Anyhow, I have been on the Adderall for 2-3 weeks. It definately helps with getting motivated to complete tasks/chores. However, if I’m not moving around and I sit down to read, get on the internet or my cell phone, I get extremely hyperfocused on what I’m reading. It’s very annoying when I should really be exercising, completing chores, paying attention to my son, etc. Hours will pass without accomplishing anything besides reading blogs. Guess I need to let my mind get used to the dose or decrease it. I guess I’m having the same problem as you do with Strattera and hyperfocusing. Sorry, just wanted to let you know that u may want to try Adderall, but it may have the same issue as Strattera. We just need to stay away from our phones and internet!

All of them have caused me periodic itchiness, which varied in intensity from time to time. Often this would affect the back of my hands and I’d find myself scratching them until I noticed I was bleeding. Why the variance? It’s doubtful anybody really knows. And remember these meds are all about nerves and the way they behave. It might be connected to many things, perhaps connected to something one has recently eaten, which in turn changes amount of many other chemicals circulating in our bodies at various times, like trace metals, hormones, hundreds of different enzymes, amino acids, levels of vitamins.

*there’s another major neurotransmitter only recently discovered, nitric oxide, (Molecule of the Year for 1992), which earned three researchers a Nobel Prize in 1998. Their discovery led directly to the invention of Viagra and its subsequent cousins, all of which, too, are not yet perfectly targeted to just the right subset of receptors nor totally without breakdown byproducts which play some havoc. Hence headaches, backaches, bluish vision, etc. as side-effects. Nitroglycerin had been in use as a source of this neurotransmitter for well over a hundred years, but nobody knew that one of its breakdown products, nitric oxide, was a true neurotransmitter. We’re learning it has many functions, but is most famous as a vasodialator, meaning it relaxes blood vessels allowing increased blood flow.

I’ve had ADHD since I was a tyke back in the ’50′s well before it had a name. I was simply an odd, boisterous, stubborn child, an enigma to my folks.

I’ve learned over many years that I’ve always been quite bright. At age 4 I could never accept the inevitable answer to my obsessive questioning “Why?” about everything I was told to do.
My exasperated and often face-slapping mother insisted that I make do with: “Because I SAID SO!” I already understood at that age that this was tyrannical and totally unacceptable. I took every kind of punishment, but I never shut down and quit asking ‘why.’
I suggest to any of you parents who respond in this way:
Consider that just maybe your AHAD child might be exceptionally bright, perhaps brighter than yourself, and like any adult is insulted by intimidation when he/she intuits the parent actually has no answer, is too proud to admit it or believes the child isn’t ready for the honest truth. Increasingly, scientists suspect that ADHD is a portion of a ‘cluster’ or ‘spectrum’ of related abnormalities. Severe autism at one end, going towards Aspberger’s then less ‘abnormal’ to AHAD. With increasing knowledge comes the discovery that often such children posess a spike or more of genius in some areas beyond their parents’ and that far more of the problem is a communication wall than previously thought. iPads are working miracles opening up surprisingly bright brains to a populous which had naively perceived only subnormal IQ. Google the ground-breaking Aspergers woman, Temple Grandin, who sees both sides and has done so much to help enlighten the formerly ignorant about the degree of intelligence and emotional capabilities of many who lack the capacity to be heard and understood.
One astounding example: It was long thought autistic children didn’t want to be held or touched because they didn’t have the emotional wherewithal to crave it. Turns out that probably ALL autistic children love touch and holding, but at the first encounter with it at birth became phobic because touch was always so spontaneous, often leading to head petting, getting dragged somewhere, picked up, kissed.. just roulette. This suggests that the moment autism is detected, touch needs to be so predicable that the child doesn’t immediately associate it with “all hell will break loose” and henceforth fear it for life.
Is there anyone still reading? I told you I was a problem child. My folks tried to beat me down, but I still suck up knowledge at 63 like a sponge am obsessive about my interests and am proud of it;-)

This book is absolutely amazing and definitely an eye opener for parents, teachers, and child care providers of all kinds. I am a parent and a preschool teacher. I am not making money on the book, its just the only book like it of its kind, and I try to tell as many people as I can about it. You can get used sometimes at used book stores, but it is also very inexpensive on amazon or sites alike.

My son was Diagnosed with ADHD, just under 1 year ago, he turn 5 just this summer. The doctor that he is seeing is a pediatric neurologist. He has been reluctant to put him on medication due to the fact that he has had a very difficult time gaining wieght but eats a very large amount through out the day. I have recently been working with a children’s mental health centre, he is now in the centers milleu program which is having good benifits as i am not the only one seeing the behavioural difficulties that he has including opposition, impulsivity, and temper control. I just had a meeting with the whole team that over sees the benifits and such for my son both phycologist on the team are recomending that my son go onto strattera and think that if there are no side effects that hinder it’s usage with him it would be a good match. I was wondering if this would be true considering that all the research that i have been doing is suggesting that it is for children 6+?