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Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

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Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#51

Post by jeromie »

whatnotests2 wrote: post #2

Seriously, yoga. Martial arts. Painting. Crafts. Working on cars, bicycles, motorcycles, skateboarding. These all have something in common: each has a goal, but these are individual pursuits. They require and reward focus, and succumbing to distractions will be obvious because progress will suffer.

I went down the music track around that age, and it was the gateway into daily routine, meditation, delayed gratification and a community similar to software (at least back in the day) that understands and embraces neurodivergence. It's now this life-long cornerstone that brings me deep joy and stability when things are too hard. It was probably one of the first places where I really felt seen by adults and found peers that got me.

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#52

Post by getwiththeprog »

xlii wrote: post #23

Depending on how severe your nephews ADHD is (and it can go from borderline ADHD to severe mixed type) it might be worth doing sleep training, eating training, stimuli training etc. In all cases I would recommend multiple psychological education courses. Sports and diet are very important - protein rich diet has protective effect on neurological system (doesn’t mean only proteins but make sure that healthy amount is…

Raising diet is very important. Eating fast foods and drinking sodas daily will make a teeanger exhibit ADHD type symptoms. Many people do not think that caffiene is in colas, or energy drinks and etc. Poor diet has become so normalized that a doctor might not even ask about it.

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#53

Post by jeromie »

feydaykyn wrote: post #19

From my experience as a parent of a 11 year old with ADHD: - we start the diagnosis process because he was very depressed as being bad at school, everything was hard, while there was no need. - meds are fantastic, they let all his qualities shine. They do require some experimentation at the beginning. At the beginning I was not at ease with giving him meds, but it turns out there's no lasting effect, and the differen…

Just the usual caution that Melatonin can be effective, but it's also really easy to overdose a kid. Consult your doctor first if you decide to go that route.

https://ukhealthcare.uky.edu/wellness-community/blog/melaton...

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#54

Post by jeromie »

trod1234 wrote: post #45
thenaturalist wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Don’t give drugs, they can permanently mess up his mind. Reading your entire comment, but especially this sentence makes my blood boil. None of this is backed up by science and you provide no sources. This is the equivalent to flat earthers explaining how the universe works or anti-vaxxers how thoughts cure disease. The OPPOSITE is true: Medication, especially given during age when neuroplasticity is still high can…

> Don't give drugs, they can permanently mess up his mind. This is common and good advice. Ritalin at one point was prescribed for ADD and ADHD, Kurt Cobain ended up dying by suicide as a result of complications from his use of the drug. Spectrum disorders have been used for the past 20+ years as catchall diagnoses. There have been many stories of people who were diagnosed with these disorders, when in fact they were…

>Kurt Cobain ended up dying by suicide as a result of complications from his use of the drug.

Oof... you skipped right over the Heroin part of that equation.

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#55

Post by whatnotests2 »

jeromie wrote: post #51
whatnotests2 wrote: post #2

Seriously, yoga. Martial arts. Painting. Crafts. Working on cars, bicycles, motorcycles, skateboarding. These all have something in common: each has a goal, but these are individual pursuits. They require and reward focus, and succumbing to distractions will be obvious because progress will suffer.

I went down the music track around that age, and it was the gateway into daily routine, meditation, delayed gratification and a community similar to software (at least back in the day) that understands and embraces neurodivergence. It's now this life-long cornerstone that brings me deep joy and stability when things are too hard. It was probably one of the first places where I really felt seen by adults and found pee…

Music! I missed that one, but yes, I think it fits right in.

I'm glad it has served you well.

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#56

Post by thenaturalist »

miramba wrote: post #22
thenaturalist wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Don’t give drugs, they can permanently mess up his mind. Reading your entire comment, but especially this sentence makes my blood boil. None of this is backed up by science and you provide no sources. This is the equivalent to flat earthers explaining how the universe works or anti-vaxxers how thoughts cure disease. The OPPOSITE is true: Medication, especially given during age when neuroplasticity is still high can…

...then post some, instead of obviously biased organisations which make a living of treating it as a problem but can't come up with better reasons than -are less likely to finish high school and college -are more likely to experience unemployment -have more difficulty paying bills -are more likely to experience substance use issues How likely? I'm not bothering looking it up, it should be mentioned right there! Anywa…

If you are truly a clinician, I don't understand your comment.

