Learning disabilities.

I got mixed feelings about ADD... my stepdad's side of the family were largely misdiagnosed with ADD, and they were properly diagnosed with bipolar. Why? The medications they used to treat bipolar were also used to treat ADD during the 60s to 80s... that have changed now.

On the other hand, I see so many people misdiagnosed with so many things until they were in their early 20s or late 30s, then they finally start responding better to ADD management. You have to remember, most people with legitimate diagnosis of ADD refuse to take medications unless all hope seems lost for them. Why? They don't like the side effects.
 
LuciaDisturbed said:
It's not a hoax. This is insulting. I have ADD and it is difficult to stay on the task since I have very short attention span, and my mind is difficult to stay on task. No matter how hard I try, ADD still affects me. Doing a paper is hard. I wish it was easier to stay on task for things like papers, math, and listening to a person speak for a long period of time, etc. It isn't easy.
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You are one of millions "NORMAL" Americans who cannot listen to a person speaking for a long period of time. What you think why I always ask people - explain it to me in one sentence.

LuciaDisturbed said:
And I haven't been taking my ADD meds in a long time because I'm not in school nor working. I was on Ritalin as a child. I've also taken Adderall in college. When I go back to school to study nursing I will have to go back on an ADD medication so I can focus.
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hmmm.... so let me ask you something - since you haven't been on ADD med for a while.... but I see that you <3 English and that you are a bookworm. I want to ask - do you need to be on ADD med to read a lot of books?
 
news flash people - at my college, I went to see a psychiatrist and based on 15 min interview and questionnaires that I filled out.... I was diagnosed with a mild form of ADD (or was it ADHD?) and I was given a medication for it - wellbutrin. Didn't do shit for me :dunno:

what worked for me was anti-narcoleptic medication and that got me thru school. Do I have a clinical condition? not at all since I was able to zzzz properly at camping or traveling at normal hour. Is it making a negative impact on my life? Not really. Sometimes it does. Misdiagnosis is a bitch. Or was it a misdiagnosis? :hmm:

Just something to think about. Like I said in my previous post - I believe ADD/ADHD is real but I believe only 10% of entire cases are REAL enough that require medication and/or professional help.... and as for rest of the cases... just a side effect of living in a highly-populated, highly-stressful, fast-paced modern society.
 
I don't have much experience at all with LD. It must be very agonizing and feeling of self defeat with difficulties in math or reading. I really need to focus more on paying attention to others capabilities of learing and individualize or adapt methodology of teaching. When I do education at the hospital, it is all done on a level where I assume everyone has to have a "base" knowledge of something. I simply make it more detailed where staff are able to make practical application of the knowledge and skills.
 
Jiro said:
You are one of millions "NORMAL" Americans who cannot listen to a person speaking for a long period of time. What you think why I always ask people - explain it to me in one sentence.
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Me, normal? Nope. I can't even listen to someone speak even if it's just for ten minutes. My mind wanders to other things.


hmmm.... so let me ask you something - since you haven't been on ADD med for a while.... but I see that you <3 English and that you are a bookworm. I want to ask - do you need to be on ADD med to read a lot of books?
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Yes, I do. I have not been able to read a book in a long time since I am not on an ADD medication since high school. And that made college difficult. When I go back to school to study nursing I will have to go back on the ADD medication.
 
Juli-terp-to-be said:
My ex husband had his diagnosis of BiPolar changed to PTSD, by the VA. I would think that having BiPolar would be better, IMO.
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I had a mild case of PTSD for a short while after lighting struck my apt in Richmond, VA and caused a half a million in damage. My heart would pound every time I saw firetrucks near my apt for a year after that. I have a terrible fear of fire so that didn't help much.
 
