ADD Organization Tips / ADD Tools / ADHD-ADD Tips — No comments
02
Jun 10

ADHD Time Management Tips Microsoft Outlook

outlook-time-management-snooze When it comes to managing the symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, ADHD or ADD, nothing is quite as frustrating as doing everything right and putting the effort into using all of the organizational tools, electronic organizers, and ADHD planners available to you only to have them not work for your ADD mind for some reason.

One of the most useful computer tools for ADHD available in most office environments without having to go through the trouble of getting new software or utilities installed on your work computer is Microsoft Outlook. Using Outlook can be one of the good ADHD tips.

In some way, MS Outlook is an ADDer’s worst nightmare. There are so many buttons, icons, and features, not to mention tons of functionality from other programs just a few clicks away, that one can easily get distracted and end up spending 45 minutes configuring your Google Gmail email account to synchronize with your Microsoft Outlook email client when you should be working on that presentation that is due in two hours.

On the other hand, all of those planners, calendars, task managers, and to-do lists can be wonderful for the adult with ADHD when used properly. In order to make these computerized organization tools work for ADHD you have to know how to get the most out of each of the different settings and functions. For example, tasks are great, but if you never click the tasks section, you will never see the list. Furthermore, if you don’t always input your tasks on the task list, then important tasks will slip by unnoticed.

I’ll be covering some of the great ways to use Outlook to organize your schedule and tasks more efficiently for ADD people. However, for today, I just wanted to convey one very important ADHD trick for people who use Outlook to help them stay organized.

Use Outlook Pop-Up Reminders To Improve ADHD Scheduling

The number one problem with any planner, calendar, or organizer used by adults with ADHD, or teens or kids with ADD for that matter, is remembering to actually use it and look at it. Too many of us have written everything down somewhere only to forget to ever look at what we wrote down. The reminder feature of MS Outlook helps prevent this problem.

By setting a reminder on your scheduled events, you get a right in your face, can’t ignore it, pop-up when your event is coming up. The default reminder goes off 15 minutes before the event starts. You ADDers already know where this is going. You read the reminder, and that is good. Then you click the Dismiss button and go back to what you were doing for “just a few more minutes.” Next thing you know, you are twenty minutes late for that meeting that you just got the reminder for.

To avoid this problem, don’t click dismiss. Click Snooze. That way, the reminder will come up again in five minutes. Do this even if you are planning to start the new even right away. There is no harm in a reminder window popping up and staying open on your computer screen while you are away working on your new task. You can just click Dismiss when you return. On the other hand, there can be a lot of harm if what you meant to happen when you clicked the Dismiss button didn’t actually end up happening as is so often the case.

Try it. Spend a week clicking Snooze and not clicking Dismiss until it pops back up and interrupts you working on your new task. You’ll be surprised at just how much this improves your time organization.

ADD Organization Tips / ADHD-ADD Tips — No comments
27
May 10

ADHD Organization Tips From Freelancers

MC900434929[1] I’m not really sure if I have ever mentioned it here or not, but I’m a freelance writer. I specialize in several different areas (sort of a oxymoron, I know) including being a freelance financial writer and freelance technology writer. One of the websites I read from time to time is called Freelance Switch. Originally, I believe, it was conceived as a website to help people make the switch from regular day jobs to becoming full-time freelancers. Over time, it has morphed into more of a generalized resource for various freelance entrepreneurs, especially those work at home small business owners. It isn’t focused on freelance writers, per se. In fact, I feel like its focus is more on designers and developers, but much of what is good for freelance design work is also good for freelance writing business, so I try and drop by the site or catch up on the latest freelancing tips via the RSS Feed. Incidentally, if anyone is interested, you can “follow” my shared Google Reader items if you like. Be aware that they are both very self-serving (I share all of my own posts) and not at all targeted to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder or ADD in any way.

I bring the subject up because time management and organization skills for ADHD are often just more intense or specialized advice that comes from standard organization tips and best practices. In particular, the crazy, hectic, self-managed, be-your-own-boss, lifestyle that is being a freelancer requires high-power time management techniques and organizational tricks to keep up on the many tasks that a small business owner must do to be successful.

A recent posting brought up the concept of a not-do list. The not-do list is a powerful companion to the more ubiquitous to-do list.

Not-Do List ADHD Trick Advice

Here’s how it works.

