Distracted Kid
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I'm dealing with my daughter getting to the point where she is more distracted than she isn't. She's zoned out and won't pay attention. She doesn't mean to be this way, it's not intentional.
It's starting to affect her schoolwork in that she doesn't finish in class work or tests.
Does anyone have some general advice. I'm going to bring her to a doctor to see what my options are, and I was wondering if anyone else has these experiences and knows what to look out for (both with helping my kid and with not getting bad advice from doctor).
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@xaade it sounds like a serious and quite unique problem. The only advice I can give you is, if the doctor diagnoses something scary or if they prescrobe expensive and/or very intrusive treatment, get a second opinion from another doctor (avoid mentioning the previous diagnosis if possible).
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@xaade How old is she?
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Leaving the assessment of seriousness to medical professionals, have you tried Pomodoro technique? I know a few people who were "almost diagnosed with ADHD" as children, but much later found it to be very useful.
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My daughter is somewhat the same way. Most of her issue is that she doesn't like being in school to begin with and has trouble with some of the ways that the school teaches some subjects (namely math, because Common Core math or whatever derivative of it they use now is complete crap), so she mentally checks out and just doesn't care. We've rectified some of it with a combination of punishment and trying to work around the understanding issues as best we can. I help her with homework when she asks (which is somewhat sparse as she doesn't live with me), but I can't do much about in-class work directly beyond impressing the importance of it.
What I specifically do, however (and I will fully admit that this may only work because of the peculiar circumstances involved), is that I never get mad. I leave the "being upset" to her mother (who's much more suited to it, as a short angry Irish woman), but I just maintain patience. My daughter's always been a bit of a daddy's girl (which is probably more due to the fact that she did live with me for the first couple years of her life), but I always try to make sure that she understands that I will be there to help her with whatever she needs, whenever. Even if it's not one of our scheduled together nights, if she needs something printed for school or she has a question about math that she needs right away or something, she can call me and I'll do whatever is necessary and I never get upset by it. If she does something out of line that sets her mother off, I wait until the yelling is over and then I sit down and I talk it over with her. Basically, I always try to be that rock she can talk to.
Dunno how much any of that will help, but I figure anything might.
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@xaade I've no experience, so make of this what you will...
Be careful not to jump to conclusions that there's even a problem (or one that can be resolved medically). Could her distraction be well within range of normal childish behaviour? Do her teachers think there's a serious issue?
Maybe your daughter's just bored, bright kids can easily just zone-out if required to do stuff that seems stupid or pointless.
If she's quite young, make sure you've checked out stuff like vision and hearing tests, because if she's struggling then that could come across as a lack of attention.
Doctors may be under pressure to prescribe pharmaceuticals - be appropriately sceptical about that and get second opinions (which is not to say it might not sometimes be a solution).
Don't seek or follow medical advice from random strangers on the internet
. Good luck.
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@japonicus said in Distracted Kid:
Could her distraction be well within range of normal childish behaviour? Do her teachers think there's a serious issue?
No and Yes, in that order.
It's definitely outside of normal childhood ranges, and I had a similar problem growing up.
She zones out for lengthy periods of time, can't finish dinner, doesn't recognize people talking to her at all while zoned out, and loses track of everything she was doing.
The biggest problem is that she's legitimately forgetful about what happens during the day. Information is there, like stuff she learned, but whether it happened today or yesterday could be easily forgotten.
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I had similar problems growing up and I was diagnosed with ADD. I had Ritalin and later on Adderall but they each came with serious enough side effects that I came off them. I've since either grown out of it or learned to cope enough to be focused in my job, this forum's distraction notwithstanding.
My advise is before you see a psychiatrist or doctor, look into counciling. There's some chance there is a tangible distraction that is detering her from her work that, if dealt with, removes the need for medication. Let her talk about her feelings. Maybe there indeed is a problem she is dwelling on, such as a persistent bully, that's making her subconscious mind go into overdrive.
