Adult ADD Strengths

Tonight at 7.30 PST / 10.30 pm EST, I’ll be interviewed by Tara McGillicudy, ADD coach, blogger, and internet marketer extraordinaire on her online Living with Adult ADD / ADHD Radio Show.

We’ll talk about how to start and run an ADHD support group.

You can listen to it tonight, or listen to it later when it get’s archived on the website.

Here are some of the links that I’ll be mentioning in the show relating to Adult ADHD support groups

ADHD Support Group of the Month Idea

How to Start & Run Support Groups

Canadian ADHD Support Groups Listings

US ADHD Support Groups Listings

I thought about adding a new feature to this blog and my ADD resource website.

I used to run the Vancouver Adult ADD support group for 3 years and I’m on the board of another one, CHADD Vancouver. I have a whole section on my website on how to find Canadian, US and International ADHD support groups and how to start, run and promote a support group. I even did a teleclass on how to start one, The Imperfect Guide to Starting an ADD Support Group.

Just added Australian, Cypriot, Irish, and Israeli ADHD Support Groups to my US and International ADHD Support Groups listings. Canadian ADHD Support Groups listed here.

So far that’s 8 countries with English speaking ADHD support groups. If you know any that should be added to the list, let me know.

I have a list of medical professionals in the Vancouver BC area that are known to diagnose and treat ADHD in adults and children, but I don’t know who does it in Chicoutimi, Chicago or Canberra.

From CHADD USA.

Unfortunately we in Canada are far behind the Americans on this sort of thing. But if you do live in the US, make the call. That is unless your satisfied with the availability and resources devoted to mental health treatment in the US. Politicians do respond to public pressure if there’s enough of it.

Action: On Friday, December 7th, use the toll-free Parity Hotline, 1-866-parity4 (1-866-727-4894), to call your representative and senators and leave a message urging their active support for the mental health and addiction parity legislation. (The Parity Hotline reaches the U.S. Capitol switchboard, which can connect callers to the offices of their members.) To locate your US Representative go to www.house.gov and enter your zip code in the upper left hand corner; go to www.senate.gov look up the Senators from your state in the upper right hand corner.

From Jeff’s ADD Mind Blog

I am a brain surgeon. Well, let me clarify that. My area of expertise is brain surgery. This does not mean that I have any experience in the field of brain surgery. However, using my first-hand experience at cutting things open (see this blog posting on slicing chicken breasts) and whatever facts I can discover (I found out that the brain has two hemispheres. Would you like me to show you?) I have declared myself an expert brain surgeon.

The term Fisking, or to Fisk, is blogosphere slang describing detailed point-by-point criticism that highlights errors, disputes the analysis of presented facts, or highlights other problems in a statement, article, or essay.

Karin Klein an LA Times editorial staff writer wrote an editorial in the August 20th, 2007 issue entitled “Pens, Pencils and Meds”, which I thought just piled more unneeded stigma on people with ADHD. It unfortunately got picked up by many other newspapers, websites and blogs, further spreading the stigma and ignorance. I recently got an email from her saying she was on the Pulliam Fellowship, so she can work full time on an in-depth project in ADD and asked me to help her find mothers with ADD to interview. Being the curious type, I googled her and found this editorial Karin Klein wrote last August. I wrote back saying I declined and citing her article and made a few point about the stigma against ADDers it created, and that I didn’t want to help her create more stigma against ADDers.

Here’s some links to some of the content that will be mentioned in my discussion on Attention Surplus Condition in Technology at Barcamp Saskatoon Saturday September 29th.

Adult ADHD Screener Test

Top Ten Advantages of Having ADD in a High Tech Career

ADHD Treatment - Technology - Online, desktop and external clock and reminder for those of us whose internal clocks don’t work so well.

Succeeding with ADHD in the Workplace

Here’s a few other links relating to ADHD at work

ADD at work articles

ADDA’s ADHD at work section

ADHD on the Job

Possible places to call for ADHD Diagnosis in Saskatchewan. Or where to get suggestions on where to look.

The 4th Annual ADHD Awareness day will be Tuesday oops Wednesday, September the 19th, 2007.

ADDA, The Attention Deficit Disorder Association has created an ADHD Awareness Day Toolkit

It list the US senate resolution and gives some ideas on how ADDers can:

• Promote ADHD Awareness
• Organize an ADHD Awareness Day event
• Promote the event

ADDA also has some ADHD teleclasses for that week.

Last year some members of my Vancouver Adult ADD support group and I organized an ADD Awareness day in Vancouver.Unfortunately Canada is still behind the US in general awareness of ADHD and resources to manage it. Hopefully that will change and one day we’ll see a Canadian ADHD awareness day and hopefully a global one. (today Canada, tomorrow the world!).