Adult ADD Strengths

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.

There are a lot of ways how to deal with Adult Attention Surplus Condition, aka Adult Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Here are a few.

Top Ten Ways to Manage Adult ADHD

1. ADHD Coaching. More for adults than children. Pills can be useful but pills don’t teach skills. They can however, put you in a better place to learn them through ADD coaching or therapy. See the 26 benefits of adult ADHD coaching. Adult ADHD Coaching focuses on practical day to day ways to manage adult ADHD more effectively at work and at home. Adult ADHD Coaches work on dealing with the challenges of ADHD and identifying and developing the strengths of having ADHD. They work over the phone for 3-4 sessions per month. Most adult ADD coaches offer a free sample sessions of ADD coaching so you can try before you buy.

Thanks to one of our support group members for the heads up. Dr Mate is the Vancouver based author of Scattered Minds: A New Look At The Origins And Healing Of Attention Deficit Disorder

PUBLIC LECTURE
February 21, 2008, 5:30 pm

From Heroin to Workaholism: The Universal Addiction Process, Its Origins and Healing Dr. Gabor Maté Physician and Author. February 21, 2008, 5:30 pm. SFU Surrey at Central City, Theatre 2600.

Hopefully by now you’ve considered or created your New Year’s Theme. So often ADDers focus on what they did wrong, or what didn’t go well. I think that many people in society think that way but it seems that many ADDers seem to be more likely to focus on what they did wrong than what they did right.

I’m not suggesting you be stupidly optimistic and pretend you never did anything wrong, or that you shouldn’t look at your mistakes to try and learn from them.

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.

ADD Resources has a great list of links to dozens of ADHD related CME’s (continuing medical education) courses for medical professional and available to the general public as well. They also have links to podcasts and videos.

Next time you hear your Doctor/Psychologist/Psychiatrist say “I don’t know enough about ADD to diagnose or treat it”, show them this webpage.

One way to fight ignorance and stigma against ADHD in the medical profession and the media is knowledge about the condition, diagnosis and treatment.

Sometimes ADHD Adults and parents of ADHD kids need to help educate their Doctors/Psychologists/Psychiatrists about ADHD, since it still isn’t covered very well by medical schools (according to many doctor’s well versed in ADHD that I’ve talked to, who tend to be self educated).

ADHD Author and Psychiatrist Dr. Ed Hallowell and Melissa Orlov are blogging about ADHD and Marriage while they are both working on a book on ADHD and Marriage. Great way to start to promote the book, while giving out useful content at an ADD friendly pace.

They’ve got some good content there. They’re also having guest authors do some posts. They’ve blogging using typepad, and there URL’s are set up SEO friendly.

One thing they should probably change is when people click on the header image (the picture at the top of the blog) by convention it should lead you to the blog’s home page but in this case it doesn’t do so but instead goes to the the Hallowell Center. They should have it go to the blog’s home page and have a prominent link to the Hallowell center on the side.

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.