Thursday, November 03, 2005

Attention, please

It appears that Sister may have "attention issues," according to her second grade teacher. She's not sure yet, wants to give it til the holidays, but those words have been uttered. Naturally, this has me in mental and emotional turmoil. When I first became aware of ADD in my pre-childbirth years, my first reaction was something along the lines of, "What?! They want to drug kids so that they'll conform to the Man's public school brainwashing program?!?" Or maybe that was the reaction of my loony ex-husband who saw a conspiracy behind everything that wasn't free love, communism, and art for all. But my reaction wasn't too far off.

Now I'm not sure what to believe, or even what I'd like to believe. That first reaction is still there a little. Maybe more than a little since it's MY kid we're talking about now. But on the other hand, what if her definitely disruptive behavior was out of her control and could be cured by a little pharmaceutical magic? Would she be happier with herself? Would our time after school be less stressful if there weren't scoldings and reprimands to be administered so frequently? Could I really let her be drugged just to do better in school? Or would the latent rebel in me yank her out of the clutches of the Man to be home-schooled? (Jesus, what am I saying...?!)

I have no idea what the answers are just now. Any of you out there had to deal with this in your own kids? What did you decide? I'm all ears.

2 comments:

Piece of Work said...

Hey, I don't have any experience with this, but I did read something recently about it. I'm not sure you will find it revelent as maybe her son's ADD is much more extreme than your daughter's. But it might be worth a read. I can't figure out how to link the exact post, but you are looking for the post on September 26th. You'll have to scroll through.
Here

Mommygoth said...

Worst thing that can happen is that they'll try her on the meds and they won't help. If they do help, wouldn't that be wonderful? I really believe that part of our evolution as a species includes our ability to improve the way we treat our little "miswirings". It's no different from the antihistimines Miss K takes to keep her nose from swelling shut.