Edward M. Hallowell's Blog, page 13

Wanted: Women Who Have Not Been Diagnosed with ADHD

           Hello my friends. In this note from Ned I want to make an unusual offer.  I am in the middle of collaborating with some wonderful people in making a documentary about ADHD.  We want it to present this condition with emphasis on the strengths that so often accompany it, as we hope the documentary will go a long way toward combatting the terrible stigma that still prevents both children and adults from getting the help that could change their lives forever.

              While we will be emphasizing strengths, we will also portray the terrible dangers inherent in not taking ADHD seriously, the great risk of addiction, of unemployment in adulthood, of poor school performance, of medical problems due to lack of follow up, and the host of other problems that have led Dr. Russell Barkley to conclude that untreated ADHD costs on average 13 years of life.  It’s a high risk proposition.  We want the public to understand that this condition can ruin your life or it can make your life great.  We want to blow away stigma and replace it with knowledge and truth so that people can take advantage of the upside.

               My offer is this.  If you’d like to be part of this truth, if you’d like to appear in the documentary, please get in touch with me.  Because adult women are the largest undiagnosed group, we are looking for adult women who have not been diagnosed before with ADHD but believe they might have it.  If you are such a person, or know such a person, and if you’d like to be filmed for a documentary that will be released internationally, then please contact my assistant, Dianne, at hallowellevents@yahoo.com.

               The producers will screen you to see if you are appropriate, and if you are, I will do an evaluation free of charge and begin treatment, also free of charge.  This entire process, after the screening, could be filmed.

                Obviously, this is not for everyone.  But if you are the kind of person who’d like to appear on screen and make a difference by showing what ADHD is really like, by showing the strengths and the power it packs, as well as the frustrations, and if you are a woman over 24 years old and you believe you might have ADHD, then contact Dianne.

                 We hope this documentary will make a big difference.  It won’t come out until January of 2021, so there’s a lot of work yet to be done.  Let us know if you want to be part of it.

                  With all best wishes,   Ned

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Your ADHD Brain is a Ferrari

My goal is to help people master the power of ADHD while avoiding its pitfalls. When the diagnosis of ADHD emphasizes what is wrong with a person, that person immediately starts to see himself in those negative terms. Shame, fear and self-doubt grow. However, when the treatment of ADHD begins with an effort to find what’s good in a person by using a strength-based approach to ferret out their hidden strengths and emphasizes what is positive, then the person sees himself in a positive light.  

When explaining ADHD to a child, I say, “you have a turbo charged mind – like a Ferrari engine, but the brakes of a bicycle, and I’m the break expert.”   When ADHD is properly treated, the person can achieve great heights: doctors, lawyers, CEO’s, dreamers, innovators, explorers and even Harvard grads.   Founders of our country may have had ADHD. The flip-side of distractibility is curiosity.  

Read my ADDitude article “Your Brain is a Ferrari,” to learn more and watch my “RaceCar Brain” video below:

If you just found out your child has ADHD, learn more HERE.

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ADHD and Addiction

Of the many masks that ADHD wears, substance abuse is one of the most difficult to see behind because the substance abuse itself causes such problems. When someone is alcoholic, abusing opiates, or vaping, we often become so preoccupied with the problems the drug use creates that we fail to consider what purpose the drug must be servicing for the user. ADHD is one of the underlying causes of substance abuse that is particularly important to look for, because it can be treated.

For those addicts who do in fact have ADHD, it is essential that the ADHD be treated as well as the addiction. By treating the ADHD one reduces the likelihood that the individual will go back to abusing the original drug.

Those with ADHD are 5 to 10 times more likely to develop an addiction to a chemical substance or to an activity, or both. In Distraction S3 Ep 28,  ADHD coach and advanced practice nurse, Kristin Seymour, joins me to discuss the very real issue of ADHD and addiction in young people. Kristin specializes in treating adolescent boys and has seen firsthand the devastating consequences that vaping, opioids and other substances can have on young lives.

LISTEN NOW  to my podcast with Kristin and learn more about ADHD and addiction, the harmful effects of juuling and the advice you should stress to your kids about pills.

Statistically only 10% of people with addictions, get help. That means 90% of addicts don’t seek treatment. If you or someone you know are struggling with addiction, I encourage you to seek help for yourself or the person you know now.

