Calming The Storm: Learning To Live More Peacefully With Your Extra-Active (Hyperactive, ADD, ADHD) Child

By Annette Oaks Pierce

This book is a guide to assist parents, teachers and others associated with an extra-active (Hyperactive, ADD, ADHD) child in their lives. It has practical suggestions to make life easier for both the adults and the child as the child progresses through the daily ups and downs in his or her life. The suggestions in the book can also assist adults in dealing with extra-active Asperger children.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Annette Oaks Pierce
• Release date: Jan 14, 2014
• ISBN: 9780982864326

Annette Oaks Pierce

Annette Oaks Pierce has spent 30 years as a Family Consultant, working with troubled children, at-risk families, and individuals under severe stress from loss of loved ones, divorce, illness, or other major life-changing events. Her background is in Education, and she began her consulting career working with emotionally troubled children, autistic children, and those listed as hyperactive, ADD or ADHD. She developed the RYES-6TM Program as a result of her work with these children to assist them in developing solid emotional structures. It soon became apparent that the principles of the RYES-6TM Program were as valuable to adults in trauma as it was to children. So she began doing Family Consulting for adults as well as children, using her revolutionary new program. Using the principles of her RYES-6TM Program, she has presented seminars, done retreats, and taught classes in personal growth and understanding of self and others for individuals, businesses, and organizations throughout the Northwestern United States. In the past she has offered on-line classes based on her RYES-6TM Program. Her materials are now available on-line in e-book format.

Book preview

Chapter 1

Descriptions of the extra-active (Hyperactive, ADD, ADHD child) NOTE; This material can also pertain to the Hyperactive Asperger Syndrome child.

When there is an extra-active child in a family, (sometimes referred to as a Hyperactive, Attention Deficit Disorder, Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder child), the parents, the teachers, the brothers and sisters, relatives, and the neighbors all struggle with the behavior of the child. Tears of frustration are often shed, hands are often wrung, and many negative words are often spoken in high pitched voices by those trying to cope when the extra-active child is around. Often there is a feeling of intense frustration, resignation, and sometimes total despair on the part of those having to deal with the extra-active child on a day-to-day basis.

The extra-active child often begins life very differently from other children in the home. These are the babies who cry a lot. Often they cannot be held and cuddled and comforted as other babies can. They are easily upset and they also seem to have colic more often than other babies their age. In observing these children, there are certain symptoms, a combination of which may suggest that the child is extra-active (sometimes called hyperactive, ADD or ADHD.) Some of these symptoms include the following:

Unusual sleep patterns. Often needs less sleep than other infants of the same age, and once they ARE asleep, they will sleep very, very soundly and be extremely hard to awaken.

In constant motion.

Frequent crying and their cry often has a high-pitch cutting edge to it that makes the crying very hard to listen to.

Inability to be easily soothed

Easily frustrated.

Extremely determined.

Unusual skin sensitivity.

Continual nervous hand activity.

Very active kicking.

Constant wiggling and squirming.

Easily bored.

Unable to entertain themselves for any period of time

Can become extremely angry when thwarted.

Lack of ability to relate to others through cuddling or close physical contact.

Some extra-active babies may not exhibit all of these symptoms. There may also be evidence of other symptoms not listed here. Also, as these children grow older, other symptoms may appear in their behavior patterns that were not apparent when these children were babies. However, if a baby displays five or more of the listed symptoms, the baby may be an extra-active child.

PARENTS COMMENT ABOUT THEIR EXTRA-ACTIVE INFANTS:

Some comments often made by parents about their extra- active infants are:

This child never sleeps. He's always awake.

She never DID sleep through the night. She always got me up in the middle of the night, and she still does.

There's no way I can get that child's attention so I can feed him.

There is no pleasing that child.

He's always throwing up.

She's always breaking out in a heat rash.

He cries a lot.

She always wants me to hold her, but she doesn't like to cuddle when I hold her.

He's never content.

She's always on the go.

He squirms a lot.

She's hard to dress.

He's impossible to bathe - wiggles right out of your arms.

She gets frantic when anything is on her face or over her head.

He's very rejecting of people he's uncertain about.

She's always pulling at my hair, or at my clothes, or at my face.

He gets very angry when he doesn't get his way.

She's impossible to rock or cuddle for any period of time.

The older extra-active child

As their extra-active children get older, parents of these children are often heard to say:

That child of mine doesn’t respond to any type of discipline. I’ve tried everything. She just doesn’t seem to care.

He gets so angry when things don’t go his way. I’m almost afraid to say anything around him because I never know what will set him off.