Because it's all about you, your morals and unscientific personal opinion and 0 about interest for patient outcomes.

That is not the medical ethos.

And it seems you actually don't have much touchpoints with modern psychiatric practice.

I'd give a lot for my parents who got indication of my diagnosis at a much earlier age and never told me to act on that instead of me suffering the consequences of their failure to provide medical intervention - both with regards to broken relationships in personal and professional life, years of depression and thousands of Euros out of my own pocket to get to the point of understanding myself where I am today.

As always if you start on a psychoactive medication, adult or not, you'd go trough titration to determine an optimal dose.

This is closely monitored by your psychiatrist where I live.

Nobody in this process has any incentive to produce sedated zombies.

Everyone in this process has incentives to avoid very real human suffering.

If you want to go more in depth, as always, Huberman has an in depth and direct source rich talk here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxgCC4H1dl8

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#57

Post by thenaturalist »

trod1234 wrote: post #45
thenaturalist wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Don’t give drugs, they can permanently mess up his mind. Reading your entire comment, but especially this sentence makes my blood boil. None of this is backed up by science and you provide no sources. This is the equivalent to flat earthers explaining how the universe works or anti-vaxxers how thoughts cure disease. The OPPOSITE is true: Medication, especially given during age when neuroplasticity is still high can…

> Don't give drugs, they can permanently mess up his mind. This is common and good advice. Ritalin at one point was prescribed for ADD and ADHD, Kurt Cobain ended up dying by suicide as a result of complications from his use of the drug. Spectrum disorders have been used for the past 20+ years as catchall diagnoses. There have been many stories of people who were diagnosed with these disorders, when in fact they were…

Do you have any sources for what you claim to be fact here?

Cause it sure as hell goes way against common research.

> This is common and good advice.

No it is not.

To be clear: This is equivalent to saying: Don't get vaccinated, vaccines don't work.

Or: The earth is flat.

It is unscientific and plain wrong.

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#58

Post by thenaturalist »

reify wrote: post #17

The child is in more danger from medications during the process of brain development. Thats why their are different prescribing protocols for adults and children and why pregnant women do not take any drugs because they can damage the developing fetal brain. Neuroplasticity refers to the ability of the brain to reorganize and modify its neural connections in response to environmental stimuli, experience, learning, in…

Conversely, correcting brain development during active brain development can have very real benefits.

In this talk, Huberman discusses benefits of medicating a child: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxgCC4H1dl8

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#59

Post by thenaturalist »

reify wrote: post #13

personally, as a retired psychotherapist Be very wary of ADHD diagnosis, The consequences are huge and have a massive impact on childrens lives. I hate all ADHD diagnoses, for me I have always seen just naughty children who need time to develop at their own pace and not develop at someone else's pace or for the benefit of any school cariculum or parental needs. Do not give any child medication to control ADHD, why wo…

> Do not give any child medication to control ADHD, why would you give an amphetamine to any child

This is totally unscientific advice putting your own personal opinion and values above patient outcomes and patient wellbeing.

This is unethical and goes against any professional medical standard.

Medicating a child who has ADHD can have significant long term benefits with regards to harm reduction (substance abuse, depression, risky behavior) and there is a mountain of evidence with long term studies to back this up.

How comments like yours can find their way onto a generally educated forum like HN is really beyond me.

Re: Ask HN: My 12 year-old nephew just got diagnosed with ADHD, any advice?

#60

Post by thenaturalist »

trod1234 wrote: post #44
hirvi74 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ADHD focussed psychotherapy How does anyone even find this? I find there is a lot of signal vs. noise in this realm of care. What I mean, many professionals list that they treat ADHD, when it's clearly apparent they only list that for marketing purposes. The actual care provided is either antithetical or completely unhelpful -- at least for me. For example, of the many psychotherapist I have seen, I would often be…

Did you mean to say there is a high noise floor with little signal? A lot of spectrum disorder diagnoses are misdiagnoses for other (medical) things. The diagnoses are often used as a catchall when no one can figure it out. For example, chronic heavy metal poisoning mimicks ADHD or ADD diagnoses, blood tests alone are useless because its bound to tissue very quickly after exposure (and bioaccumulates unless a chelato…

I fail to see how your recurrent relativization of the existence of ADHD has anything to do with effective psychotherapist treatment of clear symptoms.

Also, do you have reliable sources for this poisoning hypothesis?

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