Learn more about ADHD treatment HERE

Learn more about getting help for addiction at the:

National Institute on Drug Abuse

National Drug Helpline

This episode is sponsored by Landmark College, the college of choice for students who learn differently. Learn more HERE.

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Varsity Blues – What Do You Really Want for Your Children?

Dr. Hallowell’s Reaction to the College Admissions Cheating Scandal:

When I feel as much contempt as I felt for Lori Loughlin, Felicity Huffman, et al., I stop and ask myself, “And how pure are you?”  This current trick of buying the offspring of the wealthy an admission to college particularly enraged me because I’ve just put our three kids through college, after seeing them gain admission the honest way, and as a child psychiatrist, I work with many families who are going through the process right now. It can be an arduous, stressful process full of fear, uncertainty, and disappointment.  To see some select few buy their way around it is disgusting at best.

But moral outrage always makes me think twice.  As I said, how pure am I. Every Sunday in church I confess to God that I have sinned in many ways and have once again not lived up to my promise to love my neighbor as myself.  That these various wealthy people used their money to do what they now, I would imagine, are thoroughly ashamed of having done, makes me think of them, if I stop and think, rather than simply react as the primitive man I can so easily be, that they are ever so human.

A snake-like character (who has his own all-too-human qualities) tempted them with one of the most alluring and appealing of all prizes a parent can be offered, a plum college admission for their son or daughter, thus sparing said child the pain and possible humiliation of the highly competitive college admission process. The snake’s wealthy target couldn’t resist a guaranteed admission to a desirable college (knowing nothing of the true value of competing to get in, or the true value of college in general, or probably the true value of just about anything in life any longer) and so he jumps for offer.

His or her son or daughter has it made, right?  Little does the wealthy person know that even had the bribe not come to light, the transaction nonetheless would have cast a curse upon the child’s life forever.

These wealthy people were blinded by what they took to be love, were they not, and they saw a way they could afford to help their child, or so they thought, not knowing that this help was crippling, just as it had likely been ever since the child was born.  Good parents do not do this kind of thing, regardless of their wealth, but I go off track.

My main point is Loughlin, Huffman, et al. are guilty of being human.  Sure, I sat in judgement of them when I first heard of this and thought it represented everything venal and detestable about wealth and privilege and underscored the hypocrisy of so many people who pretend to be one person but are in reality another.

But then I thought of my own little hypocrisies, my own little sins, and I reminded myself maybe I hadn’t done what those folks did simply because I didn’t have that kind of money and that snake had never approached me.  I don’t know Felicity Huffman.  I bet if I sat down and talker with her I’d like her a lot.         

I just think that judging people is a really dangerous habit to get into.  I sure don’t want other people to judge me.  So I’m going to try to look at the humanity of the Varsity Blue scandal and learn from that, rather than heap more scorn and contempt upon people I don’t even know.

Right now, I encourage you to take a few moments and think of your children. Bring their faces to your mind. Then ask yourself, “What do I really want for them in their lives?”

Don’t assume you know. Before you spend another day as a parent (or as a teacher or a coach or anyone else involved with children), try to answer this deceptively simple question: What do I really want for my children?  Is it admission to the most prestigious college? Is it trophies and prizes and stardom? Is it….READ MORE HERE!

 

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I’m Such a Simple Man. I Love My Dog.

Note from Ned

da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM

A phrase came to me this morning while I was eating my grape nut cereal with blueberries and milk, not my usual breakfast but one I love nonetheless. “On what can you depend?” It came just like that.  Not in the more colloquial, “What can you depend on?” but the more formal, “On what can you depend?”

I actually like the more formal version, not because I am a stiff grammarian—actually the current doyen of grammar, Benjamin Dreyer, urges us to end sentences with prepositions and forget the proscriptions to the contrary we learned in grammar school—but because of the solidity of the rhythm of the line: on WHAT can YOU de PEND; da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM.

Right then I could depend on my grape nuts, blueberries, and milk and the solidity of the line, which I liked so much I said it out loud.  I was sitting by myself—no, not by myself, our dog, Max, was sitting on the floor next to me, and when I said it he looked up at me quizzically, so I said it again.  Max made no sense of it so he went back to looking at whatever he’d been looking at before.

