ADHD: One Family's Experiences

It seems that one of the more common challenges facing Louisiana children and the Louisiana school system is Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). More and more children with a combination of behavior and/learning problems are being diagnosed with one or both of these disorders. I recently talked to one family to learn about their personal experience with ADHD. The family consists of a father, mother and one son who turned 13 about 10 days ago and is in the seventh grade in a Louisiana public school.

I talked to the son first. "What do you think of school?" I asked.

"Its not hard, I just don't pay attention," was the reply from the young man sitting at a table with me, but also moving his head and hands.

"Why don't you pay attention?" I wondered out loud.

The answer: "Because I am always talking to people and messing with them." This student is fairly successful in school and when I asked how he learned without paying attention, he explained, "Because I can be messing with people, but still know what is going on," and he added, "ADHD is not a problem, everybody else is."

The mom later explained persons with Attention Deficit disorder use both their of their brains at once. Most of us process material on primarily one side of our brain or at use primarily one side of our brains at a time. Using both sides of the brain at one time makes it hard for persons with ADHD to focus, discipline themselves, and stay on the same track as everyone else. When a person has Attention Deficit Disorder combined with Hyperactivity Disorder (so much energy cannot be still) it can seem that a child's mind and behavior are in a state of chaos that effects everyone around him/her.

In the case of her son, he has a hard time distinguishing a learning opportunity as being separate from a social opportunity as he cannot just shut off one part of his brain and concentrate on one task. And being hyperactive makes it further difficult for him be still and to control responses to all the stimuli he experiences.

This young man's ADHD was not an academic problem until the third grade when his teacher reported that he couldn't pay attention, would answer questions directed to the class without raising his hand and waiting to be called upon as is the custom in most classrooms, and he would get up and just walk around. His behavior was both disruptive and inconsiderate of other students.

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