1. Are you Adult ADHD or ADD? ~symptoms, and suggestions that may help.
2. "If He Outgrew It, What Is He Doing in My Prison?" byT. Dwaine McCallon, M.D.
3. Books for ADHD adults, 2 classics and 2 to help positively
4. Can you help this mum of a 4 year old with ADHD? She wants your opinion on Ritalin.
5. The last word from Tricia and Mike, your editors ~ what has helped other adults.

Are you Adult ADHD or ADD? ~symptoms, and suggestions that may help.

Most adults with ADD are restless, easily distracted, have difficulty sustaining attention and concentrating, are impulsive and impatient, have frequent mood swings and short tempers, are disorganized and fail to plan ahead.  Adults with ADD often experience career difficulties. You may lose jobs due to poor job performance, attention and organizational problems, or relationship difficulties. Other times, you may simply quit out of boredom.

Education is the first strategy Once you have been accurately diagnosed, you may be relieved to learn your difficulties are due to ADHD, as opposed to some personal flaw.

You can benefit from learning to structure your environment.

• This may involve using an appointment book, a personal  computer, or tape recorder.
• Other strategies include making a daily list of tasks, posting schedules and appointments
• learning time management skills,
• setting up a self-reward system.

• antidepressants can be helpful for treating substance abuse and depression, or when phobic, panic, anxiety and/or obsessive compulsive disorders are present.

A primary goal for you, as an adult who has ADD/ADHD  is to build on success.Learn to adapt to your ADHD and  harness the energy and creativity that often accompanies ADD and you can thrive professionally. Many adults with ADD are successful entrepreneurs and you can be too.

Other intervention strategies include:

• scheduling regular physical exercise
• maintaining a sense of humour
• eliminating negative self statements
• avoiding, reducing or eliminating alcohol or drug use
• enlisting a friend, relative or spouse to help finish tasks and remember commitments, and to provide feedback
• Short-term psychotherapy can help you identify how your ADHD might be associated with a history  sub-par performance and difficulties in personal relationships.
• Long-term psychotherapy can help address mood swings, stabilize relationships, and alleviate guilt and discouragement.

The blue slides are used with permission  from a series from Louis B. Cady, M.D.  They are part of a series which can give you  a full visual presentation including  research  into brain differences in ADHD people  His excellent website is at http://www.drcady.com  Information not with a blue background, for the article above,  was adapted from CHADD website at http://www.chadd.org/fact6.htm

It is strongly suggested you investigate the planning and coaching programme that has helped us over several years. It fulfills the criteria mentioned in the article of making a daily list of tasks, posting schedules and appointments, learning time management skills,and setting up a self-reward system.Don't lose your job due to poor job performance, attention and organizational problems, Click on the banner and you will find a wealth of resources to help you structure your environment. 

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      "If He Outgrew It, What Is He Doing in My Prison?" by T. Dwaine McCallon, M.D.

The peculiarities of how mind activity develops and works under the inclinations of different inherited personality and learning features can be dramatically seen in brain scans. Even the lay public is exposed to this thrilling new knowledge through Discovery documentaries or on The Learning Channel.

In spite of this, professionals in my field of medicine or in education or even in juvenile justice, remain  uninformed about new understandings of the “criminal connection” with ADHD, Tourette disorder and other learning disabilities. Several of us in correctional medicine have noted this for some time now.

Over four years ago, an impressive study was done in the state of Utah where Dr. Paul H. Wender has pioneered the understanding that ADHD and its relatives are life long conditions which in many cases are not simply “outgrown”. Many of the subjects carried the diagnosis of bipolar manic depressive disorder.As is the case in our own treatment study, most were very depressed at being in prison, not quite understanding how their life had gone down the tubes, and had occasional ADHD type moments of  exuberance and acting out. The clinicians who had seen these men over the years could not tell the difference between this most common of learning disabilities (ADHD) and the less common bipolar  patients they were following.

 The Utah survey found approximately 24 % of male inmates to have ADD/ADHD with classical clinical findings. Other studies and our own experience have led us to believe that upwards of 40% of our  residents in a medium security prison have the findings along the Tourette/ADD spectrum. If you separate out the nonviolent, impulsive criminals (whom I term my basic, charming and even lovable car thieves and traffic offenders), the percentage is much greater.

Nearly nine years ago, a clinical social worker, a clinical PhD psychologist and I began a small unfundedstudy/treatment project for these men, who form a very significant sub-population of our prison inmates.Our program was politically hazardous for we understood that medication was essential in this group of adult patients with ADHD. If your ADHD is so disabling that you have found yourself living in a remote walled prison of over 1,000 men, then it is unlikely that you will progress toward rehabilitation without the aid of medication. Stimulant medicine can can greatly enhance the ability to learn how to learn,to develop caution and judgment, and to learn a job skill. So we did not hesitate to employ Ritalin, Cylert and an array of newly found SSRI medications to amplify the focus and processing memory (key to judgments) at the beginning of “talk therapy” and training.

