Adults (parents, teachers etc) dont have the patience anymore to deal with a kid being a kid?
8 Responses to 'Do You Believe Children Are Being Overdiagnosed With Adhd Because…?'
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But some studies have been coming out of England recently which point to artificial flavorings and colorings as being major culprits here. That did not surprise me at all since my oldest went ballistically hyper at about two years old, which was just as — for those old enough to remember — the Feingold diet information was sweeping pediatrics and the populace. My son’s pediatrician agreed he was far more hyper than normal for a two-year old and suggested taking him off of coal tar deriviatives as a first step to finding out what was going on. I don’t know what artificial flavorings and colorings are made of now, but then they involved coal tar derivatives. So the basic thing was no artificial flavorings and colorings. Within a week or less (I don’t remember –it’s been a long time), we had a normal two-year old.
I became a paranoid label-reader, much to the irritation of some! Our boy learned to ask “Is it ‘ficial?” One mom at a birthday party he went to (despite my telling her ahead of time…) thought he was asking, “Is it official?” to which she answered “Yes, of course!” And so he ate the hot dog. He was about four at the time, I think, and came home off the wall. He was finally old enough to answer questions and I asked him, “What does it feel like? What’s going on, honey?” And he replied, “It feels like I’m itching all over under my skin.”
He would have been diagnosed ADHD or ADD for sure today and no one would have thought twice about his diet.
So there is something in terms of what is being finally ‘discovered’ today officially and my own story which tends to validate, at least in terms of one child, that I think they are on the right track.
Add this to two parents working and leaving the child someplace during the day where he is babysat, the number of single parents who are exhausted, divorces, the emphasis on early learning, and I think you probably have a good part of the story.
My answer? Cook and buy good foods and let the kids be kids. It is probably no accident that little boys are diagnosed ADHD more often than little girls. The little boys’ big muscles need to be exercised — and they can literally ache to do that. They need to run and yell and fall down and climb things and throw balls. That’s who they are. If you have a quiet son, great, count your blessings. But so many of the boys need more activity than they get that they are judged out of order and hyperactive in classroom settings.
Little girls are often not in that position in terms of simply needing to exercise big muscles and many are much more content to be more still. That does not mean they shouldn’t be outside and playing, it just means they don’t react to the lack of physical exercise and playtime the same way.
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I was reading this to my husband and he immediately got out an article that just came in Science News, Dec. 1, 2007, vol 172. p. 349, entitled “Additives may make youngsters hyper.” Here are some bits from it. It would be violating copyright to type the whole thing, but here are some major statements:
“Young kids seem to have boundless energy. The colorings and preservatives in soft drinks, candy, and other foods can boost kids’ activity levels higher still, a new study finds. This increase fosters hyperactivity and inattentiveness, potentially diminishing a child’s ability to learn, the report’s authors argue….the effect ‘is very reversible,’ the psychologist says. The average increase attibutable to the additives was about a tenth as large as the score separating normal children from those with clinically diagnosed attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. His team’s findings appear in the Nov. 3 Lancet.”
These tests were only run for seven weeks. By the time a child is seven years old, though, you have years’ worth of problems to cope with and habits to break.
ADHD is being overdiagnosed because people make money off it.
ADHD isn’t a disease, people with it just weren’t meant to be in a classroom.
I believe that if behavioral modifications aren’t working, one has to look at the medical side of it, in this case, a child’s neurology or brain chemicals.
Why does it seem more common these days, is a better question.
You may want to examine all the scary crap that comes in our processed foods. Who knows.
I know that a certain part of the population does have some type of ADD or ADHD. (I am one of them, the non-hyper type)
All i can say is that i never got on medication, because I had to learn COPING SKILLS.
but the bottom line is that meds may be the answer. It’s not about controlling a misbehaving , hyper child. It’s about saying, “is there something goin on in this kids neurology that prevents him from learning:?”
A learning disability … that’s what it is.
But i believe that medication by itself , doesn’t REALLY help the kid.
Coping skills MUST be there…. and any other modfications, such as diet, and exercise… and making sure there aren’t any problems at home, and that the child is acting out.
The latter may be what may contribute to some misdiagnosis.
yes it definately is i feel like i can focus on things just fine yet when i was in school i just hated it so i was labeled by doctors as add/adhd but i wasnt i had to take medication and all kinds of stuff that contributed to my current problems
I will say that some doctors seem to have dozens more ADHD dianosis, than others. Parents often seem to want their kids to be an “A” student or to have a reason why not, ADHD fills the bill easier than most. I guess it sounds better over coffee.
