Wake up people!

Not everyone agrees with your theory about vaccines so it’s rude to tell people to “wake up and do something”.

Not everyone agrees, i would agree, I dunno that the tone was well placed, however atleast to some degree there is something to the under lieing message.

Our children ARE exposed to many chemicals not just due to their labels but from and through many other mediums as well. I don’t find it the least bit unhealthy to take notice of these things. Less chemicals in our systems would do us all good.

There is some truth too in who owns stock in what. I have done the research. I personally find it alarming, however, i don’t know that drug companies should be blamed for all evil everywhere when there is a Bush in the white house a far better scape goat. I am sure even the salem witch trials were some how his fault. Just don’t ask me how! (just kidding)

But i would agree as would the doctor who named ADHD in 1980, that it is over diagnosed and way over medicated. Over medicated does not however mean any medicating is over medicating and every child is a victim of over medicating. Each case is different. We need to be very careful with these drugs as they have huge impacts on the brains of developing young people the degree of which, we can’t measure and don’t know. It seems prudent to keep an eye on this issue of medicating and what is in the medicines and who is benefitting and the rise in labeling and the rise in medicating. In the last year ritalin use has more than doubled and a year ago, the UN issued a statement about it’s fear that american youth were being medicated into zombies. The reason being, that we as a nation used 90% of the world’s supply of Ritalin as of a year ago. Whats more…. as of a year ago, with ADHD alone, only 10% of cases were unmedicated. Whats more, as of a year ago atleast 1 in every 5 children was diagnosed with ADHD alone. That makes up 20% of america’s youth. Earlier this morning i saw a report on the news that the rate of diagnosis as gone up 4%. These drugs *can* and *may* be doing damage. I wish more people took a more cautious attitude about them and demanded WAY more testing to be done on these drugs. Maybe it is right for your child maybe not. That is your choice as a parent. However, these drugs are prescribed to 90% of ADHD children atleast which would be what? atleast 15% of children in america. And i have not even spoken to the drugs for other LD’s, or factored them into it. This isn’t just going to your child who you watch and look after fabulously. It is also going to kids in foster care etc who no one properly monitors in a system that is grossly overwhelmed. If you are sure you are doing the best for your child, i am sure you have reason to believe so and that is fine and likely you are. But please, for the sake of all these other children with no one to look out for them, please, demand more testing on the long term effects of these drugs and don’t slap down those who bring up, if rudely, the very real points that they are making. Thank you for understanding and thank you for doing what is best for your child with LD. And thank you for looking out for those children with LD who have no one to give a damn about what is best for them.

I’m just suggesting that people watch how they speak to other people on these forums. Be polite and don’t tell them to “wake up” as if they are asleep at the wheel.

A little education here for those who are not aware of how our government works…. any bill that the president signs, must first pass through congress, which means the House of Representatives must FIRST approve it, then the Senate must approve it. If BOTH houses approve, then the president may either sign or veto the bill. If you would like to blame the president, please tell me which bill he signed or vetoed that allowed “too many chemicals” to go into our children’s vaccines.

You can always send a letter, e-mail or phone call to your congressman if you think that the government has something to do with this. I’m REALLY curious. Please explain.

Kathryn

I understand that there are bad things in the meds are kids get but the truth is all kids have to get them but only some have ADHD or LD and many other health problems but what about the kids who are fine? They got the same drugs all are kids did and all the other kids still to come will. So are you saying the kids that are fine are lucky? I know I had ADD as a kid and they tested me and said I had LD. I hated reading and was bad at it! My husband had ADD and was not tested but found a way to deal with it in school. If he drew while the teacher talked he could pay attention. So you are telling me that the meds my child got caused him to have ADD not the fact that both parents had it? I have my son on ADHD meds now and I tried everything I read about my hole family was look up stuff about the meds and no med ways to take care of ADHD. I did it all and nothing helped. Some of you all might look down on me for giving him the meds but he is doing better in school. Yes there have been changes in him as for social. He is not out going to meet friends and likes to spend time alone. I am going to have him tested for depression. He did loose his grandmother around the same time he started the meds and I also know that the meds have side effects that will cause this also. I just have a hard time thing that the meds my child was given caused him to have ADD and the fact he is behind in reading when his mother and father were the same as him.

I used to be of the opinion that medicating a child with a disability was a cop out and was lazy…. until I found myself in those parents shoes. I also have a friend who is an adult with ADD. She did not know she had this problem until she was 45. She began to take ADD meds as an adult and she said it changed her life dramatically. If I found a medication that could make my daughter’s life easier I would jump on it in a heartbeat. There are no meds for her situation, so we are doing lots of language therapy. I’m sure there are others who wish there was therapy they could do for their child, but maybe for some there is no therapy that will help the way meds help. Every child and every disability and every situation is unique. No one should tell a parent how to raise their child. To medicate or not, to vaccinate or not, it is up to the parents. You have to do your research and weigh your options. That’s all I can say. I know there are those who feel very strongly against vaccines and I don’t judge those people. It is their choice. That’s the beauty of this country and the freedom that we have. We have choices.

Kathryn

Such meds changed my life too. But first they destroyed it.

Children have no choice. Their brains are still forming cop out or not… I don’t know i don’t care i try not to judge.

What i do know is that many families are disfunctional and need a scape goat. These drugs have not been fully tested as to their ong term effects on developing brains. And not just meds for ADHD or other LDs but various chemicals we don’t even think about or consider today that are in pretty much everything.

I think as individuals most who post here if not all are very kind compassionate people trying to help their children. Doing the best they know how and in most if not all cases they are doing just what they should be doing. However, not every parent is as vigilant as you all are. Drug companies are greedy. Shrinks DO get payments from drug companies for all sorts of ‘reasons.’ At the very least how much they make that way should be made public knowledge so parents have full disclosure when trying to make the best choice for their child.

I dunno enough about vaccines to have much of an opinion on them. But i ha ve used and read extensively on many other drugs. And i find the facts rather disturbing. I think that there is alot of terrorism and manipulation of parents by the drug companies through the shrinks. However, ever case is different and some shrinks are totally honorable…. It varies case to case. But i think we rely too much as a society on medicine for these things when we would be better off using and developing different forms of treatment as much and as often as possible and that meds should be more of a last resort as opposed to what they are today, 50% of a diagnosis.

The differences between the adult brain and a child brain are astronomical. This is why we don’t give them civil rights. Their brains are still developing their common sense and cognitive decision making is impaired by their brain’s maturity. For adults to choose to pop a pill is totally fine as it is for a child’s parents to make such a choice….But, the fact remains the danger from these drugs to the adult brain is grossly less than the potential danger that such drugs *may* (or may not as we don’t really know.) cause to the development of the brain which generally starts at birth and finally stops in the mid to mid late 20s.As a society we need to use more caution. As individuals…. We make our own responsible choices with the best info we can manage to get based on the needs of the child.

