ADHD, ADD, Autism.

dori2o

Can anyone help.

After reading about the above illnesses/conditions, it is possible my youngest (6 years old) is sufferring from one of them. We have thought this for a few years, she is hyperactive, constantly in trouble, both at home and at school, never tires out, marches to her own beat, is always hitting out at us and other children.

2 years ago we went to the doctors who referred us to our local Health Visitors, who in turn sent out a social worker. We were made to feel like it was our fault, we were given parenting lessons, and insulted in our own home when the social worker said she was worried that because my wife had a bad childhood where she was beaten by one of her parents, they were concerned that she may follow suit and go for our youngest. There has never been any hint of this in my wife, and very calmly my wife asked the social worker to leave and never come back, we also wrote a letter of complaint about it. Since then we have never had any visits.

It is now getting unbearable, everyday is a fight with my youngest, we go out shopping she wanders off, we tell her off she carries on doing what she wants, she has no concept of right and wrong desite our best efforts to show her what is right and wrong.

Bedtimes are the worst, we put her to bed, 5 mins later she needs the toilet and is out of bed, then she needs a drink, then she hasn't given us a kiss,then this,then that,then the other. I even tried putting a tv and dvd in her room but it makes no difference.

I'm off work for a weeks holiday after this week and I want to go back to the doctors,my wife will not go because of what happened last time.

How do I get someone to listen to me and take on board what we are saying. I feel sorry for my daughter every time she is in trouble, I just get the feeling that she does not know why no matter how much we try and explain it to her.

Can anyone who has had any experience with this please help. My only option at the moment is to refuse to leave the doctors room until the agree to do something to help us.

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

See what the school says in September. They have special needs co-ordinators. If no joy there, or you can't bear to wait that long before doing something, perhaps a private assessment by a psychologist.

dori2o

Can anyone advise how much a private assessment/Consultation would cost in the Oldham/Manchester area.

fc123

Hi I had a friend some years back who had similar issues with her daughter. Purely by chance, they discovered diet made a huge difference. It was on a holiday in a remote place and they only ate very basic rice/veg type meals and hardly any sugar ~(no soft drinks so no aspartame either).

They thought it was the hol but she read somewhere about the links with diet and behaviour. She found about sucrose, fructose etc all the hiddden sugars in everyday foods. Her daugher is full of energy and bright as a button but now is much calmer and not nearly as wired as before.
Adapting the family diet took a while but the effort was worth it in her view as life is calmer now.

It would be worth a google as the sugarfree versions of things are equally as bad as they contain aspartame (banned in USA I believe).

dori2o

I wish it was only that,when we first got the social worker last time this is one of the first things we tried, but it was all to no avail. According to the social worker however,it was our attitude towards children that was the problem, this despite the fact our eldest is very bright and very rarely in trouble.

absolutebounder

dori2o wrote: »

Can anyone help.

After reading about the above illnesses/conditions, it is possible my youngest (6 years old) is sufferring from one of them. We have thought this for a few years, she is hyperactive, constantly in trouble, both at home and at school, never tires out, marches to her own beat, is always hitting out at us and other children.

2 years ago we went to the doctors who referred us to our local Health Visitors, who in turn sent out a social worker. We were made to feel like it was our fault, we were given parenting lessons, and insulted in our own home when the social worker said she was worried that because my wife had a bad childhood where she was beaten by one of her parents, they were concerned that she may follow suit and go for our youngest. There has never been any hint of this in my wife, and very calmly my wife asked the social worker to leave and never come back, we also wrote a letter of complaint about it. Since then we have never had any visits.

It is now getting unbearable, everyday is a fight with my youngest, we go out shopping she wanders off, we tell her off she carries on doing what she wants, she has no concept of right and wrong desite our best efforts to show her what is right and wrong.

Bedtimes are the worst, we put her to bed, 5 mins later she needs the toilet and is out of bed, then she needs a drink, then she hasn't given us a kiss,then this,then that,then the other. I even tried putting a tv and dvd in her room but it makes no difference.

I'm off work for a weeks holiday after this week and I want to go back to the doctors,my wife will not go because of what happened last time.

How do I get someone to listen to me and take on board what we are saying. I feel sorry for my daughter every time she is in trouble, I just get the feeling that she does not know why no matter how much we try and explain it to her.

Can anyone who has had any experience with this please help. My only option at the moment is to refuse to leave the doctors room until the agree to do something to help us.

Children do this when they canget away with it. they are testing you to see who is strongest. Dont reward her with things like a tv send her to the room and lock the doorGive her apotty if she says she needs the loo. Praise her when she does do well but take away your acceptance of her when she misbehaves and make sure you win the battle.
ADHD is often linked to tiredness. put her to bed early and dont let her up until the morning.

aliasojo

dori2o wrote: »

2 years ago we went to the doctors who referred us to our local Health Visitors, who in turn sent out a social worker.

