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Neural Feedback Training as Therapy for ADHD?
"If you haven't heard of it, the idea is that by attaching sensors to the head, brainwaves can be measured, and by providing visual feedback, you can actually train your brain to regulate its activity. An ADHD person supposedly has a brain which isn't very good at keeping itself in 'concentration' mode. In a child, the feedback takes the form of a game or in the case of an infant, a pleasing pattern on the screen (an infant would probably be treated for sleep disorders, not ADHD, in case you were wondering). When the brainwaves are in the 'right' state, the game proceeds or the patterns get prettier. When the brainwaves are erratic, it all slows down.
Because it is a trendy new thing, it's been put forward as a possible treatment for many other things including sleeplessness, epilepsy and other disorders, but one of the better successes has been in the treatment of ADHD.
The whole thing sounds quite plausible, but it is also quite expensive. All of the stuff I've read has been either from the suppliers of the treatment, or from people trying to discredit it."
I've actually tried the sofware, as I have an uncle that's into this stuff. I couldn't seem to "train" my brain waves in the short time I tried it, though. And those sensors pressing on your head HURT after a while :(
Seriously, I'm sorry this is happening to you and it sucks, but go talk to someone who knows how to help you. Please.
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
I don't know about the Neural Feedback Training, but I'd suggest finding an alternative to Ritalin ASAP.
There are many studies out there about the inefficient conversion of ALA To EPA and DHA in people with ADHD, leading me to believe that pumping your kid full of stimulants is a (very) wrong answer.
Try Mercola.com, which has some very informative articles on ADHD. As a start, make sure your kid isn't having a lot of sugar and caffeine (ie drinking fruit juices and soda).
I love the line about Einstein. We can say all kinds of theories about the dude because he's now dead, projecting anything on to him.
Proper treatment of ADD is *not* just enough pills to "calm them down". Proper treatment of ADD is a variety of coping mechanisms, with stimulants being one of them.
In fact, having ADD and being prescribed Ritalin, I have accomplished far greater things than I would have were I to not have been medicated. Now that I am on my own, I still have found it to be beneficial, both for work, and for play.
I would steer clear of anyone with such a vehement position on this issue, as it is a serious one. To deny someone the benefits of proper medication is to bar them from realizing the full potential of their intellect. Yet be cautious, do your research, and examine other alternatives if undesirable side-effects overwhelm the benefits.
You may want to look into Strattera, as it lacks the addictive properties of other ADHD drugs. My only noticable side-effect on it has been a focused mind - something I've coveted for a long time.
And maybe you should stop ranting like a tit.
I didn't get a 'fuck the system' vibe out of his comments - they were clear, consise and backed up with personal 'evidence'.
Just because you dont' agree doesn't make him wrong. Any more than it makes you are wrong because you think taking drugs makes you a better person.
And don't try and unload on me - I've done the drugs for ADD, and I hated myself when I was on them so I'd flush them and tell my parents I took them. I have since learned 'coping strategies' that the public health people used to teach me and they work just fine. I have learned to recognize that I am drifting out of focus and correct if I need to. I also let my employer know that I am prone to ADD and that I am in fact still working even if I look like I'm not.
I agree with the parent - drugs aren't the way to go. but if you feel they work for you, thats great.
But thats still no reason to be a tit about it.
We emerge from our mother's womb an unformatted diskette; our culture formats us. - Douglas Coupland
Let me start off by saying thank you to the poster for not settling for a drug treatment. I am a very very outspoken anti-drugs for ADD person. As a child (starting at 4) I was diagnosed as ADHD (1982, so not in the middle of the 'every kid has ADD' phase). I would only sleep for a couple hours a night and the rest of the time I'd just rummage around my room, tearing off wallpaper, throwing things around or generally harassing my parents.
... just think of it as being amortized over the life of your child ... just pennies a day!
They put me on ritalin when I was about 6 after giving up on training me, and found it didn't work - it actually made me more hyper.
Thats when they moved me to Dexadrine. For the americans out there, it's the same drug some people use to lose weight. It immediately worked, helping me focus and not be so wired.
The downside was, I was moody and depressed. I was anti-social and angry a lot. but I was 8 and people didn't care really. They wrote it off as depression because my parents broke up. But when they took me off the pills for the summer, life was grand again. I was energetic to a fault and had lots of friends. Come school time, back on the drugs and back to quiet, boring, socially acceptable me.
Fast forward to highschool and I'm still on the stupid things. September was great, I'd start taking the pills and wouldn't eat for a weak (about the only upside to em, great weight loss). But around that age you start to become more self aware and I realized that I hated myself because I wasn't really me. I took these stupid pills every morning and I became who my parents and teachers wanted me to be, but I wasn't really me. I didn't laugh as much, I didn't talk as much, but I got good grades.
Around grade 11 I said 'fuck this' and started to not take the pills. Then my parents started threatening me and grounding me if I didn't take them. So I'd pop them in my mouth then spit them out. Then they started to check my mouth to make sure I swallowed them. So I found a new trick - you could pull apart the gel caps and all the little balls of medicine inside would fall out. So I'd quickly dump them on the floor or sink then take the pill. That worked well and I started to feel more like myself.
