What is ADHD?

I am often asked by parents if their child has ADHD because their behaviours correspond to the kind of behaviours which are assessed for the ADHD condition. Basically ADHD is unique to every person that has it but there are some overlapping traits that form the diagnosis of ADHD. These include impulsive behaviour, this is acting without any due consideration of the consequences. Being very active, constantly fidgeting and also failure to complete tasks and being easily distracted. Presenting these symptoms regularly over a period of time generally leads to  a diagnosis of ADHD.

However certain developmental stages of a child’s growing up and which are quite natural and necessary, do tend to throw up the same type of symptoms at the time . Anything from the ‘terrible twos’ to adolescence is going to run up similar scores on an assessment scale  and can be alarming to parents.

Compare this to a story of ‘Hyperactivity’ with other behavioural complications in an interview that I did for my radio show. This was with a lady who lived in a village, she felt the local school did not understand or help her with her son’s behaviour. Her neighbours shunned her and their children were not allowed to play with her son. The vicious cycle built up around this situation and created greater complications with the behaviour. Her partner did not understand or support her in the difficulties and blamed her for not controlling the lad. In fact her would deliberately go and buy the child sweets with the additives in that she had identified as contributing to the problem. She couldn’t go out to do the shopping as he would try and strangle her when she was driving. When she got to the supermarket he would run amok and she would often have to leave without the shopping, only to go home and be on the receiving end of her partner’s displeasure at there being no food in.

This young man went on to trash three houses that she lived in and many a time she grappled with him, trying to take the scissors out of his hand when he was attempting to stab her and at the same time kicking her. The home was always a dangerous place as he would often try to find something to harm himself or others with.

The worst part of it all was the loneliness and having no one to connect with. The relationship with her partner eventually broke down. Listen to the interview here.

This is rather an extreme example of how bad the situation can get but it certainly gives you an idea of what parents go through in trying to cope with the impact of this condition.

Press play and listen to her story

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