for how much I spent on the other two methods that had not caught even one mouse. It did not help that his "old trusty" caught one within an hour. AN HOUR. WHILE WE WERE ALL STILL UP. But it's not the snap-traps that bother me - it's the glue traps. They work like gangbusters but I hate listening to the mouse struggle in the cabinet for so long. Pants hates that they are still looking at him, pleading, when he takes them out to the trash. We both prefer the quick snap/immediate death approach.

I don't have a Christmas tree up yet, nor do we have stockings or anything else up. It would be much easier if we weren't sick every year from October 31 through the new year.

Second opinion

We got our diagnosis on Kitten and she has ADHD. The doctor immediately prescribed medication.

I asked if this was the first line of treatment. She said yes, for the kinds of numbers on her assessment.

I asked if there was additional behavioral therapy we could get in addition to the medication. She said no, she only referred people to behavioral therapists if their children had disciplinary problems.

I said that she gets so frustrated that she routinely melts down at the slightest provocation and can't seem to pull herself out of it. She said that Kitten was probably just frustrated throughout the day and was releasing that at home, maybe it would get better if the medication could help her focus during the day and not get so frustrated.

I filled the prescription with a lump in my throat. I didn't give it to her over the weekend.

And then Monday she threw up. And Tuesday I couldn't find it.

By Tuesday, I had decided to try it. ADHD medication is fast-acting - you don't have to let it build up in your bloodstream over a couple of weeks, it works on the first day. It is active for 8-10 hours in the bloodstream and then wears off. Most are psycho-stimulants that excite the nueron receptors to work harder, better. While it sounds counterproductive to give a hyperactive kid a stimulant, there is science behind it. Because it works for a specific period of time and then moves out of her system, I'm willing to give it a trial. We can always go off it.

On Wednesday, over Pants' strenuous objections, I gave Kitten the medicine. The doctor prescribed one in a capsule that we could break open and dump into a small amount of applesauce for her to eat. The drug won't lose it's efficacy by taking it this way, as long as it is not chewed or dissolved in the mouth.

Kitten's teacher emailed me at the end of the school day and said that, while it didn't solve all of her issues (Kitten still stood in the classroom in a daze until she had to be told to put away her things), she was able to focus all day and finish all of her schoolwork. Success!

Whem Kitten came home on Wednesday night, she was absolutely bouncing off the walls. Flying around like she was on crack. Swimming lessons were terrible - she flailed around like she couldn't control herself or forgot what she was supposed to be doing. She stayed up a bit later than usual, but nothing horrible.

Thursday night was better, not quite so manic, but the coordinator at the after-school program had noticed her hyperactivity that afternoon. I had given her the meds a half hour earlier that morning. It appears she has a period of intense hyperactivity when she is coming down.

Friday night, tonight, her third day on the meds, and she has been a complete basket case. I can't say in the short time we've used the drug that the meltdowns are really worse, but I'm watching. Other than that, it appears that her appetite at home has been fine (some kids stop being hungry) and she is only staying up a little bit past bedtime, not anything serious. The bonus side affect seems to be regularity, something she's struggled with for years.

But I can attest that the drug is not a cure-all. Kitten still needs some help expressing herself, recognizing inattention and correcting it, and I need some advice on helping her with daily routines. After only a few days, I know I need some behavioral therapy.

I have asked another mom how her child was treated and if there was any therapy in addition to medication. We talked for a bit and when it was clear her doctor's theories matched mine, I called to make another appointment. I want another opinion, another approach.

I won't necessarily take her off the medication. It definitely seems to be helping at school and she is on the lowest dose possible. But I want some more tools for the inattention, the inability to break down a task into smaller actions, the difficulty with concepts of time and other abstract concepts. I want to get her some help with her emotional outbursts and her anxiety issues. The medication-only approach does not work for me - I want more.