Jiro said:
news flash people - at my college, I went to see a psychiatrist and based on 15 min interview and questionnaires that I filled out.... I was diagnosed with a mild form of ADD (or was it ADHD?) and I was given a medication for it - wellbutrin. Didn't do shit for me :dunno:
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Wellbutrin for ADD? WTF. Clearly he put you on the wrong medication there. Wellbutrin was not designed to treat ADD/ADHD. It was designed to treat depression. And it can make you manic if you are Bipolar if you are not on a mood stabilizer too. It's no wonder the Wellbutrin didn't do shit for you. I know, I have a heavy interest in psychiatry.

Anyway, 15 minutes is not enough time to diagnose you. It takes way more time than that. Trust me. You probably had a crappy psychiatrist.

what worked for me was anti-narcoleptic medication and that got me thru school. Do I have a clinical condition? not at all since I was able to zzzz properly at camping or traveling at normal hour. Is it making a negative impact on my life? Not really. Sometimes it does. Misdiagnosis is a bitch. Or was it a misdiagnosis? :hmm:
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I'm guessing Progivil.
 
LuciaDisturbed said:
Me, normal? Nope. I can't even listen to someone speak even if it's just for ten minutes. My mind wanders to other things.




Yes, I do. I have not been able to read a book in a long time since I am not on an ADD medication since high school. And that made college difficult. When I go back to school to study nursing I will have to go back on the ADD medication.
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And I have ADD myself. No matter what I do, I can not keep myself from losing things though I've gotten better at it. I still lose things more often than most people. Do not deny the real difficulites that others go thru, Jiro.
 
deafskeptic said:
I had a mild case of PTSD for a short while after lighting struck my apt in Richmond, VA and caused a half a million in damage. My heart would pound every time I saw firetrucks near my apt for a year after that. I have a terrible fear of fire so that didn't help much.
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Wow!
 
Mrs Bucket said:
I used to think the same as you.

I used to think that the medical field either misdiagnosed or was too quick to diagnose learning disabilities until I learned I had ADHD.

All I can say is that those who feel the same way as you do have no place sharing opinions like yours because you have no idea what we all go through.

Until you walk, feel, go through what we do on a daily basis; then you are free to share your opinion.
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:gpost:
 
deafskeptic said:
And I have ADD myself. No matter what I do, I can not keep myself from losing things though I've gotten better at it. I still lose things more often than most people. Do not deny the real difficulites that others go thru, Jiro.
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I lose shit a lot too! I can't keep track of stuff sometimes. I have had to design special places for certain things such as my house keys.
 
LuciaDisturbed said:
It's not a hoax. This is insulting. I have ADD and it is difficult to stay on the task since I have very short attention span, and my mind is difficult to stay on task. No matter how hard I try, ADD still affects me. Doing a paper is hard. I wish it was easier to stay on task for things like papers, math, and listening to a person speak for a long period of time, etc. It isn't easy. And I haven't been taking my ADD meds in a long time because I'm not in school nor working. I was on Ritalin as a child. I've also taken Adderall in college. When I go back to school to study nursing I will have to go back on an ADD medication so I can focus.
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Thank God for computers. I hate to write and I have a difficult time writing by hand even though I have excellent English skills.

I remember when I was mainstreamed, my resource teacher was such a perfectionist that she made me redo my papers by hand 3 times and the 3rd time, she wasn't happy and I just gave up and stopped rewriting my paper. I don't think my paper was more than 3 pages long. This was before computers became mainstream.

Like you I have a difficult time paying attention to a person for a long time. I was infamous in oral school for not paying attention. I still hate my 2nd grade teacher because I got punished all the time for not paying attention.

I'm currently not on any ADD meds due to high blood pressure and I'm not sure that I'd take it again even if my blood pressure was cured.

It's difficult for me to stick with math because I hate it so much.
 
