I’ve gotten several e-mails asking about Dylan’s diagnosis. Thank you guys so much for your concern and support. I appreciate the cards, girls night invitations, and advice. I need all the help I can get. 😉
I’m so glad that we took the time and expense to have Dylan tested by this psychologist. He ran every test he had on Dylan, but 2. Dylan has been officially diagnosed with Inattentive ADHD.
Here’s what parents with children of Inattentive ADHD say:
- “He seems like he’s always daydreaming. He never answers when I talk to him. I wonder if he hears me.”
- “He loses everything. I’ve had to buy him 4 new lunchboxes since school started.”
- “I’ll ask him to go up to his room and get dressed, and ten minutes later I find him playing with his toys with only his shirt on.”
- “He can’t retain what he learns because he misses instructions and explanations in school. Even though we work so hard on his schoolwork at night, by the next day he’s forgotten everything.”
- “Our teacher called her his ‘space cadet,’ and another her ‘random student.”
We’ve been to our pediatrician a couple times now and she grabbed these books from her shelf and made me check them out:
ADHD A Complete and Authoritative Guide and
Taking Charge of ADHD – she said this one will “blow my mind” (yep her words)
I’m reading them and learning a lot. Back to Dylan’s diagnosis. Here are some of his deficits, out of 100%:
Verbal Comprehension – 70%
Working Memory – 60% (below average)
Processing Speed – 34% (what?!?)
Working memory measures the general ability to sustain attention, concentrate, and exert mental control. Processing Speed is the ability to process visually perceived nonverbal information quickly and with concentration and rapid eye-hand coordination.
Understanding Directions – 60%
Dylan showed deficits in both impulsive, sustaining attention, and the sub-categories of vigilance, focus, prudence, consistency, and stamina. In short, Dylan’s performance suggests that he tends to be impulsive, inconsistent, fatigues easily, and fails to sustain attention in either visual or auditory channels over time.
Recommendations:
1. Dylan consult a pediatrition to determine medication regimen.
2. Typical recommendations:
- Sit next to teacher,
- Establish eye contact and touch student when oral information is being communicated
- Provide multi sensory inputs to facilitate learning and retention (backing up auditory instructions with visual aids and hands on learning experiences)
- Providing instructions one at a time.
- Providing supervision, redirection, and encouragement
- Teach organizational skills
- Establish a team between professionals, parents, and school personnel
- Allow breaks as needed
3. See an occupational therapist for strengthening perceptual/motor skills.
4. Check out other resources: Taking Charge of ADHD, Driven to Distraction, Homework without Tears.
5. Individual psychotherapy may prove helpful in promoting and enhancing social skills and self-control.
I realize this is a LOT of information, but I thought that if this could help one other mother out there then it would be worth it.
I never would have realized that Dylan was having these kinds of problems if we hadn’t had him tested. I’m glad we have a diagnosis but I’m more appreciative of all the individual tests that confirm what specifically we need to work on.
