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If anyone wants, and if it's ok with the OP, I can help provide some insight in this thread from both someone diagnosed with ADD and also someone who treats people with ADD (ADHD for the sticklers in here - although we use the terms interchangeably - ADD is kind of the shorthand). Happy to answer anything without stepping on any toes.
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Aug 26, 2009 14:34
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Qu Appelle posted:I have a question: It sounds like your body may have a tough time tolerating stimulants, which happens in a small percentage of the population. Is adderall the first medication you've tried for managing your ADD? There is a number of non-stimulant based meds that might work instead. Strattera, a norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor, may get you better results. Wellbutrin, which is a norepinephrine and dopamine reuptake inhibitor (and nicotinic antagonist for the added benefit of smoking cessation) might also work. Both are non-stimulant based. If you really want to go the no medication route, there is certainly some behavior modification you can do to help you through a day. Lists are a huge one. For me (and my patients) lists are a godsend. They help you organize your day, and the act of writing things down can slow down the rapid thinking that we are all blessed/cursed with. There are also ways to structure your environment to give you an edge, like making sure your workspace is free of mess and clutter, and giving yourself frequent breaks while in the middle of a task (5 minutes for every 20 minutes of work is a good ratio - make sure you get up and move around a little, even just to go to the water fountain). If you need some reading, I would recommend Driven to Distraction by Hallowell. It's sort of the go-to for learning about how you and your family can cope with and manage ADD. I also recommend Thom Hartmann's writings - he writes about ADD being a genetic throwback to when we were a hunter-gatherer society. ADD is perfectly suited for a hunter's lifestyle. You can go out into the woods and sort of pay attention to everything all at once. Then when you hear that branch *snap* you can hyperfocus on that deer to the exclusion of everything else and chase it down for days, if necessary. He puts the problem of ADD not into the hands of those with ADD, but rather into the type of society we live in, which these days is agrarian (farmers). Farmers poke a million little holes into the soil and fill each of the million little holes with a seed. To me (and to those of you with ADD) this sounds like death. His purpose is to really restructure the thought processes of those with ADD, most of us have been told throughout our lives that we are "less than" or "broken" and his writings can go a long way towards making you feel differently about the way your brain works. Lastly, a joke: Q. How many kids with ADD does it take to change a lightbulb? A. LETS GO RIDE BIKES! linkdead fucked around with this message at 17:46 on Aug 26, 2009 |
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Aug 26, 2009 17:43
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