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@xaade said in Distracted Kid:
whether it happened today or yesterday could be easily forgotten.
apparently, shit like that is "unimportant" to my brain. No joke, someone (mistakenly) mentioned that today (well, yesterday) was Friday and I almost freaked out because I didn't have any marker memories indicating it was Thursday instead. Glad there was a clock...Anyways, it would be interesting to note if her "zoning out" is accompanied by boredom as mentioned above. Personally, if I'm unable to be fully engaged in an activity (for example, a "listen and take notes" session would qualify) my mind basically shuts down high-level thought processing after about three minutes. Even though I'm "listening" there's no interpretation happening, no engagement, and basically no attention. If this state is not caught quickly, daydream usually starts with no save, and I must be awoken by trigger.
Actually, come to think of it, this happens much more often when mentally fatigued. Possible sleep issues?
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@tsaukpaetra said in Distracted Kid:
Even though I'm "listening" there's no interpretation happening, no engagement, and basically no attention.
Sounds like many conversations with my ex-wife (when she was not yet my ex). She'd be talking to me, and my mind would be elsewhere — either entirely or thinking about how I wanted to respond to something she'd already said. She'd stop and say, "Are you listening to me?" "Yes." "What did I say?" And somehow I could repeat the words she had said, but until I repeated them, my brain hadn't really extracted the meaning from them. Often, but not always!, this was enough to convince her that I had actually been listening.
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@hardwaregeek said in Distracted Kid:
And somehow I could repeat the words she had said, but until I repeated them, my brain hadn't really extracted the meaning from them.
I actually have a problem with my language processing. It occasionally skips stuff. And my subconscious will have remembered it, and will keep looping through it until it gets processed. This means I'll be sitting there stumped, and 5 seconds later I'll know what they said.
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@xaade said in Distracted Kid:
5 seconds later
Be glad it's only as long as five seconds.
No joke, someone mentioned I was doxxed during an audio call, and only four days later did it come back to me and I asked about it.
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@tsaukpaetra doxxed? You hardly try. Anyone with half a motivation could find out exactly where you live. Hell, I found your phone number without trying.
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@pie_flavor said in Distracted Kid:
@tsaukpaetra doxxed? You hardly try. Anyone with half a motivation could find out exactly where you live. Hell, I found your phone number without trying.
There is no need for the information to have been "secret" in any way shape or form for the publication to be considered doxing [i.e. it could already be readily available elsewhere]
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@the_quiet_one said in Distracted Kid:
I had similar problems growing up and I was diagnosed with ADD. I had Ritalin and later on Adderall but they each came with serious enough side effects that I came off them. I've since either grown out of it or learned to cope enough to be focused in my job, this forum's distraction notwithstanding.
This. That stuff's no good, and you do grow out of the behavioral issues eventually if you don't end up dependent on it. I speak from personal experience on both points.
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@gąska said in Distracted Kid:
@xaade it sounds like a serious and quite unique problem. The only advice I can give you is, if the doctor diagnoses something scary or if they prescrobe expensive and/or very intrusive treatment, get a second opinion from another doctor (avoid mentioning the previous diagnosis if possible).
I don't take meds because they are expensive, but they were the only thing that really helped, the rest is all bullshit that doesn't help.
But there are other causes than ADHD, like sleep disorders. I have both, and treating the sleep problems got me a lot better.
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@xaade said in Distracted Kid:
@hardwaregeek said in Distracted Kid:
And somehow I could repeat the words she had said, but until I repeated them, my brain hadn't really extracted the meaning from them.
I actually have a problem with my language processing. It occasionally skips stuff. And my subconscious will have remembered it, and will keep looping through it until it gets processed. This means I'll be sitting there stumped, and 5 seconds later I'll know what they said.
Here's a very important principle that she ought to apply: learn how you learn.
When I was in school, I'd always be working on the assignment while, or immediately after, the teacher was explaining the principles involved, so I never really grasped why homework was often such an awful thing for me until I got into the professional world and started to pick up on a few things, and see patterns in how I would grasp some things and not others.
Turns out if I hear someone talking about a principle, it can go in one ear and out the other. If I read something, or watch someone demonstrate it, I'll remember it better, but if I do the thing myself, it gets stuck properly in my memory.
I sure wish I'd understood that about 15 years earlier...
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@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
That stuff's no good
I think it depends on the person, just like every other drug.
I've had adults and kids tell me that the medicine worked and they were happier on it.
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@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
@the_quiet_one said in Distracted Kid:
I had similar problems growing up and I was diagnosed with ADD. I had Ritalin and later on Adderall but they each came with serious enough side effects that I came off them. I've since either grown out of it or learned to cope enough to be focused in my job, this forum's distraction notwithstanding.This. That stuff's no good, and you do grow out of the behavioral issues eventually if you don't end up dependent on it. I speak from personal experience on both points.
