ADHD/LD

Over lunch recently, my friend, Kathleen, offered some good advice: 
“Write about the happy times, too.”  

She has been following my blog and I asked her for some much needed feedback… for two reasons.  We have parented children together and she knows a lot of the struggles our family has been through over the years.  
And, Kathleen teaches dyslexic and language learning disabled students at 
The New Community School in Richmond, VA.
  
She went on to remind me that a sense of humor is essential.

Happy times.  Humor.  Mothering addiction.  They don’t exactly dovetail.
But she’s got a point and I’m working on it.

As I mentioned in Change in Temperament  (Oct), my son repeated Kindergarten. During that second year, he was diagnosed with ADHD, which means that in addition to the attentional challenges, he exhibited hyperactivity and impulsivity.  
No surprise there. 
This extensive testing also showed learning style differences, also referred to as learning disabilities.  
This was a little harder to wrap my arms around.  

These diagnoses don’t come with a personal handbook.  And what I wish they’d told me was that the low self-esteem slowly growing in a child with ADHD and learning disabilities, after years of ongoing disappointments and failures, can 
lead to self-medicating.

The seeds of addiction, I realized, are sown early.  
As I recreate those years, I’ll keep an eye open for the good moments, too.
I’m sure they’re in there.  
Somewhere.