It is now getting unbearable, everyday is a fight with my youngest, we go out shopping she wanders off, we tell her off she carries on doing what she wants, she has no concept of right and wrong desite our best efforts to show her what is right and wrong.

I just get the feeling that she does not know why no matter how much we try and explain it to her.

Go back to your Doctor and ask to be referred to a specialist as you suspect your child's problems are not the result of your parenting and may be ADHD related.

The Health Visitor is the cheap/easy route sometimes opted for first.

You do need to be 100% confident that your parenting is not the issue though. Are you both consistent? Do you both invoke the same chastisements?

Do you feel she has only 'surface listened' and therefore easily forgets what's been said to her? Try to get her in a quiet place and get her to look into your eyes when you tell her something, then get her to repeat back to you, whatever it is you want her to do. The key aspect is focus. Do this every time you need her to take on board what you're saying to her and see if it makes any difference.

Does her school find there are any concentration or behavioural issues with her? IF there is a medical issue, there will be signs at both school and home. You really need to speak to her teacher. Often age 6 or 7 is the key time when signs of ADHD or other similar disorders may be diagnosed.

In my experience, sometimes you have to separate the wheat from the chaff so to speak, before you get someone who is able to consider all aspects and not just opt for the easiest option and then try to make it fit. So if you geninely feel there is 'something', then be persistent.

Good luck with it all, but remember things are not usually one sided and no-one is perfect. There WILL be things that as a parent, you could perhaps do better with, so be prepared to take all advice on board. That's the case for us all I think, whether we have wondrously perfect kids or not.

purplehelen

Hi
I just read your thread with despair. My son has ADHD but it took 9 years for anyone to listen to me. I like you attended every parenting course offered after being told it was effectively 'my bad parenting skills.' My self esteem was through the floor as I believed in my sleep depraved state that the 'experts' had to be right and it must be my fault. Good friends made me realise that it wasn't and supported me in my endeavours to find out what was wrong - after all my daughter was the complete opposite personality and had been brought up in the same environment.

You must not give up. I eventually got listened to by a psychologist from the Child and Family Consultation Service (CFCS). I'm not sure if you have this in Manchester but there must be an equivalent. It took a long time and a lot of meetings where again it was suggested a small spell of counselling would help. It didn't but it did allow the 'experts' first hand experience of my sons behaviour! This in itself led to diagnosis - its hard to ignore when a child psychologist of 20 years standing was made to feel uncomfortable by my sons lack of co-operation!

Keep pushing, keep fighting. If your child does have ADHD you will fight for her rights for the rest of her life because there are unfortunately still loads of people who believe it doesn't exist and that maye a good telling off or a smack will sort them out!
Good luck

hunnyy

Hi, just to let you know, my son is 8 and was recently diagnosed with aspergers syndrome (like a mild form of autism). I paid for a private consultation and it cost me £600 (im in South Wales). It still took over a year for a full diagnosis even though we went private.
I found the school to be extremely unhelpful as my son is very quiet and extremely withdrawn - this obviously doesn't worry the teacher because he is not disruptive and so the school was completely not interested. Because we had paid private though our consultant made the school and an educational psycholigist 'test' him. Again these came back okay because his main problem is the lack of wanting to socialise and not speak to anyone rather than disrupting other children.
I would say hang in there - it sounds like you've done your research and take this to the doctor with you.
It is easy to feel or take the blame for your children's behaviour (and like you i have an older daughter who is very bright and 'normal') But like our consultant said to us - we know our son we've always treated him to what makes him comfortable and know how far we can push him (like being in crowded places etc...) it is the school and other adults that need to change not you - out of everyone i am sure you are the one that knows her better than anyone.
Oh - ive tried the whole food, diet, behavior techniques etc... but he is who he is and actually he's a pretty cool kid.
:A

dori2o

Hi, sorry I have not been back for a couple of days.

Thanks very much for the advice. We are sure it is not our parenting that's the problem, after all we have 2 children and our eldest is great, has her moments from time to time but what 8 yr old doesn't.

The school I feel will be the difficult part of all this, we know a child in the school has been diagnosed with ADHD and the school flatly refused to give their opinions.

We have now started to keep a diary, noting all the problem throughout the day and what we have tried to do to resolve them, hopefully we can use this as evidence to support our case.

All we want to do is find out if there is a problem. if there is then we can start to deal with it. I hate shouting at either of the kids, my wife feels the same, and whenever i punish them I feel guilty, but they both get treated the same, and both my wife and I use the same punishments.

I'm sure my daughter hates always being in trouble, and if she does have ADHD/ADD/ODD/whatever,then we can try and get her further help and maybe calm her down. Surely that would mean a better quality of life for her.

Thanks again for the advice so far.

alias123

As some of the previous posters have said, try and get a referral from your doctor to your local 'child and adolescent mental health service'(CAMHS). They will be able to tell you one way or the other.