Adult ADD Strengths

This article from the Japan Times talks about Wendy Kerr, a life coach in Japan, a place where I lived for 3 years, in Sapporo, the capital of the northern Island of Hokkaido. Coaching is happening all over the globe.

We identified his ideal week, then looked to see how realistically this could be made practical. He learned the importance of prioritizing. Once he got a better handle on time, it was amazing how his energy shifted. Since I know the cookie-cutter approach to time-management doesn’t work, it’s more a matter of changing beliefs about the importance of the time you have got.

Since one of the main tools of dealing with ADD besides coaching, therapy and exercise is ADD medications like Concerta, Strattera, Wellbutrin and Ritalin, ADDers often find themselves in the doctor’s office.

Often you only have 10 minutes or less with them so here are some ideas on maximizing that time, especially if you have ADD and an occasional tendency to forget things:)

Another way is getting your ADD coach to help you setting up and using an ADD medication log, see my previous post for information on what an ADD med log is and how to set one up.

Cynthia Gerdes’ attention deficit disorder fuels her creativity and has boosted her business success.

She gives examples of how ADD effects her, i.e., forgetting to put in some ingredients in a birthday cake, fidgeting in business meetings, and stopping in the middle of one task and getting diverted to 4 etc.

“I know, I know,” she said. “It sounds like I’m totally wigged out, completely dysfunctional.”

Hardly.

Gerdes is founder and co-owner of Creative Kidstuff, a highly successful, well-organized business with six stores in the Twin Cities. Local publications repeatedly name Creative Kidstuff “Best Toy Store.” The national toy industry also praises it. Annual sales are more than $10 million

Yahoo mindset is a very cool new demo tool from the yahoo research labs for searching the Net. Thanks to Lee at the Online Marketing Blog for letting me know about this. This is what this beta tool does

…applies a new twist on search that uses machine learning technology to give you a choice: View Yahoo! Search results sorted according to whether they are more commercial or more informational (i.e., from academic, non-commercial, or research-oriented sources).

Here’s some FAQ on the tool

A study by Harvard Medical School showed that teenage girls with ADHD were more likely to be clinically depressed, to have anxiety disorders and to have conduct disorder by age 17.

About 10 boys are referred for ADHD treatment for every girl “and 99% of the childhood ADHD research is on boys,” Biederman says. He believes it’s because girls don’t become disruptive as early in life as boys with ADHD do, so it often goes undiagnosed.

This is often because girls with ADHD and women with ADHD are more far likely to have inattentive ADHD, vs. the hyperactive impulsive ADHD. Men can have both but are more likely to have the hyperactive impulsive type. Which type do you think will get noticed more in school, at home and at work?

A new Canadian study may offer hope to some for whom dieting and exercise have proven ineffective in the battle against obesity.

In a study published in the journal Eating Weight Disorders, Vol. 10, N.1, researchers have outlined a possible link between ADHD and severe obesity.

They found that 26.7 % of the severely obese women in the study had ADHD, more than 5 times larger then the regular population. They had problems with impulsivity, distractibility, and attention and staying focused.

Toronto psychologist John Fleming adds: “There’s a tendency to not pay attention to feelings of fullness and that ability to be able to say ’stop’.”

Dr. Gabor Mate, Vancouver doctor, bestselling author, and international speaker who has ADD and has written a book on ADD and a book on Stress will be presenting a 6 hour intensive workshop on how to understand and manage stress. It’ll will be held on June 4th 2005 in Vancouver BC at the Sutton Place Hotel from 9:00 am- 4:30pm.

Dr. Mate spoke recently at my Adult ADD Support Group on the topic of ADD and Stress, and he packed the room. We had 70 people show up, and he got great reviews from the members.

By combining behavioral therapy and medication researchers at the University at Buffalo have found they could reduce the amount of medication that children with ADD needed by two-thirds, according to a new study published in the May issue of Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology.

“One of the major findings of the study is that when using behavior modification, you can get away with tiny, tiny doses of medication, much lower than previously thought,” ADHD researcher William E. Pelham Jr., Distinguished Professor in the department of psychology, said in a prepared statement.”