Taking My Own Advice

If I were giving someone advice on parenting a child with ADHD, I'd suggest keeping the family on a strict schedule. Children with ADHD can really benefit from following regular routines--the more consistency, the smoother life runs. In reality, I don't keep much of a schedule at all, and my girls always seem surprised when I announce that it's time for this activity or that task. We lead a haphazard, disorganized existence that is saved from complete chaos by the few coping mechanisms we've adopted. It's time for me to take my own advice, to set the example. I can rebel all I want to about the fact that I want to do what I want when I want, but it won't get supper on the table or tomorrow's clothes laid out tonight. Sometimes, a good, old-fashioned self-discipline is called for.

The Best Kept "Secret" in Managing ADHD

It drives me nuts that every article I read about ADHD never mentions diet and nutrition as a way to manage the disorder. I just read one of the Washington Post Magazine's features from May 1, titled "Scattered," [http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/more-women-have-adhd--or-is-it-the-stress-of-modern-life/2011/04/08/AFx1Vo8E_story.html] which highlights the plight of women with ADHD. Not to minimize the plight of these women--they remind me of my 13-year-old daughter--but none of them can match my eight-year-old.
This is the child who stripped off her shorts and underpants for a forbidden frolic in the sprinkler while yelling, "Looky meee!" (I require my girls to change into swimsuits before running through the sprinkler, an idea lost on an impulsive child.) This is the little girl who can barely read at eight, who, in fact, taught herself to vomit at will in order to get out of school during her first year of first grade.
The second year of first grade has been better, in part because my daughter does take medication. However, she is also on a strict diet prohibiting artificial colors and flavors, certain preservatives, and corn syrup. I don't know which part of this double strategy would work without the other, and at the moment, I don't want to know. All I care about right now is that it works.
The Feingold Program works for my daughter, it works for the other members of the Feingold Association, and it would work for the women in "Scattered" if they tried it. Yet doctors rarely mention it, and when patients suggest it they are either told with a dismissive shrug to feel free to try it as it can't hurt or that it doesn't work at all. The Feingold Program certainly doesn't earn millions of dollars for Big Pharma and its constituents, and its methods aren't popular among food manufacturers, either. This makes it the best kept "secret" in ADHD treatment.
In 21st century America, the Land of Processed Food, this sort of diet sounds like a nightmare. In order to help my daughter, I'm extraordinarily limited in the kinds of foods I can feed her. I shop with the Feingold Foodlist, carefully choosing the brands and flavors of everything from Trader Joe's chicken soup to Planters cashews to keep my daughter's behavior and learning resembling something close to typical. It is not easy, but compared to the alternative, it's the best option going.
So how can perennially distracted adults pull this off? Cold turkey. With a Feingold Foodlist and a trusted friend or relative, an adult struggling to focus can shop for a variety of convenience foods from breakfast cereals to frozen dinners. Combined with "acceptable" bread, peanut butter, and luncheon meat as a couple of dishes prepared from the Feingold Handbook, a person can go cold turkey in a week to see if the program makes a difference. An ample supply of "acceptable" junk food can be helpful in fighting any feelings of deprivation. Certain brands of plain potato chips and corn chips, premium chocolate bars and ice cream--these are all items that are deemed "acceptable," and therefore permissible. This is not a weight loss or general healthy eating diet, it's just a program for eliminating the foods that make you a little crazy or shroud you in an unfocused fog.
Yes, my own child takes medication to manage her severe ADHD. Still, if a person can relief from a disastrous level of disorganization by making alternative food choices, that can make a huge difference. If a lot of us made such choices, it could transform not only our lives but our society. Untreated ADHD is simply not "acceptable."

The Meaning of Success

What does success look like for parents of children with ADHD/ADD?Success looks like a typical child bathed in the glow of a miracle. I can take my daughter to Girl Scout Encampment and watch her delight in nibbling garlic-mustard leaves as though it's magic. Her fingers reach tentatively to pet a tree frog, and she shivers at the feel its skin. She is focused, engaged, and I am filled with joy. The thrill of watching an eight-year-old slowly sound out short-vowel sounds that roll off the tongues of most literate five-year-olds, that's success. Walking hand-in-hand with a child who doesn't exhaust me by jumping and pulling on my arm, that's success. Spending a day in the woods with my child actually enjoying her company rather than chasing her and watching flocks of birds fly up wherever she goes, that's success. What other parents take for granted, I have learned to appreciate.

FDA Hearings on Food Dyes: One Child at a Time

I sat in the elegant hotel meeting room sipping water and listening to Ph.Ds discuss the relevance of double blind studies of children ingesting artificial food dyes. As they debated whether the number of children affected merited bans on dyes or warning on the foods that contain them, I wondered about each child. What about the little two-year-old girl who responded so dramatically in the study? Did she ever learn to say hi to the flowers as she walked along the sidewalk or did she always yank them up and run shrieking away from her parents? Did she ever play tag on the playground with her friends or did the other girls huddle and whisper to each other whenever she walked by? Did she ever march in the color guard of her high school band or was she the girl passed out behind the bleachers?
If six to ten percent of children are affected by ADHD and by the artificial colors so abundant in our food supply, how many stories does that give us one child at a time? The third grade boy who can't read, the seventh grade girl who has no friends, the mother who feels like a failure--they aren't just statistics or points on a graph. They're real people looking for real solutions.

Chicken Soup

My younger daughter and I are at home today in varying states of illness and recovery. She is the most dreadful convalescent, refusing to rest and complaining of boredom. In the past she would amuse herself by pulling down the flimsy spring rod and curtains and swinging from the top of her bedroom door. Now I get pleas for entertainment, which I would rather ignore, feeling stuffy and achy myself. I stand firm on the ban on television. (She would be "sick" every day if I permitted that.) My only comfort is tea and chicken soup.
My favorite Campbell's chicken noodle soup is forbidden. It contains the additives that trigger unmanageable behavior. Trader Joe's has an acceptable variety, but today I am making my own.
With a box of kosher chicken broth, a container of diced carrots, celery, and onion from Trader Joe's, and a cup of rice, I can make a wicked rice pilaf. By adding some extra broth to the cooked rice, I come close to mimicking the convenience of heat-and-eat soup.
That was yesterday. Today I have a monster of a whole chicken waiting in my fridge to turn into a soup. Since I don't have to wring its neck, can I call it convenience food?