for 11 April 2000. Updated every WEEKDAY.
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Intention Deficit Disorder Subject: ADD & Diet I believe that many health problems are most likely caused by the American diet. While I don't have ADD myself, my mother and I have been diagnosed with a Candida yeast infection. Part of our problem is eating a diet that is too high in refined products such as sugar. (Have you noticed that high fructose corn syrup is in everything these days?) No wonder Eli Lilly is getting into the diabetes business. It's taken me 6 and my mother 15 years to find a holistic medical doctor who understands our problems. I've come to the realization that most doctors only understand what pill to prescribe. Most don't acknowledge the profound and cumulative impact that diet can have on our bodies over the years since they have not been educated in nutrition. One book I read stated that the average physicians knows as much about nutrition as his secretary. However, if the secretary goes to Weight Watchers, then about half as much. One of my doctors told me she only received 30 minutes worth of nutrition education in med school. As a result, she eats half a box of Oreos and milk for dinner. (FYI, too much milk is bad because of all the lactose, milk sugar, in it. However, we're educated from a very early age to drink milk and make sure that we "Got Milk". Could you imagine not drinking milk? It equates with not being American.) I think the medical establishment needs a wake-up call. There's lots of good things that naturopaths are doing these days with low-tech remedies and herbs (which means no money for drug companies). I suspect that physicians are just "in bed" with drug companies because that's what they've been taught - how to write prescriptions. They look to the drug companies for answers. The trouble with drugs is that some have some very bad side effects and then one needs to take more drugs for the side effects. The advantage of drugs is that most work quickly. However, herbs, etc. are more gentler to the system and take longer to work. Most of our doctors are not going to change on their own. I've run into some obnoxious and ignorant people who gave me very little hope. On the contrary, I also ran into some well-meaning doctors who worked with me to try every possible solution, but they were still ignorant. They worked with what tools they had which were drugs. I'm much more skeptical about doctors these days and it's a good thing. I'm only 28, and it's a healthy perspective to have. These folks are not the demigods they're made out to be. They know what they've been taught, and I doubt how often they ever research their patients' problems or learn something new. Most would like to hand you a pill and have you leave quickly so that they can see someone else and repeat the procedure. And as long as they're following standard medical practices, they're technically not doing any harm. about ADD & diet about the Selective Carbohydrate Diet (SCD) Jerry <crustfan@netscape.net> 1.) Milk is the most repulsive thing on earth. It's like drinking pus. I stopped when I was about ten minutes old. Seeing grown-ups drink a big cold glass of the stuff makes me shudder and gag. 2.) Except in coffee. 3.) Oreos aren't bad at all. 4.) If I don't run at least five miles, hard, every day? Cranky, unbalanced, miserable, awful person. Tantrums. Bursts of profanity. Lethargy. Destructive bursts of unfocused energy. So: Diet, sure, but exercise, too. 5.) There are those who would argue that I'm an awful person when I run, too, but they stop complaining when I hit them. Take that for what it's worth. And these are my thoughts on the subject. Ambrose  Editor's note: Overprescribing drugs for children is undoubtedly an incredibly alarming trend. However, lest this become another idiotically simpleminded doctor-bashing pile-on... "Most of our doctors are not going to change on their own. I've run into some obnoxious and ignorant people who gave me very little hope. On the contrary, I also ran into some well-meaning doctors who worked with me to try every possible solution, but they were still ignorant. They worked with what tools they had which were drugs....I'm much more skeptical about doctors these days and it's a good thing. I'm only 28, and it's a healthy perspective to have. These folks are not the demigods they're made out to be." So, we can choose between obnoxious ignorant doctors and well-meaning ignorant doctors? No sane person thinks doctors are demi-gods, Jerry, just as no sane person thinks that someone who spent 6 - 10 years studing the hard science behind how your body functions is "ignorant" - more ignorant than you, who read a few books about herbs and how yeast breads give you everything from headaches to cancer. These people know more than you, Jerry, as horrifying as that may be to hear. While it's true that many, many doctors overprescribe drugs, and many doctors don't listen closely to patients' accounts of what's wrong with them, you have to keep in mind the sheer volume of patients doctors see every day who are sure that little green men are giving them stomach aches. It's your responsibility to find a doctor who listens to you, and respects your hesitancy to use