Anonymous wrote:No. But DH with ADHD who should have been medicated for it nearly burned the house down the other day because he "forgot " the burner was on when he put the paper towels on the stove.
I do wish he'd grow out of it though.

And I do wish DC would grow out of it every time he crosses the street without looking because he forgot.

Would you say scatterbrained?

Anonymous wrote:My kid was not medicated until high school when things fell rapidly and dramatically apart. Smart kids often keep up until the load gets to be too much and then they get underwater quickly.

This. +1

As DS has gotten older, he’s slowly found better ways to cope with adhd, but definitely hasn’t ‘grown out’ of it.

My kid has anxiety & adhd. He’s responded well to Wellbutrin re. anxiety, but cannot be medicated for adhd (we’ve tried all options and the side effects are awful). So, he copes as best as possible with a lot of reminders and a lot of extra efforts. If we ever found a medication for adhd that works for him, we’d do it in a heartbeat.

No. But DH with ADHD who should have been medicated for it nearly burned the house down the other day because he "forgot " the burner was on when he put the paper towels on the stove.
I do wish he'd grow out of it though.

And I do wish DC would grow out of it every time he crosses the street without looking because he forgot.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is cruel to not at least have the child examined to see if this might help him. Do you also refuse to get his eyes examined or refuse to buy glasses?

Not remotely the same thing.

+10000

Putting glasses on a child's face does not involve putting a psychotropic drug into a developing body.

Anonymous wrote:Can a brain scan prove a neurological disease?

Scans can't currently diagnose ADHD, but NIH is doing studies that involve taking MRIs of kids with ADHD and kids without and then following those kids over time. They have found that there are significant differences at a population level between the two groups (i.e. the average size of some brain structures in one group is different than it is for the other). And, for the sub-group of kids who report diminishing symptoms of ADHD over time, the average sizes of structure of for that sub-group comes to resemble the non-ADHD group, while the subgroup with continuing symptoms don't.

Anonymous wrote:Growing out of a neurological disorder is news to me. Perhaps, what you mean is, are the impacts of the side effects less noticeable as the kid gets older? If that's the case, then yes, a kid can learn to adapt without medication and with the help of therapies be better capable of managing themselves. It doesn't work for every ADHD child. In K the school principal told me in DS's IEP meeting that he firmly believed that DS (diagnosed with ADHD-combined) would never be a success without medication. By the end of K, DS was on grade level in all areas, except one, where he was advanced. DS is in 5 grade and most people that interact with him don't know that he has ADHD. He is not on medication. We chose to change his diet and his environment, and add all the therapies that he needed to be a success. He's on grade level in all areas. In the future, if DS decides that life and school has gotten to hard to manage because of ADHD, then we will revisit putting him on medication.

No, some kids literally grow out of it.

Read the link posted by PP on page 1 about Dr. Shaw's work. My son is one of the cohort that Dr. Shaw's team has been following from childhood to (now) young adulthood. The study that my son is enrolled in is an imaging study, which has shown that there are characteristic population-level differences in the structure of the brains of kids with ADHD versus kids without. Note that these aren't diagnostic level differences that you can look at and say "That kid has ADHD", but rather the average size of structures for the population of ADHD kids is significantly different than the average size of those structures in non-ADHD kids.

When Dr. Shaw explained it to me, what I understood him to say happens with the subgroup of kids who "grow out of it" (i.e. they are able to discontinue medication and their average scores on diagnostic tests move toward the non-ADHD population average) is that the structure of their brains changes over time to more closely resemble the non-ADHD population. He explained that for some kids it's a timing issue --- some structures in their brains develop more slowly than the non-ADHD population, but they eventually catch up. For another large cohort, this never happens.

My kid was not medicated until high school when things fell rapidly and dramatically apart. Smart kids often keep up until the load gets to be too much and then they get underwater quickly.

Anonymous wrote:Growing out of a neurological disorder is news to me. Perhaps, what you mean is, are the impacts of the side effects less noticeable as the kid gets older? If that's the case, then yes, a kid can learn to adapt without medication and with the help of therapies be better capable of managing themselves. It doesn't work for every ADHD child. In K the school principal told me in DS's IEP meeting that he firmly believed that DS (diagnosed with ADHD-combined) would never be a success without medication. By the end of K, DS was on grade level in all areas, except one, where he was advanced. DS is in 5 grade and most people that interact with him don't know that he has ADHD. He is not on medication. We chose to change his diet and his environment, and add all the therapies that he needed to be a success. He's on grade level in all areas. In the future, if DS decides that life and school has gotten to hard to manage because of ADHD, then we will revisit putting him on medication.

Look at some of the more recent research using brain scans being done at NIH or NIMH. It's really interesting but the pathways can change and develop as the child ages. Brains are pretty plastic, especially at young ages. (Think about stroke victims -- even olderly people can sometimes regrow pathways or grow alternative pathways with the right kind of therapy, support and time.) Therapy can not only help to mitigate the symptoms, but the right kind of therapies can actually help develop the neural pathways....much like exercising a muscle helps it grow. This stuff is so fascinating and there is still SO MUCH THE SCIENTISTS DON'T KNOW.

Anonymous wrote:Unfortunately many with ADHD who are not put on meds ultimately self medicate.

This was our biggest fear and our developmental pediatrician warned strongly about it. My DD is now 14, takes ADHD meds and anti-anxiety meds. I struggle wondering if the anxiety is caused by the ADHD meds and if we are just creating a big circular issue, but then I think back to before she was on meds and remember that she always had stomach aches (a hallmark of anxiety). She is also dyslexic and school is a struggle. She can now articulate how the meds help her get through school in a reasonable manner and lessen her anxiety. She has a long way to go and still has issues, but I think (and she thinks) she would be worse off without them.

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think people outgrow it. I think those people never truly had it.

The school environment change, loss of gym/recess time (too short), full day Kindergarten, and a push to more academia at a younger age has normal kids in normal developmental stages (particularly boys) seem as if something wrong with their behavior when I’m fact it’s normal.

I do have 2 very focused boys that never were in trouble, good students and good in class (11 and 13) and have seen some friends that I thought were acting normally for young kids in the early elementary years get the push to medicate.

My brother definitely would have been a candidate for meds in the 70s/80s and I don’t think he has or had ADHD. He was fairly naughty and hyper.

Your parents might not agree with you, especially if they were parenting today.

Anonymous wrote:Can a brain scan prove a neurological disease?

Yes, a brain scan shows Parkinson's, dementia, epilepsy, brain tumors, etc.

I don’t think people outgrow it. I think those people never truly had it.

The school environment change, loss of gym/recess time (too short), full day Kindergarten, and a push to more academia at a younger age has normal kids in normal developmental stages (particularly boys) seem as if something wrong with their behavior when I’m fact it’s normal.

I do have 2 very focused boys that never were in trouble, good students and good in class (11 and 13) and have seen some friends that I thought were acting normally for young kids in the early elementary years get the push to medicate.

My brother definitely would have been a candidate for meds in the 70s/80s and I don’t think he has or had ADHD. He was fairly naughty and hyper.

Can a brain scan prove a neurological disease?

Anonymous wrote:I think you should take your head out of the sand, figure out what your kid needs at this point in time, and make that he gets it. As opposed to wishing and dreaming that something that makes you uncomfortable will somehow go away with time.

Like meds?