Da-DUM, da-Dum, da-DUM. It’s good to have a dog. it’s GOOD to HAVE a DOG. da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM. it’s GOOD to KNOW your SELF. da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM. be WARE the IDES of MARCH. da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM. stand UP for THOSE you LOVE. da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM. be SURE to BRUSH and FLOSS.

I sat with Max doing da-DUM’s for quite a while.  I was reveling in the feeling of solidity they gave me.  It was heartening to know how much brick I could find in such a short time simply by looking for three iambs in a row.

I’m such a simple man.  I love my dog.  I love my grape nuts, especially with blueberries and milk.  I love the morning, especially with Max.  I love that I have three children all in their 20’s who are thriving, thank God, and I love Sue, my wife, of 30 years. I fear the things we all fear, and I fear not knowing when they will come.  Which brings me back to da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM.  i HOPE we ALL find PEACE and JOY.  Ah-ha, I added another da-DUM.

The time had come for me to take my dish to the sink, wash up, and say good bye to Max and my reveries.  It was time for me to go to work, to drive out to my office in Sudbury and see the patients who were waiting for me out there.

The drive would give me a chance to get a new window, literally, onto the world, watching the wintry scenes as I drove past them, the snows still clinging to the now brown barked trees, the bare trees, buds barely popping in as yet, muddy patches in some fields where some melting’s come, the blue sky today replacing the heavy gray from yesterday, the sun ever brighter reflecting off the fields still filled with snow, a few horses seeing what they could forage today let out of their stalls into one of the fields, feeling on the precipice of spring with Savings Time just let in to provide us with more daylight or so the idea has it go.

I watch the nature I know so well, having grown up in New England, these rhythms run me now as they ever did then.  I turn on NPR, then switch to sports radio then to the classical station then to the other station that has 60’s songs I like, I channel surf and try to pay attention to the road.

I look forward to seeing the people who are waiting to see me in the office.  I feel grateful that I have a useful purpose to serve.  I think to myself, I hope I do it well today.  i HOPE i DO it WELL to DAY.

 

 

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We’re Hiring: ADHD Professionals New York & San Francisco

San Francisco – The Hallowell Center of San Francisco, located in the downtown area, is seeking to expand. We are currently seeking part-time clinicians (Board certified psychiatrists, licensed psychologists, social workers, or nurse practitioners) to join our team .Candidates must have experience in working with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and associated disorders including anxiety and depression. They must demonstrate excellent diagnostic and clinical skills.

The Hallowell Center is a multidisciplinary private practice with offices in New York, Boston, and San Francisco that provides comprehensive evaluation and treatment for a full range of emotional, behavioral, and developmental issues in children and adults. The San Francisco office primarily treats adolescents and adults but is considering adding services for children as well. Founded by Dr. Edward Hallowell, the Hallowell Center uses a strength-based model to help all of their clients recognize and reach their full potential. 

Applicants must align with our strength-based approach and have the ability to work collaboratively with a multidisciplinary team. Because our San Francisco office is small applicants must, in addition, be flexible and fairly independent. We are particularly looking for self-starters interested in growing with and helping us build our team. There is room for growth and flexibility within our practice and the position could conceivably expand to full time. The position is fee for service and anyone hired must be willing to work some evenings and/or Saturdays.

We are particularly interested in clinicians with the following skills:

-Psychiatrists or Nurse Practitioners who can provide medication evaluations and ongoing medication management. Training and/or experience in integrative approaches a plus

-Couples therapists experienced in working with couples where ADHD is an issue

-Clinicians/educators/coaches who are knowledgeable and skilled in helping clients develop executive function skills, including high school and college age students 

-Group therapist that has used protocols for ADHD

-Clinicians trained in DBT or EMDR, who have used these models to treat ADHD.

-Neuropsychologists

If you are interested, please reply to: gabrielle@hallowellsfo.com

Please forward this message to potentially interested colleagues.

 

NEW YORK CITY

The Hallowell Center of New York is seeking a part-time child and adolescent clinician (licensed psychologist or social worker) to join our team. Clinician must be an excellent diagnostician with expertise in CBT, executive function coaching, and parent training for children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety and mood disorders, as well as other developmental disorders. Expertise in additional treatment modalities would make a candidate especially attractive. Clinicians interested in working with adults as well as children are welcome.