I’ve seen parents cry when their kid was diagnosed as “normal”, that is without some special problem. A kid showed up in my school with a ADHD diagnosis, there were no due process forms in his file. I asked an Asst. Supt of that kid’s former district about it & she said to me, “He went to Doctor ______. I thought for a minute & said “yes”, she said nothing else. Then I asked, “I take it that everyone that goes to Doctor _______ is ADHD”. “Yes”.
It is more than just schools that push this trend. I never pushed it because it served no real purpose. I some recommended students for a medical evaluation, that were thought to have ADD/ADHD, but the numbers were minimal.
If a student is ADD/ADHD & they receive medication, he or she will benefit tremendously. If they are not ADD/ADHD there will be no benefit to the student with meds. However, a student with disabilities receives special legal protections and cannot be disciplined as you would a normal student and it is no benefit to the school to have a labeled kid, who is nothing but a discipline problem. A student with behavior problems cannot be punished because of his or her disability.
Case in Point. Doe v. Hoenig (CA in the late 1980s)
An oversize special education student picked up a much smaller student & impaled him on a spiked cast iron fence. In other words, it was similar to a spear being shoved up the little kids rectum. The school wished to expel the attacker. Special Ed advocates got involved, took the school to court and the court/judge ordered that there be no punishment of the oversized culprit.
The Courts have forced much of this on the school. The last thing a school needs is to believe a student is not disabled, and have the parents get a doctor’s opinion saying other wise. Even if the first doctors consulted say there is no problem, parents can keep taking their kid to doctors until they receive a favorable result. Now, the school is in big trouble. 5 medical authorities can say the kid is normal, a 6th one can say the kid is disabled, now the school has lost the case & millions of dollars.
1.) I was a misdiagnosed ADD child. I was on Ritalin from 4-5 grade, and it did nothing for my Academics. I was zonked out in class. I started middle school Ritalin free and rocked the classroom with my MASSIVE brain. (Kidding, but I really did do well.) My mother, a school nurse, maintains that the school (the “best” in our city) didn’t know what to do with me. I was an impatient, active, curious kid. Difficult, yes. But bored–not stupid.
2.) I currently teach an English remediation course, and many of those children are Special ed with combinations of learning disorders, and there are sprinkles of ADD/ADHD in there. There are some mainstreamed students who play the system in order to get into special ed classes that have their friends and are also easier.
You’d have to define “a kid being a kid”. My son is currently being tested by his school for ADHD. His teacher thinks he may have it. I don’t blame her. My son is extremely hyper! He can’t ever sit still. I find myself yelling at him and getting frustrated with him always moving/fidgeting/climbing. He is definitely a handful and he is starting to fail because he isn’t finishing assignments because he can’t pay attention long enough to write his homework down (which is up on the board all day long) or bring his books home in order to do homework.
For now, I am only agreeing to the testing. I am not going to automatically put him on medicine if they find that he does have this disorder. I would tend to think that it is a “made-up” disorder and there are tons of kids being mis-diagnosed with it. However, being a mother of a child that is ridiculously hyper who wants to be good but just can’t seem to swing it, I understand that it is a real disorder. I do not agree with the medicine though.
I don’t think it’s right for a teacher to have to deal with a child who just won’t calm down and focus on their work. My son is constantly interrupting class and the teacher. He talks to other children around him or just makes noises/outbursts for no reason. His mind is just constantly darting from one thing to the next. He is very impulsive. I hate that my son is one of the ones that she has to “deal with”. She is doing a wonderful job though and isn’t getting frustrated with him. She is trying to help him through it and is the best teacher I could have hoped for. She understands because her daughter was just diagnosed with ADD.
My son is 9 and in 3rd grade if that helps at all.
I also believe that they should not be medicating the problem. I don’t believe the medication is good for the children. It teaches them that if there is a problem instead of working to fix it you should just use medication and it will make everything better. Kid with ADD/ADHD just need a little extra attention and one on one help. They don’t necessarily need the attention from their teachers, but their parents. Parents are so quick to send children to care centers and then medicate them when they have a problem, they need to spend some time with their children.
I know a lot of people may think that just because I don’t have children with this problem I don’t know how it is. Well I have worked with kids that have ADD some have been medicated, some have not. They may need a little extra care, but they are still great kids who shouldn’t be made to think they are different and have to take medication. I will never medicate my child just because they have ADD, but I will spend time with them and give them the extra help and care they need.