Naturally, careful controls on these medications had to be developed as well as a contractual agreementfor conduct with each of our patients. Our program lasts from 6 months to over 2 years, depending onprogress. Patients are given 30 days supply of their medications upon parole and placed in contact with local support groups, counselors and physicians who are comfortable with and understand the condition.They are never “cut loose” with new suit, $100.00 and a bus ticket!

Our results have stunned us, even though we have a great deal of experience treating ADHD. In brief, after graduation from this program,our subjects who completed the requirements have had a two year recidivism rate under 10% for either parole violation (three only) or a new criminal charge (one only) in a group of 41 paroled over two years. This is in contrast to the usual 53-58% recidivism rate nationwide.

Several observations are disturbing to me. The great majority of the men we have diagnosed with Tourette or ADHD were treated in childhood but the treatment was not continued beyond 1-2 school years! Over half of these recall being told they
would not need treatment beyond the teens as they would outgrow their ADD. None whom we have worked with were treated into their twenties.18% had discovered that crystal meth on the street would give them focus and a sense of calmness. 20% found solace from the feeling of “being a meathead”, “still being the retard kid” by seeking oblivion with marijuana and heroin.

 Four, still in prison, found focus in risk taking and self-medication with their own adrenaline: armed robbery, torching a hospital, and two multiple homicides during rage responses. All four have become focused, advanced to college studies, developed trades and counsel high school students. Two are artists,and two are musicians now. They find some satisfaction in training other inmates how to avoid these act Its all they have left as they are doing life sentences.

Repeatedly, I have heard saddened parents mourn the fact that they and their son were told this was a character problem and more severe discipline would change it. Many were told, even some are still being  told, not to worry - growth and time would make this problem disappear. The guilt they feel, even though  they followed the advice of the “experts” in my field and in education, is indescribable when they visit their children in prison.

Our nation now has 1.71 million persons behind bars, from local and state to federal youth facilities to federal maximum security prisons. The previous highest rate of incarceration for an industrialized nation was South Africa during apartheid (3.2 per1,000 population). We are over double this rate presently.

 My message is this: we have perhaps 600,000 inmates who have reason to hope if this condition(ADHD) is treated. Rarely does a prisoner really not want to change his behavior and life path. We must recognize this most treatable of the genetic conditions of learning/behavior and continue to treat and intervene before someone like me has to treat your child “inside the walls” and behind razor wire. Never stop advocating for your child with ADHD. Dealing with the scorn of others who do not understand is a  pittance compared to the experience of visiting him or her in prison.

Confront your doctor with this as I did recently: "If he outgrew it, what is he doing in my prison?”

T. Dwaine McCallon, M.D. Medical Director,
Buena Vista Correctional Facility, Asst. Chief Medical Officer,Colorado Dept. of Corrections

"Kathleen Nadeau writes about the practical interests of adults with ADD extremely well and offers much useful advice. This is a very important book for all ADDers and those who live with and love them".   Peter Jaksa, Ph.D. President, National Attention Deficit Disorder Association

The reviewer says,"Well, it's about time somebody stands up and lets others know ADD can be a positive thing.This book is great. Lynn Weiss looks at A.D.D. as a different way of thinking rather than the disability that others have made us believe it is

"After learning  I had ADD, at age 45, I read  all I could get my hands on.  This book is more enjoyable,  more informative, more true to life...less demeaning than  anything else I have read. Dr.   Hallowell uses lifes encounters as a method to help explain every facet of ADD that he describes.   ADD is depicted as an  adventure rather than one of  lifes meladies we must  endure.  An easy read, well worth it for all family members." said one ADHD person in the reviews

Out of the  Fog   Treatment options and coping                           strategies

One thing we found amazing as we researched this month's topic, was the number of sites who see ADHD as a disability.

Our experience has shown that those who can manage ADHD  and use all resources available to them, are the most stimulating people you could meet. Where would we be as a world, without the wonderful risk takers in business, and pioneers of original thought with energy to burn. We applaud you if you are harnessing ADHD as a gift, and if not we hope this exine has helped in some way.
As you know we are very much holistic in our approach to ADHD and believe you must also have superb nutrition so the brain  can have all it needs to harness the specialness of ADHD.Just yesterday we had an email extolling yet again the benefits of essential fatty acids for ADHD people.
We therefore urge you to visit the Nutrition part of the site and revisit the options there that have helped so many. Click here while you're thinking about it!

Kind regards and keep in touch
Tricia and Mike Legg

PS

This month the free ebook is on essential fatty acids and details on how they work to help you. Email us with the subject " EFA" and we will email it back to you.