The Hallowell Center is a multidisciplinary practice that provides comprehensive evaluation and treatment for a full range of emotional, behavioral, and developmental disorders in children and adults. Founded by Dr. Edward Hallowell, the Hallowell Center uses a strength-based model to help all children and adults recognize and reach their potential.

Applicants must align with our strength-based approach and have the ability to work collaboratively with a multidisciplinary team. We are particularly looking for self-starters interested in growing with and helping us build our team. There is room for growth and flexibility within our practice and the position could conceivably expand to full time. The position is fee for service and anyone hired must be willing to work some evenings and preferably Saturdays.

Interested candidates should send a cover letter and resume to Sue Hallowell at sue@hallowellcenter.org.

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ADHD Diagnoses on the rise!

Why have ADHD diagnoses in the U.S. gone from 6.1% in 1997 to 10.2% in 2016?  Is that a good thing or bad thing?

In Distraction, S3 Mini 23, Dr. Hallowell shares his thoughts on why more U.S. kids aged 4 to 17 are being diagnosed with ADHD, and what that increase really means.  LISTEN NOW!

What you should know about getting an ADHD Diagnosis and the   Treatment of ADHD 

 Make sure you consult with a well-trained specialist. The doctors who have the most training in ADHD are child psychiatrists. If you are an adult, be aware that all child psychiatrists also are trained in adult psychiatry. Ask the person you see if he or she has extensive experience in working with patients in your age group. It is imperative that you consult with a professional who has extensive experience. If you can’t find such a person, start by calling the department of psychiatry at the medical school nearest to you.

The diagnosis rests upon a careful history taken from the identified patient as well as at least one other person, such as parent, spouse, sibling, or close friend, as well as, if possible, teacher comments.

You should develop a comfortably connected relationship with the person diagnosing and treating you so that you can turn to him or her with trust whenever the need arises.

The history may be supplemented by neuropsychological testing. This is paper-and-pencil testing that includes puzzles and games. It’s actually often fun to take these tests. They are not diagnostic of ADHD, but they add valuable information.

Treatment begins with education. The patient and concerned others need to learn what ADHD is, and what it is not. A diagnosis of the mind, like ADHD, must be fully understood if it is to be mastered and made good use of. At its best, ADHD can become an asset, rather than a liability, in a person’s life. But, for this to happen, the person has to develop a deep appreciation for how ADHD works within him or her. To understand ADHD, a person could begin with one of my books, like Delivered From Distraction, or with some other book on the topic. Just be sure you read a book by a highly qualified expert who writes clearly and well.

Treatment proceeds with a re-structuring of one’s life. Usually, disorganization is a leading problem in the life of the person who has ADHD. Often an organizational coach can help enormously in developing new habits of organization and time management.

Treatment should also include physical exercise, at least 4 times per week. Dr. John Ratey’s work and his book, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, notes that physical exercise is one of the best treatments we have for ADHD.

Proper nutrition plays an important role in the treatment of ADHD in all ages. The key simply is to eat well, avoid junk food and sugar, eat whole foods, and don’t self-medicate with carbs, as many people with ADHD are tempted to do.

If you think you might have ADHD, CLICK HERE to learn what the Hallowell Centers can do for you.

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Teen Depression Webinar

Families for Depression Awareness is presenting a free Teen Depression webinar on Thursday, March 21 from 7:00 to 8:15 PM ET/ 4:00 to 5:15 PM PT. Presenter Rebekah Gibbons, LICSW, will provide a wonderful overview of Teen Depression. This webinar covers an overview of what teen depression is; communication strategies for teens and parents; treatment options; where to get help; and what to do if help is refused.

The program is designed for parents, guardians, caregivers, youth workers, and any adults interested in teen mental health. If you are worried about a teen, new to the topic, proactively seeking education, or in need of a refresher on teen depression, this webinar is for you.  REGISTER to join this live webinar discussion.

Click HERE to learn how The Hallowell Centers can  help you.

Alpha-Stim: A New Technology for Anxiety, Depression and Insomnia available at the Hallowell Center Boston MetroWest

Learn about Changing the Shame and Stigma of Mental Health.

Click HERE to learn more about Depression.