You can’t attack the medical community like that. They have done tremendous good for society. It’s amazing the new technology and new information. Science and medicine have come such a long way.

If you isolate vaccines, then you need to include all of the environemental toxins such as aluminum, plastic, dry cleaning, lawn care, aerosols, microwaves and cell phones, preservatives and additives and so on and so on. Where does it begin and where does it end and who will change commercial business and illegal dumping? No one. We can’t go back to the 1800’s.

So, we must live in the 21st century and deal with the issues at hand.

I am not attacking the medical profession. I am attacking a system which is broken even according to the man who named ADHD in the 1980s. I am NOT denying that it has it’s uses and it’s good points. Without it i wouldn’t be alive today. I would actually be dead several times over. I certainly would not be able to walk or to do much else and i wouldn’t be an atractive woman in her mid 20s. I was hit by a car when i was 5. Crushed pelvis…. Treated as a burn victim a few small scars are still left… But nothing that is really visible and they were able to fix my face completely. You couldn’t tell today that it had pretty much been ripped off. So please, do not accuse me of judging a whole profession.

I was judging a whole society. We have become lazy. Pushing an easy button or popping a pill to some degree for many though again not all, is a powerful help. It’s not about technology or even drugs. It is about using these things on our children before we have a full and complete understanding of the long term effects that is troubling. Before we wholy understand the functioning of the brain and it’s development. I think it is an awful risk to take. I am still NOT saying it is a risk that should *NEVER* be taken, but it needs to be taken with exquisite and exceptional care. Which i think, when so much money is changing hands in such vast quantities… Care is payed to one’s employer (the drug companies) rather than to the patient which is where care should be focused. Let me also say, not all shrinks and experts are that way. There are some extremely good ones who’s praises i would sing unendingly if i knew their names. However, we do live in a society that functions around money. And it wouldn’t be the firwst time in history that those unable to vote get screwed for just that reason as no one but scared terrified parents terrorized sometimes into thinking that ADHD will turn into the Ebola virus and then into AIDS and cause their child a slow painful death just to get pills into the kid, and those poor poor deluded misguided parents, lead astray by the one they turn to for help who is getting a larger sum from the drug company each year…. Who’s interests do you honestly believe are served in large part? Again, let me be clear, there are still some honest decent upstanding wonderful credible worthwhile experts out there. But as the offers increase i am afraid more and more sell their souls and their patients out to be used as test objects for the drug companies. For the record, that bit about Ebola and AIDs was what an expert told my parents when i was 14 to stuff me full of ritalin which nearly ended my life. Without other doctors i would have once again perished. In the hand of this doctor that told my parents this nonsense about how ADHD turns into ebola and then AIDs, was a long report by another doctor, an honest one that said i would be in a group of 5% of ADHD cases that not only do not respond well to ritalin but respond truly terribly to ritalin. This doctor talking about ADHD turning into Ebola and then Aids had jhust finished reading that report. Me and my mother watched him read it. But she was so terrified she force fed me the pills anyway.

As for going back in time, you are quite full of nonsense. The ancient egyptians not only had female doctors, they also had plastic surgery atleast as good as our own and not only that but their brain surgeries rival those currently performed. You arew correct though, Nokia did not yet exist. But they had some sort of pony express and if you ever bothered to look into communications from the past you would know there are massive middens FULL of it. Not just between men but women also. Thou, it did take some time for such communications to travel.

Women even had civil rights in Ancient times depending on the culture. Especially in ancient egypt. Women held titles and ruled super powers. Yes, we have come a loooong way from that towards modernization that is just soooo much better. Where women can’t even yet be considered for offices of supreme leadership.

Also, i find most stuff tastes a bit weird and dry post microwaving. Where as before it…. Or after being cooked it has a slightly different quality. A more appetizing quality.

Back then they even had the wheel already…. Not so behind the times were they? They had the wheel and massive trade routes and no dependence on foreign oil. Are you sure they were as behind us as you make it sound??? They even had prime-eval air conditioning units, a couple of slaves waving fans. They had healthier food and better diets. The wealthy ones had roughly the same life expectancy that we do…. Those with wealth and power atleast were literate. The rest were sadly not so lucky. I will go so far as to say that may be the one draw back of this ancient society.

They had alot of the things we have now actually…. Even far further back than the 1920s. And the 20s was not so terrible and from where i sit a depression is a depression no matter what the year is. Take a look around. Our president is even a throw back to…. whenever it was before i was born that Nixon was sitting on the throne.

Plus, the medical profession has also changed alot through history. Back in the old days the doctor was just some idiot running around with a bunch of leeches bleeding people to death.

There are other alternatives to drugs too besides just behavior modification. Ever heard of herbalism??? Example, Valium (You know what that is? Who doesn’t ofcourse you do.) Valium, is a recreated chemical found in an herb known as Valerian. Infact, many actually *most* medicines are just that. Lab created chemicals found in herbs only usually they are enhanced and made overly strong. Therefore, eventually they stop working. Strep and how it is mutating and no longer reacting to the antibiotics would be a good example.

Look, i am not trying to tell anyone what to do here, i am voicing my thoughts on a subject and on a very messed up society that has such great potential. I am not passing judgement on anything or anyone except for what i personally have experienced and how it affected me and in relation to me. We are all individuals and different things work for different people. But before you go reaching for a thing created in a test tube, can i atleast suggest giving your local herbalist a call and just giving her a bit of time to figure out if there is an alternative method that has withstood the test of time as herbalism has, before you go putting drugs that could be potentially dangerous into your child’s system. Again, it is wholy up to you. You are the parent you know your child i don’t. I am merely making a suggestion. Use it or don’t use it as you choose. But don’t you dare tell me that capitalism is not a sure recipe, as sure as communism, for corruption to take place. Because, i am afraid our current government is living sickening proof of how corruptable a little money ca make alot of people.

I don’t belive she was saying the past was inferior. I think she was saying the past didn’t have smog, destruction of the ozone, polution, and big scale manufacturing of animals that are injected with antibiotics and hormones, that we feed our kids on a daily basis. Thats what scares me, our great, easy industrialized world, that as you said, is based on money, specifically, greed.

I’m afraid of what might have been in the 20 something vaccines my kids got. But I figure, what is the alternative? They now have a vaccine for chicken pox, I had chicken pox when I was young. Its not life threatening, I say we don’t bother to vaccinate for something that just might make you itch for a week.
But, what do I know, I’m no expert! :-)

You are right about chicken pox. I got vaccinated for the whooping cough… Then i got the whooping cough. No it wasn’t fun. Yes there is a reason for that vaccine… A little itching bla who cares? Suffering a bit makes us stronger. Dieing however should not happen in children till they grow up and get old and arthritic.

