Kids & Teens

Finding out you have gay children is for most of us unsuspecting parents a life changing experience.
How much it changes our life depends on many factors. I know personally how it does change your life as I do have gay children.

I am a mother that has been married for 26 years to the same man and have 2 wonderful sons from that marriage.
I still remember from a very early age that I would marry a man and have a family of my own.

Your son is running through the house at 92 miles per hour (you've clocked him with a State Patrol radar gun) and won't stop. Yes, he has ADHD, you know this, but you've asked and then told him to stop, and you could really care less about ADHD. You want this child to BE STILL.

In these circumstances it's easy to think your ADDHD child is being willful and stubborn. That really is probably not the case.

Do you have ADHD? Are you a mom? Does one or more of your children have ADHD? I just want to give you a hug and say, "You poor thing. I know exactly how you feel." I know about the teachers sending notes home that your ADHD child didn't return a paper because you forgot to sign it. I know about missing important deadlines, like signing your ADHD child up for the Gifted and Talented program, because you forgot to check his backpack. I know about the non-ADHD child saying, "Mom, you forgot to pack our lunches--AGAIN."

I know.

Saying my ADHD son doesn't wake up well would be like saying Old Faithful is a pretty big geyser. This child, age 10 and with severe ADHD, wakes up like a rock.

Morning has always been a difficult time for us, even before the ADHD diagnosis. He whines. He grumbles. He shrieks. He goes back to bed. It's like having two of me in the house!

I have come up with a morning routine that takes into account his ADHD and the fact that he's not only tired and grumpy but hasn't had his ADHD medication yet.

I should start by saying my ADHD son is only ten, and the battle might start in earnest at any point, but so far we have not had major conflicts over taking his ADHD medicine. Twice he's spit it out, both times within about a month at about 8.5 years old. Both times I invoked some mild punishment and sat him down for a talk, and it hasn't happened since.

I have some tips that I think have helped in our house, and might help you with ADHD medicine routine problems.

1. Make sure your ADHD child knows what the medicine does.

If your child has ADHD, talking to his teacher may be the most important thing you can do to help him function more effectively at school in spite of his ADHD, and maybe even because of the ADHD.

Most teachers want to help their students, and most teachers have had ADHD kids in their classes before, if they've been teaching long. In general, teachers want to understand ADHD and the ADHD child and in particular they want to understand your child, their student.

Having more than one child is a challenge. Okay, having one child is a challenge, having two or more is a monumental challenge. When one of those children (or more than one) has ADHD, the challenge multiplies exponentially. Below are some tips for handling ADHD in the family.

1. Be fair to all of your children. This means treating the ADHD child as equally as possible, of course. It also means treating the non-ADHD children fairly. Sometimes I let my son get away with things I shouldn't because I know he's having a bad day.

It was one of those "Well, DUH" moments for me. I was researching ADHD and came across the headline, "Ignoring Useless Information Aids Memory."

Well, of course it does. But if you have ADHD, especially if you're a child with ADHD, determining useless information in the first place can be a major challenge.

What's useless? If you're 10 and have ADHD, grammar is useless. But ignore it and your memory will really improve.

Many people think ADHD is a recent "fad," a new diagnosis. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

In 1845, Dr. Heinrich Hoffman, a physician who wrote books on medicine and psychiatry, wrote an illustrated book of children's poetry about children and their characteristics. "The Story of Fidgety Philip" was a portraite of an ADHD boy.

ADHD was not "discovered" by Hoffman, however, or for many years later. In 1902 Sir George F.

There are a lot of complicated and complex studies about what causes ADHD, and a lot of folk lore and popular theories.

There are also some basic facts about what does appear to cause ADHD and what doesn't.

Environmental factors: It appears that tobacco and alcohol use by expectant mothers can cause a higher risk of ADHD in offspring. There is also evidence that high levels of lead may be related to ADHD in children.

Brain injury: One early theory was that attention disorders were caused by brain injury.