Dr G's ADHD Chat

ADHD children frequently have difficulties completing tasks when told to do so. With their difficulties with working memory and executive functioning they frequently forget steps in tasks like getting ready for bed, getting up in the morning, and getting ready for school. Routines are important in all our lives. Once established, we follow them without having to make a conscious effort. A routine...

While treatment for ADHD, especially medication is seen as one of the most effective treatments in all of psychiatry, a surprising 80% of all patients quit within a year. If it’s such a wonderful and successful treatment, why do so many discontinue treatment. I’ll discuss this situation in some detail. In case you’re wondering, my own son discontinued medication. His mother and I loved it when he...

The thing that ADHD parents in my private practice were most concerned about was their child’s temper tantrums. I agree that these displays of anger were sometimes scary and some parents were thinking their child’s temper tantrums might have a major diagnosis like Bipolar disorder or even Schizophrenia. Temper tantrums are upsetting but they are more complicated than just anger. I’m going to discu...

Last week we discussed summer as a time of some trials and tribulation when your child could totally fall out of all those patterns of behavior that took so long to establish during the school year. I’ m going to present summer as the ideal time for you to observe your child’s strengths and help develop them in practical, applied situations. This is also and ADHDers preferred way to learn and expe...

Summer causes a lot of questions and difficulties for ADHD parents. Just when you’ve got a routine established with school, now school is ending and you have to establish a new routine. In the next few episodes I’ll explore the difficulties and explain something’s I recommend you implement based on my experience both as a psychologist and as a parent of two ADHD kids.

ADHDers, both parents and adults with ADHD will frequently blame lack of willpower when they have any difficulties secondary to ADHD. When they procrastinate, when they forget about doing something, when they fail to complete a task on time they blame inadequate willpower and berate themselves. This totally ignores the fact that ADHD is a neurologic difference that appears to be cause by inadequat...

We members of the ADHDer world are used to spending most of our time and energy with the negatives of ADHD-the temper tantrums, the “lost”homework, the “I forgots”, the dreaded morning getting ready for school on time crunch and the teacher conferences and so much more. But it’s important for us parents to recognize enjoy and praise the strengths that our ADHDer displays. This allows us to develop...

Parents of ADHD children need to have 3 very important skills-resilience, Intention and self awareness. Resilience makes it possible for you to come back after a bad day and learn from it. Intention so you can plan ahead and avoid many of the problem situations. Finally you have to be self-aware.both the . You have to know your strengths and weaknesses and demonstrate to your ADHDer how to handle...

If you are a neurotypical married to a spouse with ADHD, this show is for you. Be married to an ADHDer requires a special kind of patience and acceptance. I have been married for over 50 years and only recently has my spouse come to the conclusion that she, like 2 of her siblings has ADHD. She also has a family history of multiple ADHD relatives. We got married before ADHD was a diagnosis. I was a...

It’s not easy having a child with ADHD, it’s not easy being a person with ADHD. How successfully we adapt to ADHD has to do with our attitude towards our situation. You have to accept that it’s up to you to adapt and adjust to your situation. You don’t get a free pass because you and/or your child have a brain that wasn’t designed for our current society. You can get accommodations, but those are...

Coaching is a system. Of helping people improve their performance that is particularly effective for ADHD. It is action-oriented and oriented to improving performance immediately. It is not involved in analyzing the past or past accidents or injuries that explain current emotions or behavior. It also is more egalitarian and the client has more say in the direction treatment takes. I’ll cover this...

After several sessions governing various aspects of employment throughout life for ADHDers. This is for parents of ADHDers and adult ADHDers trying to figure out where to focus their efforts in terms of getting employed, being relatively satisfied with the employment and being able to perform up to standards despite their ADHD.

Another in our series on the best jobs for people with ADHD. This time we’re discussing Jobs that help and ADHDer generate more dopamine because they are so detail-oriented and so structured. This means that mistakes are immediately noted and correction is required also immediately.

In this episode in our series on the best jobs for ADHDers, we’re covering jobs that demand attention and boost dopamine because they are naturally intense. These are jobs that don’t allow for slow reaction time or indecision. I’ll cover some of these jobs and why they’re good for ADHDers

Ideal jobs for ADHDers have many different characteristics. Today I’ll be discussing jobs that allow a lot of independent action. ADHDers don’t typically do well in overconrolled environments unless there is a lot of intensity. They tend to be mavericks that like to follow their own lead so they have problems when the job structure requires obedience.

We have been discussing the ideal jobs for ADHDers. We’ve established that high intensity jobs work well because the intensity stimulates dopamine production in the ADHD brain. Today I’ll be discussing jobs that work for ADHDers because they are so structured that any deviation is not possible. This causes tension that also stimulates dopamine.

`One of the big concerns ADHD parents have is whether or not their child will be able to find employments as adults. I just returned from a podcasting conference and about 70% of the participants had ADHD. Does this mean podcasting in particular and entrepreneurship is ideal for our ADHD children. The answer is perhaps. Entrepreneurship is ideal in that there is no boss to please but there is also...

When my ADHDer was struggling with school amongst other things, I worried about how he would be ale to fit into society? What kind of work could he do? I did a lot of research on that one and then he picked a career himself dealing with crystals, gemstones and jewelry design. I’m going to cover some of the things to consider in terms of employment.

Evaluating ADHD is a complicated procedure that requires a lot of experience mainly because there is not a single instrument that can determine ADHD. This leaves the evaluator with having to rule out the other diagnoses that can be confused with ADHD like anxiety disorder, learning disability and bipolar disorder. There are some instruments called continuous performance test that are good measures...

ADHDers have a lot of difficulties adjusting to a world that doesn’t understand them. It’s even worse if the ADHDer doesn’t understand him or herself. Self-esteem tends to plummet. It’s not incidental that one of the first books on ADHD was titled “You mean I’m not Lazy, Crazy or Stupid.” This ls the view that ADHDers tend to develop of themselves. Even if they are finally diagnosed, it’s difficul...

Being a parent is not easy. Being the parent of an ADHD child is even harder, yet most of the treatment advice we get is focused on the child. We, as parents, are kind of overlooked or treated as an afterthought. In this show, I’m going to focus on parent care. We need to be able to take care of ourselves or it won’t be good for the whole family. I have a lot of training in what we used to called...

ADHDers tend to have difficulties with education as conducted in the United States. Therefore, it’s important for them to develop other interests. These can be sports , music, theater, art and many other activities loosely categorized as sports. These activities are loosely called hobbies but they are extremely important for an ADHD child because they allow them to perfect other abilities that may...

One of the most important skills to teach an ADHD child is resilience. One of the quickest ways to sabotage your efforts is to let them quit easily. This covers everything from guitar lessons to Little League. ADHDers can learn pretty much anything, if they put their minds to it, but few new things will come easily. They will require effort and frustration tolerance. Your child will never develop...

Coaching. Is not the same as psychotherapy. People can be coaches witthout without being psychotherapists. People can be psychotherapists without being coaches. Coaching comes out of the positive psychology movement and the basic goal is to help people become the best they can be. The goals are set by the client. Psychotherapy comes from the mental health and involves trying to reduce the distress...

ADHDers get more criticism than neurotypical children and frequently have lower self-esteem. To help them develop resilience and better self-esteem, it’s important to remember that they have a lot of strengths and positives. On this show I will briefly review the positives and strengths that ADHDers commonly demonstrate.