Posts Tagged: ADD

ADHD Traits — No Comments
1
Jul 10

What Is Attention Deficit Disorder Like

Understanding attention deficit disorder, or ADD, requires getting past the pop culture version of ADHD, also called Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and looking at what attention deficit disorder is really like.

First off, you need a basic understanding of the symptoms of attention deficit disorder. Once you have a basic grasp on the generalized symptoms of ADHD, you need to be aware that there are actually three forms of ADD all of which can be present in both adults and in children. After that, you will want to understand both the conventional ADD treatments of therapy, coaching, and prescription medications, as well as the bombardment of new, maybe works, kind of sort-of backed up by scientific data, alternative treatments for ADHD.

Of course, all of that only gives you a basic concept of what the condition is like in some prototype population like attention deficit disorder child or adult adhd labeled groups. None of that gives anyone a real grasp of what it is actually like to have ADD as an adult or as a teen or child. That is why from time to time I like to profile here on Addessories real life events or stories of an adult with ADHD. (It’s me.)

Deadline Today’s life with ADD episode comes courtesy of my small home office where I conduct my freelance writing business as a work from home dad. For the past three or four hours there has been a small empty plate on my desk. It comes and goes from my consciousness as I fling my fingers across the keyboard generating text that will hopefully pay the mortgage and more this month. When it arrives in my consciousness, or what I like to call “my front brain,” it annoys me a little bit because I can’t remember how it got there or what was on it. Also, I have had a terrible headache for the past 90 minutes because I’ve been thinking, “I need to go get something to drink,” for somewhere around 70 minutes, but I keep remembering in the middle of writing something and I know that if I stop, it might take me a while to get started again, or more likely, I might not be able to quite remember where I was going with my thoughts and I’ll have to start over altogether.

In a lot of ways this is nothing more than so much whining, except that none of this is uncommon.

When someone calls on the phone or a family member pops by my home office, they almost always have to wait for me to go to the restroom before they can talk to me. You see, while I am working my brain does scatter about distractedly from here to there, but one of the “theres” never seems to be my bodily functions. Rather, my mind wonders if I finished that article I started this morning, if there are better keywords than the ones I am using, and it can’t help but wonder what the plate is doing on my desk.

As it turns out, my wife brought me a sandwich and strawberries for lunch on that plate. Ah, that’s what it was.

Which brings us to today’s lesson in ADHD. People with ADHD are not forgetful, per se. While I struggled to come up with an idea of what the plate was doing on my desk that was less a function of being unable to remember and more a function of being unable to command some of the sections of my brain to stop doing whatever it was they are already doing and focus on the issue of the plate. Once the image of the strawberries popped back into my front brain (one of those brain centers apparently got around to processing some of the things in its queue, like what about the plate) I could remember everything about it.

I remember her appearing at my side with the plate. I remember that she had one too. I remember how good the strawberries were and what kind of sandwich it was. I also remember why I put the plate on my desk. (I wanted to remember to take it upstairs and not leave it on a shelf in my office.)

The point of all this noise is that the symptoms of ADD are not necessarily comical stereotypes of forgetful space cadets, but rather the manifestation of what happens when, in some cases (not all the time), one cannot calm the brain down enough to get it to do the front brain’s bidding and instead, the rest of the brain (the back brain, if you will) continues on with what it already had determined — often at the front brain’s command — what was currently important and that new requests would simply have to wait.

In other words, this isn’t the absent minded professor. ADHD is the command center switchboard with too many urgent requests coming in from the field. The good news is that if you can wait around a minute, your call will be answered in the order it was received.

ADD Medication — No Comments
14
Jun 10

ADHD Prescriptions Are Controlled Substances

As any anyone with ADHD can tell you, the drugs for ADD are classified as controlled substances. You can’t get refills of ADHD prescriptions, you have to get a new prescription for every time you get your monthly supply of Adderall or Ritalin. Likewise, the pharmacy cannot call your doctor to get an approval for your ADD prescription for you like they can for other drugs like antibiotics or insulin. Of course, this also means that you cannot take advantage of the discounts or convenience for getting  your prescriptions in a 90-day supply via mail order from your insurance company, either.

