Natural Way to Deal with ADHD

I would do an elimination diet, often times food issues are mistaken for ADHD, such as sensitivities to gluten or sugar. Once that has been ruled out then I would start looking at other home treatments, and as a last resort, meds.

Sigh. I can relate.

I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was in 3rd grade.

My boys were diagnosed in 1st grade.

I really struggled with giving my boys medications because of how hard it was on me as a little girl. But back then, the medications were different. All they had, pretty much, was Ritalin. Ritalin and I don't get along. There are huge portions of my childhood that I don't remember, thanks to Ritalin.

So when my boys were each fully evaluated and diagnosed, I tried all kinds of natural remedies for them. Some of them made a slight difference (caffeine, magnesium, Omega 3's, DHEA, balanced diets). Most didn't do a thing (BrightSpark, AD/HD multivitamin mixes, ). But none of them made a big enough difference to help my boy boys in school and with homework.

I went to our doctor (a D.O.) and talked with him. I explained my reluctance to medicate and he said a few things that changed my outlook completely.

1. ADHD is a brain communication problem. So is epilepsy. If your child were having seizures, would you hesitate to give him the medication needed to stop them? Then why the hesitation to treat a brain communication problem just because the symptoms aren't as severe? Especially during a time when what he learns is so important...and he CAN'T learn without some kind of intervention? This isn't a parenting issue....it's a BRAIN problem.

2. You don't have to go straight to the stimulants. There are non-stimulant options out there, and you should try them out. The fact is, for AD/HD kids, stimulants DO work the best...but you can also get good results with a lower dose stimulant and a non-stimulant combo.

3. If your child has negative side effects, you can try something else. You aren't stuck with a drug just because your doctor prescribed it. Go back, try something else. And if your doctor isn't open to that, find another doctor.

I hope this helps.

C. Lee

ETA: There are countless studies out there that say countless things about treating AD/HD. And I completely understand trying to find another way to treat the condition, but what I'm trying to say is: When you get to the end of the natural/non-medication road, don't stop there and throw your hands up in frustration, leaving your child untreated. The goal is to find something that works and helps your child to be successful. If meds are the answer, use them. You're not a failure as a parent for choosing to medicate your child if they need it.

I personally very strongly disagree with medicating a child, and I think the effects of the psychotropic drugging of children won't fully be realized for many years. Then we will look at the pharmaceutical companies and wish they had told us the truth.

ADHD is not a disease, it's a host of symptoms that have been classified as a disease. It's like saying a cough is a disease. It's not, it's a symptom.

There are probably many different causes of the ADHD symptoms, therefore the treatment will depend on the cause in your child. You MUST find the cause.

In many, it's a food intolerance of some kind. Our food today is very different than it was when we were young. It's full of artificial colors, sweeteners, MSG, genetically modified ingredients, pesticides, etc. You can start by feeding your daughter organic foods and getting rid of artificial colors, sweeteners and MSG.

Our food doesn't contain as many vitamins as it used to. An orange today contains much less vitamin C than it used to. You'll want to supplement with a GOOD source of vitamins (and not all vitamins are created equal).

Sometimes it's heavy metals in the body from vaccinations that can cause ADHD. Chelation can help with that.

It could be a candida overgrowth. She could have gotten that from you when she was in utero (so it would seem like it's "hereditary). Both of you should get tested for that. Candida overgrowth affects 80% of the population, and they don't even know it. The symptoms can be exactly ADHD symptoms in some people. Look up candida overgrowth.

My advice to you is to take your daughter to a holistic practitioner. They can do saliva or hair tests to see if your daughter is lacking in a vitamin or mineral.

Allergy testing can see if your daughter is suffering from a food intolerance.

My daughter acted ADHD in first grade when she was 6. It was recommended we get her tested--and drugged. All we really needed to do was eliminate red #40 from her diet. No more symptoms! I can't imagine how I would feel if I drugged my child when all we needed to do was eat better and eliminate artificial colors.

Others may choose to go the medication route, and I believe it's every parent's choice how to raise their children and I would never take that right away. But I personally strongly disagree with drugging children, and that's how we raise our family.

Talk to your ped or a child psychiatrist. True ADHD is most effectively managed by medications. It is not a parenting problem or a diet issue, its a nuerological condition. Sure, diet and behavior modification might help a bit,but will never fully allow a kid with TRUE ADHD to shine to their full potential.

EDIT: I understanding not wanting to use medication- these are powerful drugs-scary stuff! I know many have had negative experiences, but my family's has been completely positive. We plucked out on the first drug we tried and it has been a miracle worker. My then 6 yr old was so depressed, had low self esteem, thought she was stupid, was FAILING every subject. Within a month of going on medication she was back to her normal, confident cheerful self and grade had gone from F to B. She's a 3rd grade honor roll student now.

EDIT: TRUE ADHD is neurological. The brain has a genetic marker and basically develops differently than a regular brain. Gluten allwrgies and red dyes don't cause TRUE ADHD but may cause ADHD like sympotoms in a child with a "normal" brain.

i think there is no natural way to deal ADHD, its a chemical imbalance and your child needs medication from experts to alleviate some of the symptoms. and about dealing with ADHD there are support groups which your entire family can join with.

I agree with the others here experienced with ADHD. Don't be afraid of medication. Talk to the specialist who made the diagnosis for the best advice for a medical game plan. Get informed as much as you can. Join CHADD and subscribe to ADDitude magazine.

There is no natural way to treat ADHD. We all wish we could just make a dietary change or use supplements and see results. It just doesn't work that way. Omega 3s are showing promise, but they only help with focus and to a mild degree. It won't solve the ADHD symptoms entirely, unless you're dealing with a very mild case.

Medication completely transformed our son's world. He went from being kicked out of preschool to fitting in like a normal child in kindergarten and making honor roll now in 4th grade. It connected the dots in his brain in ways that our parenting strategies (even in working with a behavioral therapist) could not. Same child with the same personality and s****, but normal behavior.

We also tried neurofeedback, a newer treatment option. That cost a fortune and unfortunately for us, we were in the 50% group that doesn't see results.

Again, the diagnosing specialist is your best source for expert advice.

P.S. Definitely use caffeine only as a last resort. It's a stimulant, like medication, but unlike medication, it's addictive. We gave our son caffeinated soda if we needed to take him out in public for something important (as we waited to get in with the child psychiatrist for real help). It doesn't offer the same degree of treatment as medication does. It's a temporary solution, not one to use all the time.

ETA: New research from Harvard found that ADHD is closely related to conditions including Autism and Schizophrenia. This is not a condition you want to treat yourself, unless you have a medical degree.

Also, to Cheerful, calling it "drugging" is insulting and ignorant. Would you use that language to a parent who's treating a child's heart condition with medication? It's not drugging, it's treating a very valid medical disorder. Please don't comment on something you have no personal experience dealing with or any medical background.

Fish oil has worked wonders in our house! We also had her tested for food allergies and sensitivities -- we discovered wheat sensitivity and milk and egg allergies, so we adjusted the diet. It has made a big difference.

ETA: I'm all for medication when the situation warrants it, but after watching "the medicated child" on netflix and watching my nephew struggle with a variety of health issues after 12 years on the meds, I will do everything in my power to avoid the medications unless absolutely necessary. According to our pediatrician, approximately 80% of diagnosed add/adhd cases are not truly add or adhd. Very much is attributable to learning styles and differences, allergies and sensitivities, giftedness, etc. There's a lot of research out there on it.

ETA: I really appreciate Mommyc's post -- but the idea of a "formal" diagnosis is, to me, very squishy. My daughter was diagnosed on the basis of a questionnaire. That's it. To me, that is insufficient for a diagnosis. But it was a "formal" diagnosis. I don't know what other people's experience with childhood psychiatric diagnoses is, but to me, it is too easy to pigeon hole a child and prescribe medication. JMO.