The stuff is not intended to help you grow out of it. It is intended to help you live normally until you have grown out of it. If taken in moderation, there is no dependence. I speak from personal experience too. And I can tell you for certain that there was about a six year gap between when I got off Adderall and when I stopped actually needing it, at great detriment to my social life.
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@pie_flavor said in Distracted Kid:
And I can tell you for certain that there was about a six year gap between when I got off Adderall and when I stopped actually needing it, at great detriment to my social life.
My son tried that for a semester (I think), at great detriment to his academics; he failed every single class (although the uni allowed him to withdraw ex post facto on medical grounds). Unfortunately, the bad habits he developed that semester persisted even after he went back on his meds, and he ended up getting kicked out of uni. He didn't even want to go off the meds in the first place, but his mom (and/or her boyfriend) "encouraged" him to consider going into the military (to "grow up"), and that would have required being off the meds for a year before he would have been eligible.
Also, some people may "grow out of it;" others may not. In my 50s, I still have the classic symptoms of being able to hyper-focus to the exclusion of eating, sleeping or other bodily functions on something interesting but having trouble focusing for 2 minutes on an important but boring or frustrating task. About a decade ago, my doctor tried various meds; methylphenidate helped noticeably (but not dramatically). The problem, though, is that insurance wouldn't cover it, because adults "grow out of it." (If I'd known then what I know now, $200/month out of pocket would have been so worth it. So, so worth it. I probably wouldn't have lost my job at the beginning of the recession, so wouldn't have lost my house. Probably wouldn't have had some of the personal issues that led to the loss of my marriage. Which led to bad choices by my kids...)
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Just an observation. My son (born in the very beginning of the 1980s') was one of the early diagnosed. He was on various medications over the years. No medication was a "silver bullet", but talking with him over the years (he is in his late 30s) he considers them to have been a "life saver" [his words].
I do not believe there is any "once size fits all". Pick any way of moving forward and there WILL be people ho had a bad experience with that path.
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@xaade said in Distracted Kid:
I think it depends on the person
Very much so. It depends what the actual root cause of the problem is, and body chemistry varies quite a bit between people…
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@xaade said in Distracted Kid:
@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
That stuff's no good
I think it depends on the person, just like every other drug.
I've had adults and kids tell me that the medicine worked and they were happier on it.
This. I do think the drugs are over prescribed...especially to boys but some people actually need them and continue to need them into adulthood.
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@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
@the_quiet_one said in Distracted Kid:
I had similar problems growing up and I was diagnosed with ADD. I had Ritalin and later on Adderall but they each came with serious enough side effects that I came off them. I've since either grown out of it or learned to cope enough to be focused in my job, this forum's distraction notwithstanding.This. That stuff's no good, and you do grow out of the behavioral issues eventually if you don't end up dependent on it. I speak from personal experience on both points.
That's great that you managed but I think it's dangerous advice that doesn't sound different from a Food Babe article. And the science on those drugs is interesting.
Adderall Risks: Much More Than You Wanted To Know
[Previously in series: Antidepressant Pharmacogenomics: Much More Than You Wanted To Know; SSRIs: Much More Than You Wanted To Know, etc. This is all preliminary and you should not take it as a rea…
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@boomzilla said in Distracted Kid:
And the science on those drugs is interesting.
The risk of drugs is horrible, but usually not worse than the risk of not taking them [when rationally prescribed and taken as prescribed]
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@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
This. That stuff's no good, and you do grow out of the behavioral issues eventually if you don't end up dependent on it.
That didn't work like that for me, and thousands of people that are diagnosed with this thing after their 30s
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@hardwaregeek said in Distracted Kid:
being able to hyper-focus to the exclusion of eating, sleeping or other bodily functions on something interesting but having trouble focusing for 2 minutes on an important but boring or frustrating task.
This isn't normal?
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@mott555 said in Distracted Kid:
This isn't normal?
It's normal up to a degree, but there is a point it becomes obvious you have a problem.
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@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
Turns out if I hear someone talking about a principle, it can go in one ear and out the other. If I read something, or watch someone demonstrate it, I'll remember it better, but if I do the thing myself, it gets stuck properly in my memory.