Too bad, because it would be a great ADHD advice tip to have people who aren’t good at organization and remembering to-do lists to have their medication automatically mailed each month.

All drugs (not supplements – there is a difference) are controlled substances by virtue of being “controlled” by the DEA and the FDA. What people with attention deficit disorder may not realize is how ADHD drugs are classified.

Adderall, Ritalin, Concerta, Vyvanse, and all the generic equivalents are classified as “Schedule II” controlled substances.

That may not sound absurd at first, but believe me, it is asinine and yet another example of why the so-called war on drugs is so messed up.

Adderall Is As Bad As Morphine or Cocaine

There are technically five schedules used for classifying drugs. Schedule I drugs are the “bad” drugs, the ones that get smuggled in by villains using super speedboats and hollowed out dolls, depending upon the movie. These are the narcotic drugs and they include Heroin, Ecstasy, Marijuana, and LSD. Ironically, cocaine is not on this list which is going to make your Adderall meds being on the next list all the more pathetic.

Schedule II drugs are the very next set of medications. This is where ADD medicines are classified, just one step below Heroin and meth. It is also where cocaine is classified, as well as all of those pain killers that you hear about people getting addicted to.

How are ADHD medicines like Adderall and Ritalin grouped with pain killers and cocaine?

The law states that in order to be classified as a Schedule II controlled substance three factors must be met:

  1. There is a high potential for abuse
  2. There are valid medical reasons for using the drug (this is the difference between Schedule I and II)
  3. Abuse of the drug may lead to severe psychological or physical dependence

Wow!

Number 3 is a newsflash to me. No one every told me that taking mixed amphetamine salts could lead to severe dependence!

Of course, the reason no one ever told me that, is because it is not true.

There have been no medical studies that suggest that taking ADD medication like Adderall leads to any kind of dependence at all, except for having to get used to its affects going away. Certainly there is no medical data that these medications cause severe dependence.

As for abuse, the only thing I have ever heard of is students using ADHD medicines to study and concentrate. That’s hardly shooting up in the back of an alley. It is not safe, but neither is taking someone’s antibiotics because you feel sick; that’s no reason to lock them all up under tighter rules.

The law requires that all three conditions be met to be listed as a Schedule II medication, so even if you go with the whole “abuse” thing, ADD drugs should not legally be classified as Schedule II substances.

Even worse, the law specifically says that the “salts of,” among other things, amphetamine,  are to be listed as Schedule III drugs.

So, the next time you have to jump through hoops in order to get the same medicine that you have gotten every month for years, remember that it isn’t even legitimate. You are just being screwed over by a Federal Agency who put your medication on there for political reasons.

ADHD Traits — No Comments
8
Jun 10

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder – Distracted By Boring Stuff

boring-wall When I first envisioned what the addessories.com website would be like, I pictured a site where both adults with ADHD and teens with ADD and even children with ADHD could get ADHD tools, products, tips and yes, accessories for ADD lifestyles. The idea was that of the many books, magazines, websites and organizations for ADHD out there, there was, and still is, a lack of actual useable tools and products for helping with ADHD symptoms and making time management and organization easier for people with ADD.

(What is with switching between ADD and ADHD all the time? – What is the difference between ADD and ADHD?)

For example, every book about ADHD or ADD article you read is going to tell you to do things like make lists, use reminders, and of course get a calendar or organizer to help you get more organized. Of course, unless you are incredibly un-self-aware (Whew, too many hyphens!) chances are that you already have tried tons of planners and calendars and lists and various organizational systems. If you were diagnosed with ADHD as an adult, chances are that you have desperately tried buying calendars and Palm Pilots and BlackBerries and the like hundreds of times in an effort to work better, organize better, and be a better husband, father, dad, wife, mother, or mom. After all, one of the symptoms of ADHD is not liking to be disorganized.

