Scattered Minds: The Origins and Healing of Attention Deficit Disorder

by Gabor Maté MD

Some development of the capacity to be alone is necessary if the brain is to function

A person cannot become sane in the midst of the chaos she perpetuates around herself.

A child with attention deficit disorder may be difficult to rouse in the morning, but in the evening there is no getting him off to bed. I believe the problem is separation anxiety,

The fear is of being alone with one’s urgent mind for even a few short minutes.

The problem, of course, is that sleep is essential for the brain to regenerate the sensitive neurological apparatus of alertness and attention.

nutritious

meals,

served in an atmosphere free of...

meant to be consumed in a leisur...

People with ADD, habituated lifelong to self-generated tension, tend to have tight muscles and stiff joints and ligaments. Simple stretching exercises done for a few minutes daily

Nature

The ADD

adult’s

worka...

are juggling too many

projects,

ADD confers advantages such as creativity and a good sense of humor.

The tendency to creativity of the ADD mind cannot be denied.

The self-parenting part of healing ADD must, I am convinced, involve paying attention to one’s need to create.

Spiritual work is the cultivation of a mindful solitude.

spiritual work is essential in the self-treatment of ADD.

The ADD mind is most uncomfortable with meditation, is intensely bored

with it.

Meditation aiming at mindfulness, at strengthening the observing “third eye” in the mind, is a direct way of weakening the hold of ingrained neurological responses. “Pay precise attention,”

Contemplative solitude is different from being alone in a room, reading, listening to music

In order to

settle the chaos inside, we have to clear up the chaos outside, which was generated in the first place by the chaos inside.

After a lifetime of discouraging experiences, people naturally hope that the help they need will be found in a pill...

All

addictions are anesthetics. They separate us from the

distress in our consc...

large number of people addicted to behaviors and substances of various sorts have attention deficit disorder,

The gambler

the compulsive shopper

and

th...

or woman who insists on skiing uncharted glaciers are all looking for the same hit of dopamine and endorphins that the ingestion ...

for me, as for all addicts, the excitement was not in the ostensible goal—listening to the music—but in the process of acquiring.

The main drugs in ADD treatment are

Ritalin, and

Dexed...

they both stimulate the activity of the cerebral cortex by balancing the levels ...

in the frontal lobe of...

The factors that maintain the ADD-related mental turmoil and behaviors are only in part biochemically internal to the individual, and have more to do with the circumstances in which an adult or child lives her life.

We don’t do our children any favors when we try to protect them from experiencing sadness or failure. What we really want for them when they feel sad is to be able to endure disappointment and hurt feelings,

Adults with ADD face the most difficult task of all: learning how to be loving toward themselves.

a child who was upset over separation

would alternate between unfocused running activity and immobility.”