She never settles down to anything for more than five minutes at a time – if I’m lucky!

He never stays looking nice until I can even get out of the house. I don’t know what’s the matter with him, but he seems to attract dirt like a magnet.

I don’t know what ever happened to that child. The rest of my children are so well-behaved.

Why this book was written

This book was written because these feelings of frustration and despair are so universal when it comes to dealing with these extra-active children, and because the information base for dealing effectively with these children and their special needs is often limited or inadequate. The suggestions in this book are designed especially for those working directly with these extra-active children on a daily basis.

One instructor at a local university said she had received long-distance calls from across the nation asking for help when it was learned that she even briefly discussed how to deal with the extra-active child in her classes.

There are three main areas of focus in this book. The first area of focus is to offer those adults who deal directly with these extra-active children some simple, practical, easy-to-follow suggestions for working more effectively with these children at home, at school, and in the community.

The second area of focus is to present these extra-active children in a different light than the way they are usually viewed. Often the extra-active child's bright intellect and the child's delightful approach to life are overlooked in the daily battle to keep the child moving ahead and out of trouble. Because much of any child's feelings about himself or herself is a reflection of other's feelings about the child, it is terribly important that those who work with the extra-active child learn to recognize the child's unique gifts, and his or her individual potential, as well as looking at the child's problems.

The third area of focus has to do with helping the adults who are working with the extra-active child recognize and channel the child's emotions into constructive and supportive behaviors and relationships regarding the child. Because these children need to be surrounded by supportive adults who can give them positive reinforcement, the adults who work with these children need to be able to understand THEMSELVES and their own emotions well enough so that they are then able to reach out and held the extra-active child understand, accept, and deal with himself or herself in a constructive and productive manner.

IMPORTANCE OF THIS WORK:

All of the input these extra-active children receive from those around them helps to predict the future role of these children either as a contributing member of society, or as destructive, ill-fitting, unhappy, lonely human beings. If those who work with these children can recognize that THEY have the ability to help these extra-active children find success, they hopefully will be more aware of how they relate to these children, and will place a greater emphasis on helping these children achieve a more positive view of life.

Chapter 2

Possible Causes

BIRTH HYPERACTIVITY

Some children demonstrate the symptoms of extra-activity from birth, while other children may develop the symptoms later in their childhood.

What causes a baby to be born extra-active? Over the years, there are a number of things, both physiological and environmental, that have been considered as possible causes of extra-activity in children, but there is no one cause that has yet been isolated. Although no one to date has been able to positively identify the specific cause or causes for the appearance of extra-activity in the newborn, there are several conditions that appear frequently in the case histories of babies afflicted with this problem at birth. Among them are the following:

1. Lack of oxygen during the prenatal period due to maternal anemia or other maternal problems.

2. Lack of oxygen during the delivery period due to a prolonged delivery or a breech delivery.

3. Maternal malnutrition during the prenatal period.

4. Maternal use of drugs or alcohol during pregnancy.

5. Maternal fall or high fever during pregnancy.

6. Maternal anxiety and/or heavy stress during the prenatal period.

Some specialists also view heredity as a possible cause, since occasionally a parent was also extra-active as a child. To date, however, there has been no genetic link positively identified to be related specifically to the incidence of extra-activity in newborns.

ONSET HYPERACTIVITY

Sometimes a child seems fine in the early months of life, only to develop the classic symptoms of extra-activity later. Here again, experts in the field have found no specific cause or set of causes to explain this onset behavior. However, there are some theories that have been given. Some of these are:

1. Stress in the home that might affect the child.

2. Artificial coloring in foods or certain types of food additives that the child might have a reaction to or that the child might be allergic to.

3. Other types of allergies to certain foods or to other environmental causes.

4. Concussions, high fevers, or other medical causes affecting the child.

5. A change in the child's personal circumstances, such as the birth of a new baby.

6. Upsetting life changes for the child such as divorce, the death of a parent or close relative, or an unexpected or upsetting family move.

Another possible cause for the onset of extra-activity may be the stress caused in a child's life by having to conform to unfamiliar rules and expectations such as in a new day-care situation or starting formal schooling.

There was one little girl, for instance, who, while busy and energetic at home, was well within the normal range of activity. She was bright, highly creative, and very outgoing and friendly. She played well on her own, and while she kept her mother busy, she fit very comfortably into the home setting with her brother and sisters.

This little girl was cheerful and good-natured, and while she needed some direction, she didn't need constant attention. There was no destruction of toys or furniture. There was no aggressive behavior toward other family members. There were no eating problems or behavior problems. There were no indication of classic extra-active behavior. But when she started kindergarten, the whole world changed. Suddenly she didn't seem able to cope with her world.