Except then my grades started slipping.
So thats when I turned to the psycho babble they'd been teaching me at my semi montly sessions. They called it 'coping strategies' and taught me how to recognize when I wasn't behaving well or focusing like I should. Instead of just throwing pills at the problem, they put me in control of my life and said 'these are the tools to make things better for you, but you need to do them'. They made me responsible for my behaviour and grades.
So I started with them. At this point I can't identify what I do, but my friends will notice when I *click* in and out of focus now. Apparently I'm much better and I can recognize when I'm having ADD moments. Sometimes I have ADD days. I've learned to work with instead of against the ADD. I now run dual monitors on my PC so I can do more than one thing easily. my desk has lots of distractions on it, but they're all little. I can jump from work to a distraction for 30 seconds to give my brain a break then back to work. I can focus much better now that I've learned these skills, and I dno't need pills to make me work well.
So, the moral of this story is that pills aren't necessary. They inhibit your mental and social and emotional growth by turning you into a little robot. I found that I could actually feel myself in a little tunnel when I took them and things seemed duller. Teaching coping skills is, I think, the key. Teaching your child how to recognize when they're not paying attention is the first step, then teaching them how to focus when needed, and let their mind go when not needed. If this Neural Feedback Training does that (and it sounds like it does), then go for it! Don't spare any expense
We emerge from our mother's womb an unformatted diskette; our culture formats us. - Douglas Coupland
Hello,
First, let me start off by saying that I have in fact taken this "feedback" therapy, or, more accurately known as EEG/EMG biofeedback therapy.
A little background information on ADHD... trust me, I've done my homework on this as I have the condition. The strongest medical explaination of ADHD (which encompasses the former ADD... more later) is a rapid decline of oxygen metabolism in the prefrontal lobe during periods of thought requiring concentration. This kind of conditition can lead to two forms of ADHD: inattentive and overactive... I happen to fall into the former category. Basically, EEG waves can be measured through the skull/scalp in the picovolt range by use of an amplifier connected to a small probe stuck to the scalp by use of electrolytic gel similar in consistancy to vaseline. When EEG signals are filtered, they can be separated into waves in the .1 second duration and .5 second duration. ADHD individuals show a marked amount of "slow" wave amplitude over "fast" wave amplitude.
Someone mentioned earlier in the post that he was unable to alter his brain function in a short period of time; a just statement. I attended therapy for nearly 3 weeks after diagnosis before seeing any kind of large changes in brain activity while concentrating. The excercises used started off with concentrating on an object in a video monitor to mentally "push" it along... and later was changed to academic study of exceedingly boring material. As my scores improved, so did the quality and depth of the notes I wrote during a timed interval of study.
Now, coming down to it. ADHD is usually a male-dominant trait, passed from father to son... explaining the vastly larger amount of males with the condition.
I specifically did NOT choose drug therapy as it would have prevented me from service in the Marine Corps. Simply put, I'm a rock in a traditional education environment, but continue to score in the 130 range with reputable IQ tests. My doctor in fact was the person who encouraged me to satisfy my "thrill seeker" personality (which is somewhat common in ADHD individuals). Since my diagnosis, I continue to be a United States Marine, having endured training such as aircrew school and SERE, and now get to fly around in KC-130 tactical aerial refueling aircraft as a Crewchief/Flight Mechanic. I have also attained my private pilot's license, parachute jump license, and have started racing a stock RX-7 in autocross. Major "Pappy" Boyington of the Black Sheep squadron was also of the ADHD personality. What can I say? It feels good to go fast.
It is my firm belief that your daughter does NOT need stimulant therapy, and would benefit from the somewhat unconventional EEG biofeedback therapy. If you contact me privately at my email address, I will be happy to converse with you over the phone about my doctor and how to contact him for more information.
Hope this clears up any doubts you had about this somewhat unconventional therapy method
CheersThe prevalence of myopia is about 25% among the adult population in the USA.
Does that mean it's not a disorder, that instead of wearing glasses we should have the other 75% be restricted to a minimum font size of 48pt (or preferably 96pt given my own ability to read my CRT from inches)?
Sure, one can argue whether it's better to view the ADHD or myopic population as falling inside one tail of a bell curve rather than having a qualitatively different 'disorder', but either way -- if there are treatments to improve the quality of life for those people, where's the problem in that?
With the amount of people out there doping up to try and avoid every sign of being human, I would definitely consider a second or even third opinion on the ADD diagnosis. I seriously hope that there has been more than one opinion. I can't say because I don't know your situation.
If my folks would have taken me to a doctor as a kid because I spaced out on the gym floor, I would surely have been diagnosed with ADD. But the real truth is that I wasn't a jock.
Going back to my first statement (about people doping up for everything under the sun), think about it:
1. I've got a few age lines in my face. Solution? Inject toxin just under the skin to make it swell and fill in the wrinkles for a few months!
2. I've got reflux (probably the fallout of too many antibiotics and a bad yeast infection in the digestive tract) disorder. Solution? Get the purple pill that costs an arm and a leg and I will have to stay on for life lest my symptoms get worse.