LuciaDisturbed said:
Wellbutrin for ADD? WTF. Clearly he put you on the wrong medication there. Wellbutrin was not designed to treat ADD/ADHD. It was designed to treat depression. And it can make you manic if you are Bipolar if you are not on a mood stabilizer too. It's no wonder the Wellbutrin didn't do shit for you. I know, I have a heavy interest in psychiatry.
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yea I know - I told her that I'm not depressed. She knows that and well if you look more into wellbutrin, you will find that it can be used for treating ADHD and even to wean off smoking addiction. Because my case was mild, it's not enough reason to prescribe Ritalin or Adderall for me. I asked for it but she can't do that because it's unethical of her to do that.

LuciaDisturbed said:
Anyway, 15 minutes is not enough time to diagnose you. It takes way more time than that. Trust me. You probably had a crappy psychiatrist.
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lol I doubt it. Rutgers University is renowned for...... psychology field in USA - top 20. I had a regular visits but you know that this is not an immediate effect where I would suddenly feel better after taking it. I've had several sessions with her and it was just a matter of trial and error with different dosage. I just find it bit funny to me that she kept asking me if I'm experiencing any suicidal thoughts or suicidal depression. But my time was up because the semester was over and I ain't interested in driving 2 hours round-trip to see her during off-semester. oh well. now that I have insurance coverage.... so I went to see new one near my house. He thinks I'm just narcoleptic so I got Provigil. Worked for a while but not anymore. (see below)

LuciaDisturbed said:
I'm guessing Progivil.
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yes I mentioned that several times. It's no longer working for me. Its side effects are starting to overwhelm me.

red-bold fonts mean it's what I had while on provigil
# Common side effects of PROVIGIL are headache, nausea, nervousness, stuffy nose, diarrhea, back pain, anxiety, trouble sleeping, dizziness, and upset stomach.
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Time to switch to different one.
 
LuciaDisturbed said:
Me, normal? Nope. I can't even listen to someone speak even if it's just for ten minutes. My mind wanders to other things.

Yes, I do. I have not been able to read a book in a long time since I am not on an ADD medication since high school. And that made college difficult. When I go back to school to study nursing I will have to go back on the ADD medication.
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I see. But you have written numbers of novel-like posts in here. You read a lot of posts (mix of short and long version). I'm wonder how you did that without ADD med.
 
deafskeptic said:
And I have ADD myself. No matter what I do, I can not keep myself from losing things though I've gotten better at it. I still lose things more often than most people. Do not deny the real difficulites that others go thru, Jiro.
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question - you said that you're getting better at it. what improved your situation? medication? professional counseling?
 
I appreciate how mrs bucket gave description about how ADHD is. I agree that is so difficult . At first i learned that dr who is hoh or late deafened who have phd told me that I have ADHD at age 30. Her explanation made sense to me that I remember I often got yelled by teacher that I made noises or distracting in the classrooms and so were college. I rather not take medicine as to what I think that i may have mild or i could be wrong. Sure, its very hard for me to focus on one thing for one minute. god. but I notice that i m ok with multitask by doing one then two then back to the original one then back to the second then addiing third back to the first one then second then third. thats how I do in my life and its ok. I understand how Jiro feels about the misdiagnose with children. but adult? its up to adults decision like mine. =?
 
Jiro said:
question - you said that you're getting better at it. what improved your situation? medication? professional counseling?
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Several things. Meds didn't improve my organizational skills though it helped with my ability to focus.

I just put my keys (or other items) in the same place and I make sure I'm not distracted. I WILL lose them if I'm distracted for even a few secs which is why I hate people interupting me while I'm doing something. A good way to piss me off is to constantly interrupt me because it will cause me to get sidetracked and make it harder for me not to lose things.

Despite the improvement, I still lose things more often than others. I don't think I'll be able to do things as well as others in this dept.

Second, synonyms decrease with age to some extent. Judging from stories that I've heard about some members in my family, I'd say it's possible that ADD may be heredity from my mother's side.

My mother's cousin Barbra still has some ADD like synonyms and she is nearly 77 years old. She's always interrupting others and she still have a lot of energy despite her age. I've heard stories from others and not just my mother that makes me think it's possible she has ADD or had it in the past.
 
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