But ok maybe i read the message wrong. And i agree there is just crap in EVERYTHING today….. I don’t see how it can be healthy however, there are plenty of justifiable vaccines. The thing is is giving a vaccine so that a child will not get a tangible illness of a physical nature that can actually be tested for that hard evidence can be offered for that isn’t a part of a child’s identity and a different untangible way of thinking and viewing the world and struggling with things that to many seems so basic and being advanced in areas many don’t understand at all… It’s different… Having LD is not hurting a child. What hurts a child is society and the abuse they take for being different. Medicate society for this long term and well documented ‘illness.’ but with all the garbage going into our kids today anyway, i think we should all think long and hard before we put additional stuff into our kids that we don’t have a real understanding of the long term effects of when the said children are not a threat to themselves or others. How would you like to be forcibly medicated into being a man instead of a woman, if it was decided that being able to have babies was a disability and that being able to lift heavy objects was normal???

Also, what is *MOST* critical ti remember and understand here, is this: EVERY CASE IS DIFFERENT! EVERY CHILD IS DIFFERENT!!! Not all children have parents to protect them and to make decisions in their best interests some rely on the state that simply wants as little hassle as possible. I am sure medicating kids out of being kids is frequently done and totally acceptable in many states just to cut back on the work load for an understaffed and underpayed very necesary group of government workers who have more than they can handle. And have more than they can place and have many who are disturbed for a zillion and one reasons sometimes definately including LD but likely not as often as they medicate for LD. So please stop and think about these children with no one to speak for them and no voice. And think about your own child and other ppl’s kids and what you consider part of your identity the good and the bad and ask if you would really pop a pill if you had NO IDEA what the long term effects would be of popping it for your worst habbit or character trait. If you knew that it had been proven (as with Ritalin) to shrink the brain as much as 10% over the course of many years of continued use etc…. Do you think you would willingly take that pill if this trait were just part of your everyday life and personal identity and worldview? I am not saying anyone is right or wrong for medicating or not medicating… I am saying… The amount of crap that goes into kids today by a whole multitude of different routes chicken dinner ritalin pill experimentation with marijuana, ummm… vaccinations…. keeping household cleaning products in the house etc… Is it wise to continue mixing such chemicals while their little fragile brains are still developing… Is it ever wise? Is it ever necesary? When does it become necesary? Why is it half of a diagnosis today??? Maybe we should ask ourselves some hard questions before we feed our kids another pill… Maybe we should do so every time we put a pill into a child. Just to be absolutely certain, we are doing the right thing. And i am not saying it is wrong. There *are* cases where it truly not only helps but is desperately necesary. But in many cases today, kids behavior is more like the chicken pox itch and ritalin is the vaccine that the parents put into someone else’s body instead of their own. In a school of 50 children with mild to severe ADHD, Some of those kids were on dosages that i wouldn’t have fed to a 6 ton elephant. As a society, we need to pay closer attention and we need to be less interested in our own wants as adults and we need to be more tolerant of our children being children. As vigilant parents we need to be acutely aware of when our child really isn’t alright and do what ever we have to do to make our child as alright as is humanly possible for our child to be. And we need to be aware of all the children who don’t have such devoted parents and try to be sure that they are not taking anything they shouldn’t be either or that they are taking what they need. Kids are hyper…. This is true of kittens puppies…. lion cubs tiger cubs…. baby anythings including young human children. As a society we need to keep up better or atleast put more effort into it no matter how tired we may be from working our butts off… And when a kid is *really really* still having severe issues…. Maybe then we should look for solutions and various non chemical based treatments first and only eventually in the truly severe cases reach for the pills…. But again every case is different….

Well, I totally agree with you about ADD/ADHD medication. My 5 year old boy is very active. He is full of constant energy. He hasn’t started school yet, but I’ve heard that many active kids can calm down in school, and then get their energy out when they come home, I hope thats the case. In order to be diagnosed with ADD/ADHD, the child has to have the same symptoms in 2 places, like school AND home, according to the DSM-IV. Where do you drawl the line between an active child and a disorder? I honestly have a problem with the way its diagnosed in the first place. A questionaire with 20 questions like “my child is always on the go” strongly agree, mildly agree, disagree, strongly disagree. And this is how we diagnose a disorder for the most part!

What sacres me more is the increase of kids who are diagnosed with bipolar. You’re right, it’s individual case by case. Although, they say bipolar is in the same family as ADHD!

I def feel sorry for the kids who have no one to advocate for them, or whose parents don’t have the time or money or energy.

Were you on meds at a young age mandi?

Uhhh no a child doesn’t have to exhibit much of any symptoms at all. 2 ‘experts’ can watch and do the SAME evaluation and come to totally different conclusions. This ‘disorder seems to be rather subjective in nature. Until someone can produce the gene and show me how and why it is genetic and until *UNREFUTABLE* scientific evidence of an organic nature can be produced for this psych disorder LD i remain convinced that children are sponges and they learn their behaviors from high strung parents who do not react well to stress. This board is a perfect example. Everyone screams and cries and has a freak out when their kid is diagnosed. It’s as if 4 letters turn your child into a leper. WELL THEY DON’T. Your child is still as able as anyone else. There are some disturbances there is something going on getting to the bottom of it is a GOOD idea,knowingyour kid’s learningstyle and being able tousethatinformation to HELP your child is a GOOD idea. But having a freak out break down and never quite seeing your kid exactly the same asyou would if they were yours only normal NOT a good idea.

Our whole stinkin society is getting more and more out of control. The pressures we put on kids are soooo extreme they have no time to be children and wow so a kid does great in every subject but math where he gets a C BREAK OUT THE PILLS!!!! Seriously! Get a hold of yourselves EVERYONE THESE ARE CHILDREN!

Sorry for my rant these things piss me off though… I guess because i have been there and the damage that is done to children… I wonder if i ever would have developed depressionb had i never been force fed paxil at 17 against my will. Physically beaten up and held down my body violated while someone stuffed a pill down my throat that can not be given to children that age anymore because of the side effects. I wasn’t even depressed then.

I was diagnosed ADHD. I was diagnosed bi polar a billion times as an adult and not even my mother understood it cuz i didnt have half of the necesary symptoms *ever* in my life time. NEVER manic. I started to calm down at 7. but yes when i was very young i was wild.