That is why I have started work (again) on the ADHD Planner which will be a calendar and organizational system specifically designed for people with ADD to use. Since no two cases of ADD are exactly alike, the ADD planner will be customizable based upon your particular case of attention deficit disorder.

What Is It Like Having ADHD or What Is ADD Really Like

Along the way, to creating my utopia of the best ADHD gadgets and top ADD tips and tricks, I’ve gotten side tracked.

Now, I know what you are thinking, and yes, I get distracted just like everyone else, both with and without ADHD. However, in this particular case, the distraction has been a bit of a good news / bad news sort of thing. The delay it has caused in making this ADHD website what I want it to be is the bad news. The good news is that much of the distraction has come in the form of increased work for my freelance writing business, which until I get all of these products created, manufactures, and sold, pays the bills.

However, there has been an unexpected distraction in the form of visitors to this website. They come here for many reasons. Almost everyone who ever lays eyes on this website for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder comes here via results for queries made on search engines. When that happens, there is a log of information that basically says what the keywords were that were used to search for ADHD or ADD. This is, of course, why I constantly shift between using ADD/ADHD and why I also try and spell out both acronyms at least once per post.

The really odd thing is that a lot of the traffic to Addessories comes from searches for things like:

  • What is ADHD really like?
  • What does ADHD feel like?
  • Is ADHD a real things?
  • How Do I Know If I Have ADHD?
  • and so on…

The weird part is that this is isn’t really a broadly covered topic. Read any of the major ADHD books out there and you will get a clinical description of ADHD as well as a handful of what I have come to call either "Me too stories," or "Sob stories," depending on my mood. These are the "examples" or "cases" that the PhDs that crank out these books write about where a patient or client of theirs relates how ADHD has affected their life in some way.

What is almost always missing from these writings is an indication of what ADHD actually feels like, or what it is like inside the ADHD brain. I don’t know if this is due to the difficulty in describing it, or if it not scientific enough to relate in formal writings, or (if I’m feeling jaded) if the authors of these books really don’t know because they don’t really have ADHD or it is something very minor to their overall life.

Whatever the reason, people keep coming for answers about what ADHD is like in the real world, outside of the clinics and counseling sessions. Therefore, I will endeavor to keep exploring this avenue in detail and welcome your help in doing so. After all, I can only tell you what it is like inside of my brain.

With all of that being said, I think I may have finally gotten into words a key concept about what ADHD is like and how ADHD is different from everyone getting distracted sometimes.

As I have said in the past, and most ADHD authorities point out, ADD involves an unusually high level of distractibility on a chronic (on-going) basis, not just getting distracted sometimes by distracting things. Which brings me to my pseudo-epiphany which we will cover in more depth in the next post.

The difference between ADHD and regular distraction is that people with ADHD get distracted all of the time by things that are NOT distracting.

Put another way, ADDers get distracted by boring stuff just as often as they do by exciting stuff.

If you have ever brought home a brand-new DVD release that you have been dying to watch and ended up cleaning the dust bunnies you noticed under your TV stand instead, you know what I’m talking about. I needed to be reminded a half-dozen times not to use up all of the already minimal time we had for "date night" because I was trying to get a laptop to play the DVD onto the TV so that I could show her some of the new features in Windows Media Center. Instead of eating popcorn, laying on the couch, and watching the movie I desperately wanted to see (and which she has no interest in, but agreed to watch for me) I was trying to find the online manual for my laptop. Instead of fun, I was troubleshooting keys, software, and S-video cables.

In other words, I got distracted by something boring. That, my friends, is what it is like to have ADD.

ADD Organization Tips / ADD Tools / ADHD-ADD Tips — No Comments
2
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 — 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
3
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.

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