GainesvilleMoms.com

Anyone else have a child with ADD? My 7 yr old son has it and this week has been one of those weeks. He is just pushing limits and boundaries again.
He gets a daily note from school about his behavior. He is not a bad child, just one that has a hard time staying on task, looses his focus, etc. Anyways, today his reading teacher wrote in pencil about his reading and he attempted to erase it and was caught. He wanted to have a good report.
I explained to him that that was a form of lying and deception. But he is frustrating at times.
Anyone have any tips or thinks that worked for them that can help?
I am open to anything except drugs. I will not put my children on chemical drugs for ADD or ADHD. I am open to vitamin type of supplements. I have my ADHD daughter on one and it works wonders for her, but it has done nothing for my son.

Tammy,
I don't have a child with ADD but I worked for a Nutritional Practitioner who would see ADD children. In her practice her clients really saw results in the behavior of their child when they followed a specific diet. She would have them eliminate all artificial colorings, sugar, wheat, dairy products ect... I know it sounds overwhelming but the clients really saw results. The place where I worked is in upstate New York but we referred people to other practitioner's in other states. The company we worked with is called Standard Process. If you would like more information I could call them and see if they could refer you to someone in the area. If your interested let me know. I hope maybe I was helpful.
Good Luck,
Kaya

You know, my step-sister just told me the same thing...that her child, who is ADD-diagnosed, is on a strict diet. I remember one day he had some of his old stuff (sugar, etc.) at a school party, and she said she had the worst day with him. For her, she swears by the diet. I think it is worth looking into.

My oldest son, was diagnosed with ADD when he was 6 years old. We tried putting him on a special ADD Diet but it didn't work for him. However, we did notice that he does react to sugar (even just a little bit). Even at 14, if he's had too much sugar, he can drive us crazy.

That was the main complaint of my step-sister...the sugar...

why do you completely rule out drugs? if you son had a heart condition that could only be treated with drugs would you refuse him the medication as well?

my son is on medication for depression that mimicks ADD. i have a friend whose son is ADHD and he is on medication. they tried everything first. but now that his medication is regulated and monitored closely by the dr, his grades are up, his behavior is under control and all around he is a happier more well adjusted child.

softballmom, you are not the first one to question my stand about drugs. I am not judging anyone else's decisions about drugs or intending to start an argument or debate. And I don't think that comparing ADD to a heart problem is good enough to me. I myself have had to deal heart problems and know what it is like. If any of my children were having problems with medical conditions that I could not solve on my own, I would defiantly take them to the doctor and get proper treatment, including any drugs needed.
However at this time I do not feel that I want to take that step with my son.
I am generally anti-drug. I am asking for people to respect my stand and opinion on it. It is my preference just like any other preferences I have.
If after trying everything else, exhausting all options I can find, I will then consider placing my son on a medication/drug.

quote:

Originally posted by -1kaya:
Tammy,
I don't have a child with ADD but I worked for a Nutritional Practitioner who would see ADD children. In her practice her clients really saw results in the behavior of their child when they followed a specific diet. She would have them eliminate all artificial colorings, sugar, wheat, dairy products ect... I know it sounds overwhelming but the clients really saw results. The place where I worked is in upstate New York but we referred people to other practitioner's in other states. The company we worked with is called Standard Process. If you would like more information I could call them and see if they could refer you to someone in the area. If your interested let me know. I hope maybe I was helpful.
Good Luck,
Kaya

Hi Kaya,
That would be really helpful. I have seen the diets, but it seems so strict, I can't help but think...then what can he eat? Do you mind finding out what you can for me?
thanks so much!

Tammy - i do respect your decision, i'm just expressing my thoughts and opinions. but my question still remains, why are you generally anti-medication.

We live with heart disease in my family, it has not missed a generation yet. that is why i used the comparison. Often times when there is something physically wrong with the body, we treat it immediately because it is associated with pain or the threat of loss of life. when there is a neurological condition, we take a much less aggressive approach. i'll try this and if that doesn't work, i'll try this next. i wish my son could say, mom, my brain hurts, it's just not working right. but he can't. he just knows something is wrong, no matter how hard he tries, he can't pull it together.

regardless of what drs say, i believe add, adhd and childhood depression are still fairly new in the scope of childhood illnesses. I left one dr because he wanted to use my son for studies and basically try out untested treatments all while my son would continue to struggle if the diet had no effect or if the herbal treatments caused adverse reactions.