In addition to your usual ADHD trick of maintaining a calendar, adhd planner or organizer with your important to-do list, you also keep a list of things to not be doing.

Now, this isn’t what you might think. A Not-Do list is not for those abstract ADHD traits that you want to manage by avoiding them. For example, do not procrastinate, might be a worthwhile goal, but it is not what goes on the organizing Not-Do list. Rather, the not do list is for items that have been deliberately and rationally dropped from your to-do list for whatever reason.

Generally, the end result of prioritizing your tasks is that some lower-priority items, or tasks with future due dates, are either dropped from your to-do list, or moved to the bottom of the list. One really good organizational tip when it comes to time management is to keep shorter-term to-do lists because they are more manageable. For example, if it is May and you need to register for classes in July, but the schedule isn’t released until June, that to-do item is just cluttering up your list for a month or more. If there is one thing people who are easily distracted do not need, it is extra clutter to focus on.

Which leads back to the not-do list. Unlike the to-do list, which you should look at to help determine what you should work on next, the not-do list is a reminder of the tasks that might draw your attention away from the more important tasks and pressing needs currently at hand, like writing posts for your ADHD blog. (Ahem!)

It’s an age old story among the world of ADDers about people with ADD going off and suddenly doing long-standing projects with laser focus for a period of hours when what they should really be doing is filling out those forms that have to be delivered in one hour. In other words, the not-do list is used to remind yourself of those important, but not pressing needs that might be particularly distracting for that day or week.

Try putting that necessary, but long-term project on your not-do list for this week as a way of maintain focus on those things that must be accomplished this week instead.

Let me know how it works out for you. I’ll be trying it myself.

ADHD-ADD Tips — 1 comment
24
May 10

ADHD Tip for Time Management

There are a lot of tips out there for time management, and even more time management advice. Most of it is aimed, of course, at the public at large. After all, time management is one of those things that plenty of people have trouble with whether they have ADHD or not. Like many other symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, the difficulties of time management with ADD are often extreme versions of the the issues non-ADD folks have with time management. However, many of the time management tricks used by the general population can be very useful ADHD tricks for ADDers as well.

adhd-tool-timer-time-management This post will be very short because, as a follow-up post will show, I have already spent way too much time "off task" today. I haven’t been screwing around, per se, nor have I been wasting my time. Most of the tasks and functions that I have tackled this morning have value and will benefit me in one way or another. However, as is often the case with focus problems, there are other very important tasks that I should be doing right now instead. In fact, when I sat down this morning there were some "must do" tasks on my plate that have not yet found their way to my fork – metaphorically speaking.

One of these many sideline tasks that have been distracting from important tasks is re-finding, downloading, and installing an old ADHD tool that I used to have on my computer that I forgot about when I did my upgrade to a newer, faster system with Windows 7 installed.

ADHD Tools Timers

One of the tough things to swallow about all of the ADHD advice and ADD tools or tricks thrown around is their mind numbing similarity. After a while of reading about attention deficit disorder and the research being done for ADD, as well as the number self-help books and other books for ADHD, you start to see a lot of the same things mentioned over and over again. Sometimes, that is for good reason. Many of the ADHD tips given by these resources are good ones that are particularly effective. Sometimes, on the other hand, it seems that the conventional wisdom is just being repeated within the mental health community echo chamber and that all innovation in the realm of helping with ADHD symptoms has ceased.

Using a timer is one of the most common suggestions for help managing ADHD time management issues. This tip occupies both of the realms mentioned above, being both a good tip, and one so rote as to be wholly unhelpful to many people. Which is why I wanted to pop up a post about one computer-based ADHD tool that has proven helpful for me to some degree.

There is a small Windows utility called Multi-Timer 1.1 which is freeware. The guy who developed it has also written a fancier, nicer looking version, but that one is not free, and as ADHD tools go, sometimes simpler is better.

What makes Multi-Timer so useful for ADHD time management is that it shows multiple timers at once. Obviously, the ADHD mind likes to do more than one thing at a time. Sometimes this stream of multitasking works well, and other times, not so much. Either way, it is very likely that while working, an adult with ADHD will encounter another task that is just as important or more important than the one being worked on. Having multiple timers allows for the original timer to keep running (or be paused) while the timer on the next task starts.

Even more useful, this timer utility allows for both count up and count down timers to be used simultaneously. This provides the ability to both time how long something takes, as well as provide a time structure for something that should take a certain amount of time. By default, Multi-timer displays 10 timers at once and each time can be selected individually via a tab. I like to set the 5 timers on the right side to my most common count down timer periods. For example, I have 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 5 minutes, and 1 hour as my count down timers. (The last timer is the one I use for variable times like 25 minutes if I need that for some reason.)  I use the timers on the left as my count up timers, starting one for each change of task or setting as appropriate.

Ironically, some of the best ADHD help comes not from the timers themselves, but from seeing the timer application on the screen counting down (or counting up) and become embarrassed, upset, or disturbed by what is showing on the timer. This can be a stunningly effective way to refocus. Imagine that you have a writing project that  should take 30 minutes. You start a timer and hammer away. Later, you get distracted by other tasks. Eventually, you close enough windows that the timer shows through and you notice that the time spent on the task so far is 55 minutes. This can make you stop looking for that Jim Croce song you just remembered you love so much and get back to finishing the writing, because you aren’t going to let it go over 1 hour!

Try downloading the timer and see if it works for you. Often the toughest part of using it is remembering to start it up in the first place and then remembering to trigger the timers themselves. Even so, it may work just often enough to make your days more productive.

ADHD — No comments
21
May 10

Is ADHD Real or Is ADHD Fake?

adhd-real-add-fake-graphic Answering this question gets a little old after awhile. Part of the problem, of course, is that there are now, and have been in the past, those who use attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in one way or another to further their own selfish ends. Some of those people come from the ADHD is real side, and some of those people come from the ADHD is fake side. Of course, there are many self-serving types in between as well.

To answer the question whether ADHD is real or not, one needs to consider numerous factors. First and foremost is the fact that the current scientific understanding of how the brain functions, brain biology, and mental health has grown exponentially in just the last 30 years. That being said, our comprehension of how the brain works is staggeringly low. Even the scientific techniques we currently use to study the brain are crude. In many cases the science behind much brain research starts out with a laughably simple assumption that may or may not be true.

Consider, for example, PET scans. A PET scan is a way of measuring how the brain works. In many recent ADHD studies, PET scans have been used to show that adults with ADHD and children with ADHD have brains that function differently from brains in subjects without ADHD. That is biological proof that ADHD is real, right?

Unfortunately, the whole concept of the PET scan is based upon an unproven assumption.

PET scans don’t actually show how the brain works. They don’t measure which parts of the brain are working, nor do they give any insight into the complex inner relationships between various regions of the brain. What PET scans measure is how much glucose is being used by the different parts of the brain. The assumption is that since glucose is the body’s energy source, the tissues in the brain using the most glucose must be working the hardest. The next assumption is that if any particular brain tissue is working hard, then it must be doing something at that moment. Thus, the areas in a PET scan that glow brightly are the regions of the brain being most heavily used during that time.

ADHD Tips Tricks and Advice

These assumptions have been backed up a bit via the other main source of brain research, which is far more crude. Much of what we know about the brain comes from studying brain injuries and brain damage. If a person has an accident that destroys a certain area of the brain, and then can no longer speak, one can draw the conclusion that the damaged region is responsible for speech. PET scans show the same areas glowing brightly when a person is talking. That hardly counts as proof, but it does mean that the current assumptions under which we use PET scans are at least reasonably good ones.

So, is ADD real?

Even PET scans are inconclusive. While ADHD brain scans have consistently shown different activity in brains of subjects with attention deficit disorder, they also show a wide variety among people without any diagnosed conditions. One could make the claim that a PET scan of a Type-A person would look differently than a scan of lazy person. That opens a whole can of worms.

For now, what we can say definitively about whether ADHD exists is that there is a large sub-population of people who have similar issues and that these issues tend to respond in similar ways to specific treatments. That in and of itself is good enough for a start. After that, as seems to always be the case, more ADHD research is needed.

ADHD Research Studies — No comments
11
May 10

Latest ADHD Research News Updates

A couple of interesting updates in the world of attention deficit disorder research. Of course, ADD is technically known by its formal medical name of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, but people like to use both terms.

The first ADHD study comes from Spanish researchers who scanned the brains of 42 children with ADHD and 42 children without ADHD (the control group). Their results were that kids with ADHD had a smaller ventral striatum, particularly on the right side. If you are wondering, the ventral striatum includes the nucleus accumbens. That still isn’t helping, I’m sure. As it turns out the nucleus accumbens maintain a person’s level of motivation when they start a task and continues to maintain that motivation until the task is completed.

That seems to be a pretty precise understanding of brain function and anatomy, but if accurate, makes some sense. This study also gives additional weight to a hypothesis about the cause of ADHD and origin of ADD symptoms that says that attention deficit disorders are primarily caused by different brain structures or functions that impede the usual motivation and reward pathways.

This is obviously a very small study. No major conclusions can be drawn from the data presented as to ADHD’s cause or treatment of ADD symptoms. However, these small initial research studies like this one are an important step in both gaining enough scientific and medical credibility for the hypothesis that further research will be green-lighted by both government agencies and educational institutions and research facilities. They also play an important role in obtaining funding for larger research studies.

ADHD research like this recent study build the groundwork for the case that this isn’t just some wild guess about how ADD works and where ADHD comes from, but rather a sound hypothesis grounded in hard data that requires further testing. Put together with other ADD research recently that have come to similar preliminary conclusions, and this may just be the next major research path into the cause of ADHD in children and adults.

As always, great ADHD tips are available here, as well as ADD organizational tools and the elusive ADHD planner.

ADD Medication / ADHD-ADD Tips — No comments
03
May 10

How To Take St. John's Wort For Depression With ADHD and ADD

Taking St. John’s Wort to treat mild depression that occurs with ADHD might be a helpful way to control symptoms that don’t respond as well as you would like to traditional attention deficit hyperactivity disorder medicines and therapies. As always, discuss all of your symptoms with your doctor or medical professional whether they are symptoms of attention deficit disorder or otherwise.

This posting is continued from Use St. Johns Worth For Depression with ADHD ADD

It should go without saying, but here it is anyway.

I am not a doctor. Nothing in this article or on this website should be considered medical advice. All information including dosages, medications, timing, and recommendations and warnings are for general knowledge only and is not medical advice. Consult with a physician before starting any treatment. Drug interactions can be dangerous or unpleasant. Consult a pharmacist or physician about taking any medicine, herbal remedy, or supplement.

st-johns-wort-for-depression-adhd-medicine Before anyone jumps on the, Let’s Try St John Wort to treat possible depression with attention deficit disorder Bandwagon, here are some facts you need to know.

How To Use St. John’s Wort

  1. Not all herbal medicines, natural remedies, vitamins, supplements, and pills are created equal. Time and time again, studies or investigative journalism has shown that LOTS of over the counter medicines don’t have what they say they have in them. Just because it says it on the label doesn’t make it true. My ADHD trick for getting real alternative ADD treatments in a bottle is to always buy from a company that has something to lose. That is, buy your St. John’s Wort from a respected brand that has more to lose from the bad publicity about selling a crappy product than they have to gain from cutting corners. The easiest way to use this ADHD tip is to buy your stuff at Whole Foods or Vitamin Cottage or the like. These companies build their entire business model around being “better” and “more trustworthy.” That means the suppliers know that they are out, if bad publicity threatens to drag down their brand name. If you don’t want to go that route, then buy from a well-known and respected supplement brand.
  2. St John’s Wort can be what my gal once termed, “buzzy.” That means that it can make your mind seem a little buzzed. Not in an intoxicated way, and not in a racing way, but in a crackling, seems like I can feel the electricity firing in my neurons, sort of way. What that all means is that it can make it very hard to fall asleep and stay asleep. So, start by taking your St Johns Wort in the mornings, not in the evenings until you have an idea of how it affects you.
  3. Like all depression medications, and unlike most ADHD drugs, St. John’s Wort is not an instant effect medicine. It must build up in your body, or more specifically in your brain, before it has any effect. That means you need to take it for six weeks or so before deciding if it does or does not work. It may start working sooner. However, if if seems to be working on Day 2, that just be a good day or a placebo effect. More importantly, it might be that something else is working, so don’t just attribute it to the St. Johns Wort. Instead, look around and evaluate what you are doing that is different, maybe there is something else going on that helps with your inattention or other ADD symptoms and you need to know what that is. (I have one ADD friend who is always more focused after a night of drinking, but after the hangover ends. There isn’t much you can do with that alternative ADD treatment-wise, but at least you know not to judge the effectiveness of other things on that kind of day.)
  4. Finally, get the dosage right. Remember how I said not all pills are created equal? That goes double in the supplement world of alternative herbal therapies, because there is no regulations telling manufacturers or customers what SHOULD be in the bottle. Contrast this to multivitamins where the label has to say what percentage a vitamin is of the government established recommended daily allowance. That way you know if your vitamin has the right amount of Vitamin B, for example.
  5. The right dosage for adults using St. John’s Wort for the treatment of minor depression is 300mg with 0.3% hypericins taken three times a day. Note that to get a full dosage like this without encroaching on bedtime, you’ll need to use a schedule like first thing in the morning, after breakfast, and after lunch, or something similar. Furthermore, note that you need BOTH of those numbers to be on the label. A cheapo way of making St. John’s Wort is to just throw a bunch of it in a vat regardless of quality and then make 300mg pills. The 0.3% hypercins means that the right amount of actual medicinal quality stuff is in there.
  6. Don’t just get Hypercin extract or hyperphorin, or whatever. All the best studies test the WHOLE St. John’s Wort herb, not just extracts of it. Some research suggests that while the compound called hyperforin within St. Johns Wort might be the main cause of improvement for mild depression treatment, there is also research suggesting that some of the other components inside of the herb might be important as well. If you are getting 0.3% hypercins, then you are getting all of the hyperforin already, so you might as well get the other stuff.
  7. Lastly, St. John’s Wort can interfere with other prescription drugs and medications so research the heck out of what you are taking before you start up. If you are already taking anti-depressants the DO NOT start taking St John Wort too. That is a recipe for big trouble. Also, it seems that almost everything in the world interferes with heart medications, so specifically check with  your doctor first if you are taking any heart medicine. I don’t have to tell you which is more important of the two if you want to stay alive.

That should about do it. If you want to verify (PLEASE DO) the research and medical information I have jotted down here quickly, and without any editing, start with the U.S. Nation Library of Medicine from the National Institutes of Health at PubMed.gov. Here is a link to get you started. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12543057

Yes, there is a lot of medical and scientific terminology in there, but don’t wimp out. Keep reading and you will get the gist of what is going on even if you don’t know what molarity is. The last sentence or two of the abstract is usually a conclusion, so at the very least read that. Also, always note the date of the research. It is often the case that the first study has very positive results because the first research is usually don’t as a proof of concept that more research is worthwhile. Even though the results are often reported in a splashy manner, these experiments are done on the cheap with limited controls and small groups of test subjects. Later research is typically more reliable, and when it comes to the brain, stuff from before 1980 is the mental equivalent of using leaches, so forget about research from the 1970s and before that has not been followed up significantly.

Have you tried using St. John’s Wort or other herbal medicines as alternative therapy for your ADHD or co-morbid conditions like depression? What has your experience (good or bad) been?

ADD Medication / ADHD-ADD Tips — 1 comment
29
Apr 10

Depression and ADHD St Johns Wort Treatment

adhd-medicine-st-johns-wort-depression This one is going to be a little on the short and sweet side because I’m supposed to be doing other work (Hmmm, where have we all heard that before?), but it keeps bouncing around in my head, and that can be just as unproductive as a little writing tangent. So, you’ll have to forgive me if this post does not live up to my usual standard of backing up what I say with links to the original source materials and research evidence. As always, the best ADHD tips I can give is to please DO check up on what I (and others) say about ADD treatments and other ADHD tips.

If you have done much reading about attention deficit disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder then you know that

  • a) Those are both the same thing, I did that for the benefit of searchers
  • b) That many adults with ADHD, teens with ADD, and children that have ADHD are frequently diagnosed with other mental health issues in addition to their official diagnosis of attention deficit disorder.
  • c) That one of the difficulties in effectively treating ADHD is that certain conditions or issues can overlap each other.

These “add-on” conditions are known by the unfortunate medical term, “co-morbid,” which couldn’t sound worse if you tried. That is mostly because most people do not know the full definition of the word morbid, which is both “of or caused by disease or medical condition,” as well as, “gruesome.”

Note the very important difference between co-morbid conditions, which are those that occur together, but independently from each other, versus, a medical issue that is caused by, or the result of another medical issue. For example, improper insulin balance is NOT co-morbid with diabetes. A person has messed up insulin BECAUSE OF diabetes.

One common co-morbid condition of ADD is depression. Again, depression is NOT caused by ADHD, nor vice versa, it just so happens that the brain biology of people with ADD appears to give rise to depression sometimes as well.

The difficulty of having both depression and ADHD at the same time is that some of the symptoms of ADHD and depression can overlap meaning that while trying to treat and medicate certain issues, one might be barking up the wrong tree, so to speak, by using ADHD medication to help with symptoms that are actually caused by depression in whole or in part.

One symptom of some mild depression is apathy. Apathy, can easily lead to procrastination, which is also a potential symptom of a persons ADHD, particularly for those with the inattentive type of ADD. So, while you pump your body full of Adderall, and talk for hours with your therapist or ADD coach about your procrastination, you might be completely missing the target.

The reason I sought any sort of diagnosis and treatment in the first place was an overwhelming sense of apathy. In fact, I started out being treated for depression and being prescribed various medications for it like Zoloft rather than being diagnosed with adult ADHD. This was partly due to my focusing on the apathy in all of my sessions and either ignoring, not mentioning, or not understanding the potential importance of some of my other “quirks.”

Lately, I have been having trouble not with my focus so much as with my ability to GET GOING ON ANYTHING. Additionally, there have been some very major events happen in my life, including some spectacular failures, to which I had virtually no emotional reaction of any kind. It makes me wonder if it was a mistake to stop investigating the depression or anxiety angles to focus on just the ADD.

No one knows your mind or your body like you do. Unfortunately, our system dictates that you work through expensive, and (rightfully) skeptical middlemen called doctors or therapists to access some of the treatments, medications, and information about most medical conditions, including the ones that deal with your mind. That rules out starting back up the Zoloft or whatever else I was trying.

Now, let’s be clear. I never advocate trying to “get around” your doctor or medical professionals, and I do plan to talk to my guy about my ADHD plus depression hypothesis during our next visit. But, until my current supply of meds and prescriptions runs out, I’m conducting a self-experiment on my theory.

If you are suffering from depression, or think you are, seek professional help immediately. Do not wait based on trying this idea out!

St. John’s Wort is occasionally (and generally wrongly) mentioned as a possible non-prescription therapy for ADHD. This is not surprising as pretty much any herb, natural remedy, or medicine that shows the slightest effect on the brain is eventually promoted as a cure for ADHD and every other mental condition there is. However, real scientific research has shown that St. John’s Wort can be just as effective at treating mild depression as prescription depression medications. In fact, in some research St Johns Wort has been shown to be more effective for treating mild depression cases.

Unfortunately, just like with ADHD, the human mind is a complex and splendored thing. Not everyone responds the same way to every medicine or treatment, especially when we are talking about the brain. However, St. John’s Wort is available everywhere and is not very expensive, so it has a sort of “give it a shot” quality to it. Just keep in mind, St. Johns Wort has only been shown to be effective treatment for MILD depression.

St. John’s Wort is not an instant effect medicine. It must build up in your body, or more specifically in your brain…

The catch is that just grabbing a bottle of St. Johns Wort off the shelf at Whole Foods and throwing a couple down is not going to work. In order to be an effective treatment, you have to get it right. Which is why next up is how to take St. John’s Wort for depression with ADHD ADD.

I am not a doctor. Nothing in this article or on this website should be considered medical advice. All information including dosages, medications, timing, and recommendations and warnings are for general knowledge only and is not medical advice. Consult with a physician before starting any treatment. Drug interactions can be dangerous or unpleasant. Consult a pharmacist or physician about taking any medicine, herbal remedy, or supplement.

ADD Medication — 2 comments
26
Apr 10

Self-Medicating ADHD With Caffeine, Nicotine and ADD

Self Medicate ADHD symptoms caffeine nicotine sugarRecent research has suggested that some adults with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, self-medicate their ADD symptoms. In one study in particular, researchers showed that adults with ADHD smoke not just to get the “high” (clinically referred to as “for affect”) provided for nicotine, but also for its potential effects upon adult ADHD symptoms. Other studies have examined the ideas that people with ADHD self-medicate with caffeine or sugar, as well as other foods, medicinal herbs, supplements. All indicate that there is at least some truth to the idea that certain natural occurring stimulants or food products can tame certain ADD inattention difficulties to some extent. (Whew! How is that for qualifying a statement? Some truth, that certain thing, might help, somewhat.)

