i THINK my DD MIGHT have ADHD

[FriggFRIGG]

sorry dont know where to put this.

im at my wits end with her.
shes only 2.9yrs
last night i read this

it sounds A LOT like my DD.

she is also a caring sweet girl,v empathtic,(sp) and quite clever esp' developed with speech.

but i lose sight of this every day with the contant tantrms,screaming,hitting,and plain nastyness.
but she seems out of control,like she doesnt want to be doing/saying these things.

please help.

she is also incredibly impatient and impulsive,
she only has an atention span longer than 30 sec for things she really likes doing.
and gets very very emotional.
about seemingly nothing,but falling down etc,she doesnt seem to care about.

Before going to a diagnosis of ADHD, what are her diet and sleep patterns like? Cut out ALL fruit juice (fruit juice, squash and fizzy drinks are the work of the devil as far as toddlers are concerned) if she ever has it and make sure she's getting enough sleep. She's at a very challenging age and if she's bright she may not be being stretched enough. Does she get plenty of outdoor exercise?

If as you say she seems unable to help herself when she has these episodes, then it's up to you to try and help her control it. Try keeping a diary of when she gets unmanageable - you may find that it's predictable. My own 2 year old does similar things approaching food or sleep times as her body starts to need whichever it is. Other times she will play happily for long stretches.

thank you,thats very helpful and concise advice!

i will start to keep a diary,and cut out fruit juice.
she does drink quite a lot of (diluted) pure orange,so that may well make a difference...
although do you have any savoury snack food tips?
because OJ is pretty much her favourite thing,and whilst we do already limit it,she kicks up merry hell when we say No.

she gets plenty of time outside and its very obvious if she hasnt.we go out every single day,rain or shine.

she does get tired,and she is at her worst when she is,but i really dont know what to do about it,she sleeps well at night,but often wont nap during the day.
i cant make her,she just screams and tantrums and bites herself if i put her to bed at home,i try walking her in the buggy,sometimes she'll sleep,and other times,when she's clearly tired,she wont.

Perhaps you could "fade out" the OJ, make it more and more dilute until it's basically water?

When did she drop her nap?

ok, just a quickie as I am supposed to be working... but at this age it is totally totally age apropriate not to be able to control her emotions and have not got any attention span.
I really really recomend the Webster Stratton prgramme- may be some classes near you but if not read "The Incredible years".....

thats a good idea,and would result in less screeching!

shes never really 'dropped' her nap,its always been tough to get her to sleep,just recently (6months or so) it's been easier to get her to bed at night,but her nap continues to be a struggle.so sometimes she will,and sometimes she wont.

Even if she has ADHD - and at that age it is difficult to diagnose - the recommended treatment for small children is altering their behaviour by the parent altering theirs.
The best book by far that will be of help to you - and one that is used as a model for family work with ADHD kids and their parents by CAMHS and other services - is 'The Incredible Years - a Trouble-Shooting Guide for Parents of Children Aged 2 - 8 Years' by Carolyn Webster-Stratton.

www.amazon.co.uk/Incredible-Years-Carolyn-Webster-Stratton/dp/1892222043/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1304539043&sr=8-1

she sounds amazingly like my DD was (she is now nearly 4) and I have to say I had similar concerns. In our case she was sleep deprived. For some reason she always gets up ridiculously early so we ended up having to put her to bed early as well (6pm). I found the more she slept, basically the better she got.

I understand the (eek) too because we were scared of her when she was like that and both of us found it very upsetting and stressful.

tips that worked for me were:

I found giving her a warning that something was going to happen helped (like instead of getting angry I'd say Mummy's going to get cross if you don't do it in 1...2...3...4....5 - now she goes and does it at number 3). It helped me keep my temper otherwise she'd keep going until I was very upset or cross.

Definitely regular snacks helped as she couldn't tell the difference between hunger and tiredness (I still sometimes can't tell with her either). I now know when she is tired she repeats questions/speaks nonsense and when she is hungry she becomes physically clingy.

Good snacks that mine loved were:

marmite toast/pitta with hummous dip/cheese and ham cubes/fruit kebabs/fruit pots/yoghurts/olives/cashew nuts/flapjack/cheese pitta pocket.

Finally I have to get her to sleep/bed before she loses it otherwise there is no way of reasoning with her. Once she is hysterical she is overtired and I have to lie with her and stroke her head or sing songs until calm again.