My son is 7 and was diagnosed with ADHD about a year ago. The medicine route didn't work for us. They would all work in the beginning but after about 4 weeks he would be so emotional it would interfere with his quality of life. So medicine was off the table for us. I then found this book: Parenting Children With ADHD: 10 Lessons That Medicine Cannot Teach by Vincent L. Monastra which was very helpful. There is a chapter or 2 on medicines so I just skipped those. Also, Children's Hospital here offers class on Parent Training for Kids with ADHD which I will be starting next month. You could also try a child psychiatrist and go as a family to find ways to handle and "teach" behavior to your child. Your pediatrician should be able to point you to the right people to help if you don't want to do medication.

Best of luck!!
Katrina

Since the docs can hook up an EEG to a person's head and measure brainwaves or do a PET scan and see hyperactivity going on in the brain it is a measurable disease. It can be quantified and diagnosed without all those expensive tests though.

I think of it like this. If your child was a diabetic and the doc wanted to put her on insulin would you be here asking for natural ways of fixing that? If she had a seizure disorder and was having seizures every few days and the doc wanted to give her meds would you be here asking for a natural way to fix seizures? Maybe but you'd get a lot of mom's telling you that she may just have to live with taking a medication on a daily basis, perhaps for a very very very long time.

It's the same with ADD/ADHD. If it a true diagnosis that is measurable then it may need medication. My grandson is like night and day when he has his half a Ritalin. It speeds his brain up so it sync's and he can pay attention and understand the world around him, process it, apply what's going on and make heads or tails of it.

Medication effects the brain by speeding it up to a point it suddenly starts working efficiently.

Like a car, have you ever had a car that drove badly at 40 but if you could keep it at a steady 45 it smoothed out and drove very well? That's the same thing. When the brain is going along normally it's firing all over the place, nothing is going where it's supposed to be going, it's random and unorganized. When the medication hits it the speeding up makes it sync and work normally. That's why coffee or Mountain Dew or other high caffeine drinks will show an effect. They are not very healthy since they effect the whole body and have all those empty calories in the drink. Also do not ever ever ever ever give that child artificial sweetener or red dye 40. Those are known to effect behavior in normal kids and can drive an ADHD kid to the brink.

Please take your child to be evaluated "if" the teacher observes any issues or behaviors that may need to be addressed. Your child may not ever show any signs of having issues during school. She may also have so many problems that she has to be medicated soon after the semester starts.

The most recent issue of Parents Magazine about the possibility of a link between gluten sensitivity and ADHD. If you can get your hands on a copy (April 2013), it might be worth reading. A few quotes:

"Kids with undiagnosed celiac [disease] or gluten sensitivity may simply be showing ADHD-like symptoms. With primary ADHD, however, diet changes don't make a dramatic difference."

So, if she doesn't have a formal ADHD diagnosis, see if eliminating gluten from her diet makes any differences. Another quote:

"A small Italian study found that 15 percent of kids and adults with ADHD tested positive for celiac. After they ate a gluten-free diet for six months, they had a decrease in distractibility and impulsiveness."

It also says "If you're going gluten-free for ADHD, it's helpful to pinpoint what improvements you're hoping to see. 'Take a day or two to establish a baseline of your child's symptoms.' ... How many tantrums does she have in a week. How long can she focus on her schoolwork? Then you can reassess over the course of weeks and months on the diet. If you're not seeing any significant changes, the diet may not be worth your while."

Anyway, something to think about. I don't have personal ADHD experience so I can't offer any first hand advice. good luck!

I wasn't diagnosed with ADD until I was an adult and I went through the mess of trying to find a medication at the correct dose for me and as an adult, who knew what was going on, it was awful. I can't imagine putting a child through that.