For medical researchers looking into ADHD, the primary motivation for conducting such studies is two-fold. One, it eliminates variables in other research studies. For example, if adults with ADD, or teens with ADHD, can be shown to be populations that have a biological reason that makes quitting smoking harder, then such groups can be excluded from research studies about the effectiveness of quit smoking techniques.

Just imagine if it turned out that ever major smoking cessation experiment over the last decade could trace its success or failure largely to the number of people with attention deficit disorder conditions who took part in the study. That would be a very big deal. It also suggests that additional treatment options for ADHD smokers might be necessary to successfully quit smoking.

The second purpose of doing ADHD research like this is that it gives additional clues to the biological effects of ADHD on the brain, as well as additional factors to consider when doing research into the cause of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in teens, adults, and to a lesser extent (for smoking studies, anyway) children with ADD. If the mechanism by which tobacco and nicotine affect the brain’s neurological pathways is well understood, and it can be shown that to some extent that the curative affect some ADDers feel from nicotine on their inattention symptoms is similar, then their is the possibility that ADHD functions by affecting the brain in a related manner.

See why real research is peer-reviewed research.

Self-Medicating ADHD Without Prescription Medication Drugs

What information about dealing with ADHD can those of us with ADD take from such research studied. While far from being the kind of research that conclusive conclusions about attention deficit disorders can be drawn, it does suggest some possible techniques for improving concentration in people with ADHD. One ADHD trick would be to conduct self-experiments to see how certain natural stimulants affect your ADHD symptoms. Excluding smoking, which is dangerous, unhealthy, and very addictive, experimenting with the affects caffeine, sugar, tuarine (or whatever that is in Red Bull) and the link can be very useful for ADDers looking for new ways to deal with their own ADHD symptoms.

For example, if a teenager with ADHD were to find out that caffeine early in the morning improves their concentration for three or four hours, then the best ADHD tip for concentrating better on an early morning geometry test would be to drink some coffee before leaving the house, or on the way to school. However, it is important to know exactly how the caffeine affects you, how much causes an improvement, as well as how much is too much. Also, teens with ADD in school would need to know how long it takes for it to “hit them”. Drinking a bunch of Cokes right before an important history test, when it turns out that it takes 45 minutes for the caffeine and sugar to really kick in, isn’t going to help much.

Please ignore this quick test ADHD Tools Advice

These ADHD tips and tricks are not for replacing your current ADD therapy regime. The idea is to have an arsenal of ADHD tools in your pocket that you can pull out for certain situations. Not just tests, but important meetings, during a critical sales call, self-medication of your ADHD symptoms for a little extra control might just be the difference between further frustration, and additional success. You might even find there are times when you would prefer to treat ADHD naturally by skipping your normal medication and using a stand-in in order to maximize certain personality traits or a specific kind of focus.

ADHD-ADD Tips — No comments
18
Apr 10

ADHD Kids Will Be Kids

"I’m not really sure I buy into the whole ADD thing," he says, like he’s explaining his views on a new multilevel marketing opportunity.

It’s one of those times when the topic of attention deficit syndrome has come up somehow, and the person speaking isn’t very educated in exactly what is ADD or how ADD symptoms affect kids or adults.

What he really means is that he isn’t sure how much he believes in ADHD. The original term of ADD was replaced by ADHD, or attention deficit hyperactivity syndrome, because mental health professionals were concerned that attention deficit disorders were being underdiagnosed in children who were then either going untreated, or being treated for the wrong thing. In this sense, my friend is correct. There is no such thing as ADD and therefore, no need to buy into it.

Of course, this is not what he is saying. He means that he isn’t sure that ADHD is not just made up by a bunch of shrinks trying to get rich by giving their equally rich clients an excuse for their child’s behavior. He means that what is really going on is that either there are bad parents or bad kids involved, or that maybe this whole "ADHD thing" is nothing more than kids being kids.

Everyone Gets Distracted Sometimes

"Everybody gets distracted sometimes. Heck, I get distracted all the time when I’m bored or stuck in long meetings."

Ah, yes. The "evidence" that many people cite as proof that ADHD is a sham or, at the very least, an over-diagnosed fad that has too many kids hopped up on Ritalin when they should just be left alone.

I don’t really bother too much with conversations like these anymore. One important ADHD tip is to not take statements like these too much to heart. Some people are uneducated about certain things and proud of it, thank you very much. Talking to them about whether or not ADHD is real is a waste of time. Other people might listen or even take the time to evaluate a rational argument given the right environment. However, knowing when and where that is isn’t easy.