That's true for almost anyone. Some people are better than others at learning from just hearing or watching something but in general you have to practice to get any sort of permanent learning.
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@xaade From my experience, Things that work/ don't work are extremely specific from child to child. I would gently suggest you to not just get a second opinion but another one after that if possible. Did you bring her to a doctor yet?
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@sockpuppet7 said in Distracted Kid:
@mott555 said in Distracted Kid:
This isn't normal?
It's normal up to a degree, but there is a point it becomes obvious you have a problem.
That point is somewhere north of 12 hours. Otherwise it would mean I'm crazy, and I assure you I am absolutely not crazy.
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@gąska They hyperfocus is rarely a problem. It's the trouble focusing on boring things for more than 30s and the forgetfulness that is crippling.
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@sockpuppet7 said in Distracted Kid:
They hyperfocus is rarely a problem.
Until you pee yourself because you're so focused on what you're doing that you don't stop for biological necessities. (I've never quite done that, but I've gotten really damned close.) Or you realize it's 03:00 and you have to get up for work in two hours, and you've never gotten around to eating dinner. (I've definitely done that.)
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@hardwaregeek said in Distracted Kid:
Until you pee yourself because you're so focused on what you're doing that you don't stop for biological necessities.
It's like when you sit down to play a few minutes of Factorio, and the next thing you know you're sitting in a pile of your own excrement with about a week's worth of filth in it and you're five pounds lighter from not eating.
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@jaloopa said in Distracted Kid:
@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
Turns out if I hear someone talking about a principle, it can go in one ear and out the other. If I read something, or watch someone demonstrate it, I'll remember it better, but if I do the thing myself, it gets stuck properly in my memory.
That's true for almost anyone. Some people are better than others at learning from just hearing or watching something but in general you have to practice to get any sort of permanent learning.
That's important and a problem for people with mental illnesses. You never know exactly what is normal because you only have yourself for reference, and stuff like that that you have and that fits with the illness, you tend to believe is part of the illness.
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@hardwaregeek IKTF
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@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
This. That stuff's no good, and you do grow out of the behavioral issues eventually if you don't end up dependent on it. I speak from personal experience on both points.
My 8yo has been taking it for the better part of a year and I can only say it's just what he needs. I'm very skeptical of the trend for medication of every little behavior issue but in his specific case, he is definitely better off with Ritalin. He'd usually have an overwhelming urge to fidget about, throw stuff through the room, screech, babble and generally do everything to distract from what he's supposed to do. We tried the whole spectrum from pure "positive reinforcement" to screaming and threatening but we might as well have been trying to keep him from breathing. It doesn't fucking work. Stuff like Pomodoro does make it a bit easier but not substantially. He was reading like most first-graders do after a couple of weeks at the end of first grade; if he had continued like this, he'd have ended up with a whole lot more issues, being "the stupid clown" all the time. Now that he can concentrate better it's still hard work but he has mostly caught up and is even above grade level in a few things. And I'm positive there's no dependence as he usually doesn't take anything during holidays.
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@pie_flavor I agree. That's why self diagnosis is so tricky. If I'm feeling low I can go down a list of depressive illnesses and agree with enough symptoms of almost all of them to convince myself I have them.
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@jaloopa said in Distracted Kid:
@pie_flavor I agree. That's why self diagnosis is so tricky. If I'm feeling low I can go down a list of depressive illnesses and agree with enough symptoms of almost all of them to convince myself I have them.
Same here. Yet I'm also too paranoid to go see a doctor for anything because I don't trust them, nor do I trust any of the mood or brain-alterant drugs to not make me no longer be me.
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@e4tmyl33t I was on SSRIs for a few years on and off. They didn't make me not me, they just evened out the peaks troughs in my mood so I was less likely to have the really bad days.
I was against it at first, until my therapist compared me to a diabetic. If my body didn't produce enough insulin to keep me healthy, I wouldn't have a problem supplementing, so why is it so different if the deficiency is in serotonin? That really stuck with me.
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@e4tmyl33t said in Distracted Kid:
@jaloopa said in Distracted Kid:
@pie_flavor I agree. That's why self diagnosis is so tricky. If I'm feeling low I can go down a list of depressive illnesses and agree with enough symptoms of almost all of them to convince myself I have them.