Within a few months of starting school, her whole personality altered. Her mother would send her off to the small local school, (only two and one-half blocks away), and the little girl would stop at neighbor's houses and ask to use their bathrooms or ask for food. She would stop at the corner post office and ask people for a ride. She would drop in at the local church and check to see what was going on.

No matter what her mother said to her when she went out the door for school, the little girl never made it to her class on time. Finally in desperation, her mother started driving her daughter to school each morning. But even this did not cure the problem. Once the little girl arrived on the school grounds, instead of going into the school for class, she would stay outside and chase stray dogs or go running through the neighborhood looking for something interesting to do.

Once she DID finally make it to class, she drove the teacher crazy. She couldn't seem to follow even simple directions. She refused to stay in her seat. She would kick and hit the other children. She bit a child one day when he got in her way.

Things did not improve at recess. When she was outside on the playground, she broke bottles in the parking lot, she fought with the other children, and on rainy days she threw mud at the school. By the time she was halfway through kindergarten, the school had started sending home warning notes. Because it was a small community, the mother was able to talk the school into keeping her in the regular classroom through the year, but by the time the child started first grade, the school was threatening to expel her.

When the mother went to observe the school situation, she saw that both the kindergarten teacher and the first- grade teacher ran a fairly free classroom and both were very kind and gently with the children. There just didn't seem to be any observable reason why the child's behavior had changed so drastically.

In addition to the problems at school, the little girl's home behavior had disintegrated to the point where she could hardly be lived with. She was hitting other family members, she couldn't seem to handle more than one thought at a time, and she seemed completely oblivious to any type of parental direction. Her sleeping behavior had gone downhill, and she became very defiant and very strong-willed.

By the end of first grade, she evidenced all of the classic symptoms of the extra-active child. There were absolutely no clues as to the source of her disruptive behavior. Shortly after the little girl started second grade, the principal finally called the mother in and said that the staff could no longer handle the little girl. He said she had become a danger to the other children because of her aggressive behavior, and that because she refused to follow any directions and did not respond to any type of discipline, she could no longer remain in the regular classroom. At his suggestion, the state resource team was brought in to do an evaluation on the child.

The resource team diagnosed her as being one of the most severely hyperactive children they had ever evaluated. They found that she demonstrated high mental ability, yet she was completely lacking in any social skills. Even though she had just begun second grade, she was already reading on a sixth grade level, but she was completely incapable of following directions of any kind while in the classroom setting.

Now, what caused these symptoms to appear in this child's life? She was not extra-active as a baby. Was school more than she could handle? Was being out on her own without her family's support too difficult for her? Was retreat into the classic extra-active behavior the only means she could use to cope with the structure of the school situation? Is it possible that sometimes these children who are extremely sensitive to so much in their lives simply retreat into frantic activity when confronted with a situation they feel unable to handle? At the present time there are no answers... only questions.

ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS

Sometimes it seems that our children today are more anxious than the children of a decade ago. It appears that the nervous activity in children is also increasing. Perhaps part of this increase may be environmentally-based. Much of our daily lives are now filled with noise and commotion. The constantly moving action of the T.V. screen, the continual noise and intense action of video games, and the hard-rock beat of our music all contribute to a world of unceasing motion and distraction. Childhood is now a kaleidoscope of rushing and jostling.

There is no time for our modern children to sit and meditate about life and who they are. Children very seldom meander any more. There seems to be a constant feeling of motion, movement, hurry, speed, urgency, and running to catch up. There are ballet lessons, piano lessons, dancing lessons, singing lessons, ice skating lessons, karate lessons, horse-back riding lessons, and swimming lessons. There is Little League, Soccer, Cub Scouts, Girl Scouts, Campfire Girls, and choir practice. Because we have become an affluent society, we can afford to involve our children in all of the different activities that we may have missed during our own childhoods. In the old days the extra-active child would be sent outside to pitch some hay or feed the chickens or pull some weeds. Now there are no chickens to feed or hay to stack, and often the weeds are taken care of by a landscaping company.

Sometimes it seems that we rush our children from one structured activity to another without giving them time to investigate and explore and digest their world. Their lives are so tightly structured that they don't seem to have anyplace left for finding peace in just being children. Sometimes it seem that there are no quiet places for our children to retreat to anymore. There are no places for them to just sit and think. And without time to sit and think occasionally, there is no relief from the impact of their world. There is no time for them to assimilate and categorize their world. There is no time for them to build coping devices to handle the world around