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Dr. Hallowell’s Red Beans and Rice Recipe

When I was in medical school at Tulane, down in New Orleans, back in the mid-1970’s, I learned how to make red beans and rice.

You may not think that sounds like much of a much, but it remains the dish more people ask me to remake than any other. Once you’ve had my red beans, you’ve just got to have them again.  My daughter insists that I freeze them and bring them with me to New York whenever I make them in our home outside Boston.  Our friends always ask, “When are you making those red beans again?”  They’ve become a staple at our Super Bowl parties and we always clean the huge pot down to the last bean.

The problem is, I have ADHD, so my “recipe” isn’t the kind of recipe people who follow recipes expect.  When I told my wife I was going to put my recipe for red beans and rice in our newsletter, she laughed.  “How are you going to that, honey?  You don’t have one!”

And that’s the truth.  Just like every talk I give is different from every other, every batch of red beans I make is different from every other.  And probably none of them is as good as what’s simmering on the back burner of some shack out in the Bayou right now.  But I’m getting there, one batch at a time.

There’s some basics you do have to follow though.  That much I can tell you. So you never use canned red beans.  You might as well serve dog food and rice as serve canned red beans and rice.  Pure mush.  So you start with dried kidney beans.  I buy two and a half pounds because I always make a pretty large pot of my red beans, why else bother.  Sometimes I buy three pounds, even three and a half.  Then you need to soak your beans in water overnight.  They will plump right up so make sure you put them in a large pot and leave a good eight to ten inches of water over them for them to plump up into.

When you come down in the morning your beans will be looking out at you over the brim of the pot.  Now you drain them in a large colander and throw away any beans that look ugly.  You don’t need any fancier or more technical word than that.  Just throw out the ugly beans.  And keep all the rest of those plumped up proud little beauties.

Next, pour some olive oil into the bottom of the large pot that you’ve dried thoroughly (cuz oil and water don’t mix, don’t-cha know), and dump in a couple of chopped up onions and a chopped up large green bell pepper or two smaller ones.  After a while, when they become translucent, so you can sort of see through them, the onions and the peppers that is, but not entirely see-through, then throw in about ten or twelve cloves of chopped up garlic.  Now I love my garlic.  You can use less if you want to.  When it’s done you won’t hardly taste it anyway, I mainly put so much in for the aroma while I’m cooking.  Once all of that gets mingled and settled in, then you can dump in all those lovely red beans, and listen to them hit the pot like rain on a tin roof.

Now you hafta add some liquid quick, and you can pick whatever you want, I usually add some of that beef broth that comes in those cardboard quart containers, I put in about three quarts, and more later, but you can use water if you want to cheap out, or you can use a boullion cube, or whatever tickles your fancy, there’s no rule, but you do need some liquid right away.

I usually add a full bunch of flat leaf Italian parsley with the thick part of the stems cut off.  Then I take a three pound chunk of Black Forest ham and cut it into chunks and throw that into the pot, along with about seven or eight Andouille sausages cut up, and a couple of kielbasa cut up, and four or five Chorizo sausages cut up.

Now you add whatever spices you want, but low on salt because the ham will have it.  Bay leaves, oregano, thyme, pepper for sure, red pepper flakes (go light because you can add them at table), and whatever else moves you at the time.

Then simmer for hours.  Gradually the soup will thicken as the beans soften and a kind of gravy will come into being, a beautiful melding to behold and smell.  It is so delicious.  Taste as you go, modifying all along.  This is your creation, make it live.  There is nothing quite like making your very own red beans.

Play with it.  Have fun with it.  Enjoy! I would love it if you sent me your comments and photos. Send to drhallowell@gmail.com.

 

 

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ADHD Palooza is back!

Want to be part of changing the way the world looks at women with ADHD? You can! Linda Roggli, has developed a ground-breaking online event and you are invited!  

The Fourth Annual ADHD Women’s Palooza is a ground-breaking FREE online event, February 25 – March 2, 2019 with Dr. Hallowell and other top ADHD experts in the world presenting on topics that are near and dear to ADHD women:

Adjusting to Your ADHD Diagnosis – Mourn the Past, Create the Future
How Brain Function Becomes The New Diagnostic Criteria
Radical Approach to Treating ADHD Women 

….and that just the tip of the iceberg.  Find out more HERE! 

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