You don’t give someone with impulse control and who is overly hyper the equivalent of cocaine or speed. It doesn’t make sense. And ritalin has the same affects on the brain as you got it. The white poweder. Only more strong an affect. It hits the dopamine system. Who is not more compliant when they are happy? There are some kids who are way the hell out of control to the point that they actually need to be made more compliant. but i have seen kids like me in PERFECT control sitting through class who listen quietly on and off the meds who may be mildly dreamy and look out the window a little bit… while they listen on enough of this garbage to kill a large horse. There are other methods to control children’s behavior with the umm ‘average’ alledged ADHD case. And i think before we turn to pills it is a better thing to do. especially when they are young. They need to learn these skills anyway. Because when they grow up and cant afford health insurance due to their inability to find work due to being labled for being god forbid a bit hyper ate age *4* and now even *INFANTS* are being so called ‘diagnosed.’ Yes if your infant cries when it is in pain it vould have ADHD. Please folks… IF YOU CAN’T HANDLE A CRYING BABY DON’T HAVE A BABY! THAT IS WHAT THEY DO! THEY CRY! Expecting calm reasoned rationality from an infant and calling it agfe apropriate behavior where as the whining is ammurity and ADHD which has more or less come to be considered the equivalent of some minor form of retardation by the masses and the pooor terrorized parents with no tangible evidence constantly goaded and terrorized by experts. SHAME shame on all of this madness. I am a PERSON. And i have had enough. If you want to be a biggot you are an idiot. Yes it’s true now you can’t be sexist nono can’t be racist anymore either. So be ADHDist. Race isn’t real. PMS doesn’t make women less rational than men and ADHD can’t even be proven with tangible evidence to exist. Who do you all wanna pick on tomorrow?! If you have problems handling your kids go get some pills to become better parents and leave your children alone because you see. Your brains are atleast fully formed there is some semblance of understanding what these drugs do to the adult brain. But no one cares at all what the long term effects are on the child brain… Just end the terrorism of my hyper impulsive child. Make my kid behave! Even the UN objects to how we treat our children and has said so. The USA uses 90% of the world’s ritalin supply the rest of the worlds combined uses the other 10%. Why doesn’t this disorder strike as frequently in other places??? I mean if it is genetic most in the USA are descendants of europeans. So why then are the kids in Finland not doped beyond reason? Why not irish children? Why not italian children??? Maybe the disorder is not the kids but the machine like system which has proven to be doing *no* children any particular good as our kids are the least well educated in the western world according to recent studies. And the least happy too.

later i think i will go through my entire story so that more people will understand and so that maybe they will think harder. Though some of it… Will likely make many people uncomfortable or a bit hmmm…likely disbelieving. I don’t much care i think it is an important story to tell and if it saves one child from any of the crap that i endured…. Then i could die tomorrow in peace.

Yes i was medicated when i was a kid. My mother waited till my teens. The first doctor Said i would be in a group of 5% of children that reacted poorly to ritalin and that i should never have it. Dr. Eurien or Eurian at Children’s in Boston when i was 4. World renowned. Years later, mid teens, A shrink just done reading that information put me on a high dose of ritalin. I am not vioent by nature. And i was not yet opposed to taking a drug it was this experience that made me opposed for MANY years after. I have never in all my days had so much trouble controlling myself and remaining even when hardcore pissed non violent. There is only 1 violent event in my life time didn’t happen on Ritalin bvut on ritalin it took everything i had to not kill people and had the dose been any higher… well… I am so glad it wasn’t. So this dr. in my mid teens read that info had it in his hands and gave my mother the riot act for 5 hours uptil then she had refused to put me on anything. Finally he ‘leveled’ with her and even told her without this drug i would die a painful death likely in the next few years… I would get the Ebola virus due to my alledged ADHD without hyper activity. And then it would turn into AIDs. My mum is not an idiot at first she told him yeh right but he kept pointing to his degrees and explaining no one really understand the correlations yet bla bla bla bla bla what a quack! I vote him to the island! (rather than off it) Guantanamo bay, for terrorism. My mother was terrified by the time he was done with her. I was laughing my ass off. It was funny. His desperation to put me on this medicine… I was painfully clear there was something in it for him. And even then i was happy to try it *at first* Till i discovered the unholy rage that went with it.

But in my life time, i have been more a science experiment. The chimpanzee they infected with something anything and then seek to medicate by testing one thing after another after another after another. And again, my ADHD is of the variety that *lacks* hyper activity. I never visited the principal Got my name put on the board once until 7th grade. When i had me a little prank party on the first of April. It was the only time i was ever in trouble for really anything until highschool junior and senior year. But my dog needs me i have to go take her on a walk i will go through all the steps and details later.

I just want to say that if because of me my kid gets labled…. since they say it is genetic with no actual clinical hard proof of that… well then… that is predjudiced it is the beginning of an independent race of humans. rather than black or white or latino this one is ADHD and it is ok to abuse them however you feel and jam crap into their systems with no idea what it does to them in the long term because they are already ‘brain damaged.’ Please show me the damage to my brain before you say such vicious hurtful cruel things to me or to anyone else labled like me. I swear, ADHD is no different than the N word. Why give it a name it can’t even be identified in the brain… Oh right it is a set of behaviors. Which are totally open to interpretation for which there is no hard core cold standard and for which there are geezus 18 symptoms and so long as someone has less than half of them they qualify as disordered….

The only disorder i see is the one in the generations prior to mine or in people who let this quackery stand for science and who give in to it wholly and completely unquestioning and clueless as to how their child’s brain will continue to develop. Atleast that has really 3 symptoms in large part.

1. Being american and part of the 90% of the world’s supply users on their children.

2. Being too lazy or tired to have a child. (easy fix here folks, don’t have any. Abortion is legal so is birth control. Abstinence (yeh that option sux i will agree.) Condoms… Spermicide jelly. But to then feed your kids pills because they are irritating and hyper andyou just can’t take it because you are old hard working and exhausted. Don’t have kids then. That is part of childhood. Or are your memories that short that you have forgotten? Ad that s number 4 to the list.

3. Being selfish. Wanting your peace and your tranquility and your carpet to stay white and your job to go well and its all about you. When did our society stop being at all about our children, what gives us the right to bring them into the world if we are so self centered?! Oh right… We *want* them. Apparently so we can medicate them into drones rather than children. In which case we have drones not children…. So build a robot don’t have a child. But instead we medicate our children… Even those who exhibit no behavior problems. The one that gets straight As in everything but math where they still get a totally respectable grade. The horror. Children are not innately adults in miniature bodies their brains are not developed yet. But why wait for that to happen when we want it now now now!!! So stick a pill in a kid… Then you tell me that my diagnosis has the effect of causing me to be immature because what, i am not hyper or out of control or disturbing anyone and all my life i have merely asked that same favor…. Yeh right… You see, children need adult parents we don’t need little kids in adult bodies having babies at biological age 16 or biological age 60. If you can’t wait for your kids to outgrow being children, then maybe you are the one with the disability. After all those of us with ADHD we can’t wait for anything. Well… that is also a crock. These generalizations are dangerous. Whats more, ADHD is becoming more and more over diagnosed and it is taking on elements that in no way reflect me at all… but there is no real way to differentiate who has ADHD with hyper activity and violent behavior and who doesn’t. And now they lable every other violent offender with ADHD. I have never met a person with ADHD who was violent in any way. Except for me. And i hit the person i hit because they were torturing and killing a living thing in front of me. And before i hit them, i spent something like 10 minutes calmly trying to talk them down and to get them to let the poor thing go. The animal being abused died because i wasn’t more impulsive and more violent sooner. But that is just so far from my character… And it is NOT in any way a symptom of ADHD. Unlike the rest of you in society we think about the pain we cause others we are able to empathise. And though we miss the odd social cue maybe a little more often that gets turned into a major issue instead of the minor one it is due to 4 stupid letters that dont even spell an actual word… What i am trying to get at is, maybe before you medicate and before you call people less able and less intelligent and behind in age age because we are mildly dreamier than most… Maybe, you should try walking a mile in our shoes, in our minds in your society. Maybe you should try to empathize rather than critisicing and over analyzing and reading so much into the tiniest thing that it turns into…. well… ADHD i suppose. And to those experts all pro medicine… If Ritalin really helps with causing the brain to become rational and ‘age apropriate’ instead of just compliant and stoned, why do you not give it in such vast quantities to those with clinical retardation? I must say as the ADHD age inapropriateness pales by comparison to the poor people suffering happily with that affliction for which there is plenty of organic proof, they need it more than we do. Test it on them. Oh right. But that defeats the purpose. Because, if we want to know what affect this drug has on the brain first we need a sub species to test it on. You can’t give someone called normal such a thing. No parent would allow it. BUT if the kid is somehow ‘broken’ then guess what… parents are putty. But the fact remains simply this, those with ADHD respond to Ritalin and the other standard ADHD drugs in EXACTLY the same way as those without it. So no credible proof of this disorder… No proof of it’s organic alledged components and every person’s behaviors and personalities open to interpretation by others…. And the human need to designate an ‘other’ so that the ‘normal’ can feel superior and so there is someone to mistreat without consequence…. ADHD magically appears.