Good luck, not an easy one, you'll get through it!

oops, sorry that was long!

thankyou so much for that link.

i of course would not want a diagnosis in order to do anything BUT alter our (mine and DPs) behaviour,and perhaps to pre warn the nursery she is due to start in september.

i worry that im not good enough as a parent,although i do try my best for her it can be incredibly hard to not get visably annoyed.and that of course make it much worse

I'm sure that you are a fab parent, you clearly care about your little one very much (sorry, that sounds so patronising).
The book might be good for giving you more confidence by reminding you what you are doing RIGHT as well as offering other strategies!

To be honest, she sounds like a normal 2.9 year old. i have a child with ADHD and a 'normal' child - and she sounds just like the normal child at 2.9. It's normal for 2 year olds to have no control of their emotions, it's normal for them tohave screaming tantrums and upset themselves as well as everyone else with them, and for them to have very little attention span.

i'm mnot saying it's not horrible to deal with - it is. It's awful. But ADHD is about a lot more than tantrums and actually my child with ADHD never had a significant one because all i had to do was say "Oh my goodness, look at that dog!" and he forgot he was having a tantrum!

Personally I would prefer not to think my toddler (2/3 year olds) had ADHD until it was picked up by a different environment and by someone removed from the family, eg pre-school/school nursery.

That's not to say that some 2/3 year olds are displaying signs of it as the article says, but also as pp (colditz) says, MOST 2/3 year olds will have periods (and sometimes long periods) of god damn awful behaviour, tantrumming, upset etc and this is NORMAL.

It makes you wonder if it is normal. IT IS!!!!! They get better, it can take until 4- we noticed an improvement at 3 and then an improvement at 4 and I'm hoping for another improvement at 5!!!

Also, I would not bother warning the nursery- she may behave very differently there and it's nice for them to start with a clean sheet. You could say something vague like "she's quite challenging at home". I remember having screaming/tantrums with my 2.5 year old, often before 9am in the morning when pre-school started. However, when he got there, or often when we got out the house, it was like a switch flicked and he was on best behaviour, most of the bad stuff was reserved for me (great being a Mum eh!).

Definitely recommend more sleep, tho I know how impossible it is to get them to nap- buggy rides/car rides when very tired is only answer round here, and snacks at regular intervals. Personally I don't think diluted squash is so bad, although we combine it with water, smoothies, semi-skimmed milk. My 2.5 year old snacks on bananas, french bread, bourbon biscuits (!). I will often offer a sandwich mid afternoon if lunch hasn't been eaten as this is prime bad behaviour time!

I completely agree with 120. My DD starts to 'lose' words when she's overtired.

Definitely try cutting out the OJ - your dd's behaviour at naptime sounds exactly like my dd's on the two or three occasions she's had OJ! Desperately needing sleep and totally unable to! Mine loves it too, so I will squeeze one orange for her as long as it's nowhere near sleeptime. When you think about how much fruit sugar there is in one orange, and then think about the average size of a glass of orange juice, it's not suprising that it acts like baby crack!

thankyou coldiz that makes sense! she is not distracted that easily!

tiger of course i dont WANT her to have ADHD!! i just want to know how to help her.its true that sometimes you just cant belive what they are doing is normal,and her friends dont behave like her...so i worried a little to much it would seem.

120 somehow i compleatley missed your post,sorry! its a fantastic one,and has made me have a re think.
we started to put DD to bed later 7-7:30ish,as everyone did this when we said she went to bed at 5:30-6ish.but she wakes up at 6am regardless.
it co-insides with us also trying to crack down on her 'over snaking' on fruit etc and not eating her meals.

so there you go,simple,my poor DD is hungry and tired

sometimes it takes an outside perspective to make you see something that is staring you in the face

thankyou.

Frigg, I made DD go through a whole year before I twigged. Good luck. It's not at all as obvious as it sounds so don't be too hard on yourself.

It's is normal, honest. I've not much to add but maybe you just don't see your DD's friends act like that I can bet you they do!!

I think it's normal! At least, my son was like that. Now, he is not allowed ANY sugary food or drinks, ONLY water, I ONLY offer simple, healthy food. She will get better as she grows up.

I don't think many children at 2.9 still have regular daytime naps - only 1 out of my 4 still had a nap at that age!

Actually the main culprits in my ADHD son's diet (identified by the hospital using an exclusion diet) were milk and wheat. If there is a food element please seek medical advice before removing things from your child's diet.

and normal "healthy" foods can be the triggers - (bread, cereal, milk, cheese, yoghurt, anything contain sunflower or olive oil, fruit -except apples and certain vegetables) in my son's case.