How It All Started.

I am embarrassed to say that I used to think that ADHD wasn't real.  I believed that was was  a parenting issue; that it was over-diagnosed; that meds were just to make teachers' jobs easier; that parent and teachers just didn't get that boys are rambunctious; etc., etc.  At the time, I was a busy home schooling mother of four.  Our oldest had been diagnosed with Tourette Syndrome at age 9, so I had some familiarity with neurodiversity--clearly not enough, though, as you will see.

Our No. 2 was a junior in high school and struggling with pre-calculus.  He had always struggled with math--understanding the concepts but making so many mistakes.  As his math teacher until his sophomore year in high school, I taught the concepts and watched him demonstrate them ably before turning him loose with his assignments.  As I checked his work, I observed that almost invariably, about half way through the homework, a switch flipped, and he stopped "math-ing".  Basic concepts like doing the same thing to both sides of the equation seemed to disappear, as if fallen out of his head.  His struggles in math continued in high school.  He was working incredibly hard and getting very discouraged.  His wanted to go into engineering, a career where higher math was very important, and he saw his goals slipping away.

I was desperate to figure this out, and I began to wonder if he had dyslexia--he frequently reversed numbers when copying problems and figuring.  I finally found a doctor who was willing to test him.  We drove an hour and a half and No. 2 underwent five hours of testing after which the doctor called me in and told me he had primarily inattentive type ADHD.

I was shocked, and my response was, "You are going to have to prove it to me".  The doctor did, patiently teaching me about ADHD and how it manifested in my son's test results.  We returned a week later, having gotten a prescription for a single dose of Concerta and repeated the five hours of testing with the Concerta on board.  His scores showed 100% improvement, almost across the board.  I was humbled and persuaded.

I plunged into learning as much as I could about DHD, starting with Thomas Brown's book, Attention Deficit Disorder.  It soon became clear that No. 2 wasn't the only one in our family with ADHD.  Testing and diagnoses followed for No. 4 and No. 1 in rapid succession.  We underwent the same process as we had for No. 2.  On our long drive for retesting, with his single dose of Concerta on board, I asked No. 4 how he felt.   He said, "I feel like I interrupt a lot--do I interrupt a lot?"  (Yes, he did.)  

My husband was also diagnosed.  We happened to be out running errands on the first day he had tried medication.  The six of us went to lunch at Olive Garden, and Husband ordered his very favorite soup.  The boys, fresh from their own experiences were eager to know if he noticed a difference on meds.  He said, "Well, I'm eating my soup and I can concentrate on what everyone is saying".  I looked at him in astonishment.

"You mean you've never been able to do that before?"  Bemused, he shook his head.

In the long run, No. 3, our daughter, too, was diagnosed with ADHD.  She had coped astonishingly well (partly by keeping herself so busy that she had no choices), and it wasn't until partway through her PHD program that she reached her tipping point.  My tipping point might be right now.  As a woman of a certain age, I find myself struggling with some of the very things my entire family has been wrestling with for years.  "Is this what ADHD is like?", I asked them.  Their knowing smirks and eye rolls said it all.