The next major symptom of the disabled parents of ADHD children:

4. No long term memory. Clinically unable to recall or interpret their own behaviors as children unable to recall how free and stressless life was for their generation when they were young. Unable to remember being youthful and exuberant instead of tired and selfish.

I lied. There is finally 1 last symptom.

5. Being Gullable. Easily conned out of your good sense and goaded into a freak out by any idiot with a stupid piece of paper which one can just pick up and stick in a shredder for all it’s relevance as the expert likely has not bothered to empathize with those he is labling and likely hasn’t got children of his own. And likely was payed huge summs of money to uhhh ‘speak’ about the drugs he is prescribing. And lastly likely he has himself not experienced ADHD himself in his own brain and has no idea therefore how our minds work. Only how they work on specific rediculous tasks that are really not relevant to daily life for the most part. Lastly, he has never experienced being a cage animal in Dr. Frankinstein’s lab and has no idea how it feels to have your body used against your will or without the proper understanding of what is being done to you because your understanding is impaired by the fact that you are a child. Parents can not sell their children for sex it is a crime and people can not legally have sex with a child. But they still legally violated my body and my brain more times than i can count. And as i write this, they are doing it to some other child somewhere in america and it is all totally legal. When they can’t even prove why our will and our minds are invalid. Every situation is different. But why put the kid sitting quietly on drugs? Right, because of good old fashioned predjudiced and lables that are cruel and dehumanizing until you have stripped away my humanity. Except you haven’t. The only thing you stripped was your own. And some day all you people involved with forced medicating of non insane children will be held accountable. I promise you. On that day, I will be there to look into your eyes to show you the pain and the sorrow you have all caused with your inability to empathize and your desperation to feel superior and free to abuse someone. You are hurting people. You hurt me. And i am not alone. I am one of the 20% of american children that wore my lable when i was a child. That rate is growing. Today we win olympic medals, tomorrow, perhaps we sit on the civil court… Perhaps we run for president. Perhaps we lobby for our rights to be seen and heard and treated with respect as human beings and equals as Blacks are. We can not help but see the difference in skin pigmentation. But we know, the deeper more relevant differences are not of race at all but of individuality of each person of either and both race.

“let freedom ring, let the white dove sing let the whole world know that
Today is a day of reckoning let the weak be strong, let the right be wrong roll
The stone away, let the guilty pay, it’s independence day”

Please believe that there will be a day of reckoning and you had better pray that on that day those of us harmed by this madness decide instead of wreaking our anger and hurt violently, that we instead accept a simple punishment meated out by society. That day is coming as our numbers grow. So if you want to be afraid of us, and to treat us differently and to scare our parents about what messed up offspring they have, you go right ahead because after all your treatment, we are messed up broken people that can’t even see our own images clearly. Our sense of self is so eroded that we see something sunhuman when we look in the mirror. All because of your lables. The damage you do… It can’t be undone. And when finally we make up the majority of the population which at this rate will be in not too long… You better pray that we don’t get in touch with our less than human natures that you taught us we had when we were young and impressionable. A time will come for massive trials. So, prepare yourselves. Prepare yourselves to for charges of fraud that should be being filed now but will eventually be filed… Prepare to have all the nice things you have, through your systematic use and abuse of *humans* like me, stripped away from you. Justice exists in every culture in every time in every place it is a part of the universe. Perhaps one day you all will have to hide like Ex nazi war criminals for those of you making these ‘diagnosies’ and ruining lives, because what is the difference? You invented ADHD instead of picking on jews? I await that day with a hopeful heart. And maybe, if you truly learn empathy by then and if you truly face what you have done and if you truly become less vicious, maybe, i will sit beside you and we can cry together over the agony that your idiocy and hate and fear mongering has caused me rather than shipping you off to some specialize prison for people of your ilk. But if i were you, i wouldn’t hold my breath. Because like you, i can love and laugh and cry and hate and fear… Every last one of you experts just about belongs in jail where you can not harm another child. It is a different kind of harm you do but in essense you are no less sick twisted vile and evil than pedophiles and the damage you do is not any less painful or damaging.

I agree with mosy of what you are saying Mandi. I belive that every psychiactric illness out there is subjective and based on symptoms. I agree, I wish there was a genetic test that could prove these things. There are too many “experts” that don’t have a clue. The pharmacuticals are making big money, and our government runs on money from big business.

Still not quite sure what happened to you? You said you went on the ADHD meds at 17 yrs old? Stange since true ADHD is usually diagnosed by 7 yrs old. Hmm, they said you were bi-polar and you were never manic? Thats nuts!

Yes, tell us your story when you have time…

I don’t agree that every psychological illness is subjective and that is NOT what i said. I did not say every LD is subjective. I was speaking in large part and predominantly to ADHD. I am dyslexic. I accept this happily because it can be proven. I believe i have an uncle with schizophrenia, because, well it can be proven. But i DO believe a significant amount of these psych illnesses are a bit ambiguous to say the least… Or in some cases altogether fraudulent.

I think i was 17…. My memories of a large portion of the years there are just… not there… Or are scattered in pieces like some sort of undated slide show. I find it interesting i can tell the rest of my life in consecutive order until the first month of medicating and then i lose huge chunks of time during my teenage years etc…

You are correct. Usually you ARE diagnosed by age 7. I was diagnosed at age 4. which was 1 year before the car accident.