unneeded pharmaceuticals, and respects your testimony regarding homeopathic remedies. However, given the fact that you're sure your health problems can be summed up with the words "Candida yeast infection" and that drinking milk is bad for everyone because of those "milk sugars," you may have more trouble than most people do finding this person. Sucksters Having raised two boys who were labeled ADD and ADHD at early ages (five and seven, respectively), I look with growing dismay upon this "The kid's hyperactive, let's put him on drugs to quiet him down" model of education that seems to be growing more and more popular here in the good old U.S. of A. I'll be the first to admit that the behavioral situation in the nation's public schools is bad, but is wholesale medication of the populace really the answer? In addition to the blatantly mixed message that this sends to our youth (Carry Midol in your purse and we'll expel you, but get all of the horse tranquilizers that you want in the nurse's office), it implies that no one is responsible for his own behavior, a message that must bring at least a small shred of joy to the presumed souls of Messrs. Harris and Klebold, wherever they are. I'd certainly be the last to deny a child needed medication to treat a medical condition, but in the case of strictly behavioral "problems", other options should be given a chance before rolling out the big guns. Just last year, I finally persuaded my wife, a true believer in the power of prescription drugs, that we should try some alternative therapies. I mean, the older boy is a high-school senior; what, he should take Ritalin until he's 40? After experimenting with various dietary supplements, I found what seems to be the right combination, and he's doing splendidly, despite my wife's concerns that his grades would fall in this crucial year. Also, I know that teachers are underpaid, undertrained, and under-resourced, and any "solution" that provides results as quickly as the average psychotropic drug must look very attractive indeed. Certainly, in these days of ADSL connections, same-day delivery, and 30-second microwave burritos, we are conditioned to believe that the quickest solution is the best. Besides, imagine the potential genius that's being stifled every time a budding Albert Einstein or Jane Goodall pops a Prozac. (Imagine a fancy inline graphic here.) "There must be more to life than having everything." --Maurice Sendak John C Harvey <jharvey@irving.lib.tx.us> Actually, we've been meaning to talk to you about those boys of yours. Could you get them to keep it down? We're trying to get some work done. midol in my purse, Ambrose Ambrose Beer, Well done. You've voiced exactly the sort of conspiracy I've long suspected, but failed to identify, even in my home. As evidence, I offer up my crop of teenagers who, thankfully, are not prescription medicated. They are damaged however. Guess I should have played that Zappa album about the slime more often. Now, because I allowed that cathode ray tube into my home years ago, they are lost - firmly in the pocket of whoever wants to sell them something: anything, as long as it's on their radar screen. Now they only venture away from that glowing tube to do two things; to get money or to spend money. How sad that I'm too feeble to force-march them outside for a breath of fresh air or any other form of activity that doesn't require consumption and great buttloads of money. Where corporate interests and the economy is concerned, you are truly subversive. Watch your back! Robert M. Farr Austin, Texas <bobfarr@earthlink.net> There will be no t.v. for little Baby Beers, should she or he ever be conceived. I sound like somebody's WWI-vet grandpa, but that goddamn evil box is the worst drug of them all. Well, except for the dirty stations on cable. Those are very nice. And the fella what wrassles with the alligators. Ambrose Intention Deficit Disorder Ambrose, "And the cocktails of uppers, downers, and SSRIs aren't the only realities of contemporary childhood that suggest the possibility that large numbers of grade-schoolers may someday sign with Colonel Tom, do a bunch of shitty movies, and die on the toilet." Heh. Just as I finished reading this line my alarm sounded to remind me to take my Ritalin, which made me chuckle (which subsequently made me nearly choke on the damn little pill). I was diagnosed with ADD at age 23, and I've been taking Ritalin off and on ever since. I quit taking it about a year and a half ago because I was convinced that it hindered my creativity, which I saw as a con that far outweighed the pros of drugging myself into conformity every day. Turned out that I couldn't do my shitty job without it. I also couldn't balance my checkbook, pay my bills on time, match my socks, find my keys or remember to eat (maybe there's your link to why the little pharmaceutically treated buggers are getting so fat), so I started taking it again. I dream of the day when I can do something for a living that actually has something to do with my inherent talents and abilities, at which point my addled brain and my admittedly twisted way of looking at things will be an asset rather than a liability, and I hope that once I get there I'll be able to afford to hire people