I've heard it all before, "We didn't have ADHD until we had Ritalin" or "It's just kids being kids" or my personal favorite, "The child does not have a problem, the parent's need to learn how to discipline the child". Up until about 5 years ago I was adamant about no child of mine ever being on a mind altering drug on a daily basis. The day my son took his first dose was the day I realized I was crazy for fighting the doctor's advice for so long. It's not for everyone and I do agree that ADHD is over diagnosed, but my son is a textbook case.

I think what is missed when people make judgments about parents who put their children on ADHD medication is that it's not a matter of making life easier for the parents, it's a matter of making life easier for the child. My son has always been an intellectual child, what he lacked severely was common sense. He never looked ahead to what the consequences of his actions would be. When he stabbed a child in the leg with a pencil in kindergarten, he didn't realize there would be consequences. Two weeks later when he stabbed another child in the hand with a pencil because he was writing on his paper, he didn't realize there would be consequences. When he propped shards of broken glass up against the tires of a close family friend, he didn't think about how much he was costing me both financially as well as the cost it would have had on my friendship had his father not caught him in the act. The final blow came when he found one of his father's box cutters and destroyed a couch. What really got me thinking was that after making a long cut in one of the arms he didn't look at it and think, "Oh crud... I am going to be in trouble." Instead he went to the other arm and cut it through then completely destroyed the back cushions of the couch. I realized that I had to consider his doctor's recommendations. He was always angry. Not like a normal 7-year-old boy having fits of anger here and there - he was ALWAYS angry. When they tested him, I found the only box my son ever actually fit in was the diagnosis of ADHD. The day he began his medication was the day I got my son back. I'd always known that under all of that rage was the little boy I gave birth to and tried so hard to raise right, loving and kind and a little rough around the edges. I knew he was in there because every so often I'd catch a glimpse of him. I was amazed at the immediate change in him; he'd done a complete 180 in one day. I began beating myself up for shutting out the idea for so long. For 2 years I fought the doctor, all the while hating the person my son had become.

Once on the Concerta, his grades went through the roof. The fact that he was a much easier person to love was a mere bonus to the effects it had on his life; not for me - for him. He was much happier with himself. He was much more focused and no longer angry at the world. He began to like the person he was because he no longer had 600 thoughts running through his mind 24/7. He began sleeping more at night. His teachers noted a phenomenal difference in his personality and his ability to get along with other children.

I have my son back. We play together, we joke around... my son has no problem hugging his mother and looking up (soon it will be looking down at me) and telling me that he loves me. Medication didn't make my son someone he's not; it brought focus to who he actually is. He still has his normal every-pre-teen-boy bouts of anger and mischievousness, but now he's "just being a boy". I don't worry anymore if my son is going to grow up to be a criminal mind - I know he's going to be just fine. I've decided that if people want to judge me for putting my son on medication, I don't care. As a mother, I've done what I know was necessary to help my son be a better human being. I've stopped looking at his medication as a choice. It is a necessity.

I now have firsthand knowledge of that fact because one month ago I went to see a psychiatrist for the first time in my life. I went in expecting be diagnosed with either depression or bi-polar. With the trials I have been through in the last couple of years, I felt certain it would be depression. I was shocked when she suggested that I, myself, seemed to be ADHD. I'm still not sure why I was shocked, my son is a carbon copy of me and he had to get it somewhere. But I was shocked. I think that the American mindset has convinced us that if we believe we can control things like ADHD or depression or even obesity-we can and it's all in our mind. In some cases, yes - I believe absolutely that those things can be controlled. I've recently warmed up to the fact that in some cases the necessity for medication is akin to a cancer patient requiring medication. No - ADHD won't kill you, but it can put impossible obstacles in life's path. When you're stuck at the foot of a mountain and it's all you can see, you lose sight of the fact that taking only a few steps at a time will eventually get you to the top. Sitting at the foot of that mountain every day counting the steps it might take and the different paths you could possibly take gets you nowhere near the peak.

The day I began my medication I went into work like I always do and looked at the 60 things I had on my desk. I had conditioned myself to touch all 60 of those things, never really completing them, but doing something with each of them daily. At the end of each day I could say I worked on 60 different things, but I rarely got any of them completed. That morning I sat down and began my thought process as I always had, but suddenly stopped in my tracks. I made the decision to simply take the first thing on my to-do list and work on it until it was complete. The next day I went to work and found that instead of having 60 things I needed to focus on throughout the day, I only had 55 things and I began again with one thing following it through to the end.

There was never a conscious effort on my part to slow my thoughts down or hone my focus, nor was there ever the feeling of being drugged in any way. I was amazed when I began feeling tired at night. I wasn't tracking 40 thoughts at once; I wasn't trying to tackle every problem life handed me while laying there in bed. I wasn't restless with the feeling that I might miss something while I was sleeping. For the first time I can ever recall, I was tired when I should have been tired. And to boot, I was no longer plagued with self-defeating depression. Instead of filling myself with the poor-me, what am I going to do about this mountain of problems emotions. I began contemplating the here-and-now actions of solving the problems that were taking place in the moment.

Now that I'm sitting here writing this, it comes to me that I began writing this blog around the same time I was diagnosed with adult ADHD and began my medication. It was also around the same time I was promoted into my dream job. I don't know what baring my condition had on my past decisions, but I can't help feeling like I might have been more aware of the consequences if I'd have been aware of my ADHD.

It's funny... my son says I'm not as angry anymore as I used to be.