However, as a teacher, I do realize there are children who benefit from medication. As a parent, that would never be the first thing I try.

I think when she gets to school, it will be a conversation you need to have with her teacher. Tell teacher that you understand she might be active, but you are looking for alternative ways to address that and teach her to cope without assuming meds are the only approach. School days, especially kindergarten, are long for kids who have a lot of energy. They are long for kids who's activity level is "normal" because, in my opinion, school doesn't have very appropriate expectations for young children.

You will need to have ways for your daughter to get her energy out before and after school. When she comes home from school, the worst thing you can do will be to put her in front of the TV, computer, or other screen. She needs activity, otherwise her time when she needs to sit and concentrate at school will be that much worse.

Help her practice sitting down to do specific tasks, write her name, draw a picture. Start simple and gradually increase the time and see how she deals with it.

Maintain contact with her teacher and PRAY that you get an understanding teacher who is willing to work with your child rather than insisting that she be medicated!! A good teacher will help you brainstorm ways to help her be successful.

Good luck!

Look into neurobiofeedback. We call it brain training. My daughter was on meds for a couple of years before we learned of this. She was at the highest dosage they could give. Now she is completely off it. For Neurofeedback, she would watch a cartoon, whatever she choses from their library, and they would play it through a computer program that would cause the image and audio to flicker or waver when her brain waves went outside of parameters set by the technician. Other than wear sensors on her head, she didnt have to do anything, consciously. The brain picked up on this flickering, and learned what caused it and to keep the brain waves within the parameters kept the picture and audio flowing smoothly. Over several sessions, the brain learns to keep them there. i highly recommend it, especially with little ones as it's almost completely instruction free.

Find a disciplined activity that will teach how to react to situations calmly (Karate, ballet, etc) - If your daughter spends most of her time indoors in 4 walls 24/7, that will drive anyone crazy, so let her go outside weather permitting and play/work it off.

If diet "fixes" it it's not Adhd, it's food allergies, however I do think that a balanced diet is good for all kids esp kids with Adhd. My son reacts poorly to sugar, but I think he would regardless of his Adhd.

That said, our philosophy regarding Adhd is that it can not be "treated" or "fixed" as our son is not sick or broken. Our son has to learn to live with Adhd and himself as is. We find ways to help curb his activity levels, things that work for him in the class room and at home to get him to focus. We have found that for my son if it is tought via computer/video game he picks up on it VERY WELL, however simply by verbal communication, not so much. His teacher has found that a balance between independant studies and group studies has helped him greatly.

I am going to suggest you seek the guidance of a neurologist, developmental pediatrician and possibly an occupational therepist.

Since we are not medicating a pshycologist was not on our list of "go to" people.

Again, you can and should try dietary changes, but know that if it's diet cured it's not Adhd. In addition there are so many schools of though here there, everywhere you simply have to find what works for your family.

I would try a nutritional approach. Does she have a lot of sugar or other stimulating foods in her diet, this could even be a lot of fruit juice... Maybe keep a food journal and begin to write down any changes you see in her behavior once she eats different foods.. I
Although I don't have ADHD, I do notice a HUGE difference in my body chemistry when I am off sugar and or white flour and other things that may cause food sensitivities.. I've known other parents whom when they changed up their child's diet, they did have some success in resolving their child's ADHD.

good luck

I tired coffee but my son does not like the taist of it for the most part unless it's very dr.ed. We started giving him Mt. Dew which has helped. You can also try fish oil. We did that for a while and as it stopped worked we increased the doses. After a while we put him in gymnastics and now he goes to the gym three nights a week and it's tought him focus and gets lots of energy out. At 5 I would try the fish oil and caffeen. Also watch what you give her to eat. My dr told us if we were going to give him sugars try to balance with carbs. I commend you for not wanting to jump to meds. There are many children out there that yes need them don't get me wrong but there are so many that can be helped naturaly but it take work. Good luck!!!