Same here. Yet I'm also too paranoid to go see a doctor for anything because I don't trust them, nor do I trust any of the mood or brain-alterant drugs to not make me no longer be me.
When I hear somebody say they don't trust their doctor or think they know better I always think of my grandma. "I don't need a hearing aid!" And then when you try to tell her something she actually cares about it's "Wait, I need to put in my hearing aid, I'm legally deaf you know!"
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@jaloopa said in Distracted Kid:
@e4tmyl33t I was on SSRIs for a few years on and off. They didn't make me not me, they just evened out the peaks troughs in my mood so I was less likely to have the really bad days.
I was against it at first, until my therapist compared me to a diabetic. If my body didn't produce enough insulin to keep me healthy, I wouldn't have a problem supplementing, so why is it so different if the deficiency is in serotonin? That really stuck with me.
See, I get that. Rationally, I can understand the method and the way it's supposed to work. However, my brain works funny ways and interprets anything which has the potential to change "myself" as a threat and not to be trusted. It also extends to people (strangers are potential threats), places (public spaces like restaurants are no-gos for me if I don't have at least one other trusted set of eyes along with me to watch for threats), some things (all dogs are threats at all times, period). Some of these I can make temporary mental blocks for to work around for short periods of time, but it sends my general anxiety through the roof regardless (like I'm going to have to try to do next week when they cram me in a plane to send me to Arizona for a work trip).
I know I'm broken, I just mitigate it by staying home as much as possible.
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@e4tmyl33t said in Distracted Kid:
I know I'm broken, I just mitigate it by staying home as much as possible.
That's the urge that would have been hugely detrimental if I had listened to it. I've gradually become more and more normal just by exposing myself to the stuff that makes me uncomfortable more and more. I have friends to tell me what is normal and what isn't, and I make sure to exercise the areas I am deficient in, like a muscle.
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@pie_flavor said in Distracted Kid:
I've gradually become more and more normal
I don't like that thinking. Nothing against you, but I have other things going on than the stuff I listed, so I hate thinking "If I just concentrate on being normal, I'll be normal" when that would be actively harming another portion of myself...
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@e4tmyl33t I'm sorry, but I have a hard time understanding what you're saying. (parsing error, not judgement error)
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@pie_flavor Nonbinary gender identity issues that conflict with the biology the universe unfortunately assigned me with. Tends to conflict with general thinkings of "normal", because there's nothing "normal" about it.
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@e4tmyl33t I will not pretend to know what that's like, but what I'm saying works in the contexts I'm talking about. Gender dysphoria or body dysmorphia is a completely different can of worms from paranoia and social difficulties.
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@boomzilla said in Distracted Kid:
@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
@the_quiet_one said in Distracted Kid:
I had similar problems growing up and I was diagnosed with ADD. I had Ritalin and later on Adderall but they each came with serious enough side effects that I came off them. I've since either grown out of it or learned to cope enough to be focused in my job, this forum's distraction notwithstanding.This. That stuff's no good, and you do grow out of the behavioral issues eventually if you don't end up dependent on it. I speak from personal experience on both points.
That's great that you managed but I think it's dangerous advice that doesn't sound different from a Food Babe article. And the science on those drugs is interesting.
[Previously in series: Antidepressant Pharmacogenomics: Much More Than You Wanted To Know; SSRIs: Much More Than You Wanted To Know, etc. This is all preliminary and you should not take it as a rea…
I think I have attention issues...but I am very sensitive to stimulants. I get my caffeine from soda which is far less caffeinated than coffee and can't take decongestants.
Though some of those focus formula supplements have seemed to help but they are not purely stimulant.
So, I've had no desire to take these drugs. I did see the link to bupropion (wellbutrin), I did try that as an antidepressant...I had to switch off within days, if that.
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@sockpuppet7 said in Distracted Kid:
@masonwheeler said in Distracted Kid:
This. That stuff's no good, and you do grow out of the behavioral issues eventually if you don't end up dependent on it.
That didn't work like that for me, and thousands of people that are diagnosed with this thing after their 30s
I've known adults who get diagnosed when their kids get diagnosed because it wasn't a thing when they went through school.
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@karla
Although I remember my parents talking about taking me to a psychiatrist for hyperactivity, they never actually did.