to take care of the necessities of life for me; but in the mean time, I continue to take it so that I can function at my shitty job and take care of myself, and try not to dwell on the fact that my brain on drugs loses touch with those talents and abilities that I hope will someday earn me a decent living. It's quite a trade-off. I have to wonder if, had I been diagnosed and medicated from an early age, I'd have done better in school, lived up to all of that potential that everybody kept telling me I wasn't living up to, learned some social skills, graduated college, and been able to get a job that's not quite so shitty, that wouldn't require me to voluntarily drug myself into a socially acceptable norm just to be able to get through the day without screwing up or alienating all of my coworkers. Then again, maybe if I had been given medication all through my childhood, I'd have missed out on all of the schoolyard beatings and faculty neglect, not to mention the wrath of my parents who knew I was smart but mistook my inability to get ahead for unwillingness to try and punished me accordingly, all of which led to my considerable teen angst, which put me in touch with my ability to write, which led me to become a writer. So on the one hand I'd likely have turned out to be a corporate cog with good pay, good benefits, good manners, good memories, and social grace, and I'd be leading a perfectly normal life, and I'd probably be the sort of person who gets a little wigged out by people like me. When I consider this, I'm glad that my parents didn't medicate me. Yes, my childhood was incredibly painful as a result, and I may be broke, bitter and introverted, but I'd rather be this way and aware of who I am and what I came from and where I'm headed as both a writer and a person, than blissfully ordinary and uncreative. Seriously. Jean Marie Cousins <cousinjean@cybergeek.com> Jean, I have torn through many, many, many shitty jobs, and the thing I can promise you is: There are always more of them out there. Not worth drugging yourself to keep a job you hate when unemployment is at, like, point-zero-zer- zero-four percent. Save that for the next major economic depression. As for me, I spent about a month on Ritalin as a five year-old. My parents, however, immediately noticed that it turned me into a houseplant, and - bless their hearts - told the mediocre school district that wanted me drugged to... well, you get the point. And now, to repeat a favorite theme, I write for Suck! And, anyway, what the hell's wrong with a shitty childhood, schoolyard beatings, no social skills, a poor education, and being broke and bitter? You make it sound bad or something. Please. Ambrose Todays article kicked ass. I particularly like the part where you refer to the American consumers as Aphids of the new economy. We are indeed being reduced to spineless consumers which excrete food for our masters. As someone who tries to avoid participation consumerism, I must say that the good feelings generated by standing against the man more than compensates for the derision I recieve for my unstylish dress, my wholesome diet, and my anti-imperialist hygiene. Ciao Ben <bschwabe@mit.edu> Your warm praise is humbly accepted. Well, okay, not humbly. Just one thing: Tragically, you have singled out, for special praise, a piece of the essay - that "aphids" thing - that came from the mind of a highly trained Suck editor. They're good, yes? But the rest was mine. Or at least a lot of it was. For sure all the other good parts. So. Yeah. Ambrose Ambrose: Read your piece in Suck today and enjoyed it immensely. This trend of medicating our kids seems only to serve to raise the stock values of pharmaceutical companies and continues a grotesque trend of America's elders not raising the young but devouring them. If we can't bother to raise them, we can at least make a little money off them as we grind them to dust. I was surprised you didn't mention Brave New World anywhere in your piece, with the Soma holidays being a natural extension of what these medicated kids will become as adults. Your pieces habitually hack me off, make me laugh and oblige me to nod my head. Strong work. Cheers, Randal Doering <rdoering@best.com> "Your pieces hack me off" just doesn't sound like a compliment, no matter how many times I re-read it. Sounds like I've given you a throat disease of some kind. But still and all, thanks. off to the feelies, Ambrose Thank you for your piece on the appalling overuse of drugs to keep kids from being, well, kids. Back in my day (I'm a hoary oldster of 29) I played soccer, went swimming, and watched a lot of football, and except for being kind of cranky at times, did just fine. "Just Say No" was just starting; little did we know that our generation would switch to "Say Yes To Ritalin" in only twenty years. It will come full circle, though. Just you wait for the class-action lawsuits by grown-up Ritalin kids. Only a few years left until this happens - the maker had better hope that it's off patent by that time, so the risk can be spread across the whole industry. Andrew Sullivan <ajsullivan@att.com> Lawsuits? Naaaaah. Baseball bats. Much more elegant and streamlined. Ambrose |
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