please understand, i am only trying to continue the dialogue. i appreciate an area where we can discuss issues openly and honestly, not offending those we engage.

softballmom,
I wasn't totally offended or upset, just a bit aggravated at the comment. I get a push from the school, and others, including his dad (I was divorced) about just doing what the dr says. I don't have 100% faith in drs anymore. I tend to feel, as most moms do, I know what is best for my children.
The biggest reason I became anti-medication was due to my son's birth experience. (He was a medically necessary c/section) To make a really long story short, I went into labor, got the hospital, who would not listen to me or my then husband and gave me really medicalized birth(I know that isn't a word). I believe that hospital in part caused my heart failure during his birth, but that is another story. In the end, I had 4, yes 4 different drugs in my system. My son was not breathing when he was born due to it. They took 10 minutes to get my son to breathe. And then he spent the next 2.5 days in an incubator hooked up to everything. All because of the convince of drugs.
While I do not discount the great things that drugs have done for people and they have helped people in so many ways, I do believe they are overused and whenever there is any problem the first thing that is done is a drug is given.
I have found through my own research a combination of vitamin supplements that are formulated for children I give my ADHD daughter. These supplements are the same things found in the foods that are good for her anyways. They are just formulated in the right amounts for ADHD.
All medications we have are derived from mother nature in some form and the chemically altered in a controlled dosage. Every mediation, I believe, we have available started out somewhere in nature.
I do not need a doctor to give me information, I research and teach myself.
But I am having a challenge with my son. I am looking for a method that will help him, because unless I have to, I will not put him on drugs and allow him to go through all the side effects that drugs can give.

Hi Tammy, I have a friend who is in school for holistic medicine...I can see if she knows of a homeopathic doctor up here. I do agree with you on your stance about drugs. My daughter has a form of mild OCD and I am learning to deal with it w/o drugs. I just think at this young age that there are too many unknowns as far as pharmaceuticals are concerned. My mom had asthma, COPD, and emphysema and she was on many drugs that she was told would help. She passed away 4 years ago (not from the drugs specifically) but just now they are starting to say that many of the ones she was on are producing too many dangerous side effects to prescribe! Causing heart failure and many other things. I don't want to take the chance that a drug they say is safe right now, down the road turns out to be worse than the condition it is prescribed for...just my opinions though

Yeah, isn't it something that I keep seeing commercials from lawyers who say, "If you were on this medication..." you may have a lawsuit. It's kind of scary.

Tammy, that birth story sounds really, really scary and traumatic. No wonder you feel the way you do. I remember when my sister was sick, the hospital kept sending her away with a diagnosis of a tension headache. They slapped some medication on it to make it better and sent her on her way.

I knew something more was wrong, but they were the doctors and they knew best, right? Well it turns out their diagnosis was wrong and they should have been treating her for a much more serious illness and she passed away 3 weeks later. I still regret not speaking up, not demanding something more. I felt like I had no voice and I felt so much regret for that for so many years, as if I had let her down.

We found out that in the end, the results would have been the same regardless of when treatment began because she had such a serious case, but I wish I would have had more of a voice during that time.

Hi Tammy,
I will send an e-mail out and get back to you with some information.
Kaya

my son has had great success on paxil. he is able to handle disappointment with a hung head rather than beating his head against the wall. he is able to express his disappointment with words other than i want to die or i wish i were dead. his anger towards his father is under control. i no longer worry about what he is going to do when he is with his father.

medication along with counseling has really helped my son. I could not believe the immediate difference in his day to day life once he began taking the medication. i was so angry at myself for letting him suffer for so long, just assuming i could love him enough, adjust his diet and essentially make him happy.

I respect your choice, i hope you respect mine.

bishop and Kaya, thanks, I would like any info I can get.

softballmom, of course I respect your choice. You are not the only one I have talked to that made the choice to use medication with their child. It sounds like your son had a more extreme case than my son.
My son has a more mild case of ADD. If he was doing things like your son, I would probably consider medication as well.
I just prefer to made going to the dr and getting medication my last option because I don't know what to do anymore.

My stand is and will always be that only the parents know what is best for their child. The only children I will judge is mine, and that is because I know my children better than anyone else. I have only the best interest in mind for them. And I like to assume that all other parents think the same about their children. Therefore it is never my place to judge someone else's decisions with what they do with their children. Besides it takes times that I don't have to go around and judge others. (Unless of course you see obvious abuse, and then you call child protective services)