3. I'm going bald. (Hey... we all get old eventually) Solution? There's just too many to go into, but I'll point out that the list of side effect for Propecia is mind boggling. Especially the one that says to not even TOUCH Propecia if you are pregnant!
I'm not denying that there ARE people with problems out there. I'm not even saying that this guy's kid may not have problems. But let's step back a bit. Back to the time when kids were allowed to be kids. When they didn't have to "perform" in a certain way by a certain age lest they be considered "freaks". Hell... most of us were considered "freaks" but I think we fared pretty well over our lifetimes. Haven't we? The first thing I would say is that this child may just normally be less social and more introverted. Is that REALLY a problem? Do we REALLY need to drug people who just don't get on well with other people?
The other thing is the expectation people place on their kids these days. And the ridiculous level of activity kids are expected to be involved in. (Baseball, Soccer, Football every F*cking day?!! WTF?!) Kids should be allowed to do things like sit in the backyard baking mud pies or making snowmen. They should be allowed to make "chemistry sets" with water, food coloring and old bottles. They should be free to dig holes in the ground in hopes that they will reach whatever it is they believe to be on the other side. But most of all they should be allowed to dream. Because those dreams will take them farther than any drugs they are getting pumped into them.
Un-news
Both myself and my S.O. have been diagnosted with ADHD and find that the "your just":
...
A. Undiciplined
B. Lazy
C. Just different
D. All of the above
(take your pick) explination really fustrating. You really don't know what it's like until you've been in our headspace.
Now as for medication. I agree in a perfect world being intellegent and ADHD would be great. We could be the thinkers, excentric scientists and artists. Unfortunately we live in a world that demands that we "stay focused" and have great "organizational skills", so the practical considerations must be taken into account.
That being said I belive there is an over diagnosis in children (hey kids are a real PITA and can be hard to manage) and an under diagnosis in adults. I wasn't diagnosed until I was 31 since I have found many ways to cope and be successful.
Oh look something shiny
(couldn't resist that one)
First off, fitting in is overrated. Many of the luminaries, great scientists and great leaders stuck out from the herd based on their own merits. Many of them never fit in anywhere, and thus took paths that branched from the average person.
Believe it or not, we're not all created equal. Some people are more 'gifted' than others in many different ways. What society and hack psychologists perceive to be a sickness or disease can be a great asset with the right application.
Unless you kids are autistic, don't fuck with them. If they can't pay attention in class, put them in private schools where the curriculum is more challenging. Nine times out of ten kids who screw around, draw and doodle, clown around instead of getting work done probably aren't being challenged. I know, I was one of these kids. When they finally did some standardized testing the school system discovered that kids like myself were 'bright' and were bored with average work. Once you get into something more advanced and difficult, you pay attention and do work.
I have issues with the current American school system still, because it aims to average the students out. Rather than having some dim and some bright bulbs, they all glow with the same intensity. Also most public schools promote regurgitative learning rather than comprehensive skill sets. Hence you get students that cram before the test, pass it, but don't understand what they've learned. School becomes trivia, and trivia is rarely interesting or engaging.
I hope I have 'gifted' children, because I'll understand them and hopefully will be able to challenge them in ways they'll later appreciate. They won't get hours of television; they'll get books, technical manuals, things to build. I'm not anti-television or anti-entertainment, I just believe that the way I taught myself was valuable and want to give my offspring the same opportunities.
I think this hits at the heart of the problem, and the real reason such drugs are being overused nowadays: 5 year olds are supposed to be overactive. From the time they can walk, all non-human mammals are running around, playing/fighting with one-another, etc; this is extremely important, as those that don't get regular exercise and learn precise muscular control will soon become prey.
21st-century humans, however, are being put in school at extremely young ages. When they're supposed to be running around, getting exercise, and having fun, they're forced to sit in classroom and stare at a book. Naturally, the teacher can't do her job when the kids won't sit still, so the school will pressure the parents into giving these drugs to their kids.
Damn right 5-year-olds get distracted, and why shouldn't they?
I made a PHP/MySQL library that prevents SQL injection & makes coding easier!
"That being said I belive there is an over diagnosis in children"
And this is why, I think, there are so many of the comments you hear... because there are so many 'problem' children who are just labelled as having ADHD to explain disobedience.
My parents were foster parents for many years while I lived with them, and they were often sent the 'problem' children as they were seen to be excellent in handling them. I remember one girl in particular who came to us labelled as having ADHD and a 'handful' and unable to focus or be handled.
Within ONE WEEK my parents had her happily ensconsed reading books, playing with toys etc. for ages at a time with no drugs, no fancy methods... just good old parenting, and a firm hand where required. (I don't mean physically a hand as such, I mean sticking to your ground when you say things like "No, you can't have that" or such things... not giving in to demands etc.)
So very many cases are like this, and it's THOSE cases that cause you the grief... I can't help but have the same feelings about most ADHD diagnosed kids because just so many of them have nothing wrong, it's just a convenient out for parents... which is wrong of me as there are real issues at hand here, but until doctors stop throwing the label about willy nilly, the stigma will remain.