The car accident was horrible. A head injury, but no loss of consciousness, a shattered pelvis the skin was ripped off so severely i was treated as a burn victim over a large portion of my body and had numerous surgeries. I should have died, so said my doctor and he refused to treat me beyond a pain killer until i survived the night in an effort to save the insurance company money on treatment for someone that was too far gone to survive. I remember when he walked into my room. My mom was there, he walked over he looked at me his face was very grave and he had some words with her they were the sort most kids would call big words. Fortunately for me i lived with 50 adults for over 4 years had been speaking english and polish since 9 months and was rarely read to out of children’s books and instead was read university student’s papers as they were being corrected by harvard professors etc or text books that some of the adult university student i was raised in, were reading.

I had no real interaction ever with other children (At that point anyway). My whole life was in that place. So, my ability to speak and understand english was ummm… Super well developed. And finally the doctor said i would likely perish during the night. Yes his words. He was trying to not let me know. I said ‘Excuse me, you are going to stand there and tell my mother i will die before morning. How dare you, say it to my face or shut up!’ So he sat down beside me and he said to me, ‘Yes, maybe i should prepare you you will not live through the night there is nothing that can be done for now… You are not going to make it.” I looked that idiot directly in the eyes, and i said “Like hell i am not going to make it you sick son of a bitch.” (I was in agony i don’t typically talk to doctors that way but this one was exceptionally moronic…) Then i informed him he was fired and commanded my mother to get me a new doctor.

I was living in a Buddhist zen school with my 2 hippy parents and about 20 to 50 other adults (It was a large house all public spaces aside from small private bedrooms every single person there had that as a private space.) in the boston area. My father is a zen master my mother a dharma teacher. But the rules of the school require certain spans of time in the morning and evening that are silent for those meditating. The thing is though, this is not a life style one can force on a 4 year old…. The nature of one so young is to be a hedonistic hyper loud happy ball of energy. demanding a minimum of like 6 hours a day of total silence from a child this age something like 3 hours at a time every day… It is ridiculous…

I was born in this house/zen school by midwife in 1980. I had other neurological issues, my granny had essential tremor, which i ofcourse won the lottery and inherited it ruined my carreer as a master painter…. boohoo since i went on to study opera and am a very acomplished musician and artist in a whole slew of other mediums today and contribute to the income of my household with my arts. so i can’t paint. Paint brushes are too phallic in shape for my taste anyway… But at that time i was taken to a neurologist at Children’s (ofcourse all this came after being a failure to thrive baby 4 years earlier right after my birth slightly late 4 and a half pounds with the chord wrapped 3 times around my neck but, just loosely enough to not have cut off the flow of oxygen or impair it at all.) So this world famous doctor said i had ADHD the neurologist back when it was a neurological thing…. now it is a psych thing… what will it be tomorrow besides a debunked myth? the world may never know. Anyway, this doctor wrote a massive report on me. He was wonderful a good man a good doctor and if he said something wasn’t normal about my behavior i believe him. He also said in that report that i was one of 5% of children to whom Ritalin should NEVER be given in his report. I have read it. HE SAYS IT MORE THAN 7 TIMES!

I had a hard time learning to read, and what energy you can not expend at home like a normal child tends to come out a bit when you are real little in other places when you get too bored. So, i was put in a special ed class as i was also dyslexic. and still am. I did 4 years of work in 2 years in this class, learned to read by orton guillingham, though i would say till 3rd grade i wasn’t really ‘reading’ i was figuring it all out. In third grade i could finally spell my own name and not write it backwards. I could read and sound out the words, but it was not with ease as the practice i needed i still lacked. Main streamed out by the second half of the 4th grade back in regular classes. In fifth grade i took a standardized CAT test. I scored into 11th grade science and very high in everything else. My IQ was once again tested as a whole additional sucky barage of testing was done on me 1 to 2 times a year in addition to standardized rubbish. After i scored into alleged genius range on the IQ test,(i put no faith in these tests beyond that of if you have a total moron administering the test it is quite apparent that even my 2 year old border collie will wind up with an IQ as high as mine, according to them.)I was invited to go to long fellow school for 6th grade to a special program open every year to a maximum of 50 gifted students. All that mattered to me was, was it boring and would that mean more yechy homework? I opted instead to go to Private school which my parents are rather afluent and could afford without any sort of difficulty. (lucky me, every child should have this option as should every family.) Every year or so we would see some other new expert bla bla bla or actually more like every 6 months. and they always agreed with eachother, except about the ritalin.

At this point in time ritalin was still experimental. (As when i hit around 15-present the drugs for bi-polar are.) There is NO LAW that forces experts to inform any parent their child is part of a drug study. They get money for running these studies that they don’t tell anyone about from the drug companies. Not as much as the drug companies would have to pay if they did all the testing and bla bla bla all themselves. therefore it is good business for both. So my parents, having a child that out-grew hyper around age 7 and a halfish had a dreamy child, a well educated dreamy child that learned by listening to the other people int he house who talked to me like a miniature adult. I spoke by that time as it was a multi cultural and lingual household more than 2 languages with some semblance of fluency. These people, were the ones who truly raised me as both my parents worked. Mom from 6 am till 10 pm. Dad about 8 am till 7 pm. They didn’t need to work like that, they just wanted to. And they wanted to have a child because well… wouldn’t it be kinda cool?! We had a violinist from the boston Pops living with us for a while, one day he heard me singing back when i was 2. He grabbed me and held me over his head and started screaming ‘THIS BABY HAS PERFECT PITCH!!! WHO’S IS IT?!’ and finally my mum claimed me and he told her i must study music and so began at 2 some minor music studies. He used to visit us before performances with the pops to tune his violin according to what made me cry. His conductor, once gave him an honorable mention for being the best tuned violin. The thing about this life style though is this, for most people it is a place to stay for a time and then go away from. Some stay days some weeks some months a few stay for years… I was there for 13 years…. My parents were there from age… like 22 or 23 till their early mid 40s… And my dad is still over there most of the time as the zen master. People come, you get attached you pick up their language verbally. Not written. and they become family. Someone you depend on someone you care about someone who cares about you. Someone you turn to in times of crisis or need or anything and everything… They are your earliest education. They are your teachers, *all* of them. They also all have their own habbits and methods and cultures and ways of doing things and reactions to various stuff etc…. and you learn…. as you would from your parents as i did from my parents too. But then they leave. And all that is left is the shadow they left behind in you. I am an amalgamum of different people from different places. I am the sense i could make of these early experiences, and to some degree i am the sorrow that lived on after one after another they would come and they would go. Many never looking back and some were at my wedding recently crying and more maternal emotionally than my own biological mother. But this constant coming and going and the loss of every person you love over and over and over…. for 13 years…. People of different cultures and colors and places. I never knew what racism was or that it existed till i was 17. because in private school where i was till the last 2 years of highschool (actually, a couple of them, but there were no african americans there. But there were some prior to age 13 that shared my meals and were as much my mother as my mother is.) We would all go to the only air conditioned room and lie down side by side on the floor on the hottest days of the summer. No one seemed troubled by color…. no one was… no one was troubled about genders…. these predjudices…. I never knew till my late teens. And when i discovered them, they broke my heart. And i didn’t understand. The truth is even now i don’t understand. I can’t understand. Because when i see someone african american on the street i can only equate them with one of the kind gentle generous decent upstanding compassionate people who who were members of my immediate family and who assisted my survival. I can’t see anything else. I wasn’t raised to. And then someone does something vile to one of them like in highschool haha, that was great…. I actually threw my graduation away because i wasn’t going to sit there while some bitch librarian mistreated a black student when the offending person was *me*. I was tutoring him. I am a colloratora soprano. You can’t mistake a low male voice for mine. Or vice versa unless you are clinically deaf and can not hear at all. But she heard me softly explaining something from our lit text and came over and threw herself a right ugly fit. I was shocked. And i asked her to stop. She screamed and raved at him how dare he be in the library. He was the only black student there. He had to leave immediately his library pass be damned! So i said fine we are leaving before she like started swinging a baseball bat or something. So we left… But she wasn’t yelling at me. I used to spend *most* of my day there. No pass no nothing ever sometimes 3 classes consecutively. No questioning of my right to be there…. Well so i fumed through my next class and then i cut the last class i actually could and still graduate. And i went back and i went over and i was very soft and very sweet and very gentle non accusatory but merely questioning of her behavior and took the aproach of maybe she just didn’t realize what she had just done. Maybe it was totally…. ummm subconscious… and she hit the roof! And they told my folks i couldn’t graduate. My folks asked me what doin?! I ofcourse told them what happened and as both of my folks marched and got the crap kicked out of them for civil rights they threatened to sue the school. Both on my behalf and on behalf of my black tutor victim, after asking around and hearing witnesses agreeing with my version of events. To this day my stomach turns when i think of that vile woman and horrid atrocious behavior. I had heard of racism at i think around 16ish but till then… never had i seen it… Anyway, school let me graduate to avoid law suits. And because, my grades were C+ average…. even with all the class cutting.