In this case, I decided to try and explain what ADHD really was, how the media distorts ADD, and how a bunch of blowhards wielding faulty logic and ignorance have managed to push a heap of skepticism on the diagnosis of ADHD for children and adults.

Everyone does get distracted. And, yes, it is very common to get distracted or let your mind wander when you are bored or uninterested in something. But, how common is it to get distracted while walking from your bedroom door to the bathroom? How common is it to then also be distracted on the way back?

How common is it to be distracted in the middle of what someone is saying directly to you, no matter how important or how interesting. Even more telling, how common is it to be distracted while YOU are talking. Ever stop talking mid-sentence? Rarely or several times a day?

People with ADHD aren’t just easily distracted by the usual things, they are constantly distracted by things that are not distracting. Often, people with ADHD are distracted by nothing more than their own mind. Being distracted by your own thoughts, the state of varnish on a table, the color of a rug, or the sound of the air conditioning is not a common occurrence. While it may happen on a certain day or in a certain setting for most people, such distractions happen every single day for people with ADHD. In fact, they happen several times a day, every day. Needing a special ADHD planner in order to keep organized is not common.

ADHD isn’t about getting distracted sometimes. ADHD is about getting distracted ALL THE TIME. That there is a difference, is all that you have to buy.

ADHD Research Studies — No comments
15
Apr 10

Nature Relieves ADHD Symptoms – All Natural "Cure"

natural-adhd-cure-walk-nature-park Recently, we took a quick look at some of the alternative herbal ADHD treatments available. This reminded me to write about another natural ADD treatment research finding that I have seen. A research study about ADHD in children published in August, 2008 concluded that reducing attention deficit symptoms in children was, literally, a walk in the park.

Can ADD Be Cured By Nature?

I have seen this study referenced in numerous places. This medical research into attention deficit hyperactivity disorder is titled Children with attention deficits concentrate better after walk in the park on the National Institute of Health PubMed website. The study suggests that exposure to nature, or as the researchers like to term it, “doses of nature,” might actually help reduce the symptoms of ADD in children. If so, going for a walk might be a really great addition to the arsenal of ADHD tips and tricks.

It is important to note that this research was a very small, single-blind, experiment. Extrapolating its conclusions to the general population of attention deficit disorder people is a stretch. However, there are some interesting findings generated by the research which suggest a possible, free natural treatment for ADHD in children. Similar affects might be found in this natural treatment for ADHD for adults as well.

Researchers studied 17 children aged 7 to 12 years old, who were diagnosed with ADHD. Each child was exposed to three different environments. For each environment, each child was led on the same path for a 20-minute walk. The three environments were:

  • a city park
  • urban “park” with no trees or grass
  • urban pedestrian area

Researchers note that both urban areas are “well-kept” which basically means that no one went for a walk through a dark alley or across a debris filled lot.

The effects on the children’s concentration after the walk through the park were “substantial.”

In fact, the researchers noted that the improvements in the ADHD scoring method used (Cohen’s) were in line with the improvements observed for taking methylphenidate, also known as Ritalin.

In other words, a walk in the park improved these particular children’s concentration just as well as taking a dose of Ritalin would.

Scientists noted that similar results were NOT seen after the walks in the urban park setting, implying that an open area is not the helpful factor, but rather the plants, grass, and trees in the city park. Jumping ahead, one can draw the conclusion that exposure to nature improves ADHD concentration symptoms in children with ADD.

If we’re going to jump that far ahead, we might as well jump all the way to the conclusion that being in nature helps people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, as much a prescription drugs. In fact, for concerned parents looking for a way to help their child’s ADD just enough to help improve their life with a natural ADHD treatment, this might be the first place to start.

Obviously, that is not a fully sound conclusion to take, but it does suggest an idea for personal testing. Try going for a walk in a nature area or park and seeing what, if any, affect it has on your ADHD symptoms. If you do try it, please drop by and share a comment.

To replicate what the researchers did, go for a 20-minute walk in an open area, preferably one with several trees and a natural ground. The park used in the study was grassy, so you can start there, but it might not be necessary.

Does nature seem to improve your ADHD? Have you ever tried going for a walk before a big test or important meeting as a way to improve your focus?

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