Hyper Campers

What you don't understand----the ADHD kid has a MAJOR CHEMICAL IMBALANCE---that must be controlled or corrected-----to do nothing, can cost him/her their life-------this is not a GAME-----this is Life----
The risk is extremely high for a kid that is ADHD----the suicide rate is OFF THE CHART for people that are
ADHD, when they come OFF DRUGS-----
It is not easy coming on or off DRUGS-----

Before you write a story, you better fully understand the situation-----
You don't even understand----
A Major Chemical Imbalance is not to be Played With----either you control the Major Chemical Imbalance or you begin to correct the chemical imbalance. Do do nothing ----is not the answer-----nothing is nothing----
it can cost a person their life----

I offer all of you to watch "The drugging of our Children" By Gary Null Phd. You can watch it on google.

I agree with you, MagicSchool. Why can't parents look at them selves as the ones to blame and not their children?? Every kid is so different, and deserves to develop into who he or she is, not into what a slacking parent or teacher can handle at the time. It's such an excuse!

Socially it struck him hard. Six years later Steven remembers his experience with Aderell as if he'd spread a communicable disease. He says he felt numb his entire childhood. More profoundly, the medicine made him listless and withdrawn. It isolated him. Friends were few. Then he met "Jason" who agreed with his low self esteem. Jason figured Aderell wasn't much different than the drugs he was selling. Steven agreed.

Hi

As a parent of a child with ADD I can tell you that the medication cannot be stopped and started as easily as apirin. It can take 2 weeks for the child to react well to the medication, and should always be taken off gradually. Also not all children benefit from a "drug holiday" for some it actually worsens the problem when then have to go back on. Structured sports are not a remedy, because a child who needs medication is not able to participate in severly structured sports. I have to agree with rlc1415, if you had a child with ADD or ADHD you would know that most of your article is incorrect. Some ADD children do learn to overcome some of their symptoms, but there is no cure. Also, reactions to food preservatives and colorings is not the same as having ADD or ADHD! A child with these conditions is not cured by diet.

A recent British study (The Lancet, September 2007) is the latest of many to show that for many children the symptoms of ADHD can be triggered by food additives like synthetic dyes and the preservative sodium benzoate. In February the American Academy of Pediatrics published an article saying that diet is a valid treatment for ADHD, and in May the British Medical Journal carried an editorial calling for diet to be a standard treatment, along with medicine, for ADHD.
Food manufacturers are rushing to remove the petroleum-based dyes from foods sold in England, and the European Union will require products that use the dyes to carry warning labels that they may trigger behavior and attention disorders. For more than 30 years, the non-profit Feingold Association (www.feingold.org) has been helping families determine if the symptoms are being triggered by food additives.

In September the medical journal The Lancet published the results of the newest study linking petroleum based food dyes and the preservative sodium benzoate to ADHD behaviors, even in children with no previous symptoms. Then in February the American Academy of Pediatrics published an article saying that dietary treatment of ADHD was a valid choice. And in May the British Medican Journal carried an editorial calling for diet to be considered a standard treatment.
The non-profit Feingold Association of the US (www.feingold.org) shows families how to see if the child's symptoms are being triggered by petroleum-based food additives; in most cases they play a huge part in the disturbed behavior and attention problems.
Most recently, the European Union has decided to require warning labels on foods that contain these synthetic dyes; consumers will be warned that they can bring about disturbed behavior and attention problems.

I ran Cub Scout Day Camps and Webelos Resident Camps for 11 years, and invariably some parents would hide the fact that they were giving their son a med holiday. As Director, I had the unenviable task of calling the parent to talk with his/her son or come pick up his/her son (depending on the nature of the offense). I would always hear, "But he's ADD/ADHD and he's not on his meds and you just don't know how to deal with our precious little boy . . ."

Well, I do know. I have one. I had to go on every single field trip and camp out he went on as a young boy, so that he'd know how to act in a new situation. I finally learned to say, "Well, then, you need to be on premises and show me and my staff how to handle your son appropriately, or to come out and administer his meds and leave them with us with a signed permission slip for us to administer them." In all that time, I only had one mom spend the day with us, showing us how her son "ticked". The others brought out the meds.

I'm appalled that a parent would be so selfish as to send their child to camp unmedicated! Some of these parents are worried about the "stigma". How about the "stigma" of having an out of control child who ruins everyone elses camp experience and has to get sent home? Yeah, no stigma THERE! If you want to give your kid a medication holiday, with your doctor's blessing, go for it. At HOME. Where he / she is YOUR problem. But don't send your unmedicated kid to MY kids summer camp to ruin the holiday! If after you have a few "medication holidays" you see that your child is fully manageable, THEN discuss it with your doctor and with the camp leaders, and see if you can work something out. But don't just take your kid off the medications blindly and then send them out to be someone else's problem. Lazy parenting at best.

And no, I do not personally have an ADHD child, but I used to babysit one regularly. He was out of control in the worst way when he was not on his meds. I couldn't possibly imagine a kid like that unmedicated at camp.

I find it very hard to believe anyone is giving stimulants to kids who don't have ADD. The aggressive, defiant child who does NOT have ADD is going to get worse, not better, on stimulants.

As a former summer camp counselor, we HATED parents who selfishly sent their kids to camp on a "medication vacation". Not only were their children miserable and impossible to deal with, but it made our jobs incredibly difficult. When you are in charge of making sure a group of 10 kids is having the time of their life and one child is constantly screwing around, getting in trouble, fighting, or wandering off alone and takes 90% of the counselor's time and energy, the other kids suffer, become irritable and lash out at the troublemaker. Just because your doctor says your child should go off meds at least once a year does NOT mean that you should selfishly pack them off to camp just so you don't have to deal with them. The whole point of a medication vacation is for YOU as a parent to see the changes in your child, their personality, interactions, sleep patterns etc. Putting them into an unfamiliar setting with people they don't know and doing activities they wouldn't normally do is not the way to determine this. Send your child to camp WITH their meds, they'll have a great time and make fantastic memories to last a lifetime and you won't be getting constant calls from the camp about what an umanagable brat your kid is without them.

As a parent of 2 ADHD kids who took medications for years I am opposed to "medication holidays". Personally I found it very hard to get my kids to do anything when they were off meds- they literally would be unable to do some of the simplest tasks off meds because they couldn't focus long enough such as read a book, or sit long enough to finish eating a meal. Discipline was more difficult with out meds- ever try to do time out with a child w/ ADHD off meds? More concerning is that a child who is ADHD is more likely to enter into risky behaviours with out meds leading to them being more accident prone. Meds for a lot of ADHD kids lowers theri impulsivity.