So anyway the 6month to yearly testing continued through the sixth 7th 8th and 9th grades…. By grade 11, i was back ibn public highschool for a variety of reasons that surprisingly enough have not a thing to do with LD. My parents had been fighting all this time to keep me off of drugs because there is no teacher in my history except perhaps that librarian, who’s opinion is too ignorant to matter, that will say i was ‘disruptive.’ in class in any way. They sent me for evaluation solely due to difficulty with reading. Not even due to hyper issues or anything ADHD symptomatic, and they sent me because of the essential tremor.

Well, when i was older one of the uhhh ‘experts’ informed my mother that i was a child that would benefit from drugging. Anbd he pushed and he pushed and he pushed. He was hastling her at work, at home, EVERYWHERE. He was going to see her at her office he was soooo ‘concerned’ as i was going to die of AIDS which i would somehow get or so he said as a result of the ebola virus contractible due to the ADHD. My mother thought it was all quackery initially. But this guy hounded her for a year. and terrorized with 1 horror story and one horror fiction after another and finally, she broke down and he got to force feed me ritaline while he had the other doctor’s report that said more than 7 times that crap should NEVER be given to me, just read and in his other hand. After that it felt horrible i hated the effect i refused to take the garbage my parents would physically force feed it to me under this morons machiavelli-esque spell of ‘terrorize others for your own benefit who cares who you hurt in the process.’

Well finally after a couple months they realized it was doing more harm than good. And they took me off it found another doctor. This doctor this time declared as testing on ritalin was no longer lucrative as it had once been that i was depressed not because of being labled and mistreated by school systems and family and forcibly drugged and violated etc… that i was bi-polar! I have NEVER been manic. I have been bordering on suicidal a few times usually after reading papers experts of idiocy claiming to know all about ADHD. And it was mainly due to the hurt and injury it caused me. When i was 8 i asked them ‘why do i keep having to do these tests they are icky i don’t want to.’ They told me that i did it so they could ubnderstand kids like me so that other children some day wouldn’t have to go through this bullshit. Well, 20 years later NOTHING has changed, even though every time i took those tests after they said that i took it for the children of the future. So they wouldn’t have to go through all this horridness and terribleness and live under a lable that deprives you of your humanity in the eyes of the educational system the place where a child spends the majority of their time.

So this newest moron doctor, decided that i never needed to be manic top be Bi-polar. She said all depressions were bi-polar (which i have heard echoed by many idiots since then. And the fact is it is a lie.) Anyway, first drug was paxil. And guess what on 1 quarter of a 5 mil tablet 1 time daily, i was bouncing off the walls in a manic stupor. Then she said see you have it you are manic. I was like uhhh no. This is a drug induced manic. This is not natural to my state of being. Even my mother bitched and complained and threw a fit because it was sooooooo not like me. Rather than taking me off this wonderful drug that was currently under ummm how to put this…. study as experimental, i was put on a mood stablizer. May i add, on and off this drug i was bringing home a C+ average, i was working 16 hours a week, i was primary care giver of my kid sister, taking 3 to 4 extra curriculary classes a week, and showing my horse in dressage shows and jumping competitions. I was hardly under acheiving. What did i need to invent the microwave before inventing the space ship that took us to the stinking moon to be considered ‘average and normal and non-messed up.’ lets be real here…. I WAS A *KID* The drugs made my job harder. I would often have to call in sick because of the manic. Or because of the mood stablizer effects. Ummm What was it called crap… depacote! the first one was depacote! and then there was something else she added because bewtween those 2 i couldnt sleep… some hard core sleep drug…. when she finally accepted this was not helpful after playijng with all the dosages it had been like 5 months… In that time i had gone froma beautiful young woman of 102 pounds, to a fat frumpy nut job at 230 pounds. Ofcourse that was in the first 3 months. yes great way to make a teenage girl feel better. Give her an extra 120 pounds to take with her to school every damn day…. WONDERFUL solution, considering how much we love obese people in our sick little society… Seriously experts i am just clapping my f****** brains out at your brilliant solution, to my non problem. Finally they realized it wasn’t working. So they decided to try some other medicine… It was hmmm… whats it called crap… see… this has rotted my memory. I only remember the bits and pieces of time i was off the meds with any real ummm detail…. not lithium… not paxil that was the first… some other upper which ultimately lead to another downer…. 7 months more of madness, and another brief stint ona drug or 2 that i don’t recall the names of or the time from.. and i finally turned 18. I told them what i thought of them and their ‘candy’ and i went my own way lived my own liufe over time got a degree in archaeology which i love (its what i cut all my highschool classes to do, READ ABOUT ANCIENT SOCIETIES!) So i suppose school DID give me good education in my area of interest by no fault of it’s own and solely by the accident of having a decent library. I have worked on and off on various things in various places in various areas of interest to me in my area of study and out of my area of study…. Yes i can hold a job easily. That isn’t the issue… The issue is… more that often i found i wanted to study something for a short time between jobs and would quit to take some courses and then i would do something else. I had my highschool job from age 16 till age 19. my next job i had for well over a year. Keeping it and getting it isn’t the problem… The problem presently is, i met a man i fell in love. And he has a PHD in theoretical physics and the last 5 years have been ummm nomadic. Due to his job moving every year to a different country or every other year some times…in which i cant work. and so i have been studying further into my field of interest now for a bit and am hoping to take a break from moving, and settle here in Boston for a year or 2ish give or take and really go back to a conventional university rather than doing this by distance.

