ADHD?

For a long time, as long as I can remember really, we've had a lot of trouble with Zay's behaviour. We have thought, since he was 2, that he may have ADHD. I never took him to the doctors though because I figured that it could just be a bad case of the terrible 2's. 

A few days ago Zay turned 5. I took him to the doctor finally and he gave us a referral to see a paediatrician. For the last 3 years I've really been back and fourth about the idea. I guess I just wanted to believe that he was acting up, but as he gets older it just seems more and more like ADHD is the only possibility. 

He is loud and hyperactive, he can't sit for long or stand in one place for long. If we are in line at the store he kinda hops around like he needs to pee. When watching a movie he moves seats every few minutes, gets up and jumps around the room while trying so hard to keep watching but usually failing. He has a hard time concentrating, he gets bored of things so quickly, even school work despite his love of learning. He gets angry quickly and just loses control completely. I can see it, I can see him fighting to regain control, I can see how hard it is for him. His emotions are magnified significantly compared with Izzy and Bay and other children I know. He hates being alone, he seems to need almost constant attention. He cannot entertain himself often and when he does play alone, it is usually an activity that I have encouraged him to do and will last just a few minutes.

On Friday at lunch time I got a call from the Vice Principle at Zay's school asking me to go collect him. When I got there I was met by both Principle and Vice Principle who directed me into a room with Zay. I sat down and the Vice Principle started reading off a list. 

"He kicked a child, unprovoked, He threw the puzzles and games all over the floor, He called Mrs C (his teacher) a Bloody Arsehole, He kicked the teacher aide..."

By this point I was in shock and had just stopped listening. As she started reading from the list, Zay crawled under my chair and lay on the floor, by the time she was done, he was crying so hard I was worried he was going to make himself sick. After they chatted to me for a bit longer and had agreed to collect some work sheets for him to work on while I studied myself, I took him outside for a cuddle to try to calm him down. 

I have to say, the meeting went a lot different to the way I expected. I thought I would be leaving the school feeling quite upset with Zay for his behaviour. Instead, I left trying hard to hold back tears. Not because I was angry or disappointed or anything like that, but because I felt terrible for my little man. It breaks my heart to know that he loses control the way he does. It breaks my heart to not be able to help him.

I have spoken to Logan since then and we are both convinced that his teacher and the teacher aide handled the situation wrong. We have no information what-so-ever on how they handled it, but we know already, because Zay would never lose it that badly here, because we know how to handle him when he has a melt down. Because we know never to try to force him to calm down, never to grab him or raise our voices after he has lost control. 

For this reason we have decided to see if we can make a time to speak with his teacher on Logan's RDO on Tuesday, to try to find out how they handled the situation the other day and try to make sure they never do it the way they did again. 

Also for this reason, I am scared at the idea of him going back to school tomorrow. I am scared because I don't want to put him back in that position again, with people who clearly don't yet understand him properly. I feel that once he has lost control he needs the adults around him to understand him and to help him to calm down. I feel like if he has lost control of his emotions and actions and he has adults grabbing at him and trying to lead him off to a corner or office or whatever when he is not ready then that may be scary for him, and I don't want to be responsible for allowing him to be in that situation again.

We have also decided to attempt the hard task of cutting sugar from Zay's diet. Today I started the process. I made Rolled Oats with sultanas for breakfast, scrambled eggs with mixed veg and herbs for lunch and a mandarin and rye corn cakes with natural peanut butter for snacks. Tonight I will make Spaghetti with a home-made sauce for dinner and in replace of garlic bread I will give him a slice of whole grain bread. After a trip to the supermarket today and some time spent in the health food isle inspecting food packaging, I have seen just how big a task this is going to be. 

I had a chat to him about the new diet today and he is excited about the possibility of it making life easier for him. After extensive research I have decided I am also going to look into fish oil too.

Fingers crossed it all works wonders for my little man.