Tag Archives: ADD

Jan26

ADHD Diagnoses up 24 percent. . .

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ADHD Diagnoses up 24 percent. . .

among patients served by Kaiser Permanente who were seeking diagnosis.

This article by Stephanie O’Neill, via Southern California Public Radio, shows a common problem with science and medical reporting. This article, at least, includes a link to the study, full text, so you can see the methodology and results instead of just the abstract.

You don’t really need to read the whole thing to see the giant flaw, though. It’s right here in the second paragraph of the article:

The study of nearly 850,000 patients ages five to 11, who were seen at Kaiser’s Southern California hospitals, found a 24 percent jump in the number of children diagnosed with ADHD fro 2001 to 2010.

Not random, not controlled, not blinded in any way at all. Of course rates are going to look like they’ve jumped dramatically if your population for the study includes only people who came in requesting diagnoses for things. There’s some decent generic information in the study, there are some population concentrations that might be interesting to look at in a better-designed piece of research, but that’s not showing up in the headlines.

No, everyone in the media and on the internet is clutching their pearls about this dramatic increase. Cue the storm of conspiracy theorists insisting that this is proof that ADHD is an imaginary problem created by Big Pharma. Watch the comments of people saying it’s reflective of our horrible society that doesn’t discipline children properly and/or lets them watch too much TV and play too many video games. Note the absence in any of these reports of the obvious flaw in the methods, or even the mathematical acumen to figure out that this “dramatic jump” actually means 1-2 more children out of every hundred.

*sigh*

Jan20

How to Not Fall Asleep.

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How to Not Fall Asleep.

I am so tired of not sleeping. I’m so tired of seeing information on the internet about fixing sleep problems – it’s so simplistic, and doesn’t apply to me at all. I’m really tired of sleep medications that end up costing me even more sleep than I’ve already lost.

I’m trembling all over, feeling woozy, hung over, flu-ish. I hurt myself this afternoon because the exhaustion has made me so uncoordinated. Knocked a container off the refrigerator shelf because my hand missed what I was reaching for, slammed my other hand into the refrigerator door trying to catch it and missing broadly. The obvious solution is a nap, so I set aside an hour and a half. It went much the way my nighttime sleep did, and in my frustration, I decided to write a little chronicle.

I’m trying a little relaxation/meditation technique that involves picturing yourself as a hollow vessel, slowly filling with a warm orange liquid from toes up to head, then slowly draining back down. Very effective, according to sleep experts.

Slowly, the warm liquid fills up the toes of your feet. The big toes, the smaller toes, and then you feel the balls of your feet, then the arches, slowly filling you with warmth and calm.

I think the high pitched buzz in my head is a C. Maybe one day I’ll check to see.

Feel the warmth in your feet as the liquid fills your heels, then your ankles.

God, I hate this pounding and whooshing of my pulse in the right side of my neck and head. Whoosh/pound – whoosh/pound – whoosh/pound. . .why only on the right? Why did it start up again? It’s not the sleep meds, because it started two days ago. Maybe the feeling like someone’s plunging a sharp pencil into my right ear is from the sleep meds, though.

Feel the warmth in your feet – wait, did that. The liquid begins to fill your calves. It rises slowly, inch by inch. You feel warm and calm and peaceful.

I’m thinking of a song that was playing on the radio in Physical Therapy. Do I own that CD? The CDs are organized, the books used to be, but now I’m taking them down so we can move the shelves. Audrey’s going to the library tonight, maybe this time I’ll finally go and drop off some books for donation there. That room is such a mess.

The warm liquid rises up into your knees. Feel them relax, and then feel it begin to fill your thighs.

Hot flash. Throw off the covers. Damn dog is clanking her collar on the wood floor. Why can’t the damn dog sleep on a rug? Why does the damn dog have to sleep right in the doorway whenever I’m trying to nap? Why don’t I ever remember to take the damn dog’s collar off when I lie down for a nap? Now I’m cold. Bundle up again.

Where was I? Crap. Feel the warm liquid fill your. . .ankles? Oh, knees. Knees. Now feel it begin to fill your thighs. Feel the calming warmth spreading through your body.

Am I ever going to have the energy to finish that room? I haven’t even hemmed the curtains, now I need to take them down so I can paint. All the fabric to hang so I can start sewing again. I wonder which bag has the polar fleece? I’m hearing a Jonathan Coulton song now. I should download a few more of his tracks. But I never finished learning to play Skullcrusher Mountain, even after I transposed it into A.

The warm liquid begins to fill your pelvis. Feel the warmth entering your abdomen, filling you with peace and relaxation. . .

I have to remember to read last month’s minutes before Thursday. I should finish filling out the voucher, too, and I never did make up those forms and reports in Access. The leftover supplies are in a bag in the kitchen next to the stuff I want to Freecycle. I should do that and get them out of the way. Once they’re gone, it’ll be easier to wash the floor. This stupid medication didn’t help me sleep, I’m so tired. I could get all this stuff done if I weren’t such a zombie.

Feel the warm liquid rise up past your navel, up towards your ribs. . .

Time to get up!!!

Nov15

Body Work

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Body Work

I wasn’t going to say anything, but I’m sitting here in the middle of another annoying hot flash. They’re becoming fewer, and the intensity is diminishing, but the only good thing I can say about this is thank goodness I’ll be dealing with this for months rather than years. I have nothing bad to say about having a hysterectomy, and the hot flashes would have come anyway. I can predict some of them. . .every time I wake up, every time I lie down in bed. If I get up in the middle of the night, that’s a twofer. I’m finding that three layers are good, if cumbersome. Two shirts and a sweater for the normal cold house temperature. Sweater comes off for a mild one. Sweater and one shirt for a bad one. If nobody’s home, sometimes that last shirt comes off for a minute or two. 😉 I’m sure that by the time I’m almost completely done, I’ll remember to take my coat off before I drive, because I’m always getting pissy when a hot flash comes on and I can’t un-layer. It’s worse even than getting an itch on the bottom of your foot when you’re wearing boots and driving. WAY worse!

You know, though, I wish I’d been able to convince a doctor to do this years and years ago. I don’t have to worry about confining myself to the house in case my periods are too heavy for the most superest-plusest feminine protection. No more feeling like I have a bag of rocks in my abdomen. No more ovulation pain and cyst-busting pain. And the best is that I’m off antidepressants. That wasn’t part of the original plan, but unrelated circumstances led to weaning off, and when they were out of my system, I felt fine.

Well, fine as in before clinical depression. I do miss my Adderall, because ADD doesn’t switch on and off with hormones. I’d like to sleep, I’d like to focus, but I’d also like to see what I can accomplish without chemical intervention. And really, I’m better at focusing on one thing at a time, so right now it’s going to be losing all the extra weight. And I’m saying that here so that it’s out there to keep me honest.

South Beach, Phase 1 vegetarian. Short term this summer worked well, but then came band season (and cookie season, and grabbing something at the concession stand because you had no time to eat because you were packing and unpacking the band truck season. . .) and I lost track. So that’s where my head is right now. Remind me of that in case I forget! My blood sugar is on the high end, SB worked well for my mom on both the weight and blood sugar fronts, so we’re giving it another shot. Wish me luck.

Once I like what I see in the mirror and enjoy clothes again, I’ll decide what to tackle next.