For the 10 years following mny experiences in highschool nothing could get me to see one of those morons passing themselves off as experts. But finally i suffered froma severe depression (which is actually not uncommon for me, in the winter) *I* reached out of my own accord and found a doctor. I went in spent an hour with him. He told me he would testify in court that anyone saying i was bi-polar was not only comitting malpractice but to make such a mistake it would require malicious intent or intent to specifically for go my best interests for some reason. He says i am dysthimic. And it actually FITS! I *AM* dysthimic!!! It fits it fits!!! It makes sense! it adds up! He says i am ADHD…. Which i don’t know, something is different though about how i think or what my thought process is weather it is learned or weather it is an organic issue i can not say for certain. What i CAN say though is that after all the testing and horribleness 20 years and more later there has been no move forward in understanding much of anything and it is all still just subjective bullox with nothing to show for all that time studying. Ya can’t get blood from a stone. When searching for over 20 years for evidence and still not finding maybe it is because there is none to be found? The last thing this new doctor did, was inform me i had SAD. (All my depressions are winter related.) So he gave me a lightbulb. At first i didn’t believe him about abnything because he wanted to medicate me. But he said the effects were 4 hours only as were the side effects and then we would know for sure…. He changed my entire existence that day. But i am a grown up making a conscious decision knowing and with an adult fully developed brain understanding of my choice and what the possibilities are. What the side effects are, what it is supposedly doing for me etc… and no one is controlling how i treat myself. My doctor even tells me to take what i need as i feel i need it., Even though one of these drugs is highly addictive. He does that with me with this drug though he doesn’t for any other patient he has who is on it. Because he knows how i feel about putting stuff in my body that could affect my brain. I am hyper hyper vigilant and a bit neurotic about it. If for any reason something seems to me to be becoming habbit forming he knows, i will put my pills away for a couple weeks and go back to my normal till i feel comfortable that my body isn’t demanding it anymore rather than feeding the monster. I have seen enough people wind up junkies due to taking when they should be putting the bottle of pills down. I will not ever be one of them. I will NEVER so long as my future child is not a danger to themselves or others medicate any children i have in the future. That iws roughly my story.

But i want to say that since 12 i have been reading papers by the experts there are plenty that go so far as to compare my intelligence to that of a dog… It is hurtful! And there are other children reading this nonsense today. What is more, they talk about ADHD in particular like it is a curse. Well it isn’t i am who i am… it is a part of me. And no one has a right to insist i medicate myself into less than i am to be societally accepted unless i am actually causing real damage to myself or others. I am as able as anyone else and i resent these experts that terrorize parents that their child may wind up like me playing multiple instruments trained in vocal performance with a degree in school for a masters, some what educated in all sorts of additional languages and fluent in 6 languages. Oh no folks! Your ADHD child could end up smarter than the experts!!! MEDICATE THEM QUICK!!!! Before they come up with a better money making scheme and compete for the money the experts are getting from the drug companies by finding some other use for these crap drugs where they actually may do some good by not being consumed!!!

I have a dream, My dream is to start an organization of some sort, one that demands that all drug studies bew public knowledge that calls for many changes in the labling methodology that funds independent actually scientific research and that provides classes for parents and for children in self advocacy and child advocacy with the schools. One that provides classes on all the drugs, how they work, and also offers classes on alternative methods of behavior modification etc…/ One that takes the view ADHD is a family dynamic issue rather than the view there isw a flaw in a child and then dumps on that child for the next 12 years. This organization would fund those with alot of talent assist those with trouble getting or keeping a job due to minor mistakes here and there and societal predjudiced. It would be one part lobby group directly opposing the drug companies, so that hopefully, there can be some sort of compromise that falls in the middle so that those that need something can get it and those that don’t can not be forced or abused by a wealthy industry. It would offer counseling and information. A non profit that would also give financial aide to students at a university level and would support any mother that thinks her kid is being rail roaded and can not afford an independent expert. We would test the waters for slander cases related to labling people with a ‘disorder’ that can in no way be organically proven. And we will support financially mothers who’s kids cant get what they need through the school system as they simply dont have the money themselves to fight for it. etc… There are many ideas and components i would like to organize…. And someday, i hope to make it a reality. My personal opinion of drugs and stuff are my personal opinions. My organization view is one that is NOT stressing that medicine is good. However, it will also not say that it is entirely unnecesary in every case. It will not judge those who ultimately use it. We will stress instead the use of other methods as much as possible and before use of drugs for some serious time before turning to drugs and then only if there isn’t really improvement. I am hoping too that i can find mentors for parents who are new to it all by introducing them and hooking them up with parents who have been there. And with a third mentor for parents, an adult with ADHD who has succeeded in life and has not allowed it to ruine them and who has accomplished alot. Also there will be mentoring for the kids again, others who have been there and made it through etc… this idea is rather large and huge and would take me a month to really write about so i won’t waste anymore of your time as this post is too long already.

I’m really tired….

me too. If you wanna stay on the right half of the bed i am goin to sleep on the left! But no crossing the line in the middle!!! nap time.

Wow, I’m tired too! Mandi, you’ve had an interesting life. I’m glad you are a happy functioning adult now!

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Just so you understand my perspective, I am posting as an adult with LD who is slowly tapering off of all psychotropic medication. One reason I started on meds, including a stimulant and antidepressants is I thought it would make my life easier. And it did initially.

Unfortunately, over time, they greatly worsened my life although due to the spellbinding effects of the meds, I didn’t realize it at the time.

Anyway, I developed a hearing loss and a worsening of my LD symptoms. Even many people without LD seem to develop LD like symptoms on these meds.

If someone wants citations of the cognitive and other types of damage these meds cause, just do a pub med search. If you can’t find anything, I can pull up the citations I have. I am just being lazy right now and don’t want to look for them.

My point is that don’t just look at the short term but think about the long term as these meds don’t last forever and will poop out at some point. Look at the FDA adverse side effect reports and remember that only 1 to 10% of all side effects are ever reported.

Even though it may seem like I am off topic, my post is essentially advising people that they need to wake up to what psychotropic meds do over the long term.

PT

And you have earned yourself several jelly beans for your well informed experienced opinion on these matters. You have also earned a couple of cookies, as you make some VERY relevant points of fundimental importance that are far too frequently ignored in favor of the uhh… ‘quick fix.’ Lastly you have earned a gold star for having balls (figuratively if not literally) and telling a terrifying truth that needed telling. You get a second gold start for doing it with style and intelligence! We need more people with common sense like you have.