Suggestions for help with Adult ADD, no drugs please..?!
Question:
Anyone have any suggestions for adult ADD without taking drugs. Took the drugs, helped me concentrate and stay on task but I didn't like the kind of person I was anymore. Didn't feel fun at all, made me sad. I'd love to beat this on my own.. I'd like to go to work and not feel miserable behind a desk with my mind somewhere else all the time. Probably need a new line of work but office jobs are pretty much what I know. Has anyone else dealt with this..
Answers:
I hope you'll forgive an answer similar to one I gave
earlier, but sadness, depression, inability to concentrate, all these heavy feelings all tie in together. I think it's great that you are looking at your mood and asking questions about it. I understand your desire to stay away from "sledgehammer" solutions that can be dangerous. When it comes to your health, remedies that are stronger are not always better. I have three things that have gotten me through times when I've been sad, distracted, or depressed, and they're all gentle solutions that I think will suit an intelligent person like yourself.
1 - The first is what Freud calls the "talking cure".
He insists that it must be performed by a
psychoanalyst who you are paying for, but actually
I've performed it by writing in a diary. The key is to
be very honest, and try to find connections that you
might otherwise be supressing, because these are the
areas that need work. For example, what's the first
thing that pops into your mind when you think of
"depression"? If the answer is "flying a kite", then
follow the chain. What do you think of when you
think of "kite" and "flying". You'll be surprised
how quickly this takes you right down to an event in
your childhood or an unresolved conflict that might
have happened a year ago.
2 - Looking for lies. A chair cannot make you
depressed. A lampshade cannot make you depressed. Only
another person can make you depressed. I believe it is
because a chair and a lampshade cannot lie. Only a
person can lie. Depression, it seems to me, comes from
believing a lie. That conflict (between reality and
the lie) takes up so much mental energy to maintain,
it drains you as a whole. You may find, after using
technique #1, that it leads to you to this conclusion
#2. For example, after free associating your way to an
event, you might find that it was when someone told
you that you weren't worth a hill of beans. The
problem is not that they insulted you, the problem is
that you believed the lie. Beware, giving up on a lie
that we've believed in for a long time is tougher than
it sounds.
3 - This one is going to sound goofy, especially after
wading in deeply with the other two techniques. Get
some light to shine on the cells in the back of your
eyes. Go outside for an extended period of time
without sunglasses (no need to stare at the sun or a
light-bulb, indirect light will do). Use one of those
gentle light therapy products like www.everlyte.com .
Take a trip on a sailboat. Spend a few hours in open
fields on sunny days. It's those cells in the eyes
that produce much of the chemical that pills and
herbal remedies seek to replace, but the cells in the
eyes put the chemicals where they are needed, in your
brain, and not in your stomach and everywhere else.
This third technique will help you with the other two,
allowing you to think clearly, and get out from being
stuck in a loop.
I hope this "whole-istic" answer is as helpful to you
as it has been to me over the years. A gentle look at
the whole picture is often better than a sledgehammer
to just one piece of the problem.
Other Answers:
Not gonna happen w/out the medications.
my sister suffers from adult ADHD and she takes fish oil and b-12 and it makes her calm down and focus
FISH OIL IS AWESOME THE PURER THE BETTER .ALSO IT COULD BE RELATED TO A FOOD ALLERGY MY SON IS ON A VERY STRICT DIET MOSTLY DEALING WITH DAIRY AND SOME RED FOOD DYES .GOOD LUCK I HOPE THIS HELPS A LITTLE.
Yoga.
Answers: