As I was looking at the video of the giant blue and white spiral lights in the sky over Norway, my thoughts turned to children who have ADHD. What, you may ask, does the Norway Spiral have to do with ADHD? Those spiral lights are a phenomena to which many ADHD children could successfully attend. People who have ADHD are able to attend to things which really grab their attention. Things that are new, different, exciting, or rewarding, can hold their attention. Even though one of the three main symptoms is getting distracted easily, there are exceptions.

Parents often come to see me after being referred by a teacher who believes that their child has ADHD. Many immediately tell me that their child can’t have the disorder because the child is able to pay attention for long periods of time to video games or attractive cartoons. They only seem to have problems with schoolwork.

I explain to the parents that people with ADHD have their biggest attending problems with boring and redundant tasks such as school work. These problems are so severe that they really are unable to stay on task unless someone continually supervises them one on one.
I am writing this short article to remind you that just because your child can play a video game for long periods of time or can complete work when you closely supervise, that doesn’t rule out the possibility that he or she has ADHD.

If you think your child might have ADHD, get an evaluation and find out. The proper diagnosis and treatment can really help.

For more information on ADHD in children, go to adhd1.net

Great article about dealing with the defiant child: http://adhd1.net/defiant

Here's the opening sequence to our educational DVD, "The Dr. C & Elwood Show: An Introduction to ADHD". We'd love to hear what you think!

~Dr. C & Elwood
adhd1.net
(click here to visit our webpage)




Check out this video: Intro to the Dr. C & Elwood Show: ADHD

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The Japanese edition of our educational ADHD DVD for children and parents has just been released as a book/DVD combo!!! Half of the book is in Japanese, and the other half is in English, and contains the transcript of the video. The DVD is subtitled in Japanese. Only 2,100 Yen! :-D


~Dr. C & Elwood



Click the pic to see our listing on Amazon

Check it out, and let us know what you think! Thanks.

~Dr. C & Elwood

http://www.squidoo.com/adhd-help-for-children-and-families

When you put your hand up, you can block out the sun. One little hand can stop you from seeing the biggest object in our solar system. This phenomenon is truly amazing.

ADHD, just like your hand, can block out your ability to see and enjoy your child. There is a tendency to find ones self focusing entirely on ADHD related problems and losing sight of the child as a whole. It is easy to fall into this trap when every night you spend four hours helping your child do homework, when every time the phone rings during a school day you begin to feel anxious that your child is again in trouble, when you feel unable to take your child into stores or to other children's homes to visit, and when you spend considerable time in counseling sessions because of the ADHD.

DON'T LET ADHD STOP YOU FROM ENJOYING AND APPRECIATING YOUR CHILD!

Find fun activities which you can enjoy doing with your child on a regular basis. Limit the amount of nightly homework time. Reduce the amount of energy you spend on ADHD related problems. Appreciate your child's assets instead of only focusing on the deficits. Don't take the problems personally or too seriously. Create an ADHD friendly home environment to increase success to reduce the stress.

Remember that your children will only be children for a short time period. If you spend all of your time on the problems, you will miss out on all the fun. Don't let ADHD block out your son or daughter. If you don't start enjoying them now, they'll be grown up before you know it.

Dr C and Elwood have just completed a ten lesson ADHD curriculum designed to teach children and families about ADHD in a fun way. For more information about these lessons go to